Rhianon walked down the corridor for a long time before one of the open doors caught her eye. Every door shed seen before had been closed, but here a golden light shone through the crack. She stepped closer, and all kinds of hues flashed through it. It reminded her of a rainbow. Rhianon was about to reach out and open the door, when she remembered that the star was still clutched in her hand.
«There is a pendant from the neck of the condemned man,» she must have said the words out loud when someone in the empty space answered her.
«Do you want to call out to him?»
It was not the voice of Orpheus behind her, and it was coming from somewhere above, not behind. She looked up and saw that a tiny man, just like the one she had seen in the carriage, was sitting over the doorpost. He, too, had taken off his wide-brimmed hat when she looked at him, exposing his tiny head. He would have easily fit into a thimble or a walnut shell all by himself. The creature was no bigger than a ladybug or a bug, but he acted as if he sensed his own importance. It was dressed somewhat differently than her last acquaintance. Tiny legs in gold stockings dangled over the ajar door. Rhianon was sure that if he wanted to jump down, he wouldnt crash, despite his tiny size. She even thought she could put her hand under his arm and he would fly down with a sweep of his cloak like a butterflys wings.
«What do you mean?» she asked softly.
«A dead one,» was the serious reply, «a dead one can be the mentor of a living one. You could choose him.»
«I dont need tutors. I like to learn everything myself, thats why I came here. Those who are really good at something dont need a mentor.»
«It seems that way.»
The lilliput was staring somewhere beneath her feet, and Rhianon glanced there, too, and noticed the scarlet drops on the floor. Shed squeezed the star too hard in her palm, and it had sharp ends. They were too sharp. Droplets of blood rolled to her feet, a few of them staining the hem of her dress. Others touched the floor and began to faintly ignite on it. But there was no smell of burning, as there usually was, and no shower of sparks or scorching flames. Rhianon saw the scarlet drops fade, and black flowers sprout from them.
«No more frogs and toads that would emerge from the drops of my blood,» she whispered, looking at the tiny black magnolias or orange blossoms. She didnt even know what they might be called. They dont look like clover either, but theyre exactly the size of clover heads.
«It is like a drop of your blood,» someone remarked.
Rhianon glanced at the doorway, but there was no sign of the little man.
«Dont talk to them,» Orpheus warned her. «You see, theyre all over everyone, trying to lead you astray. They are empty-headed insects. Theyll do as much harm to you as locusts do to a field.»
«But theyre funny,» Rhianon stared into the empty space, trying to see what else was there. But all the tiny creatures seemed to hide after Orpheus reproof. It was so easy for them to hide. After all, there are so many cracks and burrows and just dark corners around. They could fit everywhere.
«What did he say about me?» she frowned and looked questioningly at Orpheus. «What do drops of blood mean?»
«Well, if your blood is spilled, but fell on no treaty, then your soul is of no use to anyone here.»
«Is it my soul?» She didnt understand him.
«There is a price to pay for learning, my princess. And what did you expect?»
There is a golden crown, a triumphal procession, and a fanfare,» she joked, but then she realized this was no place for humor. Her laughter seemed to sink into the endless darkness, leaving only a crushing sense of emptiness. It was as if her soul had been drained out of her.
«Dont be afraid, they dont want to take your soul for some reason, it must belong to someone else,» his own voice cut off and fell silent. Orpheus obviously did not want to finish something.
«Is it my soul,» Rhianon repeated involuntarily, and this word sounded like a sigh and somehow frightened her.
«Yes,» Orpheus confirmed nonchalantly. «There are general rules for everyone, both for the marginally gifted and the super-talented. But they dont seem to apply to you.»
«Do you know those rules?»
«Of course, and I wonder why no one has introduced you to them yet.»
«Then you name them.»
«Well, okay,» he shrugged. «First, anyone lucky enough to come here has to sign the contract with his own blood. It doesnt matter if you stab your toe with a thorn, a pin, a needle, or just happen to cut yourself on a clump stuck in the doorpost, but the fact is, not a single drop of blood spilled here will be wasted. Barely a drop of it will get on the treaty, and youll see it. By the way, its already strange to me that you didnt hurt yourself on the way in, no sharp teeth on the doorknob, no sharpened end of the pin you found. They dont seem to want your blood too much. Otherwise youd have found a sharp object, or stumbled across one. This is a school of the arcane arts.»
«Now,» she interrupted him abruptly. «What other rules are there? Or is there just one? And thats my signature on the document, which, by the way, I havent even seen yet. And I probably wont see it again, or else a drop of my blood will burn through it. Maybe thats the only reason it wasnt offered to me to sign.»
«I dont think so,» Orpheus began to curl his fingers, clearly recalling the other terms, and Rhianon involuntarily noticed that there were more than five fingers on his hand. «One, you must sign with your own blood before you can begin training, two, no payment will be accepted no payment in gold, because you must make your own gold,» he gestured briskly, and the doubloon glinted in his palm. «You see,» he showed the full coin triumphantly, «the third rule is, if you cant do it, you have no business here.»
«Is it creating gold out of nothing?» She frowned.
«And what do you want, my dear, it is sorcery?» He tossed the coin, and it disappeared into thin air, just vanished into thin air. Rhianon would rather have thought hed managed to hide it in his sleeve, but she didnt see anything like that. The glittering gold really did seem to just emerge from the gloom and drown in it.
«You make your own gold, thats the immutable rule of this place, which is why students would flock here in droves if it were open to all, but the trick is that only the chosen can come here. Everyone would like to be able to do something like this, but only the lucky few or the unfortunate can do it, they somehow consider themselves to be the latter, though if I were them»
«Youre not,» she interrupted him, «and yet you can do it, too.»
«But not quite like them,» he corrected her reasonably. «Even you could do more if you wanted to.»
«I will someday, you bet I will,» she thought of her desperate longing to regain her lost kingdom, and the pain stirred in her soul again. She wanted power, and if only she had power, she would have no doubt in which direction to direct it and how to destroy her enemies. «Are you saying that those who come here are unhappy, despite their great gift?»
She arched her eyebrows skeptically.
«Well, personally I think its just bliss, but unlike me they have living hearts, they beat and hurt, they have human feelings, and they are not at odds with the burden of black talent that has fallen on them. You, for example, are not at all happy that fire lives inside you.»
She gave a silent gasp, though she should have realized long ago that he had guessed it. He could see inside her.