:Watching isn’t the same as playing.: Would Mical just end up in a bed next to Harrow in the next day or two?

:Eloran is getting some special coaching, this minute,: Kantor told him. :This business is half the Companion’s job, remember. And Eloran is a lot faster than Harrow’s Companion.:

Another shock; this was a day full of them. :I thought all of you were fairly equal—:

:Oh, no. Not that any of us is the Companion equivalent of Myste—: There was a snicker in that, and Alberich could hardly blame him. Poor Myste! By now she was so notorious that Selenay just had a page assigned to her to follow around behind her, picking up the things she dropped and gathering up the things she put down and forgot. Well, she might forget where she left her spare pair of lenses; she never forgot a fact, a law, or a precedent.

:Some of us have different priorities,: he replied truthfully.

:As do we. At any rate, Eloran is a little nimbler than Lekaron, with slightly better reactions. That should make up for lack of experience.: But he detected a hint of doubt in Kantor’s mind-voice, and oddly enough, that comforted him. If Kantor was having feelings of guilt, at least it meant that Alberich wasn’t being overly nice about this situation.

:They’re terribly young,: he said gloomily.

:Lavan Firestorm and his Companion weren’t any older.:

:And Lavan never got the opportunity to grow any older.:

Kantor was silent for a moment. :Lavan never really got the opportunity to volunteer. Mical did.:

There was that. But could someone that young have any real idea of what he was volunteering for? Bad enough to take the Trainees he had—all adolescents to one extent or another thought they were immortal, that death was something that happened to someone else; the older lot at least were well aware that they could be horribly hurt. But fifteen-year-olds truly thought that they were immortal, yes, and invulnerable, that even injuries would nod and pass on by. And in spite of what he’d seen, was this truly informed consent?

:When do you trust someone?: Kantor asked, seemingly out of the blue.

:Excuse me?:

:When do you trust someone? Is it by age, or maturity? What is the magic number? When do Trainees start to think like adults?:

He understood what Kantor was saying, of course, and his head agreed with it. Mical had been there on the worst day the team had experienced. He’d watched them for two moons at least. And he’d evidently learned some sobering lessons in the glassworks.

He’d shown every sign of acting in a measured and mature fashion this afternoon. So when did Alberich stop doubting and start trusting?