Priscilla Astrild was a very upright sort of woman. Tall and thin, she stood a head above most men. She was the type of woman who had the potential to be very beautiful, but quashed this potential underneath her own sharp-heeled shoes. Her hair, bleached from the years spent in the polluted Industrial Towns, was almost always tugged into a brutally-tight bun. Her dress was stark and austere; black, usually- or shades of blue or purple that were so dark that they were almost black anyway. Save for a tiny amount of lipstick and fingernail polish, no makeup was worn.

Despite more-than-humble beginnings, she had clawed her way up the social ladder. Not being born to rich parents nor apprenticed off to one of the wizards in the rural villages, as was the standard custom regarding children who grew up to govern, the actual chances of her having achieved what she had were almost nothing. But even as a child of the smog (a term coined specifically for children, often homeless, who were born in the Industrial Towns), she had displayed a fiery determination to succeed. Through rigorous self-education, Priscilla had learned magic to rival that of the wizards’ apprentices. Her efforts had earned her a cushy government position, part of the branch that decided which smog-children went off to become apprentices.

She was not fond of children, herself. She was not married, and had no desire to be a mother in the slightest. As far as she was concerned, children had only one function: to grow up and do important things in the future.  It was for this reason that she took great pride in her job. By picking the children who were apprenticed, she was picking the future.

About twice a year, Street-Cleaning Day was held in the Industrial Towns. It was not, as the name implied, a day upon which the streets were cleaned (although considering that the streets were health violations in themselves, cleaning them wasn't a bad idea. But that was somebody else's job, not hers). Rather, government officials such as Priscilla rounded up the homeless children and screened them, picking a select few to be apprenticed and kicking the rest back onto the streets once they were finished. It seemed cruel, perhaps. But it was the way things worked.  The criteria wasn’t very much. Given that all children had roughly the same potential for magic (smog children were, in fact,  even more potent than the rural ones, thanks to the magic-laden pollution that they had been breathing in since their births), it was down to simple aesthetics, at least in the opinions of most.

The children, after all, had to be fit to one day take a governing role, whether it was becoming the leader of a village in need of a wizard, or returning to the city later on to participate in politics. All ability aside, they had to look and sound like they could lead. Names were very important. ‘In-fashion’ names fluctuated, but for the past sixty-or-so years, star or constellation names were the most favorable when it came to picking apprentices.  

She had been doing this job for nearly thirteen years now.

Another part of said job was to accompany the chosen few to their destinations, which were usually the country towns and villages that relied on the judgement of an elder wizard, as tradition dictated. The bigger cities- or indeed, the Industrial Towns, were more haphazard and advanced (at least in the way of technology). There was little in the way of apprenticeship there. So it was the country that Priscilla was bound for, seated on a train.

Trains were a relatively new technology, and thus, only the rich could afford to travel on them. It was a rather elegant affair, even if you weren’t sitting in first class, which Priscilla wasn’t. It wasn’t that she couldn’t afford it, merely that the first class was reserved for rich families on outings, not governmental duties. But all the same, second class wasn’t so bad. The seats were lined with crushed red velvet and the aisles were carpeted neatly.

Her journey for the day was nearly complete; all the chosen children had been dropped off at their respective villages save one. The lady had spent most of the trip engrossed in a novella, paying little attention to her charges. They didn’t need very much. Pickpockets often were able to live a fairly satisfactory life in the Towns, and were also smart enough to avoid the roundup efforts on Street-Cleaning Day.  The children who were gathered were often the ones who’d had the will beaten out of them by poverty. This did not eliminate their potential, in Priscilla’s opinion- it merely made them easier to manage. For the most part, all they did was just sit there. They didn't even talk among themselves.

It had been a rather sorry crop this year, Priscilla thought to herself sourly.  All the more reason that her presence was required at the picking. To find that happy medium between the sickly, ill-bred, good-for-nothings and the well-fed, weepy ones who had clearly been dressed in rags and kicked onto the streets on Street-Cleaning Day by their middle-class parents in hopes that they would be apprenticed so that they could avoid the hefty fees required for private tutoring.

They’d had a few good ones, but for the most part her idiot colleagues would let in anything that could rub two brain cells together long enough to blurt out a constellation name. This was something that Priscilla strongly opposed. Tradition was all well and good, she supposed, but by now there wasn’t a soul in the Industrial Towns that didn’t know what children named after stars or constellations were far more likely to get apprenticed off.

But at least the other children’d had good names. Altair, Draco, Rigel, Jupiter... Those were all good, magical-sounding names; sufficiently impressive for a village to rally around and respect.

This one... he didn’t even have a good name. Oh, it was a constellation all right, but it was quite possibly the most mundane-sounding of them all. Not a good quality in a wizard, having a mundane name.

On top of that, his appearance was quite the opposite of impressive. Not that that was a surprise, considering that he’d just come off the street, but Priscilla prided herself on her ability to foresee how a child would grow. She could see this boy as an adult already. A small, sickly man, with a weak chin, watering eyes, and trembling hands. Nervous. Not at all good wizard material.

And the name. She still could not get over the fact that her colleagues, so hung up on tradition, had picked someone with that name.

“Leo... Leo,” she said impatiently. When this failed to elicit a response, she snapped her fingers briskly. The tiny figure across from her jumped in his seat, whipping around to face her, wide-eyed.

He was small, even for a smog child. Malnutrition was rampant in the Industrial Towns, especially among children. This one was clearly one who wasn’t a fighter. The fighters, while not as crafty as the pickpockets, were the ones who got food.   He had been dressed in a clean white smock of sorts (the rags he'd been wearing before may once have been made of cloth, but by this point had seemed to have been mostly composed of dried mud. They'd been taken away and burned before he'd even been allowed on the train), but the sickly grey grime that came with life in the Towns was still plastered over his skin. Somewhere underneath the muck there might have been a reasonably-attractive child, but even if he’d been clean, his face was mostly obscured by a wild, matted tangle of black hair. The child could have been anywhere from four to six. Probably somewhere in the middle.

“Stop touching the windows,” she scolded with a glare. “Someone has to clean those, you know.”

The boy’s eyes flicked nervously to the previously-spotless glass, noting, too late, that his sooty fingerprints were all over them. “... M’sorry...”

Priscilla frowned. So far, that had been the only word that the boy had uttered aside from his own name (which she starting to doubt was even his, judging by his lack of immediate response when people called him by it). She was beginning to seriously wonder if he even knew any other words.

“I’m sorry, my lady,” she corrected sternly.

“M’sorry, m’lady,” mumbled the boy automatically, cowering in his seat.

Priscilla let out a snort. She thought of telling him to sit up straight and not mumble, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. The wizard he was going to would straighten him out for sure. They tended to be no-nonsense types.

Which one was the boy going to, again? Sagittarius? Such a waste. That man wasn’t getting any younger. He shouldn’t have to waste valuable years teaching a runt that probably wouldn’t amount to anything.

The majority of the trip after that was, like before, spent in complete silence, and near-complete motionlessness as well. The only movement in the little compartment that the pair shared were the turning of the pages of Priscilla’s novella, and a brief motion on Leo’s part (when the food cart had passed, he’d lifted his gaze from his lap hopefully, only to drop it again once the cart had failed to stop next to them).

It wasn’t until the tail-end of the trip that he spoke again.

“What are those?”

Priscilla, who had nearly dozed off, jerked back into awareness and followed the boy’s pointing finger (which was carefully held several inches away from the glass. At least he was learning).

Outside, the sun was sinking lower, painting the sky hues of pink and gold. They were far away by now from the permanently-grey skies of the pollution-ridden Industrial Towns. Nonetheless, the effects of the smog, like the influence of the children it produced, were far-reaching. The small forest that the train was passing was composed of thin, magic-bleached trees. Their trunks and leaves had probably once been rich shades of mahogany and gold, respectively; but the contaminated rain that blew for miles away from the towns had sucked the color right out of them, leaving the trunks almost white and the leaves only a pale yellow.

Yet, Leo was staring at them as though they were the most beautiful things he’d ever seen. Understandable, Priscilla supposed. There were no trees in the Towns.

“Those are trees,” she said shortly, turning her gaze away from the sorry sight and back to the pages of her book.

“Trees?” Leo echoed, tearing his own eyes away from the window and looking back at Priscilla.

“Don’t parrot, it makes you look unintelligent,” she said bluntly, not even looking up from her book.

Leo fell silent again, but his eyes were now on the trees instead of in his lap.


About an hour later, the train slowed as it pulled into its final station. By this point, the sun had sunk even lower in the sky, almost disappearing behind the treeline. Leo and Priscilla were the only passengers left. The station was hardly a station at all; merely a little booth with benches inside, seated atop a platform.   There was a single figure standing upon the platform. A short distance away, where the platform faded into a dirt road, a Familiar-drawn buggy sat. The Familiar in question looked vaguely equine, though it was in the shadows of the trees, so it was impossible to pick out the details on it.

As the pair stepped off the train, the figure smiled and made his way over. He was a young man; no older than twenty-five, though he sported a bushy beard. He was tall and lean, with a robust face and twinkling grey eyes. His hair was longish and curly, colored a bright auburn red that caught the rays of the dying sun like copper fire. His dress was modest- a tunic and trousers, in shades of brown. It was only the small pendant he wore, decorated with an insignia of crossed staffs, that signified that he was a wizard.

All the same, Priscilla observed him approvingly. Yes, had she been around when he was chosen, she certainly would have agreed with the ones who picked him. He was how a wizard should look. Handsome.

“Good evening, my lady,” he greeted respectfully, bowing and kissing her hand before straightening up again. “I must say, it is unusual for us to get young apprentices so fine-looking...”

Priscilla’s mouth-corners twitched upwards slightly at the thinly-veiled attempt at flirting. “Thank you, but I’m afraid that I am not the apprentice.”

The man’s eyes widened in mock-surprise. “No?” He made a show of looking around before spotting Leo, who had retreated behind Priscilla’s skirts, trembling. “Ah, I suppose it must be this fine young fellow, then?”

It was at this point that Priscilla realized the child was, in fact, hiding behind her. With a frown, she reached behind and grabbed his ear (which had previously been hidden somewhere beneath the tangled mass of hair) and yanked him back in front of her again. Surprisingly, he did not cry out, though his expression was twisted into a grimace of pain.

The man frowned slightly at the rough treatment, but he leaned down with an encouraging smile. “And what’s your name?”

Leo first looked to Priscilla, as though asking for approval, and spoke only after she gave him a curt not. “M’Leo.”

“Leo, eh? That’s a good, strong name.”

“It isn’t very magical-sounding,” Priscilla couldn’t help but add stiffly, pursing her lips. “I imagine he will have a hard time gaining the support of the villagers when his time comes. I would advice changing it to something better.”

“Oh, I’m sure he’ll be fine,” the man said reassuringly before looking back down at Leo. “I’m Pegasus. I was Sagittarius’s last apprentice.”

“You were?” said Leo, drawn temporarily out of his wary silence by curiosity.

“Yes. He’s a very good teacher, if you get past his old-fashioned ways.” He laughed heartily. “Don’t worry, I’ll be there to make sure he doesn’t hit you too hard.”

It had been a joke, but Leo flinched as though there was actual force behind the words. Pegasus observed this with another, uncomfortable frown, while Priscilla simply sighed, looking at her pocketwatch. Leo indeed. This boy was no lion, but a mouse.

The train whistle pierced the air, a column of white steam released into the sky.

“I must go,” Priscilla said brusquely. “I presume that you’ll be transporting the child to the village?”

“Yes,” Pegasus assured her before holding out his hand for Leo to take. The boy merely cast a frightened glance at it before shaking his head vigorously. The bearded wizard then shrugged and merely gestured for him to follow, heading for the waiting buggy.

Priscilla re-took her seat on the train and observed the ex-apprentice and the new apprentice board the buggy (it took some help from Pegasus for Leo to get in). A whiplash, though it was silent through the glass, got the Familiar moving, and the buggy took off bumpily down the little dirt road, to the little cluster of twinkling lights near the horizon that was the village.

Before the buggy had disappeared from view entirely, the train started moving again. The little platform was soon lost to sight and the sickly trees dominated the view once more.  The lady sighed, adjusted her glasses, and opened her book again.