I Sing the Body Electric
It startled her the first time Brid heard someone humming in the halls on the way to class.
Well, it wasn’t the humming that startled her; it was the song. She hadn’t heard it in years; she couldn’t even remember the title; “Follow the Sparrow,” or something like that. But Brid knew it was one of the songs her father refused to play, even while in the North. It was too incendiary, too revolutionary. Father said that if he played it in the South, he would get arrested and if he played it in the North, he’d have old men who fought in the uprising yelling at him for trivializing their pain.
But this boy who passed Brid in the hall, he was humming it like it was a normal song. Like it didn’t have horribly violent lyrics. Like there was no conflict in the world at all.
And just like that, Brid was raging mad. She’d been at the Law School for a week, and already she’d noticed how ignorant the other students are. Oh, they knew more about Law than she knew even existed, but they knew nothing outside of their tiny academic world. They were all privileged and wealthy, and the ones who were there on scholarship acted like they were so they didn’t stand out.
Brid stood out. She didn’t mean to, but riding up the day before classes began with the Adon as her escort got the others’ attention. Once they found out that her brother was the Earl of South Dales, they wouldn’t stop looking at her. Although it wasn’t quite looking; since she got there, she could see the students sizing her up. It reminded her of looking at crowds in a village square and deciding what music they’ll like. The students were trying to decide if she could be a part of their world.
Brid wasn’t entirely sure that she wanted to be.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
Law School was her idea. They’d been discussing options for Moril and Brid after they got to Hannart.
Moril had already made the decision to go on with Hestefan. Brid knew she should want join him (she was a Singer, after all. It was supposed to be in her blood), but she was so enchanted with Hannart and all the simple things she had missed, like always having a real bed, that she knew she needed a break from travelling. Brid explored her options and leaving Hannart for schooling appeared to be the best. Keril’s advisers kept pushing her towards finishing schools, something that would be “useful” and “unchallenging.” They kept pointing out that she could continue her musical training at these schools.
But Brid didn’t want that. She wanted an education, even if it meant an extended break from music. So she picked the hardest school in Dalemark. The Gardale Law School.
Her family thought that it was a wonderful idea (with the exception of Moril, who just looked at her sadly in a way that made her feel like she was betraying him), so with their blessing, she took the entrance exams and, most likely with the help of Keril (she hates to admit), she was enrolled into the school.
Now…she didn’t wish that she had picked the finishing schools instead, but she did find herself hating the Law School. The students were prigs. The teachers thought she was stupid. There was far too much work to be done. She missed her family and she missed the constant stream of new people that were always coming into Keril’s house in Hannart. Instead, she was stuck with these same people for the next five years.
But that prospect became slightly more bearable when, three weeks into her first term, she made a friend. Her name was Robin, she was from Abereth, she was popular with the other students, and in Introduction to Law Class, she stood up for Brid after she said something (admittedly, incredibly) stupid.
Brid had not done the reading, so she said that Kotalson had won the case when he had actually lost it, creating an important legal precedent that was still used in the courts today.
Some girls behind her started giggling and making rude comments. Brid felt her face flare up, but she didn’t say anything. There was no reason not to start a fight, especially while she was still the new girl.
The girl sitting in the seat next to her, Robin, turned around and said “Would you be quiet? You’re being rude to her,” with a gesture towards Brid, “and you’re keeping me from hearing the lecture.”
The girls quieted down very quickly, and Robin smiled at Brid, who smiled gratefully back.
They walked out of class together. Brid wasn’t sure what to say and was glad when Robin asked “What class are you going to?”
“Theory.”
“Oh, I’m in that too!”
Before she could stop herself, Brid said “Doesn’t the professor look like an owl?”
She put her hands up to her mouth right after it came out, mortified. But Robin just laughed, a beautiful, musical laugh (Brid couldn’t stop herself from wondering what sort of singing voice she had) and they spent the walk to their classroom quietly giggling about all the professors in the school.
And with that, Brid made her first ally.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
She received a letter from Kialan letting her know that he would pick her up at Sending Day. Brid wasn’t sure how she felt about that; she was excited to see Kialan, but she wasn’t sure what he would be like after their time apart. She had only spent a half-term at the school, so it wasn’t like it had been years since seeing him; but everything about being with Kialan had been so rushed. Even their time together in Hannart had been a blur. She wasn’t sure what it would be like to be around him now that things had slowed down.
The same morning she received the letter, one of the older girls came around to their breakfast table and asked for a list of who would be participating in Griddling.
Brid asked what it was but before the girl could answer, Robin said, “It’s barbaric, that’s what it is.”
The girl glared at Robin and moved down the table. Robin leaned across and told Brid, “It’s supposed to be a game, but I’d call it a massacre. Everyone is put onto teams and then they fight each other. There are always at least ten broken ankles by the time it’s over.”
That sounded horrifying. “But why do they play it,” Brid asked.
Robin shrugged. “Why do they do anything around here? It’s tradition. Mind you, this one dates back to Hern’s time.”
Brid told herself that she should find out the importance of Griddling (because even if she didn’t completely love the school, she loved learning about its history), but it was quickly forgotten in the rush of examinations. By the time Sending Day came, she had completely forgotten about it until Robin asked if she was coming.
“Where?” Brid was concentrating more on finding Kialan. He hadn’t arrived yet and she was starting to worry.
“Griddling,” Robin shrugged. “It’s a requirement that we at least attend the ceremony.” Noticing Brid’s worried look, she added, “You’ll have better luck finding Kialan in there. He’s bound to attend as well.”
The room was absolutely packed with parents and other students. Everyone was chatting animatedly. Even Robin admitted that the atmosphere was lively. But her grin turned to a frown when the game started and Brid could see why.
It was an absolute melee. Apparently there were teams, but Brid could barely track them. She supposed there was a purpose to the game, but she couldn’t see it. It was just…violence. And all for the sake of being violent. All she could see were people tearing at each other, the bodies beginning to pile up. So many people would be hurt for such a stupid reason. People always got hurt for stupid reasons. The sounds of hooves and falling rocks started to echo in her head …
Without a word, she ran out of the hall, pushing Robin away when she tried to follow. She ran out into the sunshine and slumped against a wall, trying to control her breathing. She was in Gardale, she reminded herself. All of the unpleasantness was behind her now.
A shadow fell over her. Brid looked up and was shocked to see Kialan standing above her.
“Griddling,” he asked.
“Flenpass,” she said, by way of a response. Kialan came to sit close next to her. She took a deep, shuddering breath and laid her head on his shoulder.
They stayed like that until Griddling was over.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
Brid was excited when Hildrida Navissdaughter came to the Law School in the late fall. At the very least, it meant that someone had arrived at Gardale under odder circumstances than her own.
And, like many of the other students, she really wanted to meet the legendary Hildrida. She was an earl’s granddaughter who sailed through the Holy Isles, met those odd Southern gods that they have, all while in the company of a young man who may or may not be the savior of Dalemark.
Not that Brid put a lot of stock in those stories.
But once Hildrida showed up, Brid wished she had never come. She embodied all the qualities that Brid hated about the Law School; she was snobby, selfish, talked too much in class, and tried to become friends with all the professors.
Luckily, it seemed as though Brid’s opinions of Hildrida were shared by the other students (though it was probably too much to hope that this was a glimmer of self-awareness on the part of the student body). After a month, the only friend Hildrida had was Biffa, a girl who was too nice to avoid her like everyone else did.
Brid supposed she should feel bad for Hildrida. After all, her grandfather had been Earl of Holand and there was rumor that she had been forced into an engagement as part of a political plot. And even if there hadn’t been anything particularly spectacular about it, she had sailed up the whole coast of Dalemark. She couldn’t have had an easy life. This was probably just her way of assimilating.
But then she would do something like scoff at Robin for being silly in the halls or giggle when Brid got a question wrong (even though Brid had been doing much better in her classes; she was even third in her oral comprehension class) and the sympathy would vanish.
Brid didn’t try to think about whether this hardening against Hildrida was making her more like her classmates.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
Winter came and went quickly. Brid was surrounded by classes and friends who helped to pass the time. There were snow ball fights outside the One’s Chapel (which, her friend Garren explained to a professor who tried to stop them, was not sacrilegious. The One would support their celebration of Dalemark and its weather) that made the school seem more like a home than just a series of dormitories and classrooms.
It pained Brid to admit it, but by the time spring examinations came around, she had started to feel truly comfortable at the Law School.
She was always quick to remind herself of how much she missed her family and Singing and travelling across Dalemark. And she did miss all of those things. And she still did strongly dislike half of the school’s population. But she also found herself wondering what she would do over the summer holidays without having classes to go to. Things had been bad enough the year before when she had been hesitant about going back to the Law School. Now Brid would have rather stayed in Gardale and taken more classes than gone home (for she supposed that’s what Hannart was).
All of these thoughts felt like a betrayal. She tried to imagine what her father would have thought if he could see her. She hoped that he would be proud of her and all she’s accomplished. But she had no way of knowing.
As much as Brid wanted back into that old life, she had to admit that she was a part of the Law School. She had friends. She did well in her classes; she was even becoming known around school for being one of the best students (weak start to her education notwithstanding). She worried what it would be like to go back to Singing after spending so much time in this world.
She tried to push the guilty thoughts out of her head; she had examinations coming up and failing would only complicate her life more.
So Brid studied harder than she had before. She flew through her written examinations with ease (with the exception of her theory test). But it was her oral examination that she really excelled at. She presented a ten-minute argument without ever stumbling over her words and her voice only wavered once.
As she left, she heard her professors talking about her. She couldn’t help her curiosity and lingered outside the door in order to listen in on their conversation.
“She’s such an amazing student--”
“-accomplished so much in her time here--”
“How did she--?”
“She used to be a Singer.”
Brid’s heart fell out of her chest and onto the floor. She wanted to run back into the room and yell that she still was a Singer, that she would never be a Lawwoman, that all this was a horrible denial of her heritage.
She knew there was no way she could do that. Instead, she ran to the dormitories, found Robin, and asked that she follow her.
Brid had made a lot of friends at the Law School, but Robin was the only one she truly trusted. And given that Robin didn’t ask where they were going and just followed Brid down to the room One’s Chapel, Brid knew that Robin trusted her too.
In the shadowy room, for the first time in almost a year and with an audience of one, Brid sang.
She only sang the scales, but that somehow seemed purer than a song. For the first time in months, she felt truly alive in a way that she hadn’t even known she had missed. Brid sang until she reached the highest note and only stopped when she ran out of air.
She took a deep breath and looked up at Robin. Robin was looking back at her, her mouth slack. Slowly, she moved forward and then embraced Brid.
“You’re amazing,” she whispered.
Brid wasn’t sure if she wanted to smile or cry as she hugged Robin. But she did know that all she wanted out of life was some way to take the stony academics and history of the Law School and combine it with the warm story-telling of music.
And she wouldn’t rest until she did it.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
She had almost finished her first full year at the Law School before she realized that Kialan was in love with her. Worse, she needed Robin to tell her.
Once Robin had mentioned it (over breakfast, after she had seen a letter from him and remarked “It will be a relief to us all when he finally marries you”), she spent the following week feeling absolutely terrified. Kialan was not in love with her. He could not be in love with her. It was wrong. Because he was the Adon, and even if she was the sister of an Earl, she still wasn’t proper enough. And the coincidence with their names was just that, a coincidence. Keril and his talk about history repeating itself was nonsense. She wasn’t hemmed in to do anything.
And besides, she was not in love with him, either. She’d had a bit of a fancy for him, but those were extraordinary circumstances. Now, back in the real world, they were just good friends. And that was that.
Brid quickly gave up this “in love with Kialan” drivel.
Or, more accurately, she tried to give up, but once she let it slip that Kialan was coming to pick her up at the end of term, it seemed as though she was followed by gossip about their relationship. The last thing Brid wanted to be was the object of gossip. No one said anything bad about her, but they made her uncomfortable all the same.
She acted like it didn’t bother her. If anyone slyly asked how the Adon was, she just smiled and changed the subject. Kialan was a friend. One she was very close to-by circumstance, really-but there was nothing more to it. She enjoyed spending time with him, but he could never really be someone she was in love with.
And then when he appeared on Sending Day to take her back to Hannart, her heart did an absolute flip in her chest.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
Her worst fears were confirmed.
Brid missed the Law School.
She tried to chalk it up to the fact that she was stuck in Hannart, which was intolerable without Kialan around (not that that implied anything beyond friendship), but she truly did miss school. She supposed it was the schedule she missed (and not classes or her friends); idly wandering around Hannart everyday had lost its charm. It was high summer, so all of the flowers that had greeted her the first time she entered the city had wilted in the heat.
Kialan had disappeared two days before with a boy named Ynen (who was so soft-spoken and sweet that Brid had trouble believing he was Hildrida’s brother) without any sort of explanation. Keril left hours later, with an army in tow.
Brid knew that things had been, well, ‘off’ the past year in Dalemark. They’d had enough discussions in and out of classes to know that something was coming. Something dark.
It had been all she could think of since Kialan and the Keril left. This wasn’t just the usual quiet rumblings of discontent in Dalemark. Earls didn’t just take run off with their armies because of a minor disagreement.
Her mood was not helped by the fact that it was a rainy day. Rainy days were a reminder that all the things she loved in Hannart had the misfortune of taking place outside; singing the cows home with women in the fields, listening to the steam organ, shopping in the square. She had come to love rainy days at the Law School; she’d curl up in her room with homework and tea. That was not an option here (she got glared at if she tried to take a book out of Keril’s library).
Brid started to make her way to her room in order to write a letter to Moril when she heard a commotion.
Crowds of soaking-wet people had filled the front hall of Keril’s home. It took a minute for Brid to understand what they were saying in all the commotion, but when she did, she had to sit down on a step in shock.
They were yelling about the start of a war.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
Brid did not see Moril or Kialan again until she was about to leave for Gardale. Even then, it was not an official visit. Kialan was on his father’s bad side for participating in the Uprising, so he had written Brid to meet him and Moril just outside Hannart.
So when she finally saw Kialan, it was much more like the first time she had met him as opposed to the formal settings she had become used to seeing him in. He even looked a little fed-up, like the first time. But his face broke into a smile once he saw her.
She smiled back and was about to call out a greeting, but then Moril came into view and all thoughts of Kialan went out of her head.
She ran towards the approaching horses until they were close enough that Moril could get off his horse and meet her half-way. She wrapped him in her arms the second he was within reach.
“Moril,” she cried. “I have missed you so much!” She pulled away, looked at him, and then said sternly, “Abandoning us all in order to go participate in a revolution. What would mother say?”
“Nothing so far,” he smiled, and he looked so eight years-old that Brid immediately hugged him again.
“You’re staying safe, aren’t you?” Brid stared him down. “You’re not doing anything too dangerous?”
“I’ve been safe,” Moril said. Brid wanted to believe him, but there was a new look in his eyes that scared her. He looked…sad. Even when he smiled. Brid didn’t want him to ever look sad. She suddenly felt horrible for how much she had abandoned him.
“You’ve got nothing to worry about,” Kialan said once he reached them. “I’m looking out for him too.”
At the sound of his voice, Brid rounded on him. “And you! Who do you think you are? Leaving for a revolution without even saying goodbye?”
Kialan looked at her very seriously for a moment and Brid glared back. But soon they were both laughing and Kialan had pulled Brid into a hug.
Brid knew. Without have to think about school and Singing, friendship and romance, family and friends, Brid knew that she was happy.