Inyanga's Star and Other Constellations

II.iii When Inyanga Gets In

Detention turned out to be a pretty good opportunity to get tutoring one on one with the most highly sought after maestras at magicians college. Stars knew the line up for Professor Alondra's office hours went out the door, across the corridor — and sometimes out the window and into the sky outside al-Maysan Hall when students who had mastered anti-gravity spells chose to show off and direct the line out there.

Not great for those afraid of flying or who couldn't yet.

Sentenced to two hours in Alondra's office every other night at hora duodecima, plus every dies Solis morning at the crack of crepusculum, Inyanga and Storm took the opportunity to learn. Constellation wasn't going to have a retributive detention policy whereby delinquents would be punished by digging holes in sand and filling them back up, or standing staring at a wall, or writing lines — Nope, delinquents like Storm Gloriam and Inyanga Kyu Numbia were going to do something productive and educational: examination grading. For fourth year students.

Provided with the answer key to multiple choice sections, an invisibility spell hiding the students' names, the girls worked an algorithm spell Alondra had taught them to mass grade the papers automatically — and then they double checked the results the old fashioned way, searing the correct results into their minds. Meanwhile, the delinquent rule-breaking scholars took advantage of their maestra for their own educational purposes.

"Maestra Alondra, does it ever get easier to derive link coordinates for destinations you haven't seen?"

"Maestra, I still don't get how to turn a recorded memory into a replay link."

"Maestra, what's the first step for spell-casting without pointing with the gnomon?"

"Maestra Alondra, can magic ever run out?" The maestra slammed a book closed so hard it snapped on Inyanga's fingers like a mouse trap.

"This is not your one on one tutorial," said Maesta Alondra.

"Ouch," said Inyanga, and her fingers went to her mouth. She looked to Storm for a little sympathy, but Storm glared with fiery eyes and was shaking her head.

"This detention is meant to be your punishment. If you're enjoying the extra instruction, these sessions aren't serving their purpose. We're done for the day. Come back tomorrow with three thousand words on application of portal measurements."

Maestra Alondra stood. "You can spend the rest of our time today in the library collecting your citations for the paper." She collected her books and left.

She left, even though the line outside her office for tutoring went out onto the balcony terrace and beyond into the sky. As Storm and Inyanga carried their piles of books out of Maestra Alondra's office, dozens of students gave them stink eye before slowly giving up and moving along.

It was kind of Storm to wait until they reached the empty corridor outside the al-Maysan library at the core of the floating sphere before giving Inyanga hell.

"Nice job getting us thrown out, starfire brains." Storm didn't stop or slow down to throw her shade.

"Me?" Inyanga ran along after. "I'm pretty sure we were both asking her questions for next week's examination."

"But you had to go and ask her whether magic can run out, like a reporter chasing a conspiracy for the hora septa news. Like you don't already know."

Storm stormed down the hall even faster, leaving Inyanga to call after her, "What do you mean?" and scurry along behind, past the 'no talking' sign, toward the doors into the spherical center of al-Maysan's core. Where she dug her heels in and slammed to a stop.