She didn’t want to admit how much it baffled her, so she merely said, “It could have been a simple mistake.”
“Strange mistake, to misspell your own surname.”
“So what?” she challenged. “Being a poor speller hardly equates to illiteracy.”
“Regardless, I don’t think Myrddin wrote it at all. I think it’s a forgery.”
Effy gave a derisive laugh. “Now you’re sounding as nutty as those superstitious Southerners you have so much contempt for.”
“It’s not unprecedented.” Preston sounded almost petulant. “We’ve seen instances of literary forgery before. The trick of any good lie is just finding an audience who wants to believe it.”
Effy chewed her lip. “Then who is the audience for Myrddin’s supposed lie?”
“You said it yourself.” The corner of Preston’s mouth turned up into a thin half smile. “Superstitious Southerners who want to believe one of their own could transcend his common origins and write books that make even Northern girls swoon.”
“I’ve never swooned in my life,” she said crossly.
“Of course not,” Preston said, completely straight-faced again. “But there are other people who stand to profit from the lie. Myrddin’s publisher, for example—Greenebough makes a killing from royalties, even now. Half of Myrddin’s appeal was this compelling backstory: the impoverished provincial poet who turns out to be a genius. There’s a lot of money to be made off that myth.”
Preston had a way of speaking with such eloquence and certainty that for a moment Effy found herself half-convinced, and too intimidated to argue. When the fog lifted, she was angry with herself for being so easily swayed.
“You’re condescending,” she said. “Not all Southerners are backwards peasants, and not all Northerners are snobs. I bet you hate it when people paint Argantians in such broad strokes. You know, most Llyrians think Argantians are cold, leering little weasels who believe in nothing but mining rights and profit margins. I can’t say you’re doing much to dispel those beliefs.”
Even as she spoke, Effy regretted indulging the same old stereotypes. Mostly, she was frustrated with herself for failing to come up with a better argument against him.
“I don’t see it as my duty to refute Llyrian clichés.” Preston’s voice was cold now. “Besides, it’s a fact that the South is economically deprived compared to the North, and that deprivation is felt most acutely in the Bottom Hundred. It’s also a fact that Llyrian political and cultural institutions are dominated by Northerners, and have been throughout history. That’s the legacy of imperialism—the North reaps while the South sows.”
“I didn’t ask you to educate me about my own country,” Effy snapped. “Statistics don’t tell the whole story. Besides, Argantians did the same thing. Cut up your northern mountain villages into mining towns and coal tunnels, only you let your myths and magic fade into obscurity instead of celebrating them. At least Llyr doesn’t try to hide its past.”
Preston looked weary. “Some might call it celebrating; others would call it flouting a colonial legacy—oh, never mind. We can argue about this until the entire house falls into the sea. I’m not asking you to buy my narrative wholesale. But you did agree to help, so can you at least try not to fight me at every turn?”
Effy ground her teeth and looked down at the pile of letters on the desk. She had agreed, but she was finding it harder than she anticipated, what with Preston’s snooty attitude. She would try her best to bear it, for now. Once she had secured a place in the literature college, she could spend the rest of her university career trying to undo the damage she’d done to Myrddin’s legacy.
“All right,” she said at last, scowling. “But you have to promise to be fifteen percent less patronizing.”
Preston drew a breath. “Ten.”
“And you think I’m the stubborn one?”
“Fine,” he relented. “Fifteen, and you don’t swear at me again.”
“I only did that once.” She was still convinced he’d earned it. But he was right; there was no use arguing with every breath.
Yet it all tasted bitter to swallow. She had abandoned her principles to get what she wanted, to improve her standing at the university, to earn some academic honors. To escape the sneers in the hallway, the whispers, and that green chair. What did that make her? No better than Preston, in the end. At least he was committed to the vaguely noble principle of truth.