The Rithmatist

that’s the one thing I can’t do.”
    “I know how you feel.”
    “Anyway,” Melody said, “thanks for vouching for me. I think you kept that vulture from ripping me apart.”
    He shrugged.
    “No, really,” she said. “I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”
    “I’m … not sure if I want to know what that will entail.”
    “Oh, you’ll enjoy it,” she said, perking up. “I’ve got an idea already.”
    “Which is?”
    “You have to wait!” she said. “No spoiling surprises.”
    “Great.” A surprise from Melody. That would be wonderful. They neared the station, but didn’t enter, instead sticking to the comfortable shade of the trees as they waited for Fitch. Melody tried to get Joel to talk some more, but he found himself giving uninvolved answers.
    He kept thinking of that hurried picture with the frightened words beneath it. Charles Calloway had known he was going to die, yet he’d left notes on as much as he could figure out. It was noble—probably more noble than anything Joel had ever done in his life.
    Someone needs to stop this, he thought, leaning back against a tree trunk. Something needs to be done. It wasn’t just the students, not just Armedius, who were in danger. Ordinary people had been killed. And if what Fitch and Harding said was true, these kidnappings were threatening the stability of the United Isles themselves.
    It comes back to those strange chalk drawings, Joel thought. That looping pattern. If only I could remember where I saw it before!
    He shook his head and glanced at Melody. She was sitting on a patch of grass a short distance away. “How did you do it?” he asked. “With that chalkling, I mean.”
    “I just lost control of it.”
    He gave her a flat stare.
    “What?” she said.
    “You’re obviously lying, Melody.”
    She groaned, flopping back on the grass, staring up at the trees. He figured she was probably going to ignore the question.
    “I don’t know how I do it, Joel,” she said. “Everyone in classrooms always talks about instructing the chalklings, and about how they are completely without will themselves, like clockwork. But … well, I’m not really that good at the instructional glyphs.”
    “Then how do you make them obey so well?”
    “They just do, ” she said. “I … well, I think they understand me, and what I want of them. I explain what I want, then they go do it.”
    “You explain it?”
    “Yeah. Little whispers. They seem to like it.”
    “And they can bring you information?”
    She shrugged, which was an odd gesture, considering that she was lying down. “They can’t talk or anything. But the way they move around me, the things they do, well … yeah, sometimes I feel like I can understand what they mean.” She rolled her head to the side, looking at him. “I’m just imagining things, aren’t I? I just want to be good with chalklings to make up for the fact that I’m bad with the other lines.”
    “I don’t know. I’m the last person who could tell you about chalklings. As far as I’m concerned, they probably do listen to you.”
    She seemed to find that comforting. She smiled, staring up at the sky until Professor Fitch arrived. Apparently Harding was going to stay at the mansion to investigate more. Joel found himself glad to be returning to Armedius. He hadn’t eaten anything all day, and his stomach had begun to rumble.
    They walked into the station and climbed up onto the empty platform, waiting for the next train.
    “This adds some very disturbing elements to our situation,” Fitch said.
    Joel nodded.
    “Wild chalklings,” Fitch continued. “Unknown Rithmatic lines … I think that, perhaps, I shall need to have you begin helping me look through some of the more obscure Rithmatic texts. There has to be mention of things like this somewhere in the records.”
    Joel perked up, feeling a surge of excitement. Yet it was dulled by the realities of their situation. He glanced at Melody, who stood behind them, probably too far to hear; she obviously felt sheepish around Fitch since she’d been caught spying.
    “Troubled times,” Fitch said, shaking his head as the track began to shake, a train approaching. “Troubled times…”
    A short time later, they were riding back across the waters and toward Armedius.



CHAPTER

    The first European encounters with wild chalklings are the subject of some debate, the book read.
    Joel sat with his back to the brick wall of Professor Fitch’s office. “The