Tomorrow's Magic

1 Summer Thaw Wellington Jones awoke to the sound of dripping water. Drops fell from the eaves, then a whole patch of snow broke loose and rumbled off the roof. His eyes snapped open in excitement. They were having a June thaw! He sat up, and the covers slid from his plump shoulders, letting a whoosh of cold air invade the bed. Hastily he pulled the coarse blankets around him and squinted across the small room. Of the two narrow windows set deeply into the stone wall, he looked eagerly at the one covered with real glass. The ice crystals that patterned it most of the year were gone. If it was a real June thaw, this might be another mild summer. There had been one just four years ago when he first came to Llandoylan School, though he'd been too upset at the time to appreciate it. Maybe Master Foxworthy was right. He'd said in geography class that in the five hundred years since the Devastation, the climate had been slowly warming again. Wellington had doubted, feeling that in his own twelve years he had seen no change worth noting. But if this summer proved like that other one, there might be another August with no snow on the ground. Slipping a hand from beneath the blankets, he fumbled along the cold stone wall for the niche where he kept his glasses. Pudgy fingers grabbed the icy metal frames and yanked them into the warmth. He scowled. He wanted to see if the icicle hanging outside his window had shortened any. But, as every morning, he didn't want to give in to these glass tyrants and put them on. They were responsible for so much of his misery. If his eyes had been stronger (and he had been a little thinner and faster), he would be at the Cardiff Military Academy now, learning to be a warrior, as the son of a noble Glamorganshire family should be, as his parents had expected him to be when they named him for the ancient hero Wellington. Not that anyone called him that now. He was just "Welly," like the name of high boots for slogging through mud. Angrily he jammed the glasses onto his round face and glared around the bare room. So now instead of the yearned-for academy, he was at Llandoylan School receiving a "well-rounded" education, when he wanted to be learning to fight boundary raiders from Gwent or Angelsy pirates or perhaps the rumored hordes of muties from the South. Of course, he'd been told often enough, he was lucky to get any education at all. Children of herders or farmers generally got none. The muffled clanging of the ten-minute bell startled him. Hurriedly Welly slipped out of bed, yelping as his bare feet slapped against the cold flagstones. When he was an upperclassman, he'd at least have a rug in his room. He tugged on a pair of socks. Then, rushing to the washbasin, he broke the ice crusting its surface and splashed his face perfunctorily with water. Anyway, he thought as he hastily pulled on his long underwear, this was an early thawa time for exciting things to happen. And this time, he would make the most of it. Trousers and shirt on, he slid into his boots and, grabbing his fleece-lined jacket, rushed out the door into the narrow hallway. Still struggling with one sleeve, he rounded a corner and smashed into another hurrying body. Adjusting his skewed glasses, his heart sank. It was Nigel Williams, accompanied by several of his cronies. "Watch yourself, Frog Eyes!" Nigel snarled. "If you don't know how to act in the presence of your future duke, I'll be glad to show you." "Aw, later, Nigel," drawled Justin, the young lord's chief lieutenant. "The pleasure of whipping a worm like that isn't worth missing breakfast for." Nigel snorted agreement, and without another word, he and his companService, Pamela F. is the author of 'Tomorrow's Magic ', published 2007 under ISBN 9780375940873 and ISBN 0375940871.