Bastion

have been taking that class this fall. The Judgment class, as well.:
    Well, yes. A little kidnapping had put paid to that . . .
    But Dallen was continuing. :It’s no matter. Now that I know what the plan is, I can simply show you everything you would have learned in the Judgment class so at least you have an idea of what your senior is doing, so you can anticipate what he might want from you. Want me to?:
    It had been a while since Dallen had done something like that. Mostly, it had been during his first year here, when he’d had to go from an uncivilized half-feral thing that had never seen a bath and didn’t know how to behave like a human. If it hadn’t been for Dallen, he would probably still be a half-feral thing that didn’t know how to behave like a human.
    Well, maybe that was an exaggeration, but it wasn’t too much of one.
    Since then, Dallen had been careful never to “give” him anything that might have constituted cheating. It would have been easy for Dallen to merely bestow on him things he was supposed to be learning in class, but Mags had never asked for that.
    Until now, that is. But then, this one time, it wouldn’t be cheating, would it?
    :Please,: he said.
    •   •   •
    Having Dallen share information like that was nothing like the way the assassin’s talisman had flooded his mind and tried to drown him in memories. In fact, there really was no “experience” at all. He simply said please, and everything he needed to know on the subject was just there, in his mind, exactly as it would have been if he had learned it the hard way. There weren’t even specific memories attached to the knowledge, which was much better than having it the other way around.
    As he sat there contemplating the new information, it occurred to him that the assassins were idiots.
    Because if they had really, truly, wanted him to join them of his own free will, they wouldn’t have tried to turn him into someone else with that talisman. Instead, they would have done what Dallen had just done. They’d have given him everything they wanted him to know gently, painlessly, unobtrusively. And he would just know facts about them. He’d have had no reason to doubt what he knew, no reason to question what was there.
    With Dallen blocked out of his mind because of their drugs, it would have been much harder to fight against them, if all they had done was give him plain facts and information. Even if everything they had given him was purely biased in their own favor—as long as it was facts,
    But instead, they’d tried to force it all on him. They’d tried to flood him with memories that weren’t his. All his instincts had been to fight back.
    And a good thing, too.
    He was just thinking that, when there was a tap on his door, and he knew from the feel of the presences on the other side it was Bear, Lena, and Amily.
    “Come!” he said aloud, and the three of them practically tumbled into the room, all talking at once.
    He got up and opened his shutters, which he had left half closed. Light flooded in, making up for the fact that some cold got in, too. The glazing on the windows didn’t keep all of the cold out.
    It took a little time before they managed to settle down enough to talk sensibly, and it was very clear from the beginning that they were wildly excited about this plan. Bear and Lena shared a seat on the top of his clothing chest, which doubled as a bench. Amily cuddled up with him on the bed.
    Bear was the quietest of the three, but Mags got a sense of quiet vindication from him, and who could blame him? He was going to get his full Greens before they all went out, so he and Mags’ mentor would technically be the most senior people in the group. It wasn’t unusual for quiet young Healers to get full Greens, but most of them were very powerfully Gifted. Bear might be the youngest Healer who relied entirely on means other than a Gift to accomplish his Healing to ever get his Green robes.
    It was a huge vindication for Bear, and was going to be an enormous slap in the face to his father. Deservedly so.
    Lena was wildly excited. She’d never been away from home until she came to Bardic Collegium, and she’d never been away from Bardic except for visits home, since. She had already been to see the caravan they were going to use and was full of descriptions of every nook and corner of it—
    He couldn’t imagine why she was so taken with the thing, but then again, it might just have been the