Birthright-The Technomage Archive (8 page)

“
Also,” Roman continued, “all of this is going to take some getting used to for many of you. I’d bet that most of you had thought that the technomages were long dead, that the Charons were just stories you learned about in class. I hope you now realize that we are most certainly not dead or just stories, and that you all have a part to play in keeping it that way. If you can make it through your training, that is.”

Roman flourished his hand, and the classroom solidified around them. The translucent walls that Ceril had been sure were holograms were hard metal under his hands and feet. The light from the window wasn’t quite as diffuse as it had been, either. That whole time they thought they had been speeding through the holographic representation of the ship, they had actually been speeding through the
Inkwell Sigil
itself. But how?

Roman eased himself out of his levitation and back to his feet. He didn’t say anything else to the students, and there wasn’t any other faculty around. They had half an hour to kill before class started, and Ceril wasn’t going to waste any of it. He walked over to the window and stared out at the colored swirls that lit the room. Occasionally, he would look around at the crowd and saw so many frightened faces. At one point, he thought that he was the only one in the room with a smile on his face.

And why wouldn’t he be smiling? He had just been given the best show of his life and let in on a secret the rest of the world had no idea about.

If that wasn't something to smile about, then he really didn't know what was.

***

The smile on Ceril’s face didn’t last long, though. Ethan Triggs saw to that.

After all the other students had gone, Ceril still stood there and stared out the window. The swirl of colors created by hyperspace was mesmerizing, so when Ceril’s nose slammed into the window, it took him a minute to even register what happened.

And when he did, he registered the three things:

First, pain. Second, he was lying on the ground. Third, a large boy a few years older than Ceril was standing over him, laughing.

“
Welcome to the
Sigil
, noob,” the boy said. His voice was meaty, but he enunciated his words. Which to Ceril, meant the boy wasn’t stupid.

“
What the hell, man? Why did you do that?”

The boy shrugged. “Why not?”

“
Why not?
” Ceril almost shrieked. “You almost broke my nose.”

“
It’s not broken, though. You’d be bleeding if it were.” The boy put out his hand, like he was offering to help Ceril to his feet.

Ceril accepted, and when he was upright, he said, “I’m Ceril Bain.”

“
Lame,” the boy said. “I’m Ethan Triggs.”

“
Lame?” Ceril asked.

Ethan nodded. “Your name. You’re just all-around terrible for a Recruit, aren’t you, Ceril?”

“
What’s your problem, Ethan?” Ceril said. “I was just standing here, and you come in and start insulting me. What gives?”

Ethan shrugged. “Don’t really like Recruits, I guess. Most of you guys are idiots, most of you fail, and if you’re not enough of an idiot to fail, you get in my way and screw up my training or my missions.”

Ceril cocked his head to the side. “What does that have to do with me?”

Ethan shrugged again. “Who knows? You were here, so let’s just say this is my way of telling you to stay the hell out of my way.”

Before Ceril could say anything, Ethan placed both his meaty hands on Ceril’s shoulders and pushed again. This time, the back of Ceril’s head slammed into the window, and his vision flashed. He felt himself fall to the floor again. And he heard Ethan Triggs chuckle and start to walk away.

“
Welcome to the
Sigil
, Recruit.”

Chapter Five

“
Who had ever heard of a Charon before setting foot on my ship?” asked Roman, the muscled captain of the
Inkwell Sigil
. The room of two dozen teenagers stared ahead. Ceril and the other Recruits sat at their own desks, which were really unlike any desks at Ennd’s Academy. Instead of a blank slate, the desks were equipped with a touch-interface computer embedded in the tabletop, which projected a floating hologram they could interact with by waving their hands through any part of the display. Every single student—even the most privileged ones—gawked at the computers as he or she sat down for orientation. The technology was advanced beyond anything they had been allowed to get their hands on at Ennd’s, and that was saying a lot. Who knew about other schools? From the looks on the other Recruits’ faces, though, Ceril didn’t figure they had any more experience with it than he did.

This was technomage stuff, and if this was what they were given access to on their first day of training, Ceril couldn’t wait to see what he would get next month, or even next year, if he lasted that long.

Regarding Roman’s question, Ceril actually
knew
very little, only what Gramps had told him about the Charons. He thought about raising his hand and offering that information to Roman (that is what he insisted the Recruits call him. “There will be no titles and rank as long as you study with me”), but before he could, a girl in the front row started talking. Her hand had shot up like an old classroom pro, and her mouth had opened simultaneously. Roman had no time to give her permission to speak.

“
The Charons,” she said, then paused. “I suppose that most people called them technomages, though. Charons or technomages, either one.”

Roman nodded and motioned for her to continue.

“
Right. The Charons began as a group of scientists. According to most of the Yaghian legends I’ve read, the founding members were tired of the way science was handled thousands of years ago. A man united the four major city-states without a war, and began calling himself the Untouchable.”

The Untouchable?
Ceril filed that one away for later.

The girl continued her rambling, leaving him very little time for thought. “After that, those same city-states—Yagh, Ternia, Ferran, and Bester—produced a lot of myths that indicate that the Untouchable thought of himself as a spiritual man who loathed science.”

Ceril raised his hand, and Roman pointed at him, while holding his hand up to stop the girl’s prattling. She ignored him and kept talking.

“
Because of that loathing, the legends say that some scientists thought that even though he had stopped the wars, he and his government were doing nothing to advance that unification. In fact, some of my teachers in Yagh that taught that the Untouchable actually did what he could to bury scientific discoveries.”

Roman put his hands down and just started to nod. If he was giving up, then Ceril decided he didn’t have a chance to say anything.

“
Apparently, the Untouchable would either label scientific progress as heresy, or more often, he would take the invention and pass it off as his own connection to the divine. The Charons initially formed out of a desire to advance science and depose the Untouchable.” The girl sat back in her chair and became quiet.

Ceril just stared at her. She seemed slightly embarrassed after her story. Her cheeks flushed red, and Ceril couldn’t help thinking she was pretty. Kind of. She might have been. If she wasn’t so annoying.

Roman, however, nodded slightly and smiled at the girl. “Thank you, Saryn. I appreciate your enthusiasm. Some of the old Yaghian legends hold some truth, indeed. Can you tell me how long ago that happened?”

“
I'm not sure,” Saryn said.

“
Anyone?” Roman asked the class.

Silence from the class. Roman leaned back against the wall with his arms crossed and waited. When it became clear that none of the students were going to hazard a guess, he said, “About ten thousand years ago.”

More silence.

He had obviously expected some kind of response from them. He started walking around the room. “Does anyone else know anything about the Charons or the technomages?”

Ceril slowly raised his hand.

“
Yes? Ceril?”

“
My Gramps told me about them over the summer after we found a sword in the garden. It took a long time to tell, though. He’s a really good storyteller.”

“
Well, why don't you just hit the high points for us?”

Ceril cleared his throat. “Well, he said the Charons were protectors. Or soldiers. Gramps never said anything about them being scientists. He said they went from province to province doing what they had to so the old wars wouldn't start again.”

Ceril shifted in his seat as he spoke. He hated talking in front of people.

“
Thank you, Ceril. Now can
you
tell me how long ago this was?”

“
No idea, sir. Ten thousand years?”

Roman laughed. “I see what you did there. Anyone else?”

Ceril sheepishly raised his hand again.

“
Yes, Ceril?” Roman asked.

“
My roommate at Ennd’s showed me a video with some people in it. They said they were Charons. And I think that maybe the Charons might have been bad people. Sir.”

Roman smiled. “Well, thank you for that vote of confidence, my friend.”

The classroom chuckled.

I didn’t mean—” Ceril began.

“
I know, Ceril,” Roman said. “I don't like to think of myself as the bad guy, either.” Roman spread his arms out and gestured at the whole class. “So tell me which of these stories is correct? Here we are, aboard a technomage ship, speeding through hyperspace. We are both nowhere near Erlon and still right beside it. Each one of you have been specially chosen based on test scores, faculty recommendations, and,” Roman looked directly at Ceril, “other more extraordinary qualifications.”

Ceril gulped.

“
So obviously there is some truth in some of these stories,” Roman continued. “But which ones?”

No one raised a hand.

“
No one?”

Saryn fidgeted in her chair. She looked uncomfortable to Ceril. Obviously, she wasn’t used to being unable to offer a correct answer. Ceril had no idea which of the stories was true, either. He only knew that the contradictory tales existed and that they all had to be at least partially true. He wouldn’t be sitting here if they weren’t.

Around the room, the other students were just as confused as Saryn. How could any of them know the truth? In most places on Erlon, records went back a century or two at most. And that was well after the last war had ended.

Roman walked to the front of the room and over to the window. He put both of his palms on the glass. His head dropped, and to Ceril, he looked like he was praying. When Roman spoke, his words were quick, terse, and far sterner than he had sounded with the students yet. “No one can tell me which legends about technomages are true? Really? You are the best and brightest students
on Erlon
, and not one of you can tell me which of these stories is correct? No one will even guess?”

A boy two chairs down from Ceril raised his hand.

Without turning around, Roman said, “Yes, Barty?”

The boy said something that Ceril couldn’t hear.

“
Louder, son,” Roman said.

A second try: “Not to be rude, sir, but how could we know? I mean, back in Ferran, we don’t even know why it’s called Ferran. It just is. Maybe they know that kind of thing in Ternia or Yagh, but Professor Kline said last year that some stories are just lost and gone.”

“
And what does that have to do what Saryn and Ceril said?”

Barty hesitated. “I guess that we can’t know, sir. I thought that’s why we’re here. To learn that kind of stuff.”

Roman turned from the window and faced the class. He was frowning. “I suppose you're right. Who here agrees with Barty?”

A couple of hands went up slowly—not above the students’ shoulders, though, in case they might need to hide their responses quickly.

“
I see,” Roman said. “Well, let me just tell you. Barty's right. There really is no way you could know which story is correct.”

Barty beamed in his chair and sat a little straighter. Ceril felt good for the kid. He seemed like the kind of boy who didn’t get that kind of praise terribly often.

“
But so is Saryn,” the teacher continued. “And so are Ceril and his grandfather. All the stories are true.”

Saryn couldn't take it anymore. Her hand shot up, but once again, she started talking before she was called on. “But how is that possible, sir? How? They contradict each other! They can’t be true if they all tell a different story.”

“
They're all true,” Roman explained, “because they all have that one seed in them that ties them to the past. Nothing is
completely
true. They all have bits of fantasy and myth in them. Ten thousand years will do that to just about anything, right? But Barty is right. You are in this classroom because you need to know the full truth. And before your time aboard this ship is finished, you’re going to know as much of it as anyone else in the world; more than most people, actually. How does that sound?”

The class was silent again, and Roman just shook his head. “You guys are going to have to lighten up and talk to me eventually, or this is going to be a very long year.”

***

Several hours later, the students were finally dismissed. They began to stand up and mill about aimlessly as students tend to do, and Roman said, “On each of your terminals is a room assignment.” The Recruits went back to their desks. “You will each have your own, private quarters. Make yourself comfortable. If you’re one of those lucky few who become Apprenticed, this room will be your home for the next six years.”

The class began to murmur, but Roman continued speaking. “If you are from Ennd’s or Cernt Academies, your belongings have already been transferred to your new rooms. If you are from Ferahgo Academy, your things should arrive tomorrow morning. No matter which school you’re from, though, you will find new training uniforms in each of your assigned quarters. I’ll be making rounds to check in with each of you later this evening. Unless there are questions, you may go.”