Shelton shook his head. "Firstly, the Arcane Council would never want noms having access to this stuff, and secondly, because the Overworld Conclave forbids it."
"But think of the good it could do society! Anti-gravity cars would be so wicked."
He snorted. "Yeah, and I'd bet noms would love commuting on flying carpets. Never gonna happen."
"Stupid politics," I said, grumbling.
"There are a lot more noms than there are supers. If they had access to magic and our mad science, they'd have the edge, and Overworld politicians don't like that." Shelton shrugged. "They even have an entire division devoted to sabotaging nom scientists and recruiting those who are the most promising."
"Didn't stop them from making nukes or digital watches," I said.
He snorted.
An announcement for the departure of the cable car to the university interrupted my thoughts. We hurried aboard just before it lifted. I realized an instant later why it didn't need cables. "This is a slider, isn't it?"
"Yup." Shelton stared out the window as the spires of a castle rose into view.
I watched as a girl wearing a pink arcane robe played a game on an arcphone. Some kid in a brown robe across from her glanced up from an old book and frowned. "You're on the wrong shuttle, techie."
She wrinkled her forehead and gave him an unsure look, as if wondering if he'd spoken to her and not one of the many other students aboard. After meeting his stern gaze, she seemed to decide he was, indeed, talking to her. "The handbook said arcphones are allowed now." She shrugged. "Don't see how they can ban them anyways. Everybody has one." She looked around the cabin, as if searching for someone else to support her logic.
The guy sneered. "If you suck at magic you might need one."
"Kid, you might wanna join the real world," Shelton said. "'Cause I can think of a half-dozen things an arcphone can do better than a human brain and a staff." He pulled his phone out as though for emphasis. "It's a focus, just like a wand or staff, except it ain't made of wood, and it gives you a heck of a lot more computing power for complex spells."
"Oh, please," the guy said.
"Well, you sure as heck can't play Unicorns versus Zombies on your staff," the girl said, stuck out her tongue, and went back to playing.
The student glared at Shelton. "A real Arcane doesn't need that garbage to do magic."
"You're a lost cause," Shelton said, dismissing him with a wave of his hand. "Then again, you'll probably never amount to more than a magician."
A chorus of "Oohs" went up from the other students, some of them grinning at the argument while others held out their phones, probably recording everything.
The student's jaw dropped open, and his eyes filled with rage. "Do you know who I am?"
A burst of laughter from the crowd only enraged him even more, just as the cable car, now a dizzying height above the valley below, thumped down in a landing zone.
"Please tell me you did not just drop the 'I'm a big deal' card," the girl said. "That's just sad."
"I am William Vanderbilt," the guy said. "And my father—"
"I'm sure you're a real good magician," Shelton said, before the student could finish. "Maybe I'll buy you a top hat for graduation and come see you in Vegas." He threaded his way through snickering students and left the car.
I squeezed through the crowd as William hurled obscenities at our backs.
I knew Arcanes really hated terms like sorcerer, wizard, and warlock, but magician was apparently the lowest of the low.
The landing zone sat atop a bluff overlooking the valley on one side and the plateau on the other. A long stone path led down a gentle slope. Trees dotted the verdant terrain. Narrow stone paths led to quaint cottages, and fields bordered by low stone walls held flocks of bleating sheep and goats. It reminded me of a setting from rural Ireland or Britain except for one thing.
Arcane University.
The sprawling campus looked like something straight out of the Middle Ages. A massive castle and several other mansion-sized outbuildings stretched across the terrain from one end to the other. A snow-blanketed mountain peak towered behind the university, its slopes covered by thick forest.
The castle dominated the center of the complex, its walls composed of white stone bordered by gray and lined with arched windows. Soaring spires reached for the sky atop huge round towers that rose from all four corners, each one boasting intricate stone designs around the edges and windows. A long oval building of white stone with a transparent dome glittered like diamonds to the right of the castle, and something that looked like the Coliseum in Rome, only ten times bigger loomed behind it. Romanesque buildings that appeared to be housing facilities crowded the left side of the complex. A riot of colors bordered the east and west sides of the university—gardens, apparently.
"What's that for?" I asked Shelton, pointing at the giant stadium.
"That's where they hold the Grand Melee," he said.
"The what?"
Shelton gave me a surprised look. "That's right, I never told you, did I?" He grinned. "Imagine this: robots fighting golems in gladiator battles."
"Ooh," I said. "That sounds cool."
"Yeah, now imagine a giant robot from outer space fighting a golem the same size, shooting fire and laser beams at each other."
My eyes went wide, and my mouth hung open. I might have even drooled.
Shelton's grin grew wider.
"That's the Grand Melee?" I asked.
"In a nutshell." He headed out on the stone path toward the looming castle. "They have team fights with man-sized robots and golems, followed by middle-weights, and then by colossi."
"Is it a competition between the Science Academy and Arcane University?"
He nodded. "After Science Academy was built, the first dean kept bragging that science would replace magic and claimed it was more powerful and flexible. Things got pretty nasty between the two schools until an arbitration panel came up with the idea of letting the two schools duke it out by proxy."
"With the Grand Melee," I guessed.
"Yep. They hold it the last weekend of the first month of school."
"At the end of this month?" I asked.
He gave me a sly look. "Wanna go?"
"Are you kidding me?" I said, barely able to contain my excitement. "Heck yeah!"
Shelton laughed. "This place is gonna get crazy. People come from all over the world to see it."
"Who could blame them?" I replied, fantasizing about laser beams and monstrous gladiators.
As we neared the castle, several flying carpets streaked past, followed by a girl on a flying broom, and a guy on—I did a double take—a flying mop. "What the heck?" I said, following the strange sight with my eyes until the fliers vanished around the far end of the complex.
"Get used to it," Shelton said.
We reached the entrance to the castle, a massive stone arch, and stepped inside a cavernous hallway.
The girl in pink robes passed us. She beamed a smile at Shelton. "Thanks for the help with that jerk on the sky car."
Shelton snorted. "My pleasure, cupcake."
The girl turned down a different hallway, walking backward as she did, and blew Shelton a kiss before spinning around and continuing on to her destination.
"Damn, I miss those college girls," Shelton said, taking off his hat and running a hand through his thick hair.
"Aren't you kind of old for them now?"
He pshawed. "Man, I'm still in my twenties."
"Early or late?"
He didn't answer.
"That's what I thought," I said, grinning.
We walked down a carpeted hallway, took a spiral staircase up a few flights, and then took so many twists and turns I didn't know where we were anymore. At long last we reached a doorway with a placard outside that said "Miles Chamberlain, MhD."
"Are you ready to start the assessment?" Shelton said, voice serious.
I swallowed a ball of nerves and nodded. "Let's do this."
Chapter 8
Shelton stepped inside and rapped on the open wooden door.
"Harry Shelton, as I live and breathe," said a baritone voice in a proper British accent. "Come on in!"
I followed Shelton inside and saw a short man with curly graying hair, round spectacles, and what looked like a tweed robe.
"Hey, Professor," Shelton said, a smile on his face that looked way too friendly to be the rough-edged Arcane I knew.
"Have a seat," Miles said, gesturing toward a chair. He looked at me. "And this is the young man you spoke of?"
Shelton nodded. "Yep."
I shook the professor's hand. "I'm Justin Slade." It still felt strange calling myself that instead of Case, the fake last name my parents had used to hide from their respective families.
"He's here for the assessment," Shelton said.
"Absolutely," Miles said. He withdrew a wand from a desk drawer. "Let's head on down to a gauntlet room."
Miles led us through a warren of corridors, down some stairs, and into a large circular space that reminded me a lot of Shelton's gauntlet room.
"Wow, it's still here," Shelton said, looking at a particularly big black burn mark on the ceiling directly overhead. "Man, I remember when I did that."
"You made that mark?" I asked, looking at Shelton.
Shelton shrugged. "Trying to impress a girl. I ended up nearly burning my clothes off, and the blast propelled me into the ceiling."
I snorted with laughter. "Why is it all your stories about impressing girls end up going horribly wrong?"
"I think that's just the way it is with guys trying to impress girls." He grinned. "You might know a thing or two about that."