Walter sweated in the sweltering upper reaches of the lecture hall. He leaned over his desk, squinting to see the stage where Professor Malikai paced. There were twenty rows of desks between them, each one a step lower so that the students in one row could see over the heads of those in the next. The roof was glass — triangular panes were held in place by a network of steel struts that cast thin threads of shadow in a geometric web across the entire hall. It let the full force of the sun bear down on the room. The pine wood desks glowed like white hot iron. All that heat rose to the last row, where Walter sat in exile. When the moisture beaded on his brow he wiped it away before it could drip onto his notes and blot the ink. Every one of the professor’s words he missed was another step he fell behind.
Walter had three brothers, all around his age. His mother had given them all the same ultimatum before they left for college: come back with honors or not at all. They had waited to open their letters until they had them all, so they could do it together. They had gathered in their father’s study on a night their parents were out. They passed the letter-opener around in a circle, along with a pilfered bottle of whiskey, and each time one of them opened a rejection, they held it in the candle flame until it burnt to ash. Their giddiness faded as the acceptances came, all to different schools, far flung across the continent. His brothers had been accepted to three of the best in the world. Dun Isle College wouldn’t have made the top fifty. If he didn’t work hard, if he didn’t keep his place in the family, it would mean losing them. He would be alone.
He realized with a start that Professor Malikai had stopped speaking. He cursed himself. His attention had lapsed. Professor Malikai stood in the center of the lecture stage, at a point where the threads of shadow that criss-crossed the hall converged. For a moment he was silent, and the students’ murmurs died. When he spoke, his words filled the hall.
“Hear me, star-watcher! You who hide from the freezing moonlight, who cower away from the blazing sun. I demand your tribute! Summon the darkness to my hand. Make of it a blade to cleave the light!”
The threads of shadow on the stage peeled themselves up and floated into the air. They were drawn inward, gathered together in the air around the professor’s outstretched hand until it was pitch black. The shadows shaped themselves into a leaf bladed short sword. The professor slashed out in front of him. A patch of darkness was left in the sword’s wake, hanging in the air until it faded. A few students gasped, and in another moment the hall erupted into applause. Malikai dispersed the sword, and its shadows flashed back to their proper places. He bowed his head and lifted his hand in mock humility until the clapping subsided.
“The basis of any contract is an exchange, a transaction. Spirits are attracted to their own nature. The star-watcher loves shadows, but if it touches sunlight directly, it causes it great pain. Our contract protects it from the light by giving it a vessel to shelter in.” He raised his walking stick. “In return, it offers me protection whenever I should call on it.” He raised his voice. “You will each be assigned a spirit to research. For next class I want each of you to draft a contract that you think the spirit would accept. When you have your assignment, you are dismissed.”
Ronald, Malikai’s student aide, walked through the rows, handing out a bundle of papers to each student. His uniform was pressed, his tie straight, and a silver watch chain arced from his jacket pocket to the middle button. The only thing about him that wasn’t in perfect order was his red hair, which curled every which way. He handed out a packet to the student nearest to Walter and began his hike through the empty rows. Walter straightened his spine and nodded his respect as Ronald approached. He nodded back, and set the papers on Walter’s desk.
“It’s hot up here. You know it’s much cooler lower down.”
Walter struggled for an explanation. “I’m farsighted. That’s why I’m back here.”
“Don’t they make glasses for that?”
Walter opened his mouth to answer, and shut it again. The papers on his desk had started to flutter in a breeze from nowhere. He slapped his hand down on them to keep them from flying away. Ronald’s eyes went from Walter to the papers and back.
“I like your watch chain,” Walter blurted.
“Oh,” he thumbed the chain, “it was my dad’s when he went here. Is there a window open somewhere?”
“Probably,” said Walter.
Ronald scanned the walls around them. “I don’t see any.”
Walter stood. “Thank you for the homework. I need to go.”
Ronald’s attention snapped back to him. “Hold on, I forgot to tell you. He assigned you a rare spirit, so if you need any help finding the research materials-”
The watch chain was writhing in the air like a snake.
“-you can find me and I’ll show you-”
Walter watched the crown of a silver pocket watch emerge from Ronald’s jacket pocket.
“-where to find everything. It’s pretty strange-”
Half of the face was visible now, the needle-thin second hand drawing a smooth circle.
“-for Malikai to assign something so advanced to-”
The clasp unhooked itself from the suit button, and the chain lifted into the air, drifting toward Walter. He lunged forward, leaning over the desk, and grabbed the end of the chain out of the air. Ronald looked at him, and he froze. The watch had levitated out of the pocket and into the space between them, spinning on a cushion of air. Ronald’s jaw dropped.
“How are you doing that?”
“It’s not me,” said Walter. “I swear-”
Ronald nodded and snatched his watch out of the air. “It must be a stray spirit. Get back, it could be dangerous.”
“I don’t think-”
“Professor?” Ronald called out, but Malikai had already left. “Why does he always run out like that? I’ll go find him.”
“Wait!” But he was already halfway down the stairs. Walter’s stomach twisted itself into a knot. He grabbed his school bag and ran after him. By the time he reached the door, Ronald was out of sight.
He searched the campus, skipping his magical history lecture. If Ronald found Malikai, it wouldn’t matter how hard he studied. The penalty for unauthorized contact with a spirit was immediate expulsion. He scoured the halls, searched the third year dorm, even popped his head into the bathrooms. He found nothing.
✧
Finally, breathing hard and feeling dizzy, he gave up the search. He went to the edge of the island campus, where a steep slope of limestone boulders plunged into a frothy sea. He found an alcove where a pair of giant stones leaned against each other, and nestled inside. His labored breathing echoed between them. For a few minutes he let the roar of the waves wash out his thoughts. Though he should have been sheltered from the wind, it kicked up clouds of chalky dust and made them twirl at his feet. He watched them dully.
He was ruined. Ronald would tell Professor Malikai, who would tell the dean. They would never believe that a wind spirit was just following him around, teasing him for its own entertainment. Spirits didn’t act like that.
He took a deep breath and opened his school bag. He took out a matchbox and a stick of incense. It was rare, and he’d had to trade for it, giving up his favorite silver tie clip. None of his other offerings had worked. He struck a match and held it to the incense until it smoldered. It smelled sickly sweet, of cinnamon and rose.
“O spirit, trickster of the air, uh, prankster of the wind, I make this offering in exchange for a boon. Please spare me your mischief and go bother someone else.”
A sudden gust of wind snuffed out his match just as the flame neared his fingers. Walter wedged the incense into a crack in the rock and sighed.
“They’re going to kick me out. Is that what you want?”
As ever, there was no reply. He didn’t even know if it could speak.
“I could have made some friends. I was starting to, before you showed up.”
The alcove was silent. Walter buried his face in his hands.
“There has to be something I can do.”
If he gave up, his brothers wouldn’t forgive him. They had made a promise to come back home, to stay family, but what could he do? He racked his brain. It was getting late. Professor Malikai might have put off telling the dean until the morning. Walter could still convince him to keep the secret. It wasn’t much of a chance, but it gave him something to hope for. He took a deep breath, stubbed the incense out on the rock, then climbed out of the alcove and began his hike back to campus.
✧
Walter climbed the stairs to the second floor of the faculty building. Windows lined the hallway, looking out on the ocean. A ceiling of dark clouds was blowing in. The sun had already set, but its light shone up from beyond the horizon, making the water below and the clouds above glow fire red. On another day, Walter might have found it beautiful. Now, it seemed like a bad omen. He stopped in front of the professor’s door with his fist poised to knock. The wind kicked up at his feet, tugging backward. Walter took a breath and rapped three times. A moment passed. There was a rattle, and a grinding of metal on metal. The doorknob turned, and the door opened. He stepped through slowly. Suddenly, it shut behind him, making him jump.
The room was dark, and the air was still. The only light came as a dim glow from behind the curtains on the far wall. There were shapes in the darkness. A large desk, a bookshelf, a chair, but no other human form.
“Professor Malikai?” Walter whispered.
He pressed his back against the door and felt along the wall for a light switch. His fingers brushed against something like cold skin. Before he could pull his hand away, the thing had snaked around his wrist. A shudder ran from his fingertips to his spine, and he shook his arm, but the alien limb had tightened like a noose. He rushed forward to the desk and slammed his arm down onto it. The thing flattened like a balloon, then sprung back to shape. At the same time, another tentacle wrapped around his ankle and pulled him off his feet. The floor zoomed up, then lurched away as he was dangled upside down. He groped in the darkness as the room spun around him. What had the professor said to it?
“Hear me, star-watch-”
The darkness shaped itself into a hand and covered his mouth. He bit down on it, but the fingers were soft as cotton. He gagged as they expanded, filling his mouth and making his cheeks bulge. He tried to breathe, but his throat was blocked off. His lungs strained, and he flailed.
Then the wind swept up around him. In an instant, the room filled with silver light. The shadows froze. The curtains had lifted. They hung sideways, rippling in a breeze from nowhere, letting the full moon paint the room silver. The thing holding his ankle broke, and Walter fell to the floor. He clawed away the solid shadows around his mouth and coughed until his throat was raw. Finally he rose, unsteady, to his feet.
His heart was pounding, but the room was perfectly still. A forest of solid shadows was all around him, strange organic shapes, contorted and petrified. Looking at it made his skin crawl. He scrambled to the door. He undid the latch and twisted the doorknob-
And Professor Malikai opened it from the other side. Walter stood frozen. The professor’s eyes widened for a moment, then he shouldered past Walter to flip the light switch. Four lamps at the corners of the office pinged on, white as the sun, and the shadows filling the room all fled to a single point; the black walking stick leaned against the wall by the door. The professor picked it up and walked to his desk, then turned. He took a deep breath and let it out all at once.
“Well. This is troublesome. Close that door and come in. It will behave itself, now that the lights are on.”
Walter did as he was asked.
“We may as well speak frankly,” said Malikai. “You have been attacked by the star-watcher. I’m sure it was very unpleasant. You will surely make a complaint to the administration.”
Walter was still catching his breath. “I hadn’t considered it, professor.”
“Even if that’s true, you would have thought of it soon enough. So we find ourselves in a difficult situation. You need some kind of compensation for your trouble, and I would find it inconvenient if your encounter with the star-watcher became public. I believe we might be able to make a deal.”
“What sort of deal?”
Malikai lifted one hand in a half-shrug. “Whatever it is you need. Better grades. Access to restricted materials. I have significant reach.”
“If the dean found out-”
The professor laughed. “The administration already knows. How could they not? I’ve made bargains with four students before you. Anything’s permissible, as long as it doesn’t threaten the sacred reputation of Dun Isle.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Walter stepped forward. He had to take the chance.
“There is something, professor. What Ronald told you…”
Malikai raised an eyebrow. “The student aide? I haven’t spoken with him today.”
Walter swallowed. He’d gotten to Malikai first. “A spirit has been following me.” He rushed on. “I know the penalty for making an unauthorized contract-”
“This spirit, does it control the wind?”
After a moment, Walter nodded.
The professor drummed his fingers along his desk. “I’ve been searching for that spirit for a long time. It escaped its contract three years ago. For it to show itself to you-” He paused to look at Walter. “I assume you want my help contracting it?”
“No, of course not! I can’t take the chance they’d expel me. I need to succeed here.”
Malikai laughed and shook his head. “I told you already, the administration won’t interfere if it stays quiet. If you want to succeed… Why don’t we make a contract of our own? Become my apprentice. Bring the spirit to heel. I’ll make sure you never have to worry about expulsion again.” He held out his hand. “You only need to give me your word that we’ll keep each other’s secrets.”
It wouldn’t be fair. But he could still feel the star-watcher in his mouth, smothering him. He could still feel the oppressive heat of the back row, the bruised knuckles of his boyhood when he was learning the shapes of letters. One more sacrifice, and it would end.
“You have my word.”
Malikai released his hand. “Excellent.” He opened a drawer of his desk and took out a pen and pad of paper. “Your contract with the stray will need to guarantee good behavior, if you want to keep the spirit secret.”
“That might be difficult. I don’t even know what it wants.”
“I do. It wants to stay with you. Why did you think it showed itself, knowing I might recapture it?” Malikai bent over the desk and started to write. “You will be the incentive. And a punishment for breach of contract… This spirit is fond of human company, so we’ll deny it, a curse that will drive it away from people.”
“Those terms seem too strict.”
“Strict terms are necessary. Any freedom you give it, it will use against you.”
“What about your contract with the star-watcher?”
Malikai tutted. “I didn’t tell the whole story. To be in sunlight is torture for it. What do you suppose would happen if it disobeyed me?” He lifted his walking stick in both hands, clenching his fists around it as if he would break it. “I destroy the vessel, and it is expelled into the light.”
Walter swallowed his shock, and said nothing, but it must have shown on his face.
Malikai set his jaw. “It may seem distasteful, but you’ll come to understand what’s necessary. Spirits are fickle, vindictive things. A contract too gentle, and they will betray you. The star-watcher would surely kill me if it had the chance, but with the threat of sunlight, it would never dare.”
“But it hurt other students. Why keep it, if it’s so dangerous?”
“When the wind spirit escaped me, I was a laughingstock. If I lose another spirit I lose my position.” He fixed Walter with an almost plaintive look. “You should understand. I can’t afford to fail again.”
“You said it wanted to kill you! How could getting fired be worse than that?”
“A necessary concession. Not to accept it would be foolish and cowardly.”
Walter shook his head. “Then I’m a coward and a fool. I won’t make a contract like that.”
“Do you have some other option?”
Walter took a step away from the desk. “There has to be. You and the star-watcher will be at each other’s throats for the rest of your life.”
“No!” Malikai slammed his hand down on his desk. “I will break it, and it will serve me.”
“That’s no better.”
“What will you do, then? Let that stray get you thrown out of here? Spend the rest of your life as a failed mage, shining boots in train stations?”
Walter walked to the door. His heart was pounding.
“If you leave this room, I won’t be able to help you.”
Walter laughed. “Help me end up like you?”
Malikai’s face darkened. He stood. “You had better pack your bags. You’ll be expelled by morning.”
Walter’s stomach turned. “You said they wouldn’t.”
“They will when I tell them to.”
“Then I’ll tell everyone what the star-watcher did to me, to the other students.”
“Four of those students were willing to make deals. The fifth is rotting at some third-rate school by now. It was her word against mine.”
Walter said nothing.
Malikai’s voice came softer. “Make the contract. We can still help each other.”
“I won’t.” said Walter. He turned and opened the door.
“Very well,” said Malikai. “Show him out.”
Walter paused, but nothing happened. He turned around to see Malikai holding the walking stick out in front of him. His face contorted, and he lifted it above his head, then cracked it down on the edge of the desk. The sound made Walter jump.
“Do as I say or I will snap this vessel in half this instant! Show him out!”
He pointed the walking stick again, and a jet of darkness shot out of it, shaping itself into an enormous hand. It pushed Walter’s chest and he stumbled backward until his back was pressed up against the stone wall on the other side of the hallway. It hadn’t been as forceful as before, in the dark. Had the light weakened it, or had it been trying not to hurt him? It receded, pulling the door closed. Just before it shut, Walter saw a thin crack along the length of the walking stick, and a wisp of darkness leaking out.
✧
Walter could feel his heartbeat in his fingertips as he descended the stairs. He flew out the doors and into the cool night air, and into solitude. And he stopped, breathing hard, as he realized what he had done. It was as if he was a red hot piece of iron quenched in water. The rage fled his body and left him cold and dull. The clouds had moved in, steel gray, and covered the moon. He looked across the courtyard to the dorm building. He knew he should pack his bags, but the idea of doing anything on Malikai’s instruction made him sick. He would rather board the ferry with nothing.
The air stirred around him, softly. It moved through his hair and across his face. It was like feeling the world breathing around him. His own breathing slowed, and the dread that had been tightening around his heart loosened, just a bit.
“You saved me from the star-watcher. Thank you.”
The breeze from nowhere swirled around him, then flew away through the tall grass, making blades dance and wave.
“You must have been trying to help earlier, too, to give me the watch chain.”
The wind drew a circle in the grass in front of him.
“Is that a yes? Well you shouldn’t do that. It’s wrong to steal.”
A pebble flew off the ground and flicked into his forehead.
“Hey!” Walter rubbed the spot, then laughed. After a moment, his smile faded. “When I leave here, I’ll really be alone.”
The air grew still.
“Malikai said that spirits are drawn to their own nature. Is that why you chose me? Were you lonely too?”
The breeze traced a circle on the back of his hand.
“Maybe neither of us has to be alone.” Walter listened to the low roar of the ocean. “I don’t know where I’ll go. I can’t go home, and I have no place at Dun Isle. But if we stick together, it might be alright.” A laugh bubbled up. “And maybe I wouldn’t end up shining boots in train stations. So… will you stay?”
The air started to whirl around him, slowly at first, but picking up speed, flattening the grass in a wide circle. It gathered around his right hand and nudged it upward. Walter followed the guidance, lifting his hand, palm facing up. He felt a pressure building in his chest. His lungs were filling with air, though he hadn’t taken a breath. A pinprick of blue light, like a tiny star, appeared in his hand. The wind blew into it, and it flared up, growing larger. Walter breathed into it as well, and the spark opened until it was like a window to the sky. Its color deepened from a pale winter blue to the deep indigo of a summer evening. As the last of the air left Walter’s lungs, it faded away, leaving its image burned into his eyes.
He blinked. “Was that a contract?”
The air drew a sort of wiggly half-circle on his hand.
Walter grinned. “Good. Let’s go pack.”
✧
Walter walked with the wind at his back toward the dorms. He felt light. He could feel the spirit’s presence beside him, like a silent humming in the air. Just knowing it was there brought him a calm that he hadn’t felt since he came to Dun Isle, if not before. Now those weeks of trying to hide it from his classmates felt like a horrible waste. He wished he had known.
His thoughts were broken by the sound of shattering glass. The sound had come from the faculty building. Three windows in a line on the second story had been shattered. Their frames were fanged with jagged shards.
“The star-watcher.”
The air drew a circle on his hand.
Walter took a breath and walked toward the entrance. “I want to free it. Will you help me?”
The wind picked up behind him, pressing against his back. Walter nodded, and ran. With the air carrying him, each step was like flying. He reached the door in seconds and burst through it. A janitor was mopping the floor. Her mouth hung open as he flew past her. Four steps took him up the first flight of stairs, and he did the next in three, then slid to a stop in front of Malikai’s office. The door was lying flat on the floor, trampled and broken in a dozen places, and a trail of scratches and scuffs on the wood floor led down the hallway. Walter followed it, passing the trio of broken windows he’d seen from below.
It ended at a gaping hole in the wall where a window had once been. The damage was fresh; there was still brick dust hanging in the air. Through the hole, Walter saw the southern tip of the island, where it rose to a cliff. A cluster of lights crowned the top of the hill, the village where the faculty and staff lived. A winding gravel road led up to it, and moving along it was a great blob of darkness, the star-watcher. Walter stepped up to the edge, where the broken masonry gave way to air, and looked down to the ground two stories below.
“Will you catch me?”
The air drew a circle on his hand.
Walter took a shaking breath and jumped. The wind surged up below him, carrying him forward until he was nearly above the mass of shadows. In the cloud-filtered moonlight he could see it clearly. There were the legs of cats, dogs, and horses, human arms with coat sleeves and rings on their fingers, wagon wheels, the wings and three-toed feet of birds. They formed a roiling ring around the center, where a shadowy arm held the walking stick, striking the ground with it in a slow rhythm. Each time it struck, a plume of dark smoke issued forth from the crack and merged with the surrounding shadows.
Walter came down behind it, already running when his feet touched the ground. He held his hand out to the side.
“Please, be my sword.”
The air stormed around his hand until he could feel the weight of it. Mist coalesced within it and made the blade visible in swirling wisps of gray. Walter rushed in.
A horse leg kicked out at him from the wall of shadows. He held up the blade and the hoof split itself down the middle. A black lion’s paw swept at his face, and he severed it at the wrist. Before it could form into something new, he pushed forward, holding the blade in front of him, piercing through the darkness until it flowed like water around him, and finally he broke through. There was the walking stick, stamping the ground. He slashed out one more time, slicing the hand off at the wrist, and let go of the sword in time to catch the walking stick before it could fall to the ground.
It shook in his hands like something alive. Black smoke spewed from the crack, surrounding him, becoming tentacles, snakes, thorny briars, and wrapping around him. He barely had time to lift his arms to shield his face. They covered him completely and constricted, pressing thorns and fangs into his flesh. Everything was dark. Walter gasped, and heard the muffled howling of the wind. But he could still speak. That was all he needed.
Walter forced himself not to resist. “I want to offer you a deal.”
The shadows binding him tightened. Walter gritted his teeth.
“I know what he put you through. I understand why you hate him.”
The star watcher’s grip loosened almost imperceptibly.
“But you don’t have to kill him to be free-” he hissed as the darkness twisted against him. “They would hunt you down. You would never be safe. But if you go now, you won’t have to be afraid.”
Stillness.
“I’ll break the stick. If you travel under the water, the moonlight won’t reach you. And someday, you could make a fair contract. Please. Let it end.”
There was a long pause, then the shadows cleared from the air around him, splintering into a hundred thousand needles, each flying back to the blade of grass that had cast it. All that remained was the walking stick in Walter’s hands. The wind sighed. He lifted the stick and brought it down on his knee, snapping it in two. A shadow flitted away from it, across the grass and out toward the sea. Walter walked to the side of the road and sat down. After a moment he let himself fall back into the grass. There were stinging cuts all over him, but exhaustion dulled the pain. A soft wind blanketed him, and he closed his eyes.
✧
He woke to a shadow passing over his face. When he opened his eyes he saw Ronald standing over him, red hair catching the morning light.
“You like sleeping under the stars? Or does your roommate snore that loud?”
Walter blinked and rubbed his eyes. “What time is it?” The ferry had probably left already, and he hadn’t even packed yet.
“Don’t worry about class, it was canceled.” He gave an ironic smile. “Professor Malikai’s on suspension. Apparently his spirit escaped and trashed his office.”
“You’re not upset?”
“Hardly. Malikai was a prick.” He eyed Walter. “I wonder if you know more than I do. I’d love to hear that story.”
“I’m not sure if I should tell it.”
“How about this? You look like you could use some breakfast. I know a patisserie in the village that’ll give you day-olds for free. I get you pastries, you tell your story.”
Ronald reached down to help him up.
Walter smiled, and took his hand. “Sounds like a good deal.”
The fresh sea breeze followed them up the road.
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