Eyes of Silver

Royal Military Seminary Sandwycke, Bettenshire Ilbeoria 15 Arcan 1687 As he walked through the library, hugging a bound volume of maps to his chest, Robert Drury found the stares of the other students unsettling. He'd been much older than most when he entered Sandwycke--much bigger as well--and had even been a veteran of the Lescari War; so being stared at wasn't something he found uncommon. Those sorts of stares had died away over his four years at the seminary, so their renewal, especially in the library and at that moment, meant only one thing. Robin sighed. You must have really gone and done it this time, Uriah. He frowned and that broke off a number of stares, save the positively icy glare from Brother Lucas. Robin offered him a weak smile, which prompted the old priest to shake his head and turn away. Without knocking, Robin opened the door to the small study chamber he'd reserved. A long, lanky, loose-limbed youth with a shock of red hair sat sprawled between two chairs. He'd slumped down in one enough that his shoulder blades were pressed against the seat; the second chair served as a platform for his thighs. Uriah held two little painted blocks of wood, one in each hand, and rammed them together, vocalizing a sound that approximated the roar of a steam cannon firing a volley. Robin's eyes narrowed. "Interesting exercise in tactical abstraction, Cadet Smith." The wooden blocks flew as Uriah started, then grabbed for some portion of either chair to keep him from falling. He failed, tipping over the chair beneath his thighs and letting the other one skid noisily to the wall. The little blocks, painted to represent military units, danced around him as he crashed to the floor, then he looked up at Robin, anger gathering on his face. "You scared me!" "Uriah, you've been scaring me every single day we've been working on this project together." Robin set his book of maps down on the corner of the sand table in the center of the room. A boxy affair, it was open at the top and filled with sand that could be shaped into the terrain of any battlefield in the world. "I expected you to have our terrain ready." Uriah climbed to his feet, then picked up the two wooden blocks. He set them with others on the edge of the sand table. "I couldn't do the terrain without those maps, could I?" "You could have gotten started." Robin pointed to the troop designator blocks. "After all, you weren't busy painting up the troops the way I asked you to." Uriah shrugged. "Why should I? Brother Lucas had them in his stores. He looked at me funny when he handed them over, but he always looks at me funny." Robin shook his head. "You realize, of course, that Brother Lucas will give Captain Irons a list of the troops we requested, and that means he'll know we're doing ahypotheticalfor our Tactics seminar project." "Does it matter? We're not doing a battle using his Cathedral Lancers, so he's bound to grade us down anyway." Robin held up his hands. "Why don't you think about what you just said while you get the terrain ready?" He opened the book of maps and held it up for Uriah to study. "I want it exact." "Okay." Uriah nodded, then waved the book away. Robin raised an eyebrow. "Study it, Uriah. Apply yourself a bit. 'Exact' doesn't mean 'kindStackpole, Michael A. is the author of 'Eyes of Silver' with ISBN 9780553561135 and ISBN 0553561138.