Sada enrolled in the school and began spending more of her time with Tsomis. There was a buzz in the university about the elf attending class. Tsomis liked to think that the school was a liberal place, a place where the interests of others and freethinking ideals would be discussed and debated. At the same time, he liked to believe that the school was also a place where conservative truths would be accepted; while they may be debated, they would at least be heard out, particularly when it came to the society within the valley that had protected them from beyond the mountains.

The first few weeks, Tsomis did not see much of Sada. Sada was busy getting used to the university. Her studies among the elves was much different than what she experienced in the university. The elves taught concepts. Understanding and applying concepts in small groups. The humans taught through memorization. They did not learn history to apply its teachings, but to know about it. Their mathematics was the same way. They learned it to be able to repeat the theories and perhaps come up with simple theories on their own. In her elven lessons, Sada learned and applied her lessons for other reasons.

The students began to grow comfortable with Sada’s presence in their classrooms. The professors were not as comfortable. Sada was outspoken in a way that students in the university were not. The way classes ran, they would listen and take careful notes, until the professor asked a question of one of them. They would then try to answer the bombardment of questions that the professor would begin to ask, one after the next, until either the professor had exhausted the topic, or the student had given up in exasperation.

Sada could handle most barrages of questions. The wrinkle she added was that when she did not understand something that the professor explained, particularly where it did not make sense with her other learning or her reading, she would interrupt the professor to discuss the topic. She would then turn the tables on the professor and begin to question him in the same manner that he questioned others. It was almost as if there were two professors in the class when she was there.

This worked in the beginning of the semester, but as time went by, the professors began actively placating and then ignoring Sada. Her questions went unanswered, and she learned not to speak up.

“I do not understand how you are supposed to learn in these questions,” Sada asked Tsomis as they walked from the history lessons to the mathematics class.

“What do you mean?” Tsomis said. The only schooling he had ever experienced had been this university-style schooling. He excelled at memorization and did not mind the challenges the professors presented him. He enjoyed the attention when he was called on, and reveled in the challenge that the professor provided when the barrage began. It was Socratic in methodology, and Tsomis excelled at it.

“How do you learn if you are not questioning what is going on?” Sada asked, sounding more frustrated than Tsomis had heard her in some time. “These classes should be an open dialog between us and the professor. He should care about what we are asking.”

Tsomis did not answer. It was a strange question and not something he had thought much about.

The rest of the students in the school began to take Sada for granted. They knew she was there, but did not overly concern themselves with her presence. The same could not be said for the residents that lived around the university. While the professors accepted her (and would have liked her better if she did not challenge them at every turn), it was the normal folk that lived in the north west area of the valley that housed the higher learning institutes that could not understand why an elf was going to school with humans.

It all came to a head one late evening when Sada and Tsomis had stayed late to study for midterms the following day.

The sun shone in the morning but by midday storm clouds had washed into the valley, and by early evening a steady downpour was hitting the roof of the university. It was a depressing sight inside of the university classrooms as the rain washed down the uneven windows, giving the outside a strange and hypnotic look as the trees and bushes that surrounded the university buildings were stretched with the rivers of water that flowed down over the windows.

Tsomis stared out the window in despair as the last days of autumn turned into winter, a winter that promised to be as dreary and gray as any that passed over the years. He looked over and saw the professor droning on about the topic of the day. He spoke of the legal make up of the valley, how the founders had created a perfect system with a strong monarch chosen by the elven prophet having ultimate authority over the valley; but an elected council having authority over all matters day to day that the monarch did not rule on. It was an efficient model that had withstood the test of time.

As the professor droned on, Tsomis looked over to where Sada sat. Like most of the students in the hall, she was rapidly scribbling notes on the pages in front of her. It was important to write down the words that the professor used because he expected an almost verbatim answer in his exams. Sada had settled down after her challenging the professors early on the semester, and she now found satisfaction with beating the rest of the students in her exams and grades. She did not like to lose, and it was nice to know that the elves can suffer from the same arrogant hubris that humans often found themselves.

The bells rang in the university, but the professor was still a ways away from finishing her lecture. He held up his hand, waited for the bells to finish tolling, and turned the page in his notes to continue his lecture. Tsomis pushed down a loud groan that had risen unbidden to his lips. The last thing he wanted to do was sit at the back of the lecture hall while the professor continued on past his allotted time. While he knew he was paying a lot of money for his time in the class, the money seemed less relevant as he considered the time and effort he would have to expend to survive such lectures.

Before the class ended, the professor asked if anyone had any questions. At this moment, Tsomis closed his eyes and prayed softly that nobody would raise their hand to offer a question that would extend the lecture. As he heard mostly silence, he assumed that others shared his fear and were trying to get the class to end as soon as possible. He then heard the fast-paced voice of Sada begin questioning some of the theories that the professor had asked. She questioned the point of view of the prophet verse the monarch and how that offered a sort of balance. It was what she had been taught in the caves, and she felt that it was an important distinction, and not something that had been covered in the class.

Tsomis silently moaned to himself as he listened to the debate that lasted for another half hour on this topic. While he did find it moderately interesting, his stomach had begun growling some time before, and all he could think about was the end of the class and the opportunity to eat something afterwards.

The class let out a half hour later. The rest of the students pulled up their notes and dragged their feet as they pulled on their overcoats to prepare for the rain outside. Tsomis almost left without talking to Sada. It had become a ritual after these classes to meet up with her and walk her to the dormitory she stayed in. They would often dine together in the local restaurants, and she would regale him with stories of the caves, and how the elves thought of the humans.

Tsomis had explained to her his theory of classes; how it was only useful to get the degree to ensure that he got the job so he could live what he considered to be the dream life his parents had envisioned for him.

Sada did not share his desires.

“I am not in school to get a degree to move into society,” Sada said as they sat over a dinner of chicken bits fried with rice. “It is about the learning. The professors sit up there and they are trying to share something with us. Who are we not to take in what they want to give us?”

This had been a theme for Sada, and Tsomis did not agree with it. “You are an elf,” Tsomis said simply. He knew before she rolled her eyes of her reaction to this line of reasoning. It still did not stop him, however. “You cannot know the societal pressures we are put under in this society. The university is the way some of these students escape the mediocre of their family lives. It is their step up into society. You cannot take that away from them. That would be inhuman.”

Sada smiled her vicious little smile when he mentions humans to her. Sada was quite comfortable in human society. She enjoyed the ways humans thought. They were more rational than she expected; but that rationality was balanced by an almost obscene sense of emotionality unbalance. At the strangest times they would shift through an emotional spectrum that frankly scared her.

They finished up dinner and headed out of the restaurant as Tsomis paid the bill and left a large tip. He was well known in these establishments as his largess was expected and appreciated.

They left the restaurant and began to walk back to Sada’s dormitory.

As they left, they saw soldiers moving in files down the street. They were running with their halberds held against their shoulders. The strollers in the street ran off the street to allow them to pass. There was the blowing of whistles as more guards in more files approached the restaurant.

“What is going on?” Tsomis asked a passerby wearing a large top hat.

“We do not know.” There were small blankets of conversations throughout the street, and Tsomis and Sada followed the crowd in the direction that the soldiers were moving.

They headed toward the palace. More soldiers appeared and some of them seemed to be milling about, directionless.

Tsomis repeated his question to some of the guards, but they were unsure what was going on either. All they would reveal was that they had been summoned by a general alarm and cadence to the front of the palace, where they would be briefed.

By the time Sada and Tsomis had fought through the crowd, they arrived at the sidewalk that led to the palace. Tsomis secured a pair of seats inside a café with glass windows leading to the outside. The rain had slowed to a strong drizzle, and even so many people milled about waiting to hear the news.

Tsomis and Sada watched as runners moved through the crowd and the soldiers began to leave, some with orders in their hands. They gathered their men around them, and would move off in different directions. The people in the café and the ones in the streets watched. None of the soldiers would share what their orders said, some of them violently pushing people out of their way when they insisted on knowing.

Tsomis did not like to see the noble people being treated like this. At the same time, he knew through his studies that there were times when they had no choice but to be treated that way. It was about the security of the city.

There were three large gongs that rang out through the streets. Runners appeared with orders of their own. Sada and Tsomis left the café to listen to the runners.

“The king is dead,” the runner said. He had nothing else to report, and ran to the next corner to repeat his news.

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