When the furnishings were in place, the room was left to Mags and Herald Caelen, who had extracted some folded paper and a bit of lead pencil from a pocket, and was writing on it. “All right, Mags, given where you come from, I am going to assume you know practically nothing. Your teachers will find out quickly enough if that is not the case, and will promote you. So, here is the list of your classes.”

He handed over the paper to Mags, who took it, puzzled. “Classes, sir? I’m t’ go to classes?”

Caelen looked at him oddly. “What did you think you were here for?”

Mags shrugged. The truth of the matter was he hadn’t thought about it much because thinking about it only reminded him of how much he couldn’t do. “I dunno, I guess, I figgered . . . work? Diggin’ snow, scrubbing floors, belike?”

“How did you think you were going to become a Herald?”

Mags blinked. “I . . . uh . . . I guess I figgered . . . that was the kind of Herald I’d be. One that does for the others. Some’un t’ do th’ work, aye?” He really hadn’t spent any time dreaming about it at all. Despite all the things that Dallen had shown him, he had never pictured himself doing the things he knew Heralds did. It didn’t seem . . . fitting. After all, what did he know about law and justice, or fighting, or . . . well whatever. He couldn’t do those things. But he could see that the ones that knew how didn’t have to worry about other stuff. After all, hadn’t he taken care of the cooking and cleaning in the Waystations?

Caelen stared at him for a moment then shook his head. “No, Mags, what a Herald does is something no one else can do. And you will be doing that, eventually. But, for right now, you need to learn a great deal before you know how to do those things, so you will be taking classes.”

Mags looked at him dubiously. But all he said was, “But who does do all the cleanin’ and things?” Surely all those people bustling about weren’t here just to take classes?

“We have plenty of people for that, don’t you worry about it.” Herald Caelen chuckled a little.

Mags could only think that it might have been better if they hadn’t had quite so many of those people. If Herald Jakyr had ever learned how to cook, maybe he wouldn’t be trying to eat half-burned stuff all the time now.

He didn’t say that, though, and a moment later, he was glad that he hadn’t when he saw the eye-popping list of things he was supposed to be learning about . . . it seemed utterly impossible. How could anyone get through all these things and not have his head explode from trying to pour learning into it?