Master Rufus went over to a small kitchen area. Above an odd-looking stove with circles of stones where burners usually went, he reached into a cabinet and brought down three empty wooden plates. “We generally find it better to let new apprentices settle in their rooms the first night instead of getting overwhelmed in the Refectory, so you’ll eat here this evening.”
“Those plates are empty,” Call pointed out.
Rufus reached into his pocket, bringing out a package of bologna and then a loaf of bread, two things that couldn’t possibly have fit in there. “So they are. But not for long.” He opened the bologna and made three sandwiches, placing each one on a plate and then carefully cutting them in halves. “Now picture your favorite meal.”
Call looked from Master Rufus to Tamara and Aaron. Was this some kind of magic that they were supposed to be doing? Was Master Rufus suggesting that if you pictured something delicious while you ate a bologna sandwich, the bologna would taste better? Could he read Call’s mind? What if the mages had been monitoring his thoughts the whole time and —
“Call,” Master Rufus intoned, making him jump. “Is anything the matter?”
“Can you hear my thoughts?” Call blurted out.
Master Rufus blinked at him once, slowly, like one of the creepy lizards on the Magisterium ceiling. “Tamara. Can I read Call’s thoughts?”
“Mages can only read your thoughts if you’re projecting them,” she said.
Master Rufus nodded. “And by projecting, what do you think she means, Aaron?”
“Thinking really hard?” he answered after a moment.
“Yes,” said Master Rufus. “So please think very hard.”
Call thought about his favorite foods, going over and over them in his mind. He kept getting distracted by other stuff, though, stuff that would be really funny if he pictured. Like a pie that was baked inside a cake. Or thirty-seven Twinkies stacked in the shape of a pyramid.
Then Master Rufus brought up his hands, and Call forgot to think of anything. The first sandwich began to spread, tendrils of bologna unfurling, coils growing across the plate. Delicious smells rose from it.
Aaron leaned in, clearly hungry despite the chips he’d eaten on the bus. The bologna coalesced into a plate, a bowl, and a carafe — the bowl was full of macaroni and cheese covered in bread crumbs, steaming as though it had just come out of an oven; the plate held a brownie heaped with ice cream; and the carafe was full of an amber liquid that Call guessed was apple juice.
“Wow,” Aaron said, astonished. “It’s exactly what I pictured. But is it real?”
Master Rufus nodded. “As real as the sandwich. You might recall the Fourth Principle of Magic — You can change a thing’s shape but not its essential nature. And since I didn’t alter the food’s nature, it was truly transformed. Now you, Tamara.”
Call wondered whether that meant Aaron’s mac and cheese would taste like bologna. But at least it appeared Call wasn’t the only one who didn’t remember the principles of magic.
Tamara stepped forward to take her tray as her food formed. It held a big plate of sushi with a lump of green stuff on one end and a bowl of soy sauce on the other. With it was another plate with three round pink mochi balls. She’d received hot green tea to drink and actually looked happy about it.
Then it was Call’s turn. He reached for his tray skeptically, not sure what he would find. But it really did hold his favorite dinner — chicken fingers with ranch dressing for dipping, a side bowl of spaghetti with tomato sauce, and a peanut butter sandwich with cornflakes for dessert. In his mug was hot chocolate with whipped cream and colored marshmallows dotted over the top.
Master Rufus looked pleased. “And now, I leave you to settle in. Someone will be along soon with your things —”
“Can I call my father?” Call asked. “I mean, is there a phone I could use? I don’t have one of my own.”
There was a silence. Then Master Rufus said, more gently than Call expected, “Cellular phones don’t work in the Magisterium, Callum. We’re too far below ground for that. Nor do we have landline phones. We use the elements to communicate. I would suggest we give Alastair some time to calm down, and then you and I will contact him together.”
Call bit back any protest. It hadn’t been a mean no, but it was a definite no. “Now,” Master Rufus went on, “I expect the three of you up and dressed at nine tomorrow — and furthermore, I will expect you to be sharp-witted and ready to learn. We have much work to do together, and I would be very sorry if you didn’t live up to the promise you showed at the Trial.”
Call guessed that he meant Tamara and Aaron, since if he lived up to his promise, it would mean setting the underground river on fire.
After Master Rufus left, they sat down on stalagmite stools at the smooth stone table to eat together.
“What if you get ranch dressing on your spaghetti?” asked Tamara, glancing at Call’s plate with her chopsticks poised in the air.
“Then it will be even more delicious,” said Call.
“Gross,” said Tamara, dabbing her wasabi into her soy sauce, without splashing a drop outside the dish.
“Where do you think they got fresh fish for your sushi, since we’re in a cave?” Call asked, popping a chicken finger in his mouth. “Bet they took a net down to one of those underground pools and nabbed whatever came up. Glurp lurp.”
“Guys,” said Aaron in a long-suffering way. “You’re putting me off my macaroni.”
“Glurp lurp!” said Call again, closing his eyes and waving his head back and forth like an underground fish. Tamara picked up her food and stalked over to the couches, where she sat down with her back to Call and began eating.
They finished the rest of their food in silence. Despite hardly having eaten all day, Call couldn’t finish his dinner. He pictured his father at home, eating at the cluttered kitchen table. He missed all of it, more than he’d ever missed anything.
Call shoved back his tray and stood up. “I’m going to go to bed. Which one is mine?”
Aaron leaned back in his chair and looked over. “Our names are on the doors.”
“Oh,” Call said, feeling foolish and a bit creeped out. His name was there, picked out in veins of quartz. Callum Hunt.
He went inside. It was a luxurious room, much bigger than his room at home. A thick rug covered the stone floor. It was woven with the repeating patterns of the five elements. The furniture seemed to be made of petrified wood. It shone with a sort of soft golden glow. The bed was huge and covered with thick blue blankets and big pillows. There was a wardrobe and a chest of drawers, but since Call had no clothes to put away and no stuff coming, he flopped down on the bed and put the pillow over his face. It only helped a little bit. Out in the common room, he could hear Tamara and Aaron giggling. They hadn’t been talking like that before. They must have been waiting for him to leave.
Something was poking into his side. He had forgotten about the dagger his father had given him. Pulling it out of his belt, he looked at it in the torchlight. Semiramis. He wondered what the word meant. He wondered if he would spend the next five years alone in this room with his weird knife while people laughed at him. With a sigh, he dropped the knife onto the bedside table, kicked his feet under the blankets, and tried to go to sleep.