First Test Read Online Free PDF

the door. Once they had walked into the hall, she took the key from Kel and went about her business, nodding to the boys as they emerged from their rooms.
    Kel stood in front of her door and clasped her hands so no one could see they shook. Suddenly she wanted to turn tail and run until she reached home.
    Wyldon was coming down the hall. Boys joined him as he passed, talking quietly. One of them was a boy with white-blond hair and blue eyes, set in a face as rosy-cheeked as a girl's. Kel, seeing the crispness of his movements and a stubbornness around his mouth, guessed that anybody silly enough to mistake that one for a girl would be quickly taught his mistake. A big, cheerful-looking redheaded boy walked on Wyldon's left, joking with a very tall, lanky youth.
    A step behind the blond page and Wyldon came a tall boy who walked with a lion's arrogance. He was brown-skinned and black-eyed, his nose proudly arched. A Bazhir tribesman from the southern desert, Kel guessed. She noticed several other Bazhir among the pages, but none looked as kingly as this one.
    When the training master halted, there were only five people left in front of doors on both sides of him: four boys and Kel. Her next-door neighbor, a brown-haired boy liberally sprinkled with freckles, bowed to Wyldon. Kel and the others did the same; then Kel wondered if she ought to have curtsied. She let it go. To do so now, after bowing, would just make her look silly.
    Wyldon looked at each of them in turn, his eyes resting the longest on Kel. "Don't think you'll have an easy time this year. You will work hard. You'll work when you're tired, when you're ill, and when you think you can't possibly work anymore. You have one more day to laze. Your sponsor will show you around this palace and collect those things which the crown supplies to you. The day after that, we begin."
    "You." He pointed to a boy with the reddest, straightest hair Kel had ever seen. "Your name and the holding of your family."
    The boy stammered, "Merric, sir—my lord. Merric of Hollyrose." He had pale blue eyes and a long, broad nose; his skin had only the barest summer tan.
    The training master looked at the pages around him. "Which of you older pages will sponsor Merric and teach him our ways?"
    "Please, Lord Wyldon?" Kel wasn't able to see the owner of the voice in the knot of boys who stood at Wyldon's back. "We're kinsmen, Merric and I."
    "And kinsmen should stick together. Well said, Faleron of King's Reach." A handsome, dark-haired boy came to stand with Merric, smiling at the redhead. Wyldon pointed to the freckled lad, Esmond of Nicoline, who was taken into the charge of Cleon of Kennan, the big redhead. Blond, impish Quinden of Marti's Hill was sponsored by the regal-looking Bazhir, Zahir ibn Alhaz. The next pairing was the most notable: Crown Prince Roald, the twelve-year-old heir to the throne, chose to show Seaver of Tasride around. Seaver, whose dark complexion and coal-black eyes and hair suggested Bazhir ancestors, stared at Roald nervously, but relaxed when the prince rested a gentle hand on his shoulder.
    Only Kel remained. Wyldon demanded, "Your name and your fief?"
    She gulped. "Keladry of Mindelan."
    "Who will sponsor her?" asked Wyldon.
    The handsome Zahir looked at her and sniffed. "Girls have no business in the affairs of men. This one should go home." He glared at Kel, who met his eyes calmly.
    Lord Wyldon shook his head. "We are not among the Bazhir tribes, Zahir ibn Alhaz. Moreover, I requested a sponsor, not an opinion." He looked at the other boys. "Will no one offer?" he asked. "No beginner may go unsponsored."
    The blond youth at Wyldon's side raised a hand. "May I, my lord?" he asked.
    Lord Wyldon stared at him. "You, Joren of Stone Mountain?"
    The youth bowed. "I would be pleased to teach the girl all she needs to know of life in the pages' wing."
    Kel eyed him, suspicious. From the way a few older pages giggled, she suspected Joren might plan to chase her away,