(no subject)

[sythyry]

Academy Administration [20 Lage 4261]

Usually when Strenata and I have one of our quick thunderstorm fights, we make up in an hour or two with the air clear. This time, due to boyfriend issues, I was otherwise occupied when she came 'round again to apologize properly, and we didn't actually make up until the next morning. Which came around at its usual time, morning and makeup both. Though I am not particularly helping plan her party... Rhedwy has taken charge of that.

For those of a suspicious or indecent bent, when I say "otherwise occupied", I specifically mean "walking around the city in Orren shape with Ilottat, chatting about the administrative experiences I am having obeying the Duke."

I did manage to have the following conversation:

Me:"Dean Celandine?"

Celandine:"Oh, Sythyry! How's your hand?"

Me:"My paw is wholly recovered, and thank you for asking."

Celandine:"My secretary said you had an extremely urgent matter to discuss?"

Me:"Yes ... I need to change my course schedule fairly drastically, as soon as possible."

Celandine:"Well, the simplest and most honest approach would be to finish off this term at the end of the month, and set things up properly for next term."

Me:"That won't do, I'm afraid."

Celandine:[a bit sharply]"Master Sythyry: when one has, by means of disorganization or other distractions, managed to do poorly in a term, one simply accepts one's poor marks and endeavours to do better next term. Even if one is the half-sibling of Hezimikkinen ... or the crown prince of Daukrhame."

Me:"It's not that ... Hezimikkinen didn't want me to do it at all ... And I need a new class made."

Celandine:"Please be sensible, Master Sythyry. We cannot rearrange the Academy for you."

Me:"... and I'd rather stay in my classes as they are. I'm not doing so badly as that."

Celandine:"Do explain."

Unfortunately, I have an excellent and even powerful explanation for my change of plans. And a little meng circle with the fine writing of the duke's scribe on one side and the stern Illusidor-crafted image of the duke from his ducal seal on the other side, for those who doubt.

The Dean was suitably helpful. The Dean knows very well how to obey the Duke. "Professor Wynge would be the one who knows about nendrai the most, I should think."

Professor Wynge was duly summoned. He is a young Rassimel with lemurine styling -- he has the properly ringy tail, but very long and very thing, and he has no mask. Also his dark fur is dark green, which is just odd. He has been at Vheshrame Academy only as long as I have. He was the top student of someone very excellent in Tauvane, on Creithia. He knows how to obey the Dean, but not very well. "It's not the most convenient time for starting a new course, really. Couldn't it wait until next term?"

Me:"I wish it could, but it can't."

Wynge:"Why should the duke have a say in how we run our courses?"

Celandine:"He is the Duke of Vheshrame. This Academy gets many favors and benefits from the city-state and from the duke. We sometimes have to do a bit of work in exchange."

Wynge:"Well, the duke shan't be giving me orders, but you hired me, so I suppose you can."

Celandine:"I not merely can: in this case I do."

Much fussing was done, nonetheless. For the rest of the term, and up to the beginning of next term, I shall be studying nendrai by reading about them considerably, and by meeting every other day with Prof. Wynge.

This, I predict and even the Dean concurs, will render me unable to sit for examinations in my actual courses. Leaving me with the following:

Course	Teacher	Result
Formal Enchantment II	Prof. Trillisanguinus Spreen	She rather acridly refused to give me any special treatment up to the examination. "I don't care who your grandparent is or how many Dukes are bullying you around. I'm not going to be unfair to my other students." She is not nearly so new a professor as Prof. Wynge, and is quite capable of being obnoxious to even the dean. She did, at least, promise to be gentle on the grading of my examination.
Applied Enchantment II	Prof. Nethry Alzagond	This course doesn't have an examination in any case, and lets up for examination time. My project is already done, and it is already Of the Hairy-Nosed Wombat Headed Demonurge of Plong [sic], so there's not much more to be said.
Very Dangerous Knobbles	Prof. Vengtomerax Bloodthorn Tears-bringer	Prof. Vengtomerax was more interested in why her name was listed in the main catalog as "Vaisessasilmin." I wasn't actually doing very well in this course -- taking spellbinding and enchantment in the same term was not a good idea, and getting a cley-requiring boyfriend, although it was a good idea, didn't help matters. We agreed that I should be given the odd grade of "Nobly Excused" for the term. Prof. Celandine scowled at me about this one.
Biology of Elementals	Prof. Verra Tardamos	I haven't been doing very well in this course either. Rather, I have been doing perfectly well on all the assignments, but there haven't been as many of those as there might be, because Prof. Tardamos doesn't enjoy marking them. I have often missed this class, due to the vagaries of my Enchantment practicum. Prof. Tardamos and I had discussed this matter at the beginning of the term, and I was assured it would be of no concern, but of course those discussions were forgotten. I am to be given the grade of "Well-Reasoned", for some reason, and excused from the examination. Prof. Celandine interrogated Prof. Tardamos about the possibility of assisting Prof. Wynge, but to no avail.
Leap into this Pool of Boiling Acid	Prof. Phrass	Upon being told of the situation, Prof. Phrass proclaimed that I had, personally, leapt into this pool of boiling acid, and thus would be given the grade of "Excessively Excelled". Also Prof. Phrass volunteered that, while he is no expert in the natural history of nendrai, he is an expert in anecdotes about famous demises and other alarming events, in which nendrai are frequently featured. Or, more seriously, that he is not unacquainted with the ethology and psychology of nendrai, and that he would be pleased to take it upon himself to assist and even complement Prof. Wynge. This makes me very nervous. I expect that my fate will be taught in Leap into this Pool of Boiling Acid for dodecades to come, with first-hand anecdotes by Phrass.

So I am now sitting in the Cafe du Fronde with a well-read copy of How To Kill Nendrai, which Prof. Wynge recommended as the first book to read. I am, in fact, a bit reluctant to open it. If I open it, I may have to try to kill a nendrai.

Comments

[revar.livejournal.com]

Does Gnarn know about the existence of this book?
And if so, are nendrai 2.0 still vulnerable to the methods listed therein?
Not to make you any more nervous. :)

[terrycloth.livejournal.com]

Well, Vae having 100 instead of 60 is bound to make some of the methods difficult to put into practice.

Maybe there'll be 'how to get away from/hide from a nendrai' tips in the appendices. }:)

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

Well ... I don't see how a publisher can have a book in their "Popular Natural History" catalog and keep it out of a god's notice. I don't know how old Vae is, but she might be younger than the book.

Actually, though, the book isn't really about how to kill nendrai exactly. The author has a very cranky forward explaining how her publisher made her change the title to something sensational.

[sythyry.livejournal.com]

I suppose I should read the actual book and stop glaring at the introduction, too.

[collie13.livejournal.com]

...Prof. Phrass proclaimed that I had, personally, leapt into this pool of boiling acid, and thus would be given the grade of "Excessively Excelled"...

ROFL! Congratulations, you have a professor with a wicked sense of humor! ;)

[tuftears.livejournal.com]

Graduate school work with Phrass would probably be quite interesting! I bet he sees a lot of adventurers. Hmm. Between Strenata and Rhedwai and Yylhauntra, it seems to me Sythyry is having a lot of adventurers crop up in zir life. Perhaps zie will be whisked off on one, very reluctantly and with many objections!

[terrycloth.livejournal.com]

Some might say that this might happen very soon indeed! Perhaps on a riding trip with Seeks-A-Peaceful-Solution this very week!

[tuftears.livejournal.com]

That was not so much an adventure as a prelude to an adventure. };)

[redbird]

I see. I have on my shelves a book entitled "How to Attract the Wombat," which has very little on wombats at all, and nothing on how to attract them. (A wombat is a relatively rare, small animal that lives in one of the less-traveled parts of our world.)

[fringe-worthy.livejournal.com]

Of course, I think the really funny Leap into a pool of boiling acid comes if Sythyry winds up having to deal with chaperoning Nendrai courtship in 2 years. Or: How to suggest to other Nendrai that looking up one day and seeing Vheshrame embedded in a snowglobe, easily shaken, would not be a suitable gift to Vae. Even with enough mutoc locador to allow to city to also remain where it currently is.

[collie13.livejournal.com]

LOL! I concur -- especially regarding Sythyry as matchmaker for nendrai! ;)