“You want to do what?” Professor Iain asked, his eyebrows rising precipitously.

  Issa did her best to remain calm. “I said, I’m looking to set up a scholarship to help commoner students remain at the Academy, and I would like your assistance in doing that.”

  Stroking his chin, the professor looked perturbed. Issa supposed it was only natural. She had just finished laying out her plan to him, having requested a private meeting in his office for the purpose of keeping knowledge of her idea from the rest of the Academy. For a place of noble learning, it was amazing how fast gossip traveled within these walls.

  “A scholarship…” Iain repeated the word, rolling it on his tongue as he did whenever a student posed a particularly interesting question in his class. “It’s not a bad idea. And since you are the best performing student of common birth, you would naturally be the beneficiary of such a scholarship.” He ran his fingers through his beard, straightening the curly hair as he considered her plan. “Yes, it could work. You would need noble backing, of course; the council will never accept the common folk providing a scholarship for one of their own. And you’ll have to find sources of funding on your own. But it could work.”

  He nodded. “You were right to come to me. I can assist you. This is a good plan you’ve come up with, but it will require a lot of administrative paperwork to get it through the bureaucracy. That’s where I come in.” He paused. “Did you have any noble families in mind to act as the sponsors for this?”

  “Shieldcrest and Corson,” Issa responded. “I tutor several people, but those are the two I’m closest with. Both Yanitha and Gwen are only children, and have strong influence over their respective families. They should be willing to act as the sponsors.”

  “Well, you seem to have considered it all fairly well,” Iain told her. “There are a few other details that I should probably mention.” He lifted up a hand and held up one finger. “The first is coin. The minimum scholarship disbursement at the Academy is three gold. While it’s possible that we could go lower, the council always considers its image. So ensuring that you have more than three gold should be a priority.”

  Lifting a second finger, he continued. “The second is bureaucracy. There is a lot of boring work that goes into a scholarship, and they need to be multi-year things. You cannot just have a group of families donate once to pay for one year of tuition. It needs to be disbursed every year. Because of this, the scholarship will need to be structured as a fund, with enough to cover several years of tuition even with no further additions.”

  He coughed. “Finally, there’s the third thing, which is that someone will need to manage all of this. Boring, I know, but someone has to take care of the paperwork and selecting the recipient every year, and that person needs to draw a salary. You’ll also need to register the scholarship with the registrar, but that’s a trivial cost compared to the rest. All told, you’re probably going to need to earn…”

  He screwed up his face as he did the calculations in his head, his fingers moving in the air along the rails of an invisible abacus. Finally, he looked up. “About fifteen gold should suffice. That’s enough for three years of tuition relief at three gold apiece, as well as the payment for registration and the salary for a clerk to manage it all.”

  Issa felt herself going slightly pale, but she forced herself to nod. “I understand.”

  This was true, but that was only because she was quick on the uptake. She had hoped that getting a scholarship approved would allow her to gather donations for her tuition at a nearly one-to-one rate. However, only one gold piece out of every five would be used for her tuition next semester, and she needed fifteen just to start? If she could gather fifteen gold that easily, she would not need to go through all of this just to stay at the Academy!

  The professor must have sensed her shock, for he looked at her kindly. “I know it’s a lot, but I believe that if it’s you, it’s doable. I was quite upset to learn about the new tuition hike, and have spent the last few months worrying about you, my dear. It relieves me greatly to see that you are fighting back, and I am honored to be a part of your plan to remain here despite the council’s meddling.”

  Issa nodded hollowly. If he really wanted to help, he could donate some gold himself. As a professor, his salary was immense, at least compared to what her brother had earned as a clerk and now earned as an adventurer. However, she could not afford to alienate one of her few allies in the Academy, and so she fixed a smile on her face and nodded.

  “Thank you, professor. Rayne always spoke highly of you during his time at the Academy, about how fair you were no matter a person’s status. I am glad to see his evaluation ring true.”

  This caused Iain’s chest to swell, and he clapped a hand to his breast. “He’s got a good eye, that brother of yours. I’ll tell you what, let me be the first to contribute to this scholarship. I’ll pledge fifty silver—nay, a gold to the cause. How does that sound?”

  Issa stood up and bowed. “Thank you, professor. That means a lot.”

  Iain grinned. “Now, now. Don’t go thanking me just yet. There’s a lot to do if you want this plan of yours to become a reality. But just remember, my door is always open to you.”

  With one last bow, Issa exited his office, mixed feelings of elation and dread causing her stomach to turn. She had done it. For better or worse, she had embarked on this road, and now she had to follow it to the end.

  Picking up her step, she headed for the library. It was about time for her tutoring lessons, where the next two elements of her plan lay waiting.

  ~

  The library was perhaps the most impressive aspect of the entire academy, and Issa felt a slight touch of awe as she showed her identification plaque to the guard at the door. It was somewhat silly, having to show it every time. The guards here knew her by name, and yet she still had to reach into her pocket to grab the silver inlaid plaque and present it to them.

  “You’re good,” the guard on the left replied after a cursory examination of the plaque.

  She was much more casual with Issa than she was with nobles, but Issa didn’t bother to correct her. After all, the guard had the power to deny her entry. If she wanted to wield what little power she had over her by addressing her casually, then that was her right.

  Shaking her head at the childishness of it all, Issa passed through the enormous double doors and into the library annex. Her table was on the second floor, up a set of stairs, and she labored up them, breathing slightly faster as she climbed to the top. Ideally, she’d have had a table on the first floor, but those were all reserved for nobles, and so she had to make this climb every day. It was the same for her students, but her reputation as a tutor that could yield results was enough for them to overlook this minor inconvenience.

  As she reached the top of the stairs, Issa spied Yanitha and Gwen, both sitting at the table reserved for her with bored expressions on their faces.

  “Girls!” Issa called out, lifting a hand to wave at them.

  Immediately, they both brightened, rising from the table as they moved to greet the tutor who had taught them for the last year and a bit.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Yanitha Shieldcrest was a tall girl with blonde hair and a nose that was just a touch too large for her face. Gwen Corson was her polar opposite, a diminutive girl with huge eyes, a button nose, and a mass of curly hair that managed to struggle free from even the best hair pins and straightening solution.

  Both were huge fans of Issa, who had helped them improve their grades to a point that the professional tutors hired by their families had thought impossible, and the two immediately agreed to sponsor her new scholarship.

  “If it’s backed by Professor Iain, then my mother will have no issues putting the Corson family name behind it!” Gwen chirped.

  Yanitha was a little more reserved, but she too pledged to make sure that the Shieldcrests would assist her in legitimizing the scholarship. With this first step taken care of, Issa wanted to immediately launch step two, but tutoring came first, and she dutifully forced her two charges to take out their books and begin studying.

  Despite her commitment to her teaching, Issa still found herself packing up fifteen minutes early. Try as she might, she could not remove the pit of doubts that was forming in her stomach. So rather than teach while distracted and risk leading her students down the wrong path, she called an early end to the session and led both of them out of the Academy and into the Noble District proper to begin step three of the plan.

  Their goal today was a number of shops that Issa had identified in the days previous. She entered the first one now, taking care to let Yanitha and Gwen go ahead of her as she took on the role of matron, shepherding her charges into the high-priced boutique and doing her best not to cringe at the prices on display.

  There were not actually too many price tags. Such a thing were for those of more common birth, but the few that existed were all listed in gold pieces, and Issa had to school her face to stay calm as both Yanitha and Gwen immediately lost themselves looking at a dress whose sleeves likely cost more than her rent.

  How easy life is for those born into the right families. Rather than join them, Issa waited for someone to appear. She did not have to wait long. Only seconds after they arrived, a man swooped in, his mustache and goatee both immaculately trimmed and his eyes alight with the desire to earn money.

  “Welcome!” he greeted. “I’m the manager of this boutique. Is there anything I can help you ladies with?”

  This was Yanitha’s cue, and she looked at Issa, who stepped forward to take center stage. “You’re the manager here?” A slight bow was given, and she quirked her lips. “Does that mean you have the power to make decisions that will affect the business as a whole?”

  The look on her counterpart’s face changed, the previous cunning expression now replaced with one of wariness. “I do,” he replied cautiously. “And to whom might I be speaking?”

  Issa curtsied. “Apologies for my rudeness. I represent a group of noble families who are looking to make inroads with the crown. Have you heard of the upcoming changes to the Academy’s eligibility requirements?”

  The manager nodded, impressively managing to keep a look of certainty on his face. “I have,” he responded. “I take it that this group seeks to make use of that?”

  “They do,” Issa replied lightly. Lowering her voice, she continued. “What I tell you next is strictly confidential. Please do not repeat this to anyone, but the goal of the Academy changes is to draw students from further abroad and increase its prestige through this overhaul. By creating a new scholarship that cannot be granted to nobles of Torid, my clients hope to show their support for this initiative.”

  “While also pulling whichever foreign noble earns it into their debt,” the manager muttered. “Clever. And I suppose they’re searching for donations in order to mask their own involvement in case the council looks poorly upon the idea.”

  Issa smiled lightly as the man leapt to the conclusions she had laid out for him. “You know this game well.”

  This pleased him, and he straightened up, his goatee quivering as he stood tall. “You don’t get to where I’m at by being blind to the whims and wants of our primary clientele. You can count on our boutique for a sizable donation.”

  Still wearing a small smile, Issa clasped both hands in front of her. “My thanks. I shall be sure to transmit your goodwill to my employers. They’ve said to make a special note of the businesses who are most helpful to the cause.”

  “Of course, of course,” he responded, nodding furiously as he did.

  From Issa’s perspective, he was clearly reevaluating just how much to give in his head, and she did not interrupt, preferring to let him come to the answer on his own. The bigger the donation the better, obviously.

  Dropping his voice, the manager leaned in. “Just out of curiosity. How much have the other shops pledged?”

  “I’m afraid that the individual donations are confidential,” Issa responded. “However, I am free to admit that a donation of three gold has been made.”

  The moustache quivered once more, and this time, the goatee moved as well. Appearing slightly flustered, the man nodded, doing his best to control his expression as he gazed out the window to the street beyond. “I understand. I will speak with my business partner tonight, but I don’t think there will be any issue with freeing some funds for such a worthwhile project.”

  The relationship we build with this group of nobles is worth a large expenditure, was what his face read. Or rather, what the subtle changes in his expression told her. On the surface, the manager seemed rather calm. But there were small things that Issa had learned to pick up on in order to survive in the fast-paced political theatre that was the Academy.

  The slight quiver in his pupils, the uptick in exhales per minute, the small tremor in his fingers, and above all, the way his moustache moved when he was thinking. It all told her exactly what was on his mind, and Issa gave him an encouraging smile as she silently bid the number up in her mind. Her job here was done. Tomorrow, she would visit again, and he would hand over the gold to her associates in exchange for a bill of sale to make it official.

  “Unfortunately, I must get going,” she said regretfully, waving to her friends who both waved back and let go of the dresses they were examining. “Can I expect your answer tomorrow? The same time as today, perhaps?”

  Giving her a slight bow, the manager escorted her to the door. “Of course. And please convey my most gracious thanks to your employers for considering us in this project.”

  Issa returned the bow. “My employers thank you for your cooperation.”

  With that, she departed, Yanitha and Gwen in tow as the manager saw them off from the doorway.

  Yanitha looked like she wanted to speak, but Issa gave her an imperceptible shake of the head. It was not until they were a good fifty feet from the shop that she released the breath she had not realized she had been holding. From the moment she had stepped inside the boutique, nay, even before, she had been acting a part, and it exhausted her.

  Seemingly understanding what she was feeling, Yanitha moved closer, putting her arm in Issa’s as they walked. “How’d it go?” she asked.

  “Well,” Issa replied tersely. “Obviously, we won’t know how well until tomorrow when I come back to collect their contribution. But he seemed receptive. It helped that you wore your family crest in such a visible spot.”

  Yanitha beamed with pride. “I thought it might. I told Gwen to do the same,” she said, letting go of Issa’s arm and pulling Gwen closer and turning her so that Issa could see the crest on her left sleeve.

  “Good call.” Had she been in the Dregs, Issa would have ruffled Yanitha’s hair as a reward for this, but given her friend’s noble status, she settled for simple praise.

  “Where to next?” Gwen asked curiously.

  Pursing her lips, Issa examined the boulevard. There were several more boutiques, as well as a few other shops present, but there was no need to visit every one. They were after the upstarts, those in the middle of the pack who yearned to surpass their rivals that stood at the top of the Noble District, and who had the funds available to throw away on such ephemeral business concepts as scholarships in order to grow closer to the nobles behind them.

  With all that in mind, there were only a handful of stores that fit the bill, and she led her two charges to each one in turn. Each store was different, and the approach she took differed as well, but in the end, the goal for each was the same. Encourage the managers or owners to pledge as much coin as possible to the scholarship supported by the Shieldcrest and Corson families.

  To this end, she utilized Yanitha and Gwen wherever possible, calling them over to convince the more skeptical shopkeeps, and leaving them to peruse the wares for those more willing to accept the premise of her visit.

  After two hours, she finally called an end to their day, escorting both noblewoman back to the Academy with bags in hand.

  “I can’t believe you both spent so much,” Issa chided them as they struggled to carry their purchases. Taking one bag from each, she shouldered the burden as they walked back.

  “But they all had such pretty wares!” Gwen protested, showing her the frilly edge of the nightgown she had purchased for more than a month of Issa’s rent.

  Doing her best not to roll her eyes, Issa faced forward. Today had gone well, but it was only the beginning. It was a tangled web she was weaving, but she was confident she could pull it off. She had to. For her family.