Inyanga's Star and Other Constellations

II.ii When Inyanga Gets In

Tongue between her teeth, Amafu drew her scholar's gnomon, a clear glass wand that made it easily evident that the practitioner had only a learner's permit. Its capabilities could be limited to only those spells Constellation wanted them to put to practice at any given time in their schooling. If Constellation didn't want them to direct link — if their portal to class really was having technical difficulties — they wouldn't be able to. Probably.

"I have an idea," said Inyanga. "First, get me the departure coordinates."

"Right. Departure coordinates. I was definitely going to get those too."

Staring with an intent focus on the gnomon — which Professor Alondra said would not be necessary once they got good at spellcasting — Amafu began to derive the coordinates of Inyanga's body in space.

She needed to store the three-dimensional nexus points of every square millimeter of Inyanga in a memory spell — which wasn't easy to do, since Inyanga's body kept moving. Even if she hadn't been flipping through notes and dropping the heavy textbook on her burgundy booted foot, she would still have been blinking. She would still have been swallowing, and moving her mouth when she did. She would still have been breathing, her lungs expanding, her chest, belly and back ribs filling up. Her heart pumping blood to every extremity didn't expand the space Inyanga took up, but it did prove a distraction as Amafu tried to guide the stars' perception over the outer perimeter of her body. A practiced magician wouldn't need a visual aid, but Amafu was growling out loud from the effort — so she cast an illumination to help her. Light coated Inyanga's body like a wetsuit. Blindingly.

"Oh, aahhh, can't see!" Inyanga yelped and pressed her fingers to her face, and both her exclamation and the new light in the morning shade drew the attention of every single one of their classmates.

A ring formed around them, some students just turning, others jogging over to see what on earth these girls were doing.

"What on earth are you girls doing?" said Storm.

"Keep working," Inyanga hissed, too low for the onlookers and eavesdroppers to hear. "I think I know how to do it. I'm going to work on arrival coordinates."

"Don't leave me," Amafu hissed back. She did keep working, though. And since everyone was already staring, she kept the starlight on. Inyanga burned like a piece of comet entering the atmosphere, only without the heat.

The ring parted for Storm to push through. "Are we spell casting our way to class this morning? I must have missed that instruction." Glass gnomon in hand, she watched Inyanga as if putting puzzle pieces into the right places. Storm's fired amber eyes pierced the textbook and notes, and now her head tilted, dark curls resting on the cliff of her shoulder.

"You didn't miss anything," said Inyanga. "It's just my opinion that anyone who hasn't figured out how it's done yet might be a little behind. I think I've got it."

She examined Storm's reaction, scanning her up and down from green booted toe to the tip of her lightning bolt animated beret. If Storm could already link, and just needed to realize this was the test, and to identify her coordinates, she could be gone in moments.

The light that came to gather on Storm's skin, hair, and black knit sweater could just be for show — it could just be a copy of Amafu's strategy — but Inyanga couldn't risk it. To her greatest friend she said, "The stored coordinates, please."

Amafu scrunched up her eyes, as if she couldn't watch what was happening. "What about me?" But she did it anyway, even as she complained. "If I fail this test there's no stars damn bursary for me either, you know." In her head she asked the stars, via her gnomon, to pass the stored coordinates in her memory from her mind to Inyanga's. "Can you at least leave me your notes? Just drop 'em there." She pointed at the rocky ground at her friend's feet.

Inyanga just smiled and gave a mysterious negatory shake of her head. Then she faced Storm and said, "Ex hoc in illud." From here to there. And then she disappeared.

A second or two later, so little time that not everyone watching could say who vanished first, Storm linked away too, without even speaking an incantation out loud.

Both girls were gone. The audience let out involuntary yelps and gasps — then Amafu put her hands together and the crowd joined her in a round of applause.

"Stars damn, my girl, you really left me behind like that to flat out fail." Amafu still clapped.

Then she felt a finger tap her shoulder. When Amafu turned around, there was Inyanga, crossing her arms with confidence and settling down in a seat on the roots of the azaelawood.

"Gather round, my pupils," she said. "The competition has come to a conclusion, and now that I've placed first, I will teach those of you who are smart enough, and have followed along with the course material, how to direct link to class—"

Amafu was in the process of arranging her skirts to sit down, when a voice of authority, though sounding no older than those of the students, made every student start, hop, and turn. "Direct link to class? Whose short-sighted idea was this. The portal is malfunctioning, but you are not to ever cast spells without explicit permission ahead of time from your teachers."

It was Professor Alondra, whose round face usually showed a soft and lovable demeanor, but was now turning rigid. She looked outraged.

"On the way down to cast a maintenance spell, I received notification from the campus guardia of two, TWO, instances of unauthorized links. One cast by Inyanga Kyu Numbia, and one by Storm Gloriam. Where is Storm?"

Inyanga stood to take responsibility. "She linked to the classroom. We think."

"You better hope she made it safely, or the detentions for the rest of this semester are going to be the least painful part of your existence on this campus."

Amafu scratched her nose and stood up, muttering to herself, "Predictable. Sooo predictable. One would think among the top students in the school, one of us would have predicted this. Maybe these girls aren't so stars damn smart as they think they are."

Thank you for reading Act I of Inyanga's star in Constellations. I hope you will join me to see where Inyanga's journey takes her. If you like my work, please star or share it, to give me a hand with mine.