Larrikan is happy and full of energy all day. Even his shift of work at the dining hall leaves him energetic and upbeat. He takes a second bath for the day, which gets him gentle teasing by the girl who is running the bathhouse. He doesn’t mind and banters happily.
After that, he goes back to the dorm and sleeps like a rock. He had energy, but sleep is good, too. He doesn’t seem to notice the funny looks he gets from his roommates.
A few days go by, uneventfully. Larrikan is enjoying his classes, and learing to read. He has become a regular feature at Aykchenhause, and if he stays away too long people ask what is wrong.
Emblem, Eloise, Adelin, and Haoys all start hanging out there too.
Rafe, Sear, and Yda all start tagging alone. All five girls enjoy Larrikan’s company, which Rafe and Saer notice. The two young men aren’t too upset by this, as they know Larrikan isn’t doing anything to deliberately attract the girls away. In fact, they find his cluelessness hilarious.
Class goes well, work goes well, and studying goes well. The relationship between Larrikan, Valter, Thim, Hotch and Nob isn’t going well. In class, Thim goes from being disdainful of everything Larrikan says to being continuously argumentative. Every time Larrikan talks, Thim is trying to prove fault with what the fox said. In some ways, this is easy, because Larrikan isn’t able to look things up in the book the way Thim is. Larrikan knows the subject, and really understands how magic is working, or at least what they are discussing. It is not clear Thim really does understand, but he becomes lightning fast with the index, and an expert at arguing every possible point.
Larrikan begins to speak less in class. Everyone notices and Thim is unrepentantly gleeful about it.
The reactions of Valter, Hotch, and Nob are more direct. They tease the unprepared fox like every other schoolyard bully. Three of them means there’s always one out of signt to trip him, or punch him when no one will see.
Larrikan takes the reaction that Shy Folk have taken forever. He isn’t there. He learns their schedules, and stays away. He eats at odd hours, or at Aykchenhause. He studies with Haoys and Birkegeistezeder at odd hours. He stays in Barrow Hall, or goes for long walks in the forest. He avoids the problem.
This fails for his scheduled work in the dining hall. All three of the nasty boys will show up there, and tease Larrikan, or leave him messes to clean up, or gang up on him while he is taking trash out to the compost pile, and throw him in.
Yda comes in, and sits off to one side, reading. After hearing these three loudmouths bragging about the drowned rat look Larrikan had, she goes over, sits at their table, and asks, “Why are you doing this?”