Story name: Hard Lessons
Author: Christopher Hughes
Publication date: July 2, 1999 (on TSA-Talk)
Date: early July - early August, 706 CR
Location: Metamor Keep (Chris's rooms, common lab, Deaf Mule, Lightbringer temple)
Overview
Chris and Lurene fall in love, which pushes Chris towards finding a cure, receiving one from an unwanted source.
Summary
Since becoming his ward, Lurene has been studying magic under Chris, so that she can someday be a field mage. Chris, however, is still suffering from his injuries, including back pain and a powerful cough. During one of their weekly chess games, Magus helps Chris get an idea for a solution: use the curse itself to heal him, as it did Phil and Rickkter.
At the same time, Chris and Lurene both come to discover the level of devotion each has to the other, and realize there are deeper feelings between them. Chris himself cannot imagine life without her, and Lurene shivers when she's alone, thinking of them together. During one attempt with Lurene to cure him, Chris pushes the curse too hard, and falls into a deep trance which Lurene feared he would never wake up from. Not wishing to further alarm her, Chris begins studying on his own.
A few days after the Summer Festival, Wanderer visits for the first time since Chris was paralyzed. Although Lurene misses most of it, she senses the tension between the two. She returns to learn that Wanderer had offered to pay the price for his healing, though it was rejected.
A week passes, and Lurene finds out Chris is no longer teaching his students, and lying about it to her. She furiously confronts him in the common lab in the library, where Chris tearfully confesses that he did it not because of Wanderer, but because he loves her, and is ashamed by his condition. Lurene pulls him up, and they kiss.
Chris tells her he thinks he knows a method, but he needs more power. Lurene offers her aid, but just as they begin, a wave of light overwhelms them. When they awake, Chris is healed but is now completely a bear in body, while Lurene has caught the animal curse and become a wolf morph. Chris realizes that Wanderer must have done something, and rushes to the Lightbringer temple to confront him. He confronts both Wanderer and Raven, but Wanderer's mind is gone, and Raven and the gods were just following Wanderer's wishes. Frustrated but defeated, Chris leads Wanderer and Lurene away.
Characters
Main characters:
- Christopher: A tutor of the Keep, a bear morph, paralyzed from the waist down. He discovers a way to make the curse cure his legs, but becomes a full bear in body in the process, in part due to Wanderer's intervention. He still retains his human mind, and is able to use telepathy and telekinesis to talk and interact.
- He is 25 (a score-and-five) years old, meaning he was born circa 681 CR.
- The scar covers his back just above hi tail and slightly up his sides; the skin is hairless and pale where it has healed.
- He also still has the spiral scar from his geass with Akkala.
- After the duel fought in "Ward", Chris spent 2 months in Coe's infirmary trying to walk. Unable to do so, Bryan, Pascal, and Michael built a wheelchair for him (with which he was able to attend the Summer Festival).
- Chris has lost his faith in the Lightbringers since his injury, as he has never seen a miracle that was not magic, and believes the gods are just high-level mages, and he has no reason to worship them.
- He feels the same way towards the Ecclesian church.
- Lurene Grenier: Chris's ward, a female gendermorph. Originally from Castle Grenier, she is studying magic under Chris. She feels some guilt over Chris's infirmity, and falls in love with him over the weeks. She helps him heal, but in doing so activates another curse on herself, becoming a light gray-furred wolf morph.
- She wears an offwhite cotton blouse and blue knee-length skirt, and leather sandals.
- By Chris's estimates, she will be fully schooled in a year, but it will be another 5 years before she has enough practice.
Supporting:
- Magus: The most powerful mage at Metamor Keep, a fennec fox morph. He plays chess with Chris every Tuesday evening, usually in his tower.
- He wears a simple black cloak and carries a staff. He always has a faint smile on his face.
- He is skilled in telekinesis, using it to carry his chess set beside him and set up the pieces with ease.
- He is too valuable, in Chris's opinion, to use as a field mage.
- Wanderer: Chris's friend, a bard, a wolf morph. He visits Chris one day, and nothing seems to come of their conversation, until a week later when Chris and Lurene change suddenly. He is left with the body and mind of a wolf, in payment to Akkala for helping Chris heal, and is taken in by Christopher.
Minor characters:
- Donny: The barkeeper of the Deaf Mule. He has a knack for nonverbal communication.
- Raven: The Lightbringer priestess of the Keep. She confirms that it was Wanderer who intervened, and that Chris shouldn't blame Wanderer for paying the price.
Important mention:
- Byran: The Keep's "mad" scientist. He designed a wheelchair for Chris.
- Pascal: The Keep alchemist. She designed a chemical that could give soft aspen the strength and hardness of iron, and also a healing salve that Chris applies to his back.
- Michael: A beaver morph. He carved out Chris's wheelchair in a single afternoon.
- Rickkter: A raccoon morph who was healed by the curse. Chris doesn't know him too well, though he appreciates having spoken to him at the Summer Festival.
- Eryn and Mirane: Two of the seven students Chris picked up after the Summer Festival. They were concerned for Chris, as he had not shown up to tutor them for a week.
- Akkala: The goddess of healing, who directly changed Wanderer and Christopher, and indirectly Lurene. Raven does not tell Chris her reasons.
Referenced:
- Julian: A man skilled at throwing daggers. Likely Scratch, rather than the rat Julian.
- Posti: The former Prime Minister of Metamor Keep, and a powerful mage. He is dead.
- Electra: A mage and child morph. She is too busy with Magdalene Island to serve in the field.
- Sean: A mage and golden eagle morph. He has the power to amplify other mage's powers, but cannot act as a mage on his own.
- Cerulean: A dragon, native to the Keep. He has too much innate magic to serve in the field.
- Saroth: A mage and dragon morph. He has too much innate magic to serve in the field.
- Baron Grenier: The baron who stabbed Chris.
- Brian Coe: The Keep physician.
- Matthias: A rat morph. Chris took comfort by being spoken to by him during the Summer Festival.
- Phil: A headmaster of the Writer's Guild. He was on fire when the curse struck him, which saved his life.
- Kee: A Keep messenger.
- Thomas: The Duke of Metamor Keep.
Locations
- Most wood local to the Keep is soft wood, like aspen. Hardwoods like oak need to be imported, and the cost is too much.
- Christopher clutters the common lab with several discarded apparatuses from Pascal's lab, books stacked against the wall and on every table, and filled with dust.
Chronology / Story Connections
- Chris refers directly back to the events of Malvoisin and Fetish.
- He says that the events of "Fetish" happened a year ago, and that the events of Ward happened 6 months ago. "Fetish", however, took place a couple days after the 706 Spring Festival, and at the time he is saying this, the Summer Festival had not yet happened. These seem to be chronological errors.
- Chris refers to the "cure via curse" seen on Phil and Rickkter in Playing With Fire and A Place Where There Is No Darkness.
- A point of continuity: at the end of Lessoned, Raven is facing Wanderer and shouting at him when Chris enters; here, Raven is kneeling at the altar, and acts very calm about Wanderer's sacrifice.
Points of Interest
- The only mage at the Keep suitable for field combat is Kindle. The other mages Chris knows about, he summarizes as follows:
- Posti is dead;
- Magus is too valuable;
- Electra is too busy with affairs on Magdalene Island;
- Sean is not a mage on his own;
- Cerulean and Saroth are too conspicuous, and have too much innate magic;
- Chris himself is now too lame;
- There are half a dozen more talented mages, but they all lack formal training.
- Notably absent from the above list are Rickkter, Wessex, and Rois.
- Neither Chris and Magus are experts at chess, but they understand basic principles such as piece exchange, and they are both evenly matched.
- With Chris's magic sight, the curse appears as a golden mesh overlying each person, anchored in various places. The color is bright for Lurene, and dull for Chris.
- The strand of consciousness with which Chris interacts with the curse, appears as a silver thread.
Pawns of the Gods | ||
---|---|---|
Stories | For Knowledge's Sake · Lightbringer · Tail of a Young Wolf · Fetish · Ward · En Lieu | |
The Lessons Trilogy | Lessoned · Hard Lessons · Lessons of Solitude | |
Lethe · For I Am Lost · Passing Notes · Clearing Away · The Winter Assault · Misericardia · Koinonia · A Pawn Advances · Lessons of Faith · Dances | ||
Major Characters | Christopher · Wanderer · Raven · Lurene |