Princess Academy Read online

  He thought a moment, opened his mouth, then shrugged and tossed the shard away. “Never mind, it’s nothing.”

  “Peder Doterson, you had best tell me now. I’ll hold my breath until I know.”

  He picked up a new linder shard and examined its color. Miri waited for him to speak.

  “It doesn’t really matter, but I’ve always . . . You know the carvings on the chapel doors? I’ve stared and stared at them the way I see you sometimes watch the sky.” He looked over her face as if he were studying the carvings. His look stilled her. “As long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to make things like that, something more than blocks of stone. I sometimes . . . You promise not to laugh at me?”

  Miri nodded earnestly.

  “You know how I carve little things from thrown-off linder?”

  “Yes,” she said, “you made me a goat once. I still have it.”

  He smiled. “You do? I remember that goat. He had a crooked smile.”

  “A perfect smile,” said Miri. It had always reminded her of Peder’s.

  “It’s probably childish, but I like making things like that. Linder shapes really well, better than rubble rock. I’d like to make designs in the blocks, things rich lowlanders might buy to have over doorways or above their hearth.”

  The idea caught Miri’s breath, it was so perfect. “Why don’t you?”

  “If Pa ever found me making stone pictures, he’d whip me for wasting time. We barely cut enough linder each year to trade for food, and it doesn’t seem likely that anything will ever change.”

  “It might.” She meant for the comment to slip unnoticed, but something in her tone must have intrigued him.

  “How?” he asked.

  Miri shrugged off the question. It was going too well to give up on the rules of Conversation now. He pressed again, wanting to hear about what she had been doing at the academy all winter, and again she tried to keep talking about him.

  Peder sighed in frustration. “Why are you being so evasive? Tell me, I really want to know.”

  Miri hesitated, but his attention was irresistible, and she had a thousand stories trembling on her tongue. Then he smiled in his way, the right side of his mouth curving higher. She rubbed his tawny curls as she might her favorite nanny goat after a milking.

  “You may be sorry you asked,” she said, and drowned him with the account of the last few months, telling all from getting her palms lashed and the first snowfall to their escape from the school earlier that day. She spoke quickly, her tongue feeling like a hummingbird’s wing; she was so afraid of boring him if she took too long. Then she described how she had been experimenting with quarry-speech, how she could share a memory, not just deliver a warning, and how it sometimes worked outside the quarry.

  “Though it sometimes doesn’t.” She lifted her hand to say she did not know why.

  “Try it right now.”

  Miri swallowed. Quarry-speaking with Esa and Frid had felt like a game, but with Peder it became something intimate, like reaching for his hand, like looking into his eyes even when she had nothing to say. Hoping she was not blushing, she rapped her knuckles on the linder block and sang about a girl who carried drinking water in the quarry. She let the song guide her and began to match her thoughts to its rhythm, searching for a good memory to use, when Peder stopped her with a smile.

  “What are you doing?”

  Now she did blush, cursing herself for choosing a song about a love-struck girl. “I’m . . . I thought you said to try to quarry-speak.”

  “Yes, but you know you don’t have to pound and sing, right?” Peder waited for her to agree, but she just stared. “You know that in the quarry we happen to be pounding and singing while we work, but that we can use quarry-speech without doing all that.”

  “Yes, of course,” she said, smiling. “Of course I knew that. Only an idiot would think you have to pound the stone to make quarry-speech after all.”

  “Yes, of course.” He laughed, and she laughed back, bumping him with her shoulder. Peder had always been good about letting her mistakes slide.

  “So you don’t have to pound, and the only singing happens inside.” She splayed her hand on the stone and without a song quarry-spoke to Peder. It felt like whispering something right to his heart. When her vision shuddered, she shivered as well.

  “That was strange.” Peder looked at her. “Is that what you mean by memories? It felt like quarry-speech, but I’m used to hearing the warnings we use as we work. This time, I was just thinking about the afternoon when I made that linder goat.” His eyes widened as his thoughts seemed to race forward. “Is it because you spoke a memory? One that I knew, one that I lived, so it was so clear to me . . . Miri, that’s amazing.”

  “I wonder why it worked now. . . .” Miri smoothed her hand over the stone. The linder was chipped and irregular and pocked with chisel marks, not smooth like the polished floorstones of the academy. She lifted her fingers to her mouth and pressed them against her growing smile. A new idea sent her spinning. “Peder, I think I understand. I think it’s the linder.”

  “What’s the linder? What do you mean?”

  She stood up, feeling as though the idea were too big to crouch inside her and needed room to stretch. “The academy floor is made of linder, so is this stone, and the whole quarry . . . you see? Those other times when it didn’t work, I must have been outside or on rubble rock. Maybe quarry-speech works best around linder.”

  “Sit back down and let me try.” He yanked her arm and she sat beside him. This time she was a little closer, the sides of their legs touching.

  He closed his eyes, the muscles of his forehead tense. Miri held her breath. For a time nothing happened. Then she found her thoughts flash to that afternoon on the grazing hill, the scrape of Peder’s knife on a shard of linder, a plaited miri chain dangling from her fingers. It was her own memory, but stronger, vivid, pulled forward to the front of her thoughts, and full of color. And she knew it was Peder speaking that memory, the way she knew the smell of baking bread—it had the sense of him.

  “I couldn’t figure it out at first,” he said. “I’m so used to repeating the quarry warnings we always use.”

  “You told me once that quarry-speech was like singing inside, and that’s how I knew what to do.”

  “Huh,” he said, shaking his head. “A lot has happened while you were away.”

  “I’d tell you more if I thought I could do it before sunup.”

  “I’m sure you would. It must have been very hard to keep quiet all those weeks.”

  Miri punched his shoulder.

  “I can imagine you at the academy window, looking off toward the village,” he said, “believing you could see it if you just looked hard enough. You always were a hawk, gazing at the mountains as if you could see a mouse running on a far hill, or at the sky as if you could count every feather on a sparrow’s wing.”

  Miri did not respond. She felt as though she were floating underwater, tipping and sinking. Did he watch her just as she watched him?

  “I’ve never told anyone about carving stone,” he said. “I don’t know how you got it out of me.”

  Miri laughed. “Because I’m pushier than a billy goat mad. I won’t tell anyone else.”

  “I know you won’t. I know that about you.” He held the end of her braid and brushed it across his palm. He frowned as if a new thought occurred to him. “Do you ever wear your hair loose?”

  “Sometimes.” Her voice creaked, but her mouth was too dry to swallow. “I did last year at autumn holiday.”

  “That’s right.” His expression was distant, as if he were remembering. “I miss all the time we had when we were younger, don’t you? It’d be nice to go exploring the peak again, maybe on rest days.”

  “It would.” Miri held very still, afraid that if
she moved she might spook Peder and like a lone wolf he would suddenly run off. “When I’m not at the academy anymore.”

  Peder let go of her braid, but Miri still could not quite catch her breath. He turned his hands over, as if looking for something he lost.

  “The academy. So, you might marry the prince?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Miri, just then discovering that she was sore from sitting so long. “I’m trying to do my best in the class so maybe he’d notice me. I mean, he’d have to choose me from all the other girls . . . and I’m not trying not to be the princess or anything. It’s just . . . he won’t pick me.”

  “Why not?” said Peder. “I mean, why wouldn’t he? You’re the smartest one in the class.”

  “I didn’t mean to make it sound like that—”

  “Well, I bet you are,” interrupted Peder, his voice rising. “And if he’s half a prince he’ll see that and then want to carry you off to the lowlands to put you in fancy dresses. But I don’t think you need to wear lowlander dresses. You’re just fine.” He stood. “Never mind. I should get back to my family.”

  Miri wanted to say something that mattered before he walked away. She blurted, “I won’t tell anyone about your stone carving. But I think it’s wonderful, and I think you’re wonderful.”

  He stood there, letting the silence stretch thinner and thinner until Miri’s panicked heart left her with nothing more than burning cheeks.

  “You’re my best friend, you know,” he said.

  Miri nodded.

  “I wish I had something to give you, some welcome home.” He patted the pocket of his shirt, as if looking for anything at all.

  “It’s all right, Peder, you don’t have to—”

  Swiftly he stooped, kissed her cheek, and disappeared.

  Miri did not move for three verses of the next bonfire song. A smile tugged at one corner of her mouth like a brook trout on a fishing line, but she was too staggered to give in to it.

  “That went well,” she whispered to herself, and then did smile.

  “What are you grinning about?” Britta sat beside her, mirroring Miri’s happy expression.

  “Nothing,” said Miri, but she could not help looking where Peder had gone, and Britta followed her glance.

  “Oh.” Britta laughed. “Nothing.”

  Miri laughed in return and felt her face go hot again, and it occurred to her that after so much burning her cheeks should be ashes by now. She quickly changed the subject. “What do you like best so far—the food, stories, dancing, or a certain smitten boy by the name of Jans?”

  Britta shook her head, refusing to acknowledge Miri’s pointed question. “It’s all wonderful. I think this is better than any lowlander party.”

  Miri elbowed her. “Look at how you say ‘lowlander’ as if you were a mountain girl.”

  “I’d like to be,” said Britta.

  “Then you are,” said Miri. “That’s the only ceremony you need.”

  The drums and singing died out, and Gerti’s father, Os, called for village council. The youth moved away from the bonfires to leave the business to the older folks. An excited rumble in her stomach reminded Miri that she had something to present.

  “Come on, Britta, I may need your help.”

  Miri had never attended council before. She sat beside her pa, her head on his shoulder, Britta by her side. The talk concerned recent linder blocks cut, an injury of a stone braker due to carelessness, the most promising parts of the quarry to undertake next, and the use of supplies over the winter.

  “But no matter how much linder we cut, Os, it won’t be enough,” said Peder’s father. “The absence of the girls meant fewer hands to help. My own boy has had to care more for the goats and the home, and that’s one less stone this season. Isn’t that right, Laren?”

  Miri’s father nodded. “I feel the pinch this year.”

  Miri rose. “I have something to say.”

  Her father raised his brows but did not speak, and Os indicated that she go ahead. Miri hummed her throat clear.

  “At the academy, I found a book that explains how linder is sold in the lowlands. Apparently, our stone is so prized that the king himself will only use linder for his palaces, and the only place in all of Danland that produces linder is right here. So because demand for linder is high and supply is limited, it’s worth a great deal.”

  She glanced at her pa to see if he approved. He was listening, but his expression betrayed no opinion. Miri cleared her throat again.

  “In the rest of the kingdom, they trade for gold or silver coins instead of just food and supplies. In the capital, a block of linder is worth one gold coin, and in turn a gold coin can buy five bushels of wheat.”

  She paused, waiting for exclamations, but no one spoke. Then her pa touched her arm.

  “Miri,” he said softly.

  “I know I’m asking you to believe a lowlander book, but I believe it, Pa. Why would a lowlander write anything good about Mount Eskel unless it was true?”

  Britta spoke up. “Miri showed me the book, and I think it’s true as well.”

  Os shook his head. “It’s easy to believe the traders will cheat us as much as they can, but what can we do about it?”

  “Refuse to trade for anything but gold or silver, and at decent prices,” said Miri. “Then if they don’t haul enough goods to trade for our cut linder, we can take their money down the mountain to buy even more.”

  “There’s a large market in a town three days from here,” said Britta. “We stayed at an inn on my journey last summer. Gold and silver there would buy you much more than what the traders bring to your village.”

  Os rubbed his beard. “I can see the value in trading elsewhere, but if the traders won’t take our linder for gold . . .”

  “If they won’t,” said Doter, her eyes brightening, “we threaten to take the linder down the mountain. If we trade linder in that market ourselves, we’ll earn even more.”

  “No, no,” said Katar’s father. “We don’t have the wagons or mules, and we don’t know the first thing about a town marketplace. What if we drag all our blocks there and no one buys? What if in the process we offend the traders and they never return?”

  The fear in that argument hushed all the talk. Miri curled her toes in her boots and made herself speak up again.

  “I don’t think the likes of Enrik would let it go that far. I really believe the traders are making heaps of money from our stone. They’ll know we could sell the linder for more in the lowlands, and then they would be cut out of any profit.” Miri looked again at her father and tried to stamp down the trembling hope in her voice. “What do you think, Pa?”

  He nodded slowly. “I think it’s worth the risk.”

  A sigh of relief dragged out of Miri’s chest.

  The idea sparked talk that did not die down until the flames dwindled into embers. The adults debated every angle, how to go about it, what risks they faced. They consulted Britta on anything she knew of trade. Some were concerned that the villagers could not tell true silver and gold from any cheap metal the traders might try to give them.

  “My father was a merchant. I can make sure they don’t cheat you,” said Britta. “But what if the king gets impatient for the linder, and he sends men up here to quarry the stone themselves?”

  Several chuckled at her question.

  “If all lowlanders have arms as skinny as the traders do,” said Frid’s pa, “they’ll have to rest between each mallet strike.”

  Miri folded her own skinny arms under her cloak.

  “That’s one thing we don’t have to worry about, Britta,” said Doter. “Let them come, and they’ll give up after their first block cracks. We have linder in our bones.”

  The discussion continued, and Miri leaned into h
er pa, drowsy from watching the fire. He patted her hair. We have linder in our bones, Doter had said. We. Miri clung to the word, wanting to be a part of it but unsure if she was. If her idea for trading became a success, perhaps then she could be more certain.

  Her gaze wandered from the gold flames to the darkness the firelight could not reach. Peder might be there, listening, hoping for a chance to carve stone.

  n

  Chapter Twelve

  Mud in the stream

  And earth in the air

  Clay in my ears

  And stone in my stare

  n

  It was not quite morning when Miri woke to the comforting sound of her pa’s snore. She picked out the familiar shapes of the hearthstones, the door, the table, and breathed in the warm smell of home.

  When dawn began to spark color into her dark house, Miri wrapped herself in her blanket and slipped outside to start breakfast. A dozen others were in the village center using the remains of last night’s bonfires to heat that morning’s meal. Miri settled her kettle of water into the coals and noticed some academy girls there as well. Their expressions were solemn in the gray morning.

  “Are we going back?” asked Miri.

  “That’s what I’ve been wondering,” said Esa.

  Britta sat beside Miri. “Even if we want to, would Olana let us?”

  “If she does,” said Frid, “we might spend the summer taking turns in the closet.”

  “Olana said I could go to spring holiday, so I won’t be punished,” said Katar as she joined them. “I’m definitely going back.”

  Several other academy girls arrived, and they sat on stones in a crooked circle, watched the embers fizz and sputter against the dew, and talked of returning. Some were eager to go back, others too content the morning after a spring holiday to think of ever leaving. Katar and Bena were adamant.

  “I won’t have any of you risking my chances by breaking apart the academy,” said Katar.