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At the time those had been a double-edged sword anyway – friends could disappear at any moment, bought up as slaves, so I had quickly learned not to get too close to anyone.
    Bereft of the opportunity to play, Mior had started to interrogate my sister, quizzing her on techniques, spells and training regimes. I concentrated on it for a few moments, but the magic-speak bored me, and almost inevitably I drifted over to Zashter, deciding to strike up my own conversation. He acknowledged me with a nod, a hair too polite and stiff to make me feel comfortable, but that was to be expected after my earlier outburst.
    “So, what brought to you Mazar?” I began, deciding on generic curiosity.
    “It was on the way.”
    “On the way to what?”
    “On the way to where we’re going.”
    My annoyance flared up again, wiping away all other feelings. “Fine, be like that,” I snapped, and stalked away to the other side of the road. Obnoxious, arrogant, self-important, tedious son-of-a–
    “I didn’t mean to brush you off like that,” he said next to me, and I nearly squealed in startlement. I glared at him instead, but his gaze back was bland.
    “Yet you won’t apologise,” I said, still nettled.
    “Apologise? What for?”
    “Brushing me off like that.”
    “I said I didn’t mean to, didn’t I?”
    “Then why did you?”
    He sighed. “I was… Look, I hope you understand that it’s too early in our… relationship to trust you with our plans.”
    “I wasn’t after your plans,” I said, a little flustered at the suggestive way in which he had said the word ‘relationship’. “I was just trying to make conversation, get to know you. You’re my teacher now, we’re going to have to learn how to work together. I can’t do that if you continue to be a stranger to me.”
    “You have a point,” he admitted, looking pensive. The statement had sounded almost reluctant, and with a half-smile I wondered whether that was because he didn’t like to admit that I might be right about something. It made me determined to be right about other things, if only to nettle him like he nettled me.
    “I’ve never been a teacher before,” he said after a few more moments. “I cannot promise you that I’ll be good, or that I’ll be easy on you. In fact, I can guarantee you that I’ll be nitpicky, exacting and utterly intolerant of failure.”
    I met his black eyes, and this time I saw more than just his usual mocking expression. There was a glint of humour as well as a challenge, and I couldn’t help but smile at him. “I guess I’ll just have to make sure I don’t fail then,” I replied.
    That earned me a grin, though it disappeared again quickly. “Don’t think that I don’t mean it, Little Firelocks,” he said. “ I won’t be busting your pretty arse out of jail if you get yourself caught.”
    “Understood,” I managed to say, staring at the ground to hide my blush at the casual way in which he had called me pretty. Then I thought past that, taking in his full statement, and a feeling close to elation swept through me. Zashter had barely shown me anything yet, but from the little I had seen I knew that I would learn much, much more from him than I had ever learnt from Naerev. Naerev had been easygoing, sometimes lackadaisical, and had never pushed me to excel. I had tried to do so myself, but knew I lacked knowledge and drive, and without that my effort simply wasn’t sufficient. With Zashter I knew that if I slipped up even once that was it, and the fear of that alone already sharpened my senses.
    Still, I didn’t want him to think that I would just take anything from him, so I hid my elation and said casually, “So you two have a plan, huh? Impressive. I don’t think Shani and I have ever had a plan in our lives, other than to grab some cash, not get caught and stay alive.”
    He chuckled. “Not a bad plan, as things are. Better than some.” He paused for a few heartbeats, then seemed to make a decision.