Page 6

“It has to be some mistake. I’ll check after class. We’ll get it rescheduled. Chin up, Ren.”

Ren said nothing. She was used to this by now. It did not matter how brilliantly she performed. It did not matter that her grades were the best in her class. All they saw was a girl who’d come from the Lower Quarter. Dirty or dull or worse. She’d have to prove them wrong. Somehow.

4

The rest of her peers took their seats. Some of them already wore the coats of arms from the various houses, all freshly sewn into their school jackets. It was like they belonged to a club for which Ren couldn’t find the address.

“Let us begin with a story,” Agora was saying. “You’re all familiar with Marcus.”

As he spoke, he turned in slow circles, considering each student. Ren noticed the way that he avoided eye contact with her. Was he embarrassed that his contact had failed him? Or embarrassed that he’d championed the cause of a student they found unworthy of meeting?

“Marcus was one of the greatest blade makers in history, yes? Each of his weapons is more famous than the last. Honed to perfection. He took on many students over the years, but his most famous is Rowan. Do you know that name?”

Ren nodded but was saved from answering as Agora plunged on.

“He studied under Marcus for nearly a decade. Improved so much at his craft that he started to think he was better than his teacher. To prove this, he challenged Marcus. ‘Let us each make a sword. We will bring them to the river. The sharpest blade wins.’ Marcus agreed.

“Both of them took time to make their swords. On the appointed date they met along the banks of the Straywhite River. A neutral judge joined them. Rowan went first. He plunged his creation blade-first into the river. There was nothing it failed to cut. The passing leaves split in two. Great logs were severed. Even the river itself began to part ways at its touch.”

Agora’s strangest and most charming quality was how lost he got in his stories. He’d bellow and whisper and move his hands in great sweeping motions. Sweat always trickled down his forehead. In the longer lectures he’d have great patches showing under his arms. His passion was a buffer, Ren thought. It was one way to ignore Percie half-asleep in the front row or Clyde Winters snorting about something with Mat Tully whenever his back was turned.

“Satisfied, Rowan withdrew his blade. He knew he’d won. How could any blade match the sharpness he’d just displayed? Marcus went next. He plunged his own sword into the river. Drifting leaves came, but at the very last moment they’d dart to the left or right of the blade. The same was true of passing logs and debris. Every time they reached the place where his sword waited, they’d skirt the blade at the last second. Rowan watched and waited. The judge came forward.”

Agora smiled to himself.

“Twenty lines on who won. Begin.”

He used a spotted handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his forehead. There was a shuffle of materials moving from satchels to desks. A few eyes rolled. Percie leaned over to her neighbor, asking what the story had been about. Ren hadn’t noticed which coat of arms the girl was wearing. A hawk clutching a string of pearls between its talons: House Shiverian.

How did you get recruited when I can’t even get an interview?

Annoyed, Ren set to work. She knew the answer to Agora’s question because she’d read the entire historical account. Now she needed to reframe it through some other principle. That’s what her ethics professor enjoyed most. A small shift in perspective earned high marks every time. Thirty minutes later Agora descended once more into the teaching circle.

“Well, who won?”

Ren had learned not to answer first. It was always easier to impress by correcting someone else’s almost-right answer. Clyde Winters opened things up with a lazy hand in the air. Ren knew he was second in line to a massive empire. His family had a monopoly on every medical sector in the city. Not to mention, they also ran most of the cathedrals. Those were the benefits of having ancestors who’d been the only doctors aboard the first ships to sail to Kathor.

“Rowan won,” Clyde said. “The challenge was the sharpest blade. The Pyras theory argues the simplest answer is most often the right answer. Rowan met the challenge, on its simplest terms.”

Agora nodded before signaling for the rest of them to join in. Percie leapt at the chance, all too eager to correct Clyde’s answer. Her being recruited by House Shiverian made them rivals of a sort.

“But that’s not how it goes. Marcus was the winner. After all, his sword would not cut that which was innocent. It’s not enough to be the best at something. If the weapon or the advancement doesn’t take the greater good into account, that just moves society in the wrong direction.”

“Very nearly a direct quote from Age of Reason,” Agora replied. “Anyone else?”

Ren finally raised her hand. Her teacher nodded.

“While Percie’s is the well-worn answer, I think it’s interesting to see how this problem relies on the Beneficent Effect. One agreeable result causes the judge to assume all future results will be agreeable. He believes the sword will always protect the innocent. Which sounds wonderful, but that’s a naive assumption. The problem is that the sword’s moral system can extend only as far as Marcus’s moral system. The leaves floating by in the river were innocent, and thus his sword would not cut them. No one’s going to argue against the moral innocence of a leaf.

“But what happens when the wielder of the sword attempts to kill an enemy soldier? Murder is immoral. Unless you’re defending yourself in battle. But what if the battle you’re fighting is based on an immoral cause? Or the person you’re dueling is your own child? There are so many scenarios in which the sword would be forced to make decisions that our own moral system hasn’t fully categorized as innocent or guilty. It would inevitably fail, because it relies on the morality of the wielder. I’d rather have Rowan’s blade. It’s a tool, and it’s not pretending to be anything else.”

Silence followed her answer. Agora sipped his tea while Percie looked as if she was still trying to figure out if Ren had insulted her. For once, Ren didn’t care what any of them thought. Until now she’d handled her reputation in class with surgical precision. Impress enough that she couldn’t be ignored, but not so much that she became a target. Maybe she’d gotten it wrong. Maybe she’d done just enough to get snubbed. Not enough to force them to take notice.

The wealthiest scions had begun building their entourages, and Ren was quietly being left behind. Percie’s coat of arms was evidence of that. Soon all the good spots would be gone. Rising to power from one of the minor houses would take far too long for what Ren was hoping to accomplish. She needed the attention of the people who mattered.

“Onward,” Agora said, raising a finger. “The focus of this week will be on the correlation between increasing power and moral imperatives. Let’s turn to page seventy-three.…”

It was past time to do something bold.