It was the tenth rejection to come by paper bird that day. Thavma sat in her ex-boyfriend’s (ex-ex boyfriend? Too soon to tell) studio apartment and crumpled the rejection letter in her hands, tossing it to the floor to be with the rest of them littered about her side of the room.
The admissions department of Votlittle’s Institute for Magical Understanding had perhaps spent more time applying the wax seal to the damn paper than they did reading her application. She didn’t want to go there. She’d wanted to be admitted as a researcher at Candlekeep, or Blackstaff, or any number of the prestigious institutions. You’d think saving the world twice-over from a demon invasion would be enough to get one of these colleges to bite. Maybe her academic record (such as it was) wasn’t enough for a place like the Conclave of Silverymoon, and that was understandable. But Votlittle’s – shabby ol’ Votlittle’s – was a slap in the face.
The door opened and shut behind her. Ardwaithe was there, arms full of the shopping he’d gone out and done. He had a large bouquet of flowers under one arm, and a cake box in his hands. He lifted the lid to reveal the writing: CONGRATS, SMARTY PANTS.
His face fell when he saw hers.
“It’s still lunchtime,” he said, quickly shutting the cake lid and putting the shopping away. “They call it Admissions Decision Day, not Decision Morning.”
She tried to smile, but it came out all wrong. Her face leaked, and in an instant Ardwaithe was at her side, gathering her up in his arms, holding her tight, saying whatever he could think of to fix the problem.
“You’re the best spellcaster I know,” he said. “You’re overqualified. You could teach these classes, probably.”
But the schools didn’t care about experience or brilliance or merit. They cared about credentials and connections, arbitrary qualifiers and obscure requirements. It was something Ardwaithe, the son of a famous wizard and a Conclave dropout, was well aware of. The bullshit of academia, impenetrable and unapproachable. But did it have to be?
“Hells, why don’t you teach these classes?” he said aloud.
Thavma sniffed and looked up at him. The idea was so stupid it shocked her out of her sobbing.
“If they don’t think I’m qualified to learn, they certainly don’t think I’m qualified to teach,” she said. “That was the whole point – if anyone is going to hire me, I need to get into one of these programs.”
“So hire yourself,” he said. “Your own institution. You call the shots. You decide who’s qualified to teach and who’s qualified to learn.”
“Everyone is qualified to learn,” she snapped at him.
He could tell the cogs were turning in her head now. He knew the look, the one where she had hold of an idea. Now for the finishing blow:
He picked up one of the crumpled pages on the ground and ironed out the folds with a wave of his hand – one of the last parlor tricks he remembered from his studies. He grabbed a quill, and on the blank backside he scribbled in his best cursive: The Thavma School of Magical Arts and Sciences.
He passed it to her, and she wrinkled her nose.
“It would be far too gauche to name my own school after myself,” she said with a grin. “Who do you think I am, fucking Votlittle?”
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