Grimm's School for the Erratically Gifted: Chapter 4

When Edmund awoke, he knew exactly where he was. This was in direct contradiction to expected behavior of any child thrown into a new world over the course of a single night, but he didn’t have the time for such formalities.

Instead he engaged in his usual morning routine: first, he looked at his notebook.

Sure enough, during the night his sleeping brain had tried to wake him with any number of sudden thoughts, concerns, ideas, and the like; but his hand had caught them all, trapping them in ink before his rest was disturbed.

It surprised Edmund how little he had written; only a few circled words, and fewer lines connecting them. Luggage. Jolly Snagsby. Basil Tombswell. Letters. Victrola. Voice box by the gate.

Second, he thought about what he had written.

His Luggage; that was a problem. Wislydale’s training throbbed in his brain: it wouldn’t do for the Heir of the Moulde Estate to be seen wearing the same clothes day in and day out. Luckily, he hadn’t been seen yet by anyone other than Mr. Tombswell, so he was probably fine for a single day. He was lucky he never moved in his sleep; his pants and shirt were not wrinkled in the slightest.

That meant he would need to shop for clothing. He didn’t relish the idea of heading back into the streets of Mothburn, where Jolly Snagsby and his Wayward Downstreeters might be lying in wait behind any corner; but he was a Moulde, and commoners were not things he was allowed to be afraid of, at least not openly. Besides, a Moulde doing their own shopping was, at most, eccentric; a label easily weathered to avoid the scandal of wearing the same outfit more than once.

Third in his morning routine, Edmund would ordinarily have breakfast, but he had no idea where to find such a thing in Grimm’s. Edmund was now in the middle of a world with different rules, people, expectations — everything. To survive, he needed find out exactly what his place in the massive machine of Grimm’s was.

He needed to learn what it meant to be a Student.

Checking the time on his ever-wound watch, Edmund decided that the first thing to learn was where students were supposed to be at eight in the morning. He slipped out into the hallways of Grimm’s School for the Erratically Gifted, reflexively sticking to the shadows. Perhaps, if he was lucky, he could find someone to stalk.

A lesson quickly learned by new students everywhere is that you are supposed to be where everyone else is. At eight in the morning on the first day of school, everyone else was in what Edmund later learned was once the throne room, and then the altar room, and now the main auditorium of Grimm’s.

It was easy to find; Edmund didn’t need to wander long before he heard the growing murmur of voices. Following the sound, he found his way to the auditorium’s thick oak doors. The air was filled with the mutterings and whisperings of children who were supposed to be quiet, but knew no one would bother demanding their silence just yet.

The whole room was bare, if somewhat thick with dust. Giant candle chandeliers lit the room from the ceiling, and all along the side walls, giant stained-glass windows¹ glinted dully in the gloom. A broad alter made of stone squatted under the granite statue of a bearded man, gripping a book in front of him like a shield.

This, however, was nothing compared to the students.

Grimm’s was a part of the British Empire, which spanned such a large amount of the globe that the title, “the Empire on which the sun never sets” was quite fitting.² Edmund, knowing this, had assumed that the students of Grimm’s would be mostly British.

This was wrong. Of the fewer than fifty students attending Grimm’s that year, Edmund could see that while some were obviously British, others were French, Spanish, German, Greek, Scottish, Irish, Indian, African, and even the exotic Orient. Skin colors ranged from ghostly pale to glittering purple. Most of the students were dressed in elegant finery, befitting the richest princes and princesses of the world, and they all looked older then Edmund by quite a few years. Boys and girls were in equal amounts, and most were talking casually among themselves, accents thick and melodic.

What was the name for a group of students? A dismissal, perhaps?

Pushing his body away from the crowd, Edmund shoved himself into a corner, only to find it already occupied by two other students who obviously had the same distaste of physical contact.

The other corners were likewise occupied, so Edmund gave up and moved into the throng, letting the student bodies bump, nudge, and shove him as they wished. They did so with abandon, never once apologizing, or even noting that they had.

Finally, he found a spot where he could stand in relative —

Tunansia.

He heard her voice, cold and firm, before he saw her. She was facing away from him, surrounded by similarly aged and dressed peerage. Even from behind and from half the room away, he could recognize her stoic posture, her dismissive air.

Of course, Edmund reprimanded himself for his surprise. He had known she was a student at Grimm’s. When he first met her four years ago, his cousins had berated her for not impressing the teachers. After some quick mental maths, he realized that this would be her last year.

He should go and say hello.

The arbiters of social propriety would have torn their wigs off their heads at the thought of what Edmund was about to do. The proscribed behavior for re-introducing yourself to a relative with whom you have an uncertain relationship fills several chapters in the third volume of Lady Sumpkins’ Ways and Manners.

Edmund hadn’t read even the first volume. In fact, he’d never even heard of Lady Sumpkins. Instead of adopting a mildly interested air and waiting for another to mention a passing knowledge of Edmund’s and Tunansia’s relationship, which could then prompt him to make introductions; Edmund managed, with a singular burst of effort, to pry his way through the student bodies and towards his tall black-haired cousin.

“Hello, Tunansia,” he said when he reached her side.

She didn’t turn around. If her jaw hadn’t suddenly twitched, he may not have believed she had heard him at all.

The students surrounding her were not so restrained.

“Who is this?” A girl with long curly bangs asked with incredulous disgust. “Do you know him?”

“I don’t see anyone worth knowing, do I,” a brown-haired boy blinked lazily with a dismissive air.

“What about me?” the skinny girl squeaked, her eyes pushed up in worry.

“Oh, be quiet,” the long curly bangs bounced. “Obviously he meant anyone else who is worth knowing. We are all perfectly worth knowing. That’s why we all know each other. Tunansia, who is this?”

There was a thick pause, full of dark and painful words that met Edmund’s ears quite clearly, even though the words had not yet been said.

“Who?” Tunansia asked, her voice slow and cold.

Rather than wait for introductions when clearly none were coming, Edmund supplied his own.

“My name is Edmund Moulde. It is a pleasure to —”

“Moulde?”

If the students of Grimm’s had cared for Lady Sumpkins at all, the faux pas of Edmund’s behavior coming from a Moulde could have been a great enough scandal for Edmund’s plans to be ruined forever. It is fortunate that the students of Grimm’s cared little for such antiquated rules.

It is less fortunate that they cared deeply about their own social mores.

“Bloody brilliant, isn’t it,” the brown-haired boy rolled his eyes, one eyebrow stuck raised above the other. A lanky hand flipped up, wiped his mouth quickly, and vanished again. “Think you’re all important, don’t you. Don’t need to follow the rules, do you.”

“I don’t?” Edmund had wondered; he was a Moulde, after all.

“You’re late, aren’t you. Miss the train, did you? You was supposed to come straight here from the train, weren’t you.” The boy bristled at the injustice of the world. “And you didn’t, did you. And now you’re throwing your name around when it doesn’t matter, does it.”

“Does it?”

“Think we’re all impressed with what you’ve done, don’t you. Think no one’s ever been part of a marriage that ended a war, do you. Well now you’re on your own now, boy-o, aren’t you. No servants, no butlers, no maids allowed at Grimm’s, are there.”

“Are there?”

“I’m your head-boy, aren’t I. Head of Altmore house, aren’t I. Might be some free beds down the hall on the left, mightn’t there. Altmore meeting in the common room every morning, isn’t there.”

“There is,” Edmund guessed.

A chorus of snickers and hastily choked off laughs circled the group. The boy leaned in closer to Edmund, his eyes narrow.

“Making fun of me, are you, boy-o?” he hissed. “I’m Fairly Carver, aren’t I, and it doesn’t matter to me if you’re a Moulde, a Vandegaar, or even the bloody prince of Spain, so you watch yourself, won’t you.”

“Yes,” Edmund guessed again. Fairly nodded and leaned back, the disgust on his face a clear indication the conversation was over.

There is no telling what Edmund might have said next — whether he would have apologized, committed yet another faux pas, or managed to eloquently and delicately turn the opinion of Tunansia’s clique in his favor — as no sooner had he opened his mouth than the room was silenced with a single cough.

To call it a cough is perhaps a disservice. Much has been written about the Headmaster of Grimm’s School for the Erratically Gifted, Professor Arcturus Lynch, including his practiced and effective disciplinary methods. His cough was a thing of artistry, carefully polished and honed through years of academic experience and tailored to a very specific purpose.

“You will be silent,” said the cough. “Not because of what will happen if you do not, though this would be something terrible; nor because of the awe or respect with which you revere me, which must by natural course be a considerable amount; but simply because not being silent is akin to water not being wet, or snow not being cold. It is an immutable property of yourself in my presence, and to speak while I am speaking is a defiance of natural law. True, we defy the laws of nature constantly within these walls, but I know for a fact that none of you has what it would take to do so. Indeed, it would require the combined knowledge of every professor in these walls to explain how you did not pay attention, and it would take many hours of uncomfortable, invasive, and above all sharp experimentation on your person. You do not want this, and I have not allocated time for this in my schedule: therefore, you will be silent.”

Edmund swore, then and there, to learn how to cough like that.

As short as he was, he had to peer between his fellow student’s arms to see the tall wrinkled man who stood on a small dais, where a throne and then an alter had once stood. He was dressed in a black robe with an academical on his head, a book in his hand, and a metal triangle hanging around his neck. He was as stately as any priest, and his gaze was a piercing gimlet that didn’t so much scan the room as it did carve through it. There was never a moment that his eyes were not focused on something or someone.

Behind him was a row of men and women of all shapes, sizes, and colors; professors, most likely, similarly dressed in cap and gown. Some faces were dark, others bemused and disinterested. Edmund recognized Dean Aquinas and Professor Babbages among them.

“Right,” the tall man spoke. “My name is Professor Arcturus Lynch, and I am Headmaster of Grimm’s School for the Erratically Gifted. You are all here because someone in your family is either royal, or paid quite a lot of money to get you here. Personally, I don’t give a withered prune for the lot of you. Especially you, Cubbins, don’t think I can’t see you!”

“Now, some announcements,” the professor continued. “That means pay attention, Flucidity! There has been a growing awareness from the townsfolk of various gangs and gatherings of children in the city, especially at night. I would remind all of you that we at Grimm’s take a very dim view of collaboration in all its forms, and such behavior will be frowned on in the extreme. I need not remind you what that means, Bumbercutt, do I boy? I thought not.”

“Of similar import, I am delighted to inform all new students and remind most of the returning students; curfew is at eight of the clock sharp! Some of you may take this to heart, Rowdrick! This is for the protection of both you and the townsfolk. Anyone found outside their wing after eight of the clock without express permission in written form at least three professors will receive a punishment most severe! Your parents might also be displeased with you, Lorianne, and I know for a fact your mother still beheads as punishment!”

“Of great importance, the course arrangements have been adjusted for this year. Altmore house and Brookings house have switched, and Cullings house has replaced their evenings with Effings schedule. Notice has been posted in the common rooms of each house, so you will have no excuses, Flucidity. Yes I did point you out twice. Most unfair, isn’t it?”

“Lastly, for the few of you who are new this year, a few words about the culture we struggle to foster here at Grimm’s.”

Edmund nodded appreciatively. He was eager to hear his expectations for Edmund.

“You are not special,” Headmaster Lynch continued. “You are not clever. You are nothing but another atrophied and underdeveloped young mind looking up at the sun through the tall grasses. If you are quick, wise, and persistent, you might become someone worthy of a single obscure foot-note in a third-rate history book in a decade or so, but don’t expect anyone here to help. It’s a harsh world in Academia, and we don’t suffer fools at Grimm’s. Learn fast, or you’ll be back in your rubbish little palaces before you know it.”

“Oh yes,” Professor Lynch turned back to the room after glancing at Dean Aquinas. “Despite our best efforts, Gossip still prevails at this school, and therefore, to put and end to such nonsense: the circumstances of the recent murders in Mothburn are mysterious, understood? There is to be no more of this nonsense about how they are clearly copy-cats, accidents, Ripper killings, or your own pet self-evident solution to what is a strange and unexplained situation. I don’t want to hear it, Analise, no matter how many of your famous relatives died the same way!”

“There. That’s it. Breakfast in an hour. Classes start afterwards. Go away.”

---

Edmund could only briefly consider what to do next before the decision was taken out of his hands, or rather, feet. No sooner had Professor Lynch finished speaking, then the entire student body surged towards the doors, carrying Edmund out of the auditorium like a fish in a stream. Students flowed from the room and split off into tributaries through the hallways of Grimm’s, chattering, shouting, and gossiping as before.

Freed from the ability to travel under his own power, he was able to instead reflect on the Headmaster’s speech. He was painfully aware of how little it actually helped him. Classes started after breakfast, but where? Which classes were Edmund’s? What was of far more importance was finding his room, so when the stream of students abated enough for Edmund’s feet to touch the ground, he began to search for Altmore House.

The pitch-dark corridors had brightened since the previous night, and Fairly Carver had given simple enough directions, so it was only a minute or two before Edmund stood next to a pair of large doors with the word Altmore carved deep into them.

The Altmore common-room was sparsely decorated, with little more than a few wooden chairs and tables. Barren bookshelves lined the wall, broken only once by a painting of a man labeled with a bronze plaque: Lord Altmore. His face was dark and foreboding, his gaze milky and dead. He was dressed half in military dress and half in a casual gown that looked more appropriate for stepping out of the bath.

Down the hall were a collection of doors. Did they lead to single rooms, like the bedrooms at Moulde Hall? Or was this a collective dormitory, like the sleeping rooms at the orphanage? There was only one easy way to find out; Edmund carefully tried the first door.

It was locked. He tried first the second and then the third. They were all locked. It wasn’t until the seventh door he tried that the door opened with a small click.

Cracking open the door, Edmund saw the sunlight through a tiny arrow-slit in the wall illuminating a single bedchamber. There was a small bed on one side of the room, next to a small chest, cabinet, and desk. The cabinet was empty save for a single wooden hanger. The chest was bare. If this was someone’s room, Edmund reasoned, it looked like they had even less than he did. More likely it was nobody’s, and that meant it could be his.

Edmund moved to the desk, and all doubt was swept away. The room was his.

The desk itself was nothing special; a later inspection revealed a small well of dried-up ink, a shaving mirror, a comb, and three burnt-up matchsticks. On top of the desk, however, lay a single black envelope. A single glance at the blood-purple seal was all the confirmation Edmund needed.

Popping open the seal with a snap, he began to read.

Dear Master Edmund,
I am delighted to hear that you have arrived at Grimm’s. I hope you make the best use of your time there.
g4

A signature was unnecessary: The seal was that of the Knittles, and only Junapa could write Edmund’s name exactly the same way she voiced it; with an equal mix of bemusement and disgust.

Edmund knew Junapa’s games, and so he was not beset with awe or confusion at her purportedly hearing Edmund had arrived. To anyone else it might have seemed ominous, that her network of spies and confidants had communicated Edmund’s arrival in less than a day. To Edmund, it was a joke: he wouldn’t have been able to read the letter before he arrived, so of course he was at Grimm’s.

As for g4? That was a chess move. Was she playing chess with him? They had spent several long evenings in her favorite game-room at Moulde Hall, playing games of complex strategy and surprising depth. Was she wanting to play again now?

Closing his eyes, he conjured the image of a chess-board in his mind and moved her pawn forward two spaces.

Edmund stared at the chess board in amazement. In all the time that Edmund had played Chess with Junapa, she had never opened with such a bizarre move. Instead of her name, she had signed her letter with a chess opening that almost made him laugh? Why? What did that gain her?

Pulling out his notebook, Edmund quickly drafted a short reply.

Dear Lady Junapa Knittle,
You are correct, I have arrived at Grimm’s. While I am delighted to play a game of Chess with you, we did not perform any of the prescribed methods for determining initiative — I fear you are taking an unfair advantage.
Edmund

His hand was moving to his letter-kit, when his mind supplied what Junapa’s obvious reply would be.

Master Edmund,
As so often happens in life. Make of it what you will.
g4

Edmund lowered his hand. This move was a warning. Junapa wasn’t just playing chess, she was playing Edmund. It was touching. It was the closest any of his cousins had ever come to real affection.

Turning to a fresh page in his notebook, Edmund quickly scrawled out a few platitudes before writing his own move. They’d played chess via letter before, and Edmund was not about to let her think he wasn’t capable of challenging her simply because he was busy saving the Moulde Family.

After a quick fold and seal, the letter joined the others he had written the night before. Now all he needed to do was figure out how to send them. Most domiciles of the upper-class had places to put out-going letters, either near the front door or attached to the end of the nearest servant’s arm. At Moulde Hall, he had simply handed letters to Ung, but the Headmaster had been clear, as had Fairly; there were no butlers or maids at Grimm’s.

That left a plate or box near the front door. As Edmund had no better place to look, he collected his letters and left his room.

---

He had found a wooden box stuffed with letters and nailed to the wall in the foyer, and added his own, when a voice piped up behind him.

“You there, Edlum!”

Edmund turned to see Victrola flouncing towards him, a book gripped in her hand.

“Edmund,” he said. “Edmund Moulde.”

“Professor Whiskfield is giving us all papers to do,” Victrola said, ignoring his correction. “And I chose to learn more about Post-Encardiographic Locomotion. What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Edmund shrugged. “I didn’t know I was in Professor Whiskfield’s class.”

“Don’t you know anything?” Victrola tossed her curly hair behind her head. “That’s how Grimm’s works, you know. You’re in whatever class you can get into. Didn’t you hear the headmaster? They don’t give you classes, you have to take them.”

“I see.”

“Professor Whiskfield is the head of Unstable Biologies. She knows more about the human body than anyone.”

Edmund nodded, his curiosity piqued. He looked at the book Victrola was gripping in her hand. It was fairly thick.

“This is Kingcrumb’s book on Revitalization and Refreshment through Vitaeous Humours. The annotated version, because the only surviving copy of the original was banned by the Order of the Holy Torch years ago. It’s fascinating, isn’t it?”

Edmund had to admit it was.

“Good,” Victrola tossed her hair again. “Then you can read this and write a seven page essay on the proper uses of Aqueous Semulcrum, and the methods used before the advent of the Lictation Valve. Professor Whiskfield is expecting it by Thursday.”

“I don’t think we’re supposed to help each other. Headmaster Lynch said collaboration is —”

“Oh, that’s alright,” Victrola smiled. “You’re not helping me, you’re doing my work for me. That’s completely different.”

“Why can’t you do it?”

“Because I’m going to be looking around for my second friend,” Victrola laid a finger on her lips. “I think I already found a nemesis; she’s older than me, but that’s okay, and I haven’t decided if my second friend is going to be a bumbling fool who sticks by my side while trying to keep me from breaking the rules, or a dark and brooding loaner who reluctantly sees me as their only friend. Although,” Victrola pulled a thoughtful face. “The dark and brooding friend is usually the smart one, and I already decided you were the smart one. Oh well,” Victrola shrugged and turned away. “If that turns out to be the case, I may have to demote you to the bumbling friend. Here’s the book. Remember, by Thursday.”

Edmund looked down at the book in his hands. He ran his fingers over the embossed title on the cover.

It was about time someone saw Edmund as the genius he was trying to be. Why else give her work to him? If only more people recognized his naturally superior intellect.

He sniffed the edge of the pages like a gourmet.

It was a boon for him as well. Any time he spent in one class was time not spent in another class. But if Victrola gave him the work from her classes, he would be learning twice as much.

He cracked open the book, and felt the pages flutter through his fingertips.

Of course, he still needed to find the classes he wanted to take, but how hard could that be? He kept learning a large number of useful and fascinating things just by wandering and paying attention.

Or, he could do that later. Right now, he had a giant book in his hands that he had never read before.

Standing in the middle of the hallway, he opened the dusty tome and inhaled the thick heady smell of ancient knowledge. Like a thief hiding his take, he ducked into the first empty room he found. The room was painted black and filled with long tables. Edmund sat down at one and dove nose first into the book.

It was a heavy volume, the dust pressed into solid chips between its pages. The words were written in a flowing and scripted hand, and it took Edmund a few moments to recognize which letters were which. Once he did, he began to seek out familiar words and recognizable patterns. In a few minutes the cadence of the author was plain to Edmund, and he began to read in earnest. In a few more minutes, he understood exactly what the book was about.

He had read no more than a single page when, with no warning nor preamble, Professor Babbages walked into the room, huffing lightly.

Wiping his forehead with a handkerchief, the thick man hoisted a large briefcase onto a nearby desk and opened it with a loud clack. Whipping out a piece of chalk as big as a pen, he fixed it to the end of a small stick. Then, with a sharp twist, he extended the stick to a yard in length. Giving it an experimental swish, like a fencer testing the balance of his epee, Babbages turned to the wall.

The walls of the room, Edmund now noticed, were not painted black but were in fact completely covered in slate. With the steady precision of an orchestral conductor, Babbages placed his chalk at the top of the wall and began to write.

In minutes, a detailed mathematical formula covered the front of the room. Babbages continued to write, moving to the next wall when the first was filled, and then the next. Edmund watched in quiet fascination as formula after formula spilled out from the man’s piece of chalk. In an hour, the entire room was covered with more math than Edmund had ever seen.

Finally, when there was no more room on the walls, the man stopped, collapsed his stick, pulled off the tiny pebble of chalk that was left, popped it into his mouth, and left the room, grabbing his briefcase as he went. Edmund stared at the walls. They were filled with numbers, letters, symbols of strange and esoteric origin that he had never seen before.

Edmund stared at the math, following the chains of numbers and algebraic variables up and down and round about until he reached the end of the equation. Tossing the numbers back and forth in his brain, a growing realization bloomed in his mind like the dawning sun.

He had just taken his first class.

Edmund checked his ever-wound watch; Babbages had wandered into the room around five minutes after eleven. Pulling out his notebook, Edmund scratched out the place and time, to remember.

The rest of the blank page beckoned to him.

Grimm’s, he realized, was a puzzle. If collaboration was frowned on in Grimm’s, then the professors wouldn’t give him an education, he was going to have to take it.

Edmund was familiar with such tactics; hunting the halls and looking into darkened rooms. He would listen at doors, eavesdrop on conversations, take every piece of information he could from anyone careless enough to leave it for him to steal. He would fill the page with dates, times, locations, and teachers; and learn from every one.

---

Edmund’s life at Grimm’s became remarkably routine remarkably fast.

If there was anything to blame for this beyond a natural British inclination towards cultivating familiarity, it was the regimented nature of a proper Upper-Class Education. Meals were served on the dot. Curfew was rigidly enforced. Lights-out had no flexibility. The professors, if they could be found, either ignored the student body entirely or tended towards a reluctance to teaching that bordered on paranoia.

Edmund made the mistake of asking for help only once, when he saw Headmaster Lynch walking down the hallway.

“Master Edmund,” the Headmaster replied, “In all my years as Dean of Methods at Grimm’s School for the Erratically Gifted, I have never seen a student, nor professor for that matter, who required something they were not able to provide themselves.” Headmaster Lynch raised his hand like a priest pronouncing a blessing. “Any student worthy of the name is perfectly capable of finding the answer to their questions without resorting to the lazy and ineffective tool of linguistic interrogatives. There are countless opportunities to find the information you seek, if you open your eyes and your brain.”

Edmund’s brain was plenty open, as were his eyes, but he had never thought asking questions was lazy. Indeed, formulating the words and phrases that jumbled about in his brain like a thunderstorm into a sentence that not only made sense to him, but also to his listener, was exhausting.

Edmund was persistent, however, and once he understood how Grimm’s worked, he realized that classes were going on all the time. Professors appeared in rooms and began to talk, write on chalk-boards, or fiddle with strange equipment. It was the student’s responsibility to find the right time, the right room, and the right professor. Grimm’s had no place for lazy students. If you didn’t want to find a teacher, they didn’t want you in the room.

They didn’t make it simple, either. The professors’ schedules were erratic, unique, and complex. Edmund often overheard some of the other students complaining about the irregularity of their classes, a complaint that Edmund didn’t understand. Professor Flytwitch’s Heathen Geometries class, for example, took place every third day, skipping every day that followed Professor Floringhast’s Eccentric Botanies, which took place every twenty-two hours except for every sixth class, which took place after fifteen hours. What was so difficult?

Before his first month at Grimm’s was complete, Edmund had organized his own little routine to keep himself knee deep in education. He had learned the times and locations of twenty separate classes, including one on poetry.³ Some he found by stalking other students, others he found by hiding in empty rooms and waiting.

He settled on taking seven classes: Absurd Taxonomies, Euclidian Economics, The Philosophy of Physionomy, Impractical Chemistries, Advanced Histories, Distant Sociologies, and The Fundamentals of Atmospheric Electromagnatism. It was relaxing to sit in a room and listen to intelligent adults recite lessons, stare at instruments, or muse over theories. He even learned a few things.

In the evenings, he ate a simple dinner of gruel⁴ in the dining room, and spent the rest of the evening in the Library working on class work, either his or Victrola’s.

He worked until lights-out, or — as was more often the case — long after. He had become so used to the giant clock in Moulde Hall sounding out the hours of the day through his bones that he had a tendency to lose track of time without it.

When at last his body and brain could bare it no longer, he pulled his aching bones out of the library and staggered to his bed, getting at least four hours of sleep every night.

As for his necessities; a quick journey into Mothburn along with efficient application of his stash of hidden money had procured him stationary, clothing, and a few essentials; enough to make his education bearable if not comfortable. He composed letters to Matron, the Founding Families, and other notable nobilities at least once a week.

Edmund was not alone in placing importance in letters, and as such there was a reassuring regularity to their exchange. Every Monday, Fairly Carver stood on a chair in the common room of Altmore House and shouted out names while tossing letters and packages. Edmund waited patiently as the boys and girls of Altmore house filtered away with their packages and letters until he was the only one left.

Fairly inevitably still held one pitch black letter in his hand. He would shudder as he looked at the name, and glance around the room, his gaze flowing over Edmund like water off a mallard’s back before tossing the letter on the table and leaving. Edmund wasn’t perturbed; he was used to the causal unawareness he elicited in people when he wasn’t trying to keep their attention.

Each of Junapa’s letters had no more than a platitude or two, some banal piece of news from the outside world, and a chess move. If anyone had peeked over Edmund’s shoulder, it would have been rather sad how little his relative wrote to him.

To Edmund, it was everything he needed. The chess game moved on as pieces were threatened, protected, and captured. Tiny threads of information buried in the trite sentences gave Edmund a vivid picture of the outside world. Pontificates and preachers were guiding the world towards their own visions, while the rich and powerful spread their money like gamblers at a card table. The lower-classes were becoming edgy and loud, filling their drinking-halls with grumbling and fistfights. South Dunkin was getting worse. The church was getting louder. Perhaps worst of all, the King was starting to pay attention.

It was nothing that really mattered, at least not to Edmund, but it was interesting all the same. He always replied promptly and courteously, his own messages buried equally deep. After all, he was surrounded by the children of kings, queens, and other nobility.

After he finished writing Junapa’s letter, he always wrote a letter to Matron, detailing everything that happened to him as explicitly as he dared. He knew she would likely already know half of what he wrote, but there was no telling which half, so he played it safe and told her everything. She never wrote back.

---

In is in the vein of subtext — specifically, the subtext of the events that followed in Edmund’s life — that we must discuss The Revelation.

Scholars of Edmund’s life use the term to define a single moment, a specific realization had by the young heir during his first year. Indeed, his entire life could be separated into the Before and After portions, revolving around this profound understanding.

In a more immediate sense, Historians accept⁵ The Revelation led to the upheaval of the entire city, and indirectly leading to the Social Reformation Act of 1851 and eventual establishment of Mothburn as the third most powerful city in the British Empire.

This is not to say The Revelation was about to occur in Edmund’s life. It was not. But many scholars agree⁶ that The Revelation could have struck Edmund as early as October the second, were it not for a single fateful event that happened to Edmund after only one month at Grimm’s, on September the twenty-third.

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