Tessili Academy Read Online Free Page A

a slipper, his hand on the small of her
back.
    She frowned. It made no sense. And she was
distracted by what Professor Liam did next. With his other hand he
pushed the white sleeve of her dress up a little, to reveal her
forearm.
    There was a gash there, shallow and broad.
It was long, nearly reaching from the crook of her elbow to her
wrist. Professor Liam stared down at it, frowning. “This was not
made by a weapon.”
    Jey frowned too, staring at her marred skin.
The edges of the wound gleamed, giving off a pale blue sheen.
Professor Liam saw this, too. He tipped his hand this way and that,
causing her arm to shift in the light from the tall windows.
    Professor Liam pulled her sleeve back up
into position. He set her hand on the table. He turned away,
walking towards his own desk. “Do you not remember the passive
shield spell I taught you? Were you not wearing one?”
    Jey let her eyes drift half closed. It was
always so hard, so strange, when her tessila was on the holdstone.
It was as if her mind grew very slow, and very deep.
    Professor Liam waited with the air of
someone not expecting a quick answer. At last, she said, “It’s
tiring. Besides, no one ever attacks with magic.”
    Professor Liam turned to look at her again.
His deep eyes were troubled. “But someone did.” He said this in a
tone that suggested he was speaking to himself rather than her.
Finally, with a sigh, he said, “We will practice. We’ll practice
holding a passive shield in place for a length of time.”
    Jey couldn’t stifle a dispirited moan.
Nevertheless, she began to weave the spell, imagining the fabric of
it in her mind. “But,” Professor Liam continued before she was
done, “to make it a little easier, cast it on your tessila. Not
yourself. And hold it until our next session.” He paused, looking
at her. He added in a low mumble, “If you can, anyway.”
    Jey adjusted her spell based on his
instructions. She’d practiced casting spells on her tessila before,
of course. He never seemed to mind. It would make holding it a good
deal easier. He was, after all, quite small.
    In the corner, one of the orderlies yawned.
Jey closed her eyes, put the final touches on her spell, and looped
its weave over her tessila. He didn’t fight it. She snugged it
close around him and opened her eyes to see Professor Liam staring
at her with a look so intense it made her jump a little.
    “Tomorrow,” he said, “we’ll see how you’ve
done.”
    With that, Professor Liam strode from the
classroom, withdrawing into the small attached office. The two
orderlies stood as well, collecting their notes and stretching as
if they had sat through a long and boring class instead of a very
brief one. Jey consulted her timepiece and her schedule. She saw
with surprise she had quite a long time before her next class,
which was with Professor Straph. She felt a strange reluctance to
move. No flashnodes in classrooms.
    She looked down at the red curl of her
tessila’s body. She felt that stirring in her heart again,
something sweet and deep.
    The orderlies were making their way across
the room. “Come on, now, Jey,” one of them said in his smooth, soft
voice. “Class is dismissed.”
    Jey rose with reluctance, holding out her
hand for her tessila to come onto. He’d had his eyes closed. Now he
opened one, cocked his head, and released a brief, soft hiss.
Startled, she glared down at him. “Come on, Phril,” she whispered.
“We have to go.”
    A moment passed before Jey registered what
she’d said. His name is …. This time, I will remember at least
that.
    Jey’s heart began to beat faster. The
orderlies were closer now. Somehow Jey knew it was very, very
important they not see her tessila showing signs of rebellious
behavior. Once or twice, there had been little girls – girls whose
tessili had not done as they were told.
    Those girls were gone.
    Jey’s tessila stepped off the holdstone and
onto her hand. Her chain of thought snapped. She turned