Poor World by Sherwood Smith

from foot to foot.
    â€œRight there is Dejain’s place,” he said, pointing to a building set a little away from the others; it was at the other end of the compound from Kessler’s office. “Perhaps — if you adopt a more cooperative spirit — I might warn you about something important. Have fun.”
    He sauntered off, his boots crunching the tiny rocks in the road.
    I stuck my tongue out until the roots hurt, which only made me feel slightly better.

Four
    Except for being set apart from the other buildings along that street, from the outside Dejain’s building looked like the others.
    The inside was as different from Kessler’s as you could imagine.
    The air was cool, the furnishings pretty, and comfortable. There were fine pictures on the walls between tall shelves of books. Solid gold candleholders gleamed with rich beauty on carved side tables.
    Dejain was even prettier than her surroundings.
    â€œCome in, Cherene Jennet,” she said. Her voice was pretty, too.
    I entered to find a young, slightly built blond woman. I’d guessed Kessler and Alsaes were maybe half-a-dozen years older than Puddlenose or even Rel, no more than ten. This lady seemed closer to Rel’s age, though she was an adult and he wasn’t. Quite.
    â€œMy workroom is back here,” she said, and I followed her trailing pale blue skirts to a magic chamber with the same weird smells and chemical stains that marked Shnit’s and Kwenz’.
    Dejain was an adept at dark magic.
    And I was expected to learn it.
    â€œHave you any questions, child?” she asked, moving behind a worktable. “You won’t mind if I continue with the project at hand?”
    â€œNo,” I said quickly. And then — because I was curious, and it seemed safer than discussing magic — I said, “That Alsaes called me Kessler’s pet. I don’t get it — I just met Kessler yesterday.”
    â€œAlsaes,” Dejain said, and she laughed softly, a pleasant sound. “He’s Kessler’s oldest friend. Not very smart, so he’ll never see that he’s as high as he is only out of Kessler’s absurd sense of loyalty. But since that Sherwood boy failed him — just as well, for he knows nothing of magic — it seems that Kessler has selected you as a possible heir.”
    â€œA what?”
    â€œSurely you understood that?” Dejain looked at me with a kind of amused surprise. “Kessler is not known for convoluted speaking.”
    â€œUm, everything is so new, I am having trouble understanding it all,” I mumbled. “And I didn’t sleep well last night.”
    â€œAh.” One of her brows lifted slightly, and I knew that she added meaning to my comment about sleeping. But she didn’t say anything.
    So I went back to the subject that interested me most. “Why me? Because Shnit hates me?”
    â€œThat was certainly a priority, and it would explain Kessler’s sense of betrayal, and his anger, when the Sherwood boy turned him down, especially after the refusal of the tall one. What’s his name? Rel. Coming from a humble background, working hard to become so skilled. Everything Kessler wants in his leaders, yet Rel refused adamantly. You can see how that would infuriate Kessler. He does not like his gifts turned down.”
    Puddlenose hadn’t told me that. So he held things back out of embarrassment, too. And of course Rel had just sat there and Relled at me.
    â€œThen there is the fact that you appeared out of nowhere and rose, in an admirably short time, to the right hand of your queen — learning magic along the way, even if it’s the weak version of magic called ‘white’. All this indicates brains, hard work, dedication. Qualities that Kessler values. Then of course is Shnit’s tremendous loathing for you and the rest of your Mearsiean friends. And added to that is the fact that you look alike —