The Polished Penny (Wizard's Helper Book 5) Read online

  By

  Guy Antibes

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Map of Lajia

  Wizard’s helper Character List

  Excerpt of the sixth book in the Wizard’s helper series – The Hidden Mask

  Copyright Page

  Author’s Note

  A Bit About Guy

  Books by Guy Antibes

  Copyright ©2019 Guy Antibes. All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without the permission of the author.

  ~

  This is a work of fiction. There are no real locations used in the book; the people, settings, and specific places are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblances to actual persons, locations, or places are purely coincidental.

  Published by CasiePress LLC in Salt Lake City, UT, November 2019.

  www.casiepress.com

  Cover Design: www.ebooklaunch.com

  Book Design: Kenneth Cassell

  Editing: Amy Hoffman

  Principal Reader: Bev Cassell

  ~

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  ~

  Penny needs her own story, so here it is. We followed her from time to time in The Battlebone, but this time we get to see what she thinks as she struggles to become a better Penny, a more polished Penny, while she learns more about healing in Dorkansee, Corand’s capital. Don’t worry about Jack Winder. He shows up at the right time as we settle into more adventures and more startling revelations amidst the continuing battle against the Black Finger Society.

  — Guy Antibes

  Map of Corand & Lajia

  PENNY

  Chapter One

  ~

  T he gray skies perfectly aligned with Penneta Ephram’s current state [AH1][KC2][KC3]of mind. She gazed at the drops of rain skittering down the glass window of the carriage that currently took her toward Dorkansee and the end of life as she knew it. If sighs were miles, she would have already traveled around the world.

  How could Uncle Fasher, the cold-hearted man, have sent her away from Raker Falls? She pressed her lips together, hard, and balled her hands into fists as she recalled the dinner with Uncle Fasher; his new wife [AH4]Corina; and her [AH5]father and mother. They all celebrated her finally giving in to her uncle’s awful idea.

  Her sister Liddy seemed to have joined in the betrayal. Penny hadn’t realized how much Liddy missed the capital of Corand. As for her, Penny had celebrated leaving Dorkansee three years ago. The emerging social demands on her as an affluent young woman had suffocated her.

  Penny pulled out the silver-handled dagger [AH6]her father had placed in her hands just before she boarded. She didn’t tell him that her sword had joined her on the journey. Jack Winder, her rival at Fasher Tempest’s wizard healing clinic, had improved his swordsmanship on the errands her uncle assigned him, and it grated on her that she had fallen behind. She would find a suitable fencing instructor once she reached Dorkansee, but she wouldn’t tell anyone, not even Liddy.

  An errant ray of sunshine brightened up the polished blade. Inspired, she decided right then that she would polish herself while she was gone and return bright and sharp. A wisp of a smile crossed her face. Now she had a secret goal to keep her sanity. While she learned how to heal others, she would learn how to heal the pain she currently felt, even if it meant learning how to be a proper young woman and an expert swordswoman.

  ~

  By the time [AH7]the carriage clattered on the cobbles of Dorkansee, Penny had come to terms with her banishment. The sighs were left far behind as she let the excitement of returning to Dorkansee overtake her. Memories she had repressed came back. She looked at women strolling in the First Ring of the city and realized that styles had changed in three years. Wouldn’t Liddy be jealous? No, Penny thought. Liddy was jealous as soon as she heard Penny was heading for Dorkansee.

  The large square close to the king’s castle brought a jolt of more excitement coupled with shocks of fear. She would be spending the next two years, at a minimum, Uncle Fasher told her, learning at the Dorkansee Healing Institute. In a few moments, the carriage stopped, and Penny looked up at her new home.

  She jumped out the door with her bags and went to help the driver remove her heavy trunk from the roof. The man frowned and shushed her away.

  “I am paid to take these off, young lady. I’ll not have you hurting yourself before you even go inside to learn how to heal.”

  Penny nodded and gently clamped her teeth on the tip of her tongue. “Polished,” she said, restraining herself from telling the driver how wrong he was.

  “What?” the driver asked.

  “Famished.” Penny smiled at the man. “You are right. I will let you take the risk. I realized that I am very hungry.”

  The man managed to wrestle the trunk down from the roof. He wiped off his hands and gave Penny a little bow.

  “Don’t worry about a tip, since I was paid well to take you here. I must be off to catch my next fare to Bartonsee,” the driver said.

  He waved to her as he drove away. She stood in front of the institute with two bags and a heavy trunk at her feet.

  A young man ran from the building. “New student?” he asked.

  “Penneta Ephram,” she said.

  The young man looked at her blankly.

  “I am a new student,” Penny said.

  “Oh, right,” the young man said, smiling brightly now that his question had been answered. “If you can manage the bags, I’ll manage the trunk.

  No wonder he was carrying bags for the institute, Penny thought. She walked ahead of him to a large front counter.

  “I am Penneta Ephram from Raker Falls. I am a new student at the healing institute,” she said to an older woman shuffling papers behind the counter.

  “You can put the trunk there, Griff.”

  Penneta looked behind her to see the young man levitate the trunk across the hall and lower it just behind Penny. Her jaw about dropped open. She had never seen levitation done so well.

  The young man smiled. “Just wanted to help,” he said as he ran up the stairs.

  “Griff is a second-year healer. Bright as the sun, but a little too helpful,” the older woman said. “You will be staying with us, I see. Take your bags to the third-floor steward’s office. He will show you to your rooms. Your trunk will get there eventually.”

  Penny felt helpless all of a sudden. “Do I get some information about how things work here?”

  The lady took a sheaf of papers bound with a green cord from a drawer and wrote 310 on the front. She went to a different drawer and withdrew a key. “Don’t lose it!” She tied it to the cord. “Up the stairs and to your left. There are signs after that.”

  After looking at the entryway to see what she had missed when she first entered, she trudged up the stairs, gazing back at her trunk, standing all by itself in the middle of the lobby.

  The steward merely pointed her down the hall and left her to find room 310 all by herself. Penny tried the door and found it unlocked. She frowned and pushed the door open.

  “Don’t you have the decency to knock?” a voice called out from the other side of the door.

  Penny gasped. Was she to have a roommate? That wasn’t a female voice.

  She stepped inside to see a young man and a young woman sitting on an old couch in a tiny sitting room, just decoupling from hugging each other. Penny guessed they were doing more than hugging. She tapped on the open door with her knuckles.

  “Is this a little better?” she said. She wanted to put her hands to her face to cool her hot cheeks.

  “You are the new roommate?” the girl said. She stood up and straightened out her dress.

  “Penneta Ephram. I’m generally called Penny.”

  “Trinita Limpet,” she smiled. “You can call me Nita.”

  Penny pulled her bags from the hallway and closed the door behind her, but she didn’t want to walk farther into the room.

  “Your bedroom is over there,” Nita said. “Mine is on the other side.”

  “I’ll take these with me,” Penny said.

  “Well, you aren’t going to want to leave them there,” the young man said, laughing. If Jack Winder had said it, she could have responded with some
thing just as sarcastic, but this person’s comments seemed to have too mean of an undercurrent.

  Penny bit her tongue again. She had a proper retort on that tongue, but she reminded herself that she needed polish, and it seemed she was going to work harder [AH8]than she thought to get it.

  Her room was about the same size as the sitting room. A single unmade bed shared the room with a desk, chair, washstand, and a wardrobe that might fit her clothes. Everything was shabby.

  She frowned and plopped on the lumpy mattress. The room didn’t meet the expectations that she had built up in her mind. The institute was in the First Ring. This room belonged in the Fourth or the Fifth, where the poorer people lived.

  Penny stared at her bags. Did she even want to unpack?

  “Henry’s gone,” Nita’s voice called from the sitting room.

  Penny poked her head out the door and looked at Nita, smiling at her from the couch.

  “You’ll have to get used to him, I’m afraid. We are getting married when we both finish our training next year. He may not seem like it, but he ranks high at the institute. We are joining his father’s clinic in Shuttingsee.”

  Penny looked back at her room and sat in the lone easy chair. She could feel a hole in the cushion.

  Nita laughed. “Don’t worry about the state of the room. I’m buying new furniture. Want to pitch in?”

  “You can buy what you want?”

  “I can, and I want,” Nita said. “I moved in a week ago and moped around until I found I can change things.”

  Penny sighed. Her first since she had made her decision to become polished. “Count me in. I have funds.”

  Nita brightened. “So do I! Let’s do some planning.”

  Penny smiled but put up her hand. “I need to find out what to do first.”

  Nita gave Penny a negligent wave. “Don’t worry. Your first orientation is the day after tomorrow. We have lots of time to get things started.”

  “Can I start with something to eat?” Penny asked.

  “Generally, I eat with Henry, but he has an errand. He’ll never tell you, but he was glad you barged in, or he would have been late.” Nita smiled coyly. Penny suspected Nita didn’t care if Henry had been late to his appointment.

  “Then let’s go,” Penny said. She hurried back to her room and grabbed her key.

  “Don’t worry about locking our door. Nothing is ever stolen.”

  Penny pursed her lips and returned to her room, stuffing money and valuables into her purse before leaving. She might be naïve about some things, but Penny had experienced unexpected misfortunes enough on her errand with Jack Winder and Helen Rafter earlier in the year. She had learned that a few precautions never hurt, so she locked the door, hoping[AH9] her trunk wouldn’t be delivered to her room while they were away.

  Chapter Two

  ~

  T he restaurant was not the best, but since it catered to students at the University of Dorkansee and the healer’s institute, the lower prices matched the food. She wondered why Nita brought her here. Penny had expected something better from the way the woman talked and talked.

  “I left my money back in the room,” Nita said. “Could you cover our lunch?”

  Penny paid and followed Nita back to their room. The door was open a crack, and that gave Penny an awful feeling. Her bags had been ransacked, and her possessions were strewn everywhere. Nita’s room looked much the same.

  “All my money is gone!” she said. “I can get more, but I will have to send for it from home. Can I pay you back my share for the purchases we will be making this afternoon?”

  Penny bit her tongue. “I will if we lock the door to our rooms from now on.” She nearly shook with anger, but she had committed to becoming polished and restraining herself was going to put a shine somewhere on her character.

  With a locked door, they went to a Second Ring market. Everything would be too expensive in the first.

  “We should get all new furniture. I don’t think there is a usable piece in our rooms,” Nita said.

  Penny had to agree about the beds and the stuffed furniture, but the tables, desks, and chairs didn’t have to be replaced, but Nita insisted[AH10]. Penny had dipped deep into her funds, but her father had set up a letter of credit at his old merchant’s bank. She felt she should have objected, but all this was so new to her. Though it felt wrong, Penny decided a polished person wouldn’t protest. The furniture would be delivered late in the day.

  Nita laughed as they walked back to their rooms. “That was fun. I love to shop.”

  With other people’s money, Penny thought. Nita had picked out furniture much better than they needed, although Penny did spot a desk chair made by Jack’s father that had traveled all the way to Dorkansee. She would take that back to Raker Falls.

  Penny didn’t notice any changes to their rooms when they returned. Nita cleaned up her room, and Penny was left to do the sitting room and her room. The entire episode was strange. If she could initiate a conversation with Jack, she would, but she sat down at her desk after finding some paper and a pencil and wrote a letter to her father describing her early misfortune at the institute.

  Henry showed up after Penny’s trunk arrived. He peeked into Penny’s room.

  “That is a fine trunk,” Henry said.

  Penny hadn’t had anyone comment on her luggage before. She didn’t trust him any more than Myra Pulini towards the end of their adventure to Passoran and back. She wouldn’t leave the door unlocked again with Henry around.

  He walked back into the sitting room and gave Penny a slimy smile, much slimier than before, or was that Penny’s mistrust making him look worse.

  “Time to have some fun?” he said.

  “I’m always ready for that,” Nita flashed her eyes at Henry, and he smirked at his fiancé. “Don’t wait up for us. I’ll notify the institute that we were victimized on my way out,” Nita said.

  Penny stood up. “Aren’t you going to wait for the furniture to arrive?”

  “You can handle everything. Would you mind making my new bed? That would be wonderful.” She waved as Henry pushed her out the door.

  “The nerve!” Penny said aloud as she plopped back down on the easy chair with the hole in the cushion. “It is certainly going to be a challenge to properly get some polish when I have to see that man every day.” She amended her statement to reluctantly include Nita.

  Penny lit a magical light and read from one of the texts that Fasher had given her. He had said if she came back to Raker Falls understanding everything in the book, her time spent at Dorkansee would be worth it. She flipped through the pages and blinked as she scanned some of the pages. Penny lacked the context she needed to understand much of what she read, and the diagrams were even worse. Fasher had taught her basics, but this textbook was far from basic. She would have to exercise some patience as she began her studies at the institute.

  She rose from a knock at the door.

  “Furniture delivery,” a man’s voice said.

  “You can remove what we have?” Penny asked.

  The men frowned. “For a price.”

  Penny groaned. She made sure all the right pieces were delivered, and the old furniture was toted away before she paid the men for taking the old stuff away. Penny decided she wouldn’t make Nita’s bed[AH11]. There was a limit as to how deep the shine had to be at this point. She would learn to be nicer later.

  She walked down the stairs, after locking the door, and ran into Griff, the boy who had helped her get inside the institute from the carriage in the morning. It seemed like a week ago, but she had arrived the same day.

  “Is there a dining hall for the students?” Penny asked.

  “I’m hungry. I’ll show you how to get your dinner if you’d like to join me,” he said.

  Penny hesitated. She had only eaten with Jack a few times in Raker Falls, and that was for lunch. Polish, she thought. Penny managed a smile. “Just this once,” she said.

  “Good. Come this way,” Griff said.

  Penny followed him, which she thought odd. He didn’t even make conversation as he walked briskly ahead of her. They turned a corner, and young men and women were coming down a staircase through a double door.

  “People generally come from the dormitory wing and use the north stairs instead of going through the lobby.”