Read Online Sworn To Raise: Courtlight #1 by Terah Edun - Free Book Online Page B

up on all the Practicals material Damias had given her.
    The focus of the Practicals shifted between the magical and the mundane every week, which made her happy—she never knew what was next. They had flown through mind-focusing for memory retention, mind-shielding— Note to self: get better at it, Prima kicked your ass today , she thought—and Sahelian texts. This week was mathematics, which she found quite interesting.
    . Damias had also stressed the importance of being able to take over the operation of her Patron’s manor from the start. At the moment, she had to go over a keep’s ledger – the book in which all financial transactions were kept. It included everything from overall maintenance of the building: mason work, caulking, wood floor replacements, to purchase of grain for winter use and payment to household staff members. Next she had to review a merchant’s cost estimate for new upholstery for all of the furniture throughout the entire manor, rework each of the merchant’s estimates, calculate the totals and compare them to the head butler’s own calculations for errors. All she could say was that these nobles must have some truly dodgy financiers. The errors were astronomical and from the inflated figures Ciardis saw once she’d compared the merchant’s cost estimates and the head butler’s figures – it was clear that the head butler was skimming a profit off of the top.
    The comparisons took her close to two hours to complete, and then she lit a lamp to practice some simple katas for her defense tutorials. She worked hard day and night, not just to impress Damias and Serena, but also to ensure that she would be selected by a patron.
    The prospect of the selection haunted her dreams and waking thoughts alike. She had yet to manifest her WeatherVane powers, and no matter how many times she reread the book section that told her the powers would arrive only after her eighteenth birthday—if they ever did—she was still impatient. The what-ifs and doubts clouded her mind, making her belly tense with worry even in slumber. What made it worse was that her eighteenth birthday was just two weeks before the Patron Hunt was set to begin.
    She had two weeks to master her powers— if they came in at all. Not very reassuring.
    She soon noticed that she was throwing off her katas in her worry, and decided to go to bed. Nothing more could be accomplished tonight.
    By the end of the week in her Dance class, even Damias could tell something was wrong. She could see that, but it was equally clear that he had wanted to wait and see if she could overcome whatever was troubling her before asking about it.
    They were dancing a complicated quartet pattern. Serena had been kind enough to provide a set of ghostly partners for each of them.
    As Ciardis wavered for the fifth time under her airy partner’s guidance, Damias, ever the gentleman, signaled that he wanted to change partners. When Damias and Ciardis came together for their dance, the two ghostly partners Serena had provided dissipated as if they’d never been there. The dance of four became a dance of two with Damias leading, holding Ciardis’s left hand high and wrapping an arm around her waist. They eased into a simple two-step and whirled about the ballroom to the tune of a small magical music ball playing violas in the corner. Serena, her job done and her airy visions dissipated, had pulled out a pamphlet and begun to read.
    Ciardis was pretty sure that the previous dance had been invented just to show off the richness of the dancers’ clothing. She was glad it was over. This one was a bit more sedate; at certain parts of the dance when Ciardis was required to look away from her partner, she was able to get a look at Serena’s literature. It appeared to be a lady’s pamphlet on facial powder. I’ll have to ask Serena if I can borrow it , she thought excitedly. Then it struck her like a blow that only a few months before, such a thing would never have