Mind Forged: Book One of the Enchanters of Xarparion by T Michael Ford

tell you how much I have enjoyed these last two week with you as my apprentice. You’re like the son I’ve always wished for; however, I know it’s not fair for me to keep you cooped up in my hall all your life. After listening to your thoughts as you worked, I have written a new lesson plan for you. Starting tomorrow, I’m giving you two more classes; well one is starting tomorrow and the other three days from now. Anyway, your mornings will be spent on my ‘surprise’ class until noon. You will also need to interact with your fellow students and apprentices; if you hang out with old elves too long, you’ll start acting like one! To fix that, you will now go to lunch at Central every day that you have class. Even though I will miss your cooking very much, it’s for the best. After lunch, you will go to your second class and be back for dinner. At this point, you’re mine and we will continue your training.”
    “ If my first class is a secret, then what is my second?”
    She smiled brightly, showing each and every one of her teeth. “I thought you would never ask! Your second class is weapons and armor smithing!” I thought I was going to die right then and there. She was not only going to let me learn about magic, but smithing as well. This was like a dream come true for me.
    “ I don’t know what to say” was all I could think of. What do you say to someone who made one of your wildest dreams come true and did it out of love and not greed?
    “ You don’t have to say anything. Remember, I can hear your thoughts. But don’t get too excited, you still don’t know what that other class of mine is.”
    “ I don’t care if it’s advanced mathematics; I’ll gladly do that and much more for you. It must not have been easy for you to get me into that class.”
    “ Well, actually, it’s not a class; I just know the master smith here rather well and called in one of the many favors he owes me. But do you really want to repay me for this?”
    I nodded eagerly. “Yes, I’ll do anything!”
    She gave me an evil smirk. “Well, in that case, you can clean the lab today.” All the enthusiasm I had was drained away in seconds. I should have said anything but that!
    By mid afternoon , I had most of the lab cleaned up; that is, until Rosa came in to check on me. The rest of the evening was spent with her running all over the room rediscovering all the things she presumed lost but that were, in fact, buried under a large pile of clutter. And I would have to put it all back, again. We finally finished our little dance of cleaning and re-cleaning just before midnight.
    “ I can’t remember the last time the lab was this clean!”
    “ Probably six hundred ninety-nine years ago” I grumbled under my breath, but even at that low a volume, I forgot the mindreading. She spun around and punched me in the shoulder. “Hey, now that hurt!” I complained. “Remember I don’t have a magical boost to strength yet!”
    “ Yeah, well, you deserved that one!” she said self-righteously. “And I have cleaned the lab before!”
    “ Really? When? And don’t count the times where you tricked someone else into doing it for you.”
    “ Um…well, there’s that time the cockatrice eggs hatched early and I had to hose it all down to clean up all the…Crap! Fine, you win! I don’t clean, ok? I just don’t.”
    “ Then who cleans the main floors?”
    “ Oh, I have housekeepers for that.”
    “ And how many times did you try to get them to clean the lab, too?”
    “ I’ve lost count. They always give me some lame excuse about something blowing up and being too dangerous for humans! I think they were just trying to get out of it; you’re human and you’re still alive after cleaning the place!”
    “ Thanks, I’m going to bed.” Goodnight, crazy lady.
    “ I heard that!”
    The next day, after my normal routine of cooking and tidying up for the seven-hundred-year-old elf who can’t cook or clean, we headed out the