Palace of Stone Read Online Free PDF

scholarship. “Once you reach master status, you wear raven’s head—the black robes.”
    “Ha,” Miri said, and then wished she had not.
    “What’s funny?” he asked.
    “Nothing. I was just thinking, clearly the masters are the smartest. This pale blue will show every smudge, but if the masters don’t wash their black robes, no one will notice.”
    “Until you are downwind from one,” he said, fanning his nose.
    Miri smiled. Perhaps scholars were not too serious to laugh.
    “How long does it take to become a master?”
    “Twenty years or so.”
    “Twenty …” She felt her heart plummet. How could she possibly learn enough in only one year? “Wait … If you were here last year, why are you still wearing blue?”
    “I didn’t finish the year out, so I am starting over,” he said, and something in his voice told her he did not want to talk about it.
    They made their way up more stairs than Miri had imagined possible, at last arriving in a chamber of gray stone tiles, wood-paneled walls, and narrow windows overlooking the river. Three dozen scholars in open-sky robes milled about, and Miri was relieved to see a couple nearly as young as she. The sole black wearer in the room, a man of white beard and hair, raised his hand. Everyone quieted.
    “I am Master Filippus. You are either beginning your scholarship at the Queen’s Castle or you are trespassing. If your name is not on my list”—he lifted his paper and made a throaty whine—“I will be forced to send you to the Green for summary execution.”
    Miri thought he was teasing. He had to be teasing. No one laughed.
    “You will tell me your names, and I will check you off the list.”
    Master Filippus waved his hand at the nearest scholar.
    “Hanna Wengerdaughter of Elsby,” she said.
    Master Filippus peered at his paper. “Mmm, your name is present and so it appears you have avoided the ax. For now. Next.”
    After the first dozen names and provinces, Miri lost track. The older boy she’d met was called Timon of Asland. His name she would remember.
    She was gazing at a painting above the fireplace when Timon nudged her. It was her turn.
    “Oh. I am Miri Larendaughter of Mount Eskel.”
    The master’s eyebrows twitched; he was interested in something at last. “Our first student from Mount Eskel. Mmm … And where did you do your preparatory studies?”
    Miri blinked. “My preparatory studies?”
    “Which schools did you attend previously?”
    “Oh, the only school there was. The princess academy.”
    Now everyone seemed interested. Miri smiled nervously, afraid they might have mistaken her for Britta.
    “I was just one of the girls there,” she explained. “Not the princess. I mean, none of us were princesses, obviously. But I wasn’t who Prince Steffan chose for his bride. He chose Britta, so now she’ll be the princess. Not that I mind. I mean … um …”
    Shut it, Miri , she told herself.
    “A graduate of the princess academy,” said Master Filippus. “Tell me, did you study more than just Reading?”
    “Oh yes, we studied everything.”
    “Everything?” He blinked slowly, his lips pursed in scorn. “I’m not acquainted with that subject. Is Everything a science or an art?”
    “Um, I mean, we also studied Commerce, Diplomacy, Geography, Kings and Queens, Poise, and Conversation—”
    Someone snorted, and Miri blushed. Perhaps real scholars did not bother with Poise and Conversation.
    “That is a good beginning,” said Master Filippus.
    Beginning? What other subjects could possibly exist?
    “Of course, in order to graduate to tutor status, one must also have a basis in Mathematics, Science, Engineering, Law, Music and Art, Astronomy, History, Logic, Rhetoric, Theology, and Ethics.”
    “What is Ethics?” she asked. In truth she had never heard of several of the subjects he’d named, but she’d already forgotten the others.
    “Ethics …” He turned his gaze to the painting above the mantel. “I notice your