Prologue
Miss Crystalwater was sitting on her desk chewing bubblegum in despair. It had been a long time since she had had to turn people away from her school. Every year she would go through the lists of names and find the two hundred most promising pupils who would then be enrolled in her school. Many did not know their name was on the list because they came from families that did not practice their powers openly. Many had no powers themselves. These were the ones who most often did not get in. Occasionally a wrong choice was made and a poor, powerless youth was suddenly expected to do the impossible. These were quickly sorted out, and by the third year of the academy there were never any non-magikal students left. Except for last year. Last year only one hundred qualified and her schools numbers had dropped so rapidly it seemed that the blood was finally becoming short. But not this year. Thousands of entries had come pouring out of her f iling cabinet, many of them completely useless. Mortals like 'Goodwell' - 2 %, Fathers side. Signs include phobia of moths'. (Everybody knows that majikal blood on a mother's side is stronger and 5% is the minimum for acceptance into a school) She sighed as 'James’' form came shooting out at her. No, she needed something new, something incredible. She bent over to pick up the latest sheet.
Rosseta
7% on father's side
7% on mother's side
7% appeared on blood test
Signs include love of water and inability to use a hairdryer.
Miss Crystalwater sat up. 7%?
"This is worth investigating!" she said to herself. "It's a long time since we've had one of these!'

Scroll One

The clock in the great hall of Crystalwater’s school struck twelve. The corridors were empty apart from the occasional cat. The students lay in bed, asleep after the long carriage journeys that had taken them to the boarding school. Standing outside and looking up at the huge building that housed the hundreds of pupils you wouldn’t have known it was made of white marble. There was no moon and the sky was velvety black. No lights shone from the castle windows… except maybe if you looked really carefully, you would be able to see a small globe of light, shining from one of the windows, high up, that looked over the vast grounds. But of course there was no one to see the light, in the school, on an island in the middle of the sea.
A girl, of about 15, with mousy brown hair and grey eyes, sat holding the globe of light, in her hand. It would have been a ghostly sight, had there been anyone to see; a girl, sitting, pearly white in the light shining from the illuminated globe that she held in her hand. The scratching of her fountain pen was the only thing that broke the silence and she sat hunched up, under her duvet. She finally concluded her essay and stretched, before blowing her globe out, as she lay down to sleep. She could have been normal, but she wasn’t. She looked like that girl across the classroom, sounded like the girl next door, wore the same trainers as Mary’s sister… but she was different. Like all the other girls and boys, who lay in oak beds, very similar to where this girl waited for sleep to finally come, she was privileged with the greatest honour: the gift of Majik. It ran in her veins, and though she felt very normal right now, a future lay ahead of her, that only one hundred children, her age, would ever be in reach of.

Katie looked sorrowfully out of the wide windows of her room and for the umpteenth time today wished she could go out and feel the deliciously cool rain on her skin. She wished so hard that it hurt. But there was no point in wishing.
The wind swirled around her menacingly, messing up her startlingly dark hair. Katie had extremely pale skin and the sort of brown eyes that always twinkled. Some would call her pretty, despite her slightly weedy figure, but she had never much been in to looks and probably never really would be. She could hear the heavy pattering of rain as it bounced of the slate roof. She loved the rain. Always had done. She remembered, when she was a little girl she had always waited for the rain and when it came she would run out side to enjoy it. Not only that but after she had come in, cold and wet her mother always had a warm towel, a mug of piping hot coca and open arms waiting for her. But best of all were the stories. The stories she used to tell in front of a crackling fire: stories of magic and mystery, of wonder and wisdom in times of old. Suddenly Katie felt a strange yearning to be young again and safe in her mother's arms.
She wheeled herself over to the bed where her ginger cat, Tabby (whose name is a misnomer) lay. She stroked him gently. To her surprise and delight he hopped down lightly onto her knees, something she had been trying to make him do for ages.
Just as she was about to call her Mum, Lucy came in. Lucy was her big sister. She had just come back from shopping with her friends. So unfair! A bedraggled looking cat trailed after. Cats loved Lucy; Lucy loved cats so they got along fine. Somehow, however, cats objected to Katie picking them up.
"How's the leg?" asked Lucy
"Not the same but better." Katie replied
She noticed that Lucy was still wearing a drenched raincoat and that her usually curly fire red hair was straight with the wet; rainbows played gently over it. Katie watched as her other cat, which was in fact a tabby called ginger, sneezed gently.
"He...."
"When that girl tripped you up I thought you were done for" Katie shuddered. She didn't want to think about it.
"Lucy..."
"I mean I was so glad it was a clean brake and should heal quickly."
"LUCY!"
"WHAT?!"
"I was trying to say that we should probably dry Ginger before he gets a cold."
"Mmmm." She had gone quiet. It was very unusual for Lucy to shut up for even a minute. When she spoke it was with a low wispy voice very unlike her own. "I know it says my name on the front, it's for you! I opened it but I had mine years ago!" with that she handed her a letter and flounced off.



Scroll Two.
Katie,
I am most delighted to be able to invite you to enrol in my school for the forthcoming year. You are a cross between a Bone't and a witch and with the a little help and cajoling I have no doubt that you may well become a very powerful figure in the majikal world. You may ask what the difference between these two beings is. A Bone't uses power from within whilst a witch channels ones power through an object such as a cane or a rod, though most items can be used for the projection of this skill. It is my hope that one day, with the help of my most esteemed colleges, you may conquer both of these skills, as I am sure that they will prove useful in your future life. You will start by learning to do the spells without the object but I hope that, in the end, you will be able to also be able to project your power as this creates a much stronger force.
We have been unable to remove you from your home this past month because of your leg. But it is now at the state where it will not be difficult for me to heal it. Your sister, I’m sure, will help you collect together anything you need to bring and will be accompanying you on your journey as she is to return to school today, to continue with her lessons. Please give your sister the message that you will not need a familiar as you have your cat, Tabby. Also please inform her that the necessary book list has not changed so she will be able to give you her old ones.
Just ask your sister any thing you don't understand, then come and meet me at the fountain in the courtyard.

Yours Sincerely

Miss P. Crystalwater.

Katie read the letter twice, and then reread it third time for good look, or rather to see if she had miss read it the first two times. She had not. It was a strange trick for Lucy to play on her. She really wasn’t accustomed to it, and it was most unlike Lucy to try and trick anyone. ‘What was Lucy up to?’ Katie wandered, as she stumbled, on her crutches, down the seven flights of stairs, which came with living in a restored Victorian mansion. Or was it a hoax? Could it be real? Everyone knew that there had once been things called witches, but Bonnet’s? Could it be true?
These questions followed her as she climbed.

Scroll Three.
A pretty blonde lady was perched daintily on the edge of a fountain in the middle of the courtyard that had not been there before. The water was bouncing away from her as if repell ∆ed by an invisible barrier. She was using a pestle and mortar to grind something that looked like cloves but didn’t smell like them. She added some basil and started to grind again. Her cloak was hiding what was obviously a beautiful floaty dress. Its layers of metallic blues, turquoises and greens matched her name perfectly and mesmerised Katie with their sparkle and shine.
"Good afternoon." Katie stuttered. Some thing about this woman enchanted her. Maybe it was her dazzling emerald eyes or her ruby red smile, but not for one second did she distrust Miss Crystalwater.
"Ah Katie, one was starting to get worried. How art thou? Please, take no notice of my 'herb mixtures they art for the infirmary." She said, in a very strong American accent! “Now for your leg…” Miss Crystalwater’s hands twitched. Katie’s crutches disappeared. She stumbled forwards. Her leg held her up – as good as knew.
Katie had to remind herself not to gape.

Katie stared petrified o ∂ut of the carriage window.
"This might be a good time to tell you Miss Crystalwater, Katie is terrified of heights," whispered Lucy pulling down the blind of Katie's window and blocking the view of the ground many miles below.
"Don't worry, soon we shall land!"
"Where exactly are we going?" Katie managed to squeal.
"Oh, did I forget to tell thee?"
But before Katie could answer the huge winged unicorn’s, which was pulling them, hooves struck the ground and they were safely pulled through a huge steel gate embossed with the words:
'Miss Crystalwater's school for Bone'ts and Witches.'

Scroll Four.
“Here we are… Welcome to Miss Crystalwater’s.”
Katie gasped. The huge building that stood before her was magnificent. She stared mesmerised at the many turrets and arches that made up Miss Crystalwater’s. The building enchanted her and Katie found it hard to believe that this was to be her home. The whole place was made of white marble and not a à blemish was afflicted on the spires of the school. The sun reflected off the perfect, clean walls giving the bizarre appearance that the school was glowing. Perhaps it was. Katie found it hard to tell.
The structure was infinitely complicated; spiralling around it’s self, into many towers that pointed to the sky like long, thin fingers. Covered walkways lead off in all directions, to outer buildings and different levels but at the moment no students moved outside, and the grounds remained eerily silent.
A meticulously straight, gravel drive led up to the imposing, white building, upon which the equally white carriage, which had just carried them all the way from London, sat motionless, now that the silver unicorn had been taken away by a very short man, with a long white beard. The man’s face was so wrinkly that his clear grey eyes had all but disappeared in thick folds of skin. His wizened hands were covered in veins and were so thin that Katie feared that › they would snap in two. But the most peculiar thing about this strange old man was the two stubby goats horns, placed firmly upon his head.
“Thank you Mr Chevre,” Miss Crystalwater said, sweetly.
Katie dragged her eyes away from Mr Chevre and peered at the beautiful grounds that surrounded her. In every direction green fields and woods spanned out, leading to the cold grey mountains that protected the school from preying eyes. Not that there were any preying eyes out here, in the middle of no where, and even if there had been all they would have seen was a tall, monotonous, grey office block, in the middle of green pastures and granite mountains.
Katie walked slowly up the drive towards the front door. The double doors of Crystalwater’s school were made of dark oak and were big enough for a giant to fit through. There was a big round knocker, which looked like it was made of solid gold, in the middle of one of the doors. Miss Crystalwater however did not use it and merely «pushed one of the creaking doors open. Before stepping inside Katie looked up at the huge building looming for metres above her. She drew in a breath. The shear size of the place was enough to frighten anyone.

Katie walked through the entrance hall, her footsteps echoing loudly in the deserted space. The hall we even bigger than you would expect from a building of such size and grandeur. The ceiling stretched up, metres above. The circular wall leading up to it was, like the rest of the building, pearly white marble. Many doors lead off the round room as well as four magnificent staircases. One was small and dingy: dimly lit, and sloping downwards. The next two were made of more white marble, and quite the biggest staircases Katie had ever seen. Red carpets led down the middle of them, making them, if possible look even grander. The last staircase however was by far the most impressive. It was glass and spiralled high. Nothing held it up, and by the ru ∂les of nature should have collapsed before it had even been finished, but somehow it remained, standing elegantly at the side of the round entrance hall. Katie’s eye followed it up and up until it disappeared through the ceiling. A chandelier huge, casting its light all around.
As Katie walked across the floor, her old trainers squeaking slightly on the black and white checked marble, she peered through the various doors that also lead off the main hall. Katie sighed in wander, as she looked through a set of doors, similar to the ones that she had just come through. Inside was the most amazing room! It was even bigger than the entrance hall but was also made of the same pure white marble. The ceiling sloped up, from the floor on one side, to meet a sheer, glass window on the other. Through the window Katie could see the clear blue sky of a lovely September day. The neatly kept lawns sloped down to a gushing river at the bottom and the –flowerbeds burst with colour. The dark, granite Mountains loomed overhead.
The room itself had a small raised platform with a dark oak table stretching the length of it. Five similar tables covered the main part of the room but these had benches next to them rather the grand, straight-backed chairs that lined (what Katie presumed was) the teacher’s table, on the platform. There were strange rings above the tables and balanced on each were six globes of light. The floor in here was made of scrubbed oak, similar to that of the tables. It was an amazing room. The design was so simple but somehow it captured Katie attention and it was only Lucy's guiding hand that stopped her going in, to explore.

A tall woman led them down the darkly lit winding corridors. The woman was very tall and severe looking. Her strong cheekbones made her look powerful and her gaunt frame unfriendly. She was dressed in an assortment of dark shawls and drapes and had a badge pinned on her ‡ chest reading ‘Ms. Price. Matron’. After walking down the umpteenth gloomy corridor they came to a stop by an oak door will a brass sign saying 'Temporary dormitory, for new and undiscovered girls.'
The walls of the room inside were grey stone slabs and the ceiling was the same. The windows were simple arcs. It looked dismal after the rest of the schools grandeur.
"Here's your dorm," said Lucy. "If we're lucky we'll have the place to ourselves until..."
"Who art thou and what is thee doing in thy dormitory?" said a voice behind the door. The girl stopped, spotting Lucy "Oh, I’m very sorry. I'm Susannah, but you can call me Suzie, I'm in this dorm. Well I'll be off then." She said, hurrying to door.
"Shouldn’t you be in lessons?" called Lucy. "Don't worry, she was only trying to freak you out." Lucy explained that they were only allowed to use the ‘olde language’ on formal occasions such as parties, banquets and balls.
"So are there a lot of formal occasions here?"
"You better flbelieve it!" exclaimed Lucy excitedly. "One every full moon, and that's not all!" Katie had got her going now. Never, and I mean never should you give Lucy something to talk about. She won't stop.
"So what do I wear to all these occasions?" interrupted Katie. "In fact what do I wear usually? Does this school have a uniform?"
"Of course it does! You wear... Perhaps it would be easier if I just showed you. Where do you want your wardrobe?"
The uniform didn't, to Katie, look anything like any uniform she had seen before. It consisted of a black dress that went down to a little way above the knee. The dress was waisted with a black, leather belt that had a bronze clasp of a star on it at the front. It also had purple, synthetic stockings that went up to just above the knee, perfectly positioned to show all the bruises that a girl of this age gained through climbing trees, playing hockey and running up stairs much too fast when late for lessons. For Katie the latter held the most r Íesponsibility for an amazing and consistent display of purples and browns. But the boots Katie liked. They were in the chunky doc martin style. Jet black and slightly shiny, but Katie expected they wouldn't remain like that for long.
"OK," said Lucy, ten minutes later, looking at the incredibly small bag that everything had come out of. "That's almost everything. Just the rest of your clothes to go now."
"What other clothes do I need?" said Katie (She had already got two pairs of the uniform she was now wearing and some clothes she had got from home.)
"Oh, just the basics, here we are." She said, pulling something black out of the bag.
"This is a cloak,” said Lucy, answering Katie's puzzled look.
"You will wear it instead of a coat. Here, let me help." Lucy fastened the thick black cloak around her neck with a bronze badge.
"You will wear a smart gown for special occasions, now, where is it?"
"Tell me its not in that case!" said Katie, disgustedly, looking at a pink case encrusted with s Óhining jewels.
"You bet." said Lucy, with a snigger. She pulled out the gown. Katie looked at it in amazement and disgust.
"You're kidding me! When you said smart I thought you meant it would at least be slightly pleasant!"

Twenty minutes later Katie was sitting on a bed surrounded by curtains and things that Lucy had brought from her bedroom. The wardrobe was a white colour, which brightened up the grey stonewalls of the circular and very plain dorm reasonably.
There room had eight cabin beds in it. They each had a desk underneath which were made of the same dark oak as the beds. Six of them looked inhabited. One had several pictures of a band called muse surrounding it, another had pictures of friends and family covering the walls and one other one had so many newspaper clippings, postcards, pictures and posters taped up that Katie could barely see an inch of free stone wall anywhere surrounding it. Katie wandered which bed belonged to Suzie, the girl she had met earlier.
Katie clasped o ‰nto her bright blue futon, looking around at her space, which she could hardly call her own it was so impersonal. Oh well: that was something she could work on.
Her cat, Tabby, was on her lap. She was dressed in her, black dress. On its right side there was a logo. It had a moving picture of a witch's hat and a moon with a girl stroking a ginger cat sitting on it. That's strange thought Katie I'm sure she wasn't there before. A cat lay by the figure's feet. That cat looks just like my Tabby!
DRING DRING, it was the school bell, hammering into her thoughts. Katie pulled out her timetable: lesson 1- Beauty & Deportment: room 259. Suddenly, Katie remembered what Lucy had told her: "beauty and deportment is when you get taught how to sit, speak, look and walk, among over things." Lucy had then said "Your first lesson, well second for everyone else, (they’re all in a lesson now but you've been let off), is in room 259,” she continued "so leave 10 minutes early. The class is on floor Î 9; you are in tower 3 now." and she had gone on like that, finally ending in a warning: "Do not be late, you have a very strict teacher and she will not stand for it."
Well, Katie was going to be late now, whether she liked it or not.

Scroll 5.
10 minutes later Katie entered the classroom, panting. "Yes?" asked a cold voice inquisitively. Then a thin woman stepped forwards. As soon as the lady was in the light- or what little light there was in the small, dark room- it was obvious to Katie that this was the woman who had spoken for she had cold eyes to match the coldness of the voice.
The lady's features were dark. Her lips were tight and her eyes seamed to search Katie for a fault. The room was about ten times more grey and dismal than Katie’s dorm.
The walls were the same dark grey and the room was filled with rows of highly polished oak desks. There was little else in the room. It was unnaturally tidy. It was lit, like all the other rooms, by naphtha lamps, but these ones had been tu Àrned down, so low, that Katie struggled to make out the features of the other girls faces.
At each desk sat two girls. Some looked nervously from Katie to the teacher, others simply leered up at her, gleefully watching as their horribly strict teacher terrorised the clueless new girl. Only Suzie smiled.
Katie clung to this smile like a drowning sailor clinging to a lifeline. And when the teacher finally barked at her to ‘sit down smartish’ Katie squeezed in besides Suzie, before addressing her slightly over formally.
"Hi, my name's Katie. I believe we met earlier."
"Oh. Right. You're the new girl" she replied in a whisper, trying to mess up her already messy bun, of brownish blonde hair. Her appearance wasn’t anything special, with fairly standard mousy hair and grey eyes but she seemed accepting of Katie and a friendly face was just what Katie needed. "Only we're not allowed to talk in this class so we'd probably better shut up." It was harsh, but not unk ⁄ind.
"Today girls, we are going to learn a special charm for beautiful curly hair," said their teacher "so in this lesson I want you to do research into the charm and as homework to conduct the charm on yourself. And you will do it in silence." She continued, obviously used to the groans. No body talked. Madam Escuro had total control over the class. Finally the bell rang for break and with a sigh of relief Katie packed up her things and left the classroom.
Suzie ran up behind her. "Hey Katie. How about you meeting me up in the dorm in twenty minutes, I can show you where your next lesson is?" Katie may have been mistaken, but she thought she had a friend.

Scroll six.

Katie swirled round in her new school dress, staring at herself in the long, gold, engraved mirror that stood by her bed. She hated dresses. She would always choose trousers over skirts, preferring scruffy jeans to any other item in her wardrobe. Movement on her badge caught her eye. She peered at it, intr Âigued. And the little person on her badge peered back.
"Hang on a moment." Katie thought, aloud, "Is that me?"
"Well, that took you a while," Her badge replied.
The new discovery seemed to be too much for Katie to cope with and she suddenly felt dizzy. She staggered forwards, and tripped over her slightly oversized boots. She fell, as if in slow motion, into the mirror bracing herself for the deafening crash.
But the crash never came. She coughed and rubbed the dust from her uniform. Slowly she stood up and checked herself for bruises. She was not hurt but she soon saw that the door had shut itself behind her and that she was trapped. She took a few deep breaths and told herself not to panic, began to panic but presently found herself calm enough to assess the situation properly. She looked round and saw that she was in a long, dark corridor, which appeared to go on forever. The corridor six shorter corridors leading off, one of which she now found herself looking down. Each had an ¿identical door at end of them. She strained to see them clearly by the light of the single bulb that hung overhead. Katie walked slowly to the door nearest to her, curiosity conquering panic. She ran her hand over the door in front of her. Just as she feared. It had no handle, no knocker, no keyhole, no anything.
Slowly she walked down the main corridor. She soon arrived at a room. It was small, simple and round, and the walls totally covered in books on shelves apart from a small wooden bench, which ran around the edge.
The floor was laden with brightly coloured cushions, of all shapes and sizes. Katie admired the room for a minute before remembering the situation. She sighed. How many more secrets did this school hold?
There was nothing else for it- she couldn't afford to be late for another lesson. Katie hurried back down the passageway and soon was facing one of the six corridors. Was this the one she had fallen down? Uh, she felt so stupid! ‹How could she have forgotten to mark the way she got in? It was one of the oldest tricks; look at Theseus and the Minotour.
There was nothing else for it. She closed her eyes, spun around, opened them and walked down the corridor she was facing. She started to pound on the door and shouted: "Help! Help! I'm stuck in here."
To her amazement a voice answered immediately.
"Where are you?" it was a male voice. He sounded around her age, thirteen or fourteen.
"Try pushing against the mirror, that's how I got in."
Katie stood back. With a creak the door swung open. A boy about Katie's own age stood there. Katie looked him up and down. He had a mop of feathery black hair and his eyes were just as striking. They glinted in the light and his olive skin stretched over his hollow cheeks, with a promise of extreme good looks in the years to come.
"Charlie." said the boy, grinning and extending his hand.
"Katie." said Katie, shaking his hand and grinning almost as widely as him. Strang ◊ely she felt as though she had known him all her life.
"I don't mean to be rude, but the hell were you doing in there?"
Katie didn’t feel the slightest regret at having to tell Charlie about the secret passageways and she was surprised to find he didn’t as much as giggle when she told him she had fallen through and got lost.
"This is a bit of a random question but where exactly are we?" Katie asked, having answered all Charlie's questions.
"New and undiscovered boys dorm."
"How come there weren't boys in my first lesson?"
"I'm guessing you had beauty and deportment?"
"I'm guessing boys have better things to do with their time than walk around with a book on their head."
Charlie laughed.
"Not really, instead we get lectured on 'how we must make our power our own and not just rely on the blood of our ancestors to get us through in life.'"
"I'd swap that for Madame Escuro any day!"
They talked as they walked back to the girls’ dorm
(with Charlie leading the way). When the €y arrived Katie introduced Charlie to Suzie but there had not been much point seeing as Charlie and Suzie had been best friends for the last couple of months. Suzie was very keen to explore the passageways, when they told her about them, and she didn’t have much trouble persuading the others.
“Can I bring Ben?” Charlie asked, the usual cheeky grin still in place.
“Yeah, as long as he behaves himself!” replied Suzie. Katie nodded, not knowing who Ben was, but having decided to trust the others opinions.

Second period Tuesday meant Protection and Use of Majikal Fire for Katie, so she and Suzie set off quickly; the class was held on the eighth floor, five floors above their dorm. Suzie explained that the last number in the room number told you which floor the class was on, the second was the block and the first the actual class number. Once Katie understood this she felt a little annoyed at Lucy, for not telling her this earlier, as Katie thought that this was a pretty vital ‡ piece of information if you didn’t want to get lost!
But as they approached the busy corridor outside the classroom Katie’s excitement abated, to be replaced by curiosity and nerves. The whispers and curious looks that Katie received from her classmates certainly didn’t help with the nerves.
“Hey, Suzie! Suuuzie ya bum!” shouted a scruffy looking boy with a mop of brown hair and sky blue eyes. Suzie spared him one haughty look before turning back to Katie, who was practically terrified now about what she would have to meet in that classroom. But the boy persisted with his shouting. Finally Suzie turned.
“What?” she demanded.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?”
“I’m sure she’d rather I didn’t,” Suzie replied.
“Well,” Ben said to a rather bemused looking Katie “if she’s too rude to introduce me then I’ll just have to do it myself! I’m Ben, and believe it or not me, Suzie and Charlie best buddies. When she’s in a good mood.” He added in a whisper. Katie tried, to no avail, to sti •fle a grin.
Just at that moment, before Katie could reply the door swung open and the class filed in. Katie down sat next to Suzie and Ben and a slightly breathless Charlie sat down in front of them. Katie looked around. The room was not much different to the one that Katie had had Beauty and Deportment in, but slightly better lit and brighter.
Sir Kraft walked in, his long black ponytail swishing as he walked. He must have been in his mid-thirties but already his hair was streaked with grey. His muscles bulged under his tunic. He looked part Chinese with his tanned skin and slanting grey eyes. He was no talker than the average man but far more imposing. Surveying the class, critically Kraft walked towards his desk.
“Books away everyone.” There was a shuffling as everyone hurriedly pushed their books back into their bags. The class sat silently. This was a different type of silence though, to the one that intoxicated any room that Madam Escuro was: in it was a silence of waiting people, not terrified ones. “Good,” continued Kraft once all the books were out of sight. He spoke unnecessarily loudly over the quiet. “Today we will be learning how to reflect mechants back at the sender.”
“What are mechants?” Katie whispered to Suzie.
“Did someone just ask what mechants are?” barked Kraft looking for the enemy. Katie raised her hand nervously. “Oh, we have a new girl? Well this is just great! It doesn’t matter that I need to teach her does it? No one bothers to tell me. Well that’s just great.” Kraft glared at Katie as though it was her fault. “Michael, I’m sure you can tell the new girl what a mechant is.”
“It’s a bad spell. One that’s meant to harm its victim. It is sent in combat,” a boy on the other side of the room said, lazily. He flicked his curly blonde hair out of his face. Several of the girls sent him admiring looks. Suzie snorted ‘boff’ a bit too loudly howev –er and the teacher turned on her.
“What was that Suzie?”
“Nothing,” she mumbled in reply.
The teacher soon started instructing the class on how they were supposed to go around reflecting mechants. All they had to do was believe that they could reflect anything that was sent their way. The stronger their belief the stronger mechants they could reflect. They were split into pairs. Unfortunately they weren’t allowed to choose who they went with and Katie was put with a rather nasty girl, named Miranda, who reminded Katie strongly of her old next door neighbours vicious bull dog.
She seemed to have a talent for particularly mean mechants, and after Katie had spent five minutes lying on the floor paralysed with her hair trying to pull her into a standing position, watching Suzie trying to attack her with equally mean mechants as a pay back, Katie lost all belief that she could do anything. It was almost as painful a lesson as the last one.

Scroll 7.
Katie was excited. She knew she shouldn't be because she had probably broken more rules in the last 5 minutes than she had ever done in her life (not that this was hard) and, if they got caught sneaking down the passage they had accidentally found earlier, they would be in big trouble. But it was discovering the unknown and that had always made Katie excited. More than anything, though, Katie was excited because for the first time in her life she felt as though she really fitted in.
Ben grabbed her elbow, making her jump. He laughed. The joyous noise echoed round the high ceiling of the room they now stood in. His blue eyes were excited and full of fun. He was full to bursting of excitement, Katie held her hand up high; the globe of light, which she held, illuminated the ornately decorated hall, where they stood. She was pleased with the globe light she had created, after many attempts, so they could see down the narrow passageways they had been exploring for over two hours now. They had found a spider's web of halls, rooms, corridors and staircases that criss-crossed all over the school. Every now and then they had found a locked door and once, even, a room that appeared to Charlie and Ben but not to Katie or Suzie, unless the boys had been tricking the girls, which was more than likely!
But now, as it must be well into the dead of night and they all had lessons tomorrow, they were trying to find there way back to their dorms, which in its-self was, unfortunately, easier said than done.
"Ben, do you even know where we are?" mumbled Katie, as it was getting late.
"Yeah, sure I do!" replied Ben, pretending to be offended.
"Ok. So which way do we go to get back?" Said Suzie
"Erm..."
"I guess we're lost."
"Yeah, Ben, why did you lead us down here in the first place?"
"What, me?"
"Yes, you!!!" a very irrita ªted Suzie replied, "Why did I even say you could come?"
"Um... because you're madly in love with me?"
"SHUT UP AND GET MOVING YOU LUMP!!!"
"LUMP? ME?? I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW THAT I WON A PRIZE AT MY LAST SCHOOL FOR PERSEVERANCE AT SPORT!!!"
"WHICH SPORT??? EGG AND SPOON RACES??"
"OH, THAT'S IT, YOU!!! I TELL YOU, I'M GOING TO..."
"TO DO WHAT?"
Katie slid in between the two of them before they had a chance to start the bloodbath.
"Stop it, both of you! Do you think now is the right time for an argument? Shouldn't we be concentrating on finding our way back?" Said Katie, restraining Suzie from getting close enough to Ben for her to strike out at him.
"Yeah, you two being at each others throats is hardly going to help us get out of here, is it?"
"Exactly!" Said Katie, letting Suzie go. "Thanks." She whispered to Charlie.
"No problem," he replied. “You’ll get used to it after a while.”

“Katie, can you come here a minute?" called Charlie, from a roo ‘m to her left.
They had been searching through rooms for hours now. So far they had found many rooms, never two the same, all as if someone's soul had been trapped inside its very heart. The saying 'if only walls could talk' seemed redundant here, because it was as if they could. Each room told a story so powerful they found it hard to remember that they were trying to get out of this haven. There was the room that was full of papers, all written in the same scrawly handwriting, all pieces of music and literature, written so beautifully that Katie wasn't sure whether she wanted to laugh or cry. On the walls were hand drawn pictures of characters from the author's musicals, in cartoon form, not quite anime, but still so lifelike it was as if they could step out of their frames and ask her whether she was "Seriously expecting me to sing at the same time as doing that little jiggly thing with my feet?" The boys had practically had to drag her away.
"Sure, just give me ´a second." Katie closed the door of the room she had been looking in (which had been full of frozen animals) and walked into the room where Charlie was calling from.
It was huge.
It was the sort of room in which you would expect important meetings to be held, imposing, with a great dark wood table in the centre. The room was octagonal, and had great long windows on one side, showing them that it was dusk. Maps, of all shapes and descriptions, were framed and hung along the other side. The room was lit by low-burning gas lamps, which illuminated only part of the room, casting deep shadows across the silent
figure, holding, what seemed to be a large, rugged piece of paper.

Scroll 8.
Katie yawned. Charlie grinned at her; his usually alert eyes were red and puffy with exhortation. Their explorations the previous night had not, in the end, finished until well past two in the morning, mainly because they had not been able to fin ñd their way back until very late when they had found an amazingly detailed map showing the whole network of passages that spanned across the school. Even after finding the map it had taken them a good deal of time to find where they were on it and the quickest way back and even longer to walk all the back to the dorms due to the fact they had managed to get lost every 5 minutes.
"So," Mr. Harrison's voice droned on, "After you have added the horn of a 12 year old caston, powdered, stir your potion nine times, clockwise. CLOCKWISE Suzie!"
Katie couldn't help gagging at the awful smell her, now jet-black, potion was admitting. She couldn't help thinking she must have done it totally wrong when.
"Katie, how many teaspoons of liquidated cows dung did I tell you to add?"
"Nine sir."
"And how many did you add?"
"Ten Sir." Katie replied miserably.
"And did I or did I not tell you, specifically, to let your potio òn simmer for 3 minutes and 24 seconds precisely before adding your grated ginger?"
"You did sir." Katie said apologetically.
"Well as it is only your second day I will let you off but please do try and pay attention!" He said, not unfairly.
The next few lessons of the day didn't go so well either. Katie, Suzie, Ben and Charlie's adventures had their consequences. All four of them were so tired that they could barely keep their eyes open let alone perform the seemingly impossible charms that their teacher gave them to work on the next lesson (charms of the present day) and the girls didn't do much better in the lesson after that - beauty and deportment.
Surprisingly enough, it's not so easy walking up and down stairs with a book on your head and a perfectly straight back when all you really want to do is go back to bed. In the lesson after that - the past of charms - Suzie was so tired and the teacher was Øso boring that she actually went to sleep on her notes about Baroque stunning charms. When Ben gently shook her awake she was so surprised to find herself in a classroom that she gave a little shriek and quickly had to tell the teacher that a wasp had been flying round her head when he enquired as to why she had decided to interrupt his lesson.
Luckily, before the four of them had a chance to cause any more trouble the bell went for last break (they had already had their lunch).
They had one last lesson - which was drama (thank goodness!) - before they could all finally go to bed. The weekend could not come quickly enough!
*****
It was Thursday, and Katie had just been through a very unusual lecture on the uses of present day charms. Mrs Mertens was a young teacher, who used magic to capture her students’ imaginations. It had been interesting, but Katie was unsure whether or not she remembered any of it at all.
Lunch, as always, Ω had also been strange. The food had been served from hatches, which the students had queued up to, like any other lunch queue. The only difference was that there was no one serving the food. It appeared as each student approached. The plate was laden with whatever that particular person would have ordered off the menu. They then were carried back to the round tables that filled the hall for lunch. The arrangements for breakfast and dinner were more surreal yet, with the plates sliding down the long tables to reach their places. Katie had not yet gotten used to all the majik that happened here, but she was sure she would soon.
“Come on Katie, we’re going to be late for art!”
This was the one lesson that Katie was sure she would be able to cope with. Art had always been one of her favourite subjects, as she enjoyed it, she had always thought it shouldn’t really be classified as ‘work’.
They all were practically running up the steps to the class √room. The Portman Studio, room {INSERT ROOM HERE}, was right at the top of one of the five, huge turrets that created the outside of the pentagon shaped castle. The light reflected off the white marble walls and floor almost blindingly, as there were no thick wall hangings or tapestries in this turret.
As they spiralled up the staircase they started to notice several dusty and faded portraits hung on the spotlessly white walls - a girl in a darkened room, lit only by a single, pale candle, several framed still life’s of tomatoes and a huge black canvas, with light shining on parts of something, possibly a person, that they could not quite work out - were among the many. As they got higher and higher, the paintings got more and more common, and less and less dusty and faded.
Around the last turn was a shoddily varnished (and extremely chipped) door with a rusted bronze plaque attached to it;
‘Portman Studio
Art
Miss R. Caraga-Chorster’

The door flew – open, revealing a huge marbled room. Most of the classrooms had been plastered and painted, but this one had been left bare, not only on the walls but, oddly enough, also of all furniture, except a tattered brown leather chair and a heavy looking chest, that had coffee stains all over it’s surface. The room was filled with the class of pupils, who were lounging about, sitting on the floor and leaning against the walls. Despite them being late, the teacher had obviously not arrived yet.
“I wonder whether we’ll get old Chorster today,” said Charlie, “I heard that she’s quite something.”
“Why? Have you not had her already this term?” asked Katie.
“Nah, she’s been ill. We had this dreary supply who made us learn the history of cubism and then tested us on it. Dull city.”
“Oh, well I hope...”
“Welcome, children!” boomed a voice. They all jumped, and the room fell silent. “It will be my joy to be teaching your class today.” slurred Miss Caraga-Chorster.
In the doorw Œay stood an older woman, draped in many coarse fabrics, in different shades of beige and brown. Katie supposed that the (slightly strange) art teacher, was not at all large, but the multitude of layers she wore stuck out in a way that made her look quite substantial. Her grey, unkempt hair was swept off her face into a oversized tortoiseshell clip.
“Now,” she carried on, stumbling on her clunky, brown shoes, “Today we shall be creating abstract art.” She waved her hand once and a canvas the size of one of the walls appeared. “I need a victim, I mean volunteer...” she corrected herself, grasping Ben by the shoulder. He stiffened. “Just stand against the canvas, there’s a good sprout.” She waved her hand again.
“Hey, I can’t move!” exclaimed Ben.
“That’s right dear.” she replied absentmindedly. “Now, here’s your paint,” as she gestured to the spot the object appeared. “Brushes over there, feel free to splatter to your hearts content. Begin.”
As the pupils starte √d to warily gather paints and flick them at Ben and the canvas, she explained the reasoning of the ‘art’. “Once you have completed your paint work,” she said, whilst teetering over to her chair at the opposite side of the room. “a silhouette will be left.” She continued, whilst opening the lid of her trunk. “It will look most impressive.”
Katie watched as ‘Old Chorster’, as Charlie had called her, heated her coffee with her hands before pouring an alarming amount of whisky into the cup. She swallowed it and pulled a dreadful face, before muttering, “Needs sugar,” under her breath and stumbling out of the door again.
The class proceeded to cover Ben in a thick layer of paint before Miss Caraga-Chorster finally reappeared, five minutes to the end of the double lesson.
*****
The weekend came and the four of them were keener than ever to go and explore the hidden world behind the mirrors. However, the most part of Saturday was taken up with sleeping an fid the rest doing homework.
On conclusion, they decided that the homework, which was not very difficult, could have been done much faster, had they not taken to wandering the gardens and common rooms whist, supposedly, writing their essays.
A lot of time was spent when Suzie decided to introduce Katie to all the other girls in their dorm and many more besides. Katie had to admit that she was quite relieved to get back to her homework as she soon realised she had not remembered a single girl’s name. So the weekend flew by and it was not long until it was time to go back to their lessons.

Scroll 9.
Monday morning came as a shock to Katie. The bell went at half past six. The sun streaming in through the thin curtain was welcome in cold tower. The other girls groaned and started getting ready; Suzie remained in bed, putting her head under the duvet and she refused to get up, so Charlotte resorted in pulling her out by her feet.
"Is she always like that?" laughed Katie.
"Pretty m ©uch," replied Sophie, who had the bed next to Katie and looked like she would rather be in bed too.
Katie pulled out her timetable and was not too pleased to find that she had majikal games and physical education "First thing on a Monday?"
"I know. Bit harsh isn't it?"
Majikal games and physical education proved to be more bearable than they thought. However when Katie realised that they were going to be late she was worried. It had taken them all quite a while to have breakfast in the dining hall but it would have been all right apart from the fact that they all forgot that their first lesson was to be held on top pitch; it wasn't called that for nothing. Top pitch was on the roof of the school, above 12 floors of classrooms.
When they finally arrived, panting, the teacher, to Katie's amazement - she hadn't got on with her teachers so far - didn't shout at all. She merely laughed.
"Got up a bit late girls?"
A rather enjo ¥yable lesson was spent playing majikal bench ball - a game that involved blasting a ball into the hands of another team mate who stood on a bench at the other side of the pitch - with the boys. And though Katie found the majik part hard she was good at the catching and running.
However it wasn’t long before Miranda took advantage of Katie’s lack of majikal knowledge and the natural violence of the game. Miranda had no trouble in taking the first opportunity to blast Katie straight off her feet, despite Katie’s feeble shield. And, worse still, Katie watched as Miranda revelled in the laughs that caused Katie so much embarrassment.

Katie had a feeling that the next few months – or possibly the next lifetime - were going to be like one constant game of bench ball. Well one point to Miranda nil to Katie!

Unfortunately the next lesson, Arithmetic was about ten times worse. Katie sat at the back of the class next to Charlotte. In her old œschool she had been the best at math and so had expected to find arithmetic easy. She didn’t. At all. She soon discovered that this wasn’t like normal math in the slightest. It involved making and breaking secret codes using majik. In fact the only way numbers were used were in various complicated formulas that supposedly broke any type of code. No body bothered to explain this to Katie however – except Charlotte, who wasn’t much help as she herself didn’t seem to understand what was going on – and Katie left the lesson feeling more confused than when she had entered. She had no idea how she was supposed to do the homework.




So the day passed. The lessons were hard and Katie was tired by the end of the day but Lucy, who gave her the honour of visiting, told her she was not allowed her to go to bed but that she should "go and be sociable for a change."
"Do I have to?"
"Yes. What have you even done today that is so tiring?"
"Are you kidding?" replied Katie, exasperated. Her perfect sister, Lucy - the one who everyone liked, including the teachers, the one who always got top marks, could wear anything and get away with it, in short possibly the ultimate most perfect person ever - well it was easy for her to say there was nothing too tiring in learning majik. Lucy had succeed in stopping Katie from going to bed at seven o' clock, but not in the socialising part.
Katie ended up entering the passageways under the pretence that she was getting her cloak. She crept down the narrow hallway and knocked on Charlie's door.
"Charlie, are you in there? I just escaped my sister, please let me come through." Katie called, not too loudly.
The door opened and Charlie was standing there, looking very tired and grumpy.
"Ugh, why are you here?"
"Um... My sister decided that I wasn't going to bed, but instead I had to tag around with her and look like a spare part. What are you doing?"
"Nothing much, just doing some writing for household charms." ÌSaid Charlie, without enthusiasm. "Do you wanna go for a walk in the grounds or something? I'm sure we could avoid your sister."
"Ok, why not?"
The gardens at the school turned out to be massive, and very well cared for. There was not a flower out of place. But the orchards were different. They were higgledy and messy – just how Katie liked it. There were gnarled plum and apple trees everywhere and a small stream tricked peacefully down to a bigger river at the bottom. "This is where we all hang out at lunch usually. We haven't been in the last couple of weeks though because it’s been so wet. It dried up yesterday though, so I thought I'd bring you here." He told her, searching for a response. He didn't have to wait long.
"Wow, it’s amazing here!" She turned towards him. "I had no idea this place even existed!" The leaves were crunchy underfoot, and the apples were golden orbs. The sky was purple and red and yellow and on fire, but so calm it could have been the sea.
"Come on, there's one „more place I want to show you.”
She ran into the orchards, ducking under the ancient branches that reached down to her and tried to pluck her from the ground, to toss her high into the sky, where only the birds soared gracefully…
Already she knew that this was home!

SCROLL ELEVEN.

Charlie lay under the big oak tree, feeling totally relaxed. There was something in Katie’s attitude towards life, the universe and everything else that made a lot of people feel like this when with her. He watched her skimming stones and tried to think of something to say. It wasn’t often that he was lost for words and, even now, it wasn’t a lack of them but rather more a lack of ones important and clever enough to break the perfect silence in which only the ripples on the lake and the wind in the trees spoke.
“Do you get on with your sister?” Maybe not the best perfect silence breaker but Charlie was getting bored. However perfect a silence is the sound of one’s voice has to be more interesting.
“As ◊far as sisters go we get on, yeah.”
“Why didn’t you go with her earlier?”
“Trying to get rid of me already?” Katie laughed.
“No. It’s just… well… quite a lot of girls would die for your sister. I mean she’s in the cool crowd but she’s always nice to people, which is quite unusual for that sort of group. She’s got a great sense of fashion and she’s clever.”
“If I didn’t know better I’d say you liked my sister.”
“Nah. I just think you should go with her next time and meet all her friends.”
“And what would be in it for you?”
“What would be in it for me?” Charlie repeated, replacing his heart-stopping smile for an uncannily convincing look of innocence. “Maybe just the chance to be introduced to lots of fit girls,” he explained cheekily.
“Charlie! That’s disgraceful!” Katie laughed.
“I don’t mean it… I mean I’ve got you and Suzie. What more could I want?”
Katie punched him gently for his sarcasm.
“Ow, that hurt!” teased Charlie.
“I know.” said Katie, grinning, whilst flopp ⁄ing down beside him, “That was the point.”

Scroll 12.
The week flew by Katie. The work appeared, to Katie, to be getting harder by the day, certainly not easier as Lucy had promised on Monday. By midweek she felt more tired than ever and even the prospect of exploring further into the passages couldn’t keep her awake. She told them to go without her but they insisted that they wait for her to relax into school life before they had another adventure.
“After all, you found them,” Charlie reminded her.
“Look, I’ll help you with that if you want?” Ben offered Katie as she poured over books trying, in vain, to find a recipe that cured cramp.
“It must be somewhere here.”
“Seriously Katie, copy mine before you make yourself ill.” Insisted Suzie.
“No. I want to do it myself. I’m not totally incapable you know.”
“Maybe not, but you are totally insane,” muttered Suzie in reply.
All in all Katie was not pleased when she discovered she was to have a progress meeting with Miss Crysta ælwater.
“What do I say? I haven’t learnt anything... Oh my g… stupid progress review… will she want to see the spells I’ve learnt? I’ll have to show her a spell wont I?”
“Calm it woman! No you won’t have to show her a spell and you’ll be fine. She’s nice, honestly.” Charlotte and Sophie helped Suzie to calm Katie down.
As Thursday and the dreaded meeting drew closer Katie grew more and more agitated. By the time Thursday came she was a bundle of nerves.
She had been asked by one of her teachers to wait outside the Miss Crystalwater’s office until Miss Crystalwater arrived. Suzie, unfortunately, could not wait with her as she had a lunchtime detention for drawing on a desk. Miranda however was there to show her full support! She gave Katie a good look up and down before telling her ‘it is none of your business why I am here.’ Katie couldn’t help but feel she had been right about life being a constant game of bench ball. The score now stood at tw –o to Miranda, nought to Katie.
After she had been waiting for a good 5 minutes (although it felt more like 5 years) someone Katie vaguely knew turned up – Alice, another new and undiscovered girl. Katie had talked to her before in art, she was just coming back from seeing one of the music teachers about using one of the practice rooms. Alice talked to her for a while, but left before the start of lessons, in time to remove her fluorescent eyeliner so she would not be spotted by Madame Escuro, who she had next, and be sent to matron to get it scrubbed off. It was not long before Miss Crystalwater came; she spoke to the other girls briefly before asking Katie to step inside. She walked calmly in to the room, feeling a bit like she shouldn’t be there.
The room was suitably grand, highly polished dark wood furnishings and blue and sea green drapes adorning the room. There was a faded blue sofa by the door that looked like it didn’t really belong there; maybe it had ◊ been taken from a student’s lounge. She also noticed that one of the three filing cabinets was taped up with thick grey electrical tape, all over the drawers, as if holding something in.
Katie hoped she didn’t look as stupid as she felt. Her shoulders were tensed and her arms sort of hung by her sides. She didn’t know whether or not she should sit or stand. So she stood there in her oversized shoes waiting to be given instruction.
Miss Crystalwater glided in, from one of her many anti-chambers, her long blonde hair and layered dress billowing out behind her. She walked over to her desk and sat on it, revealing she was wearing a pair of bright pink converse trainers on her feet.
“Do sit down.” She said, in her strong American accent.
Katie sat, stiffly sinking into the sofa. She felt terrified. What would she have to do?
“So,” started Miss Crystalwater, “How’s things? Have you made any friends?”


Scroll 13.

All in all it was with relief that Katie entered the final l ¥esson of the week – household charms. She settled down, at the back of the class as usual, with Sophie on her left and Ben on her right. Sophie and Ben had just begun an animated argument, across Katie, about not very much really, when the door creaked open. But it was not Miss Brookhouse, the kind, elderly Bone’t that usually conducted this lesson, who entered.
The class let out a collective groan. But it was Katie who was most disappointed by the choice of supply teacher. Miss Brookhouse had, over the last few weeks, been quite pleasant towards Katie’s lack of knowledge, in comparison to most of her other teachers.
“I shall be taking your class today,” barked Madam Escuro. “Open your books to page 98. I want you to read the passage about the boiling spell. Begin.” All was silent in the classroom for the next hour. When the bell went and the class let out a sigh of relief.
Katie had to admit that it hadn’t been a good end to an awful ì second week at Miss Crystalwater’s.
*****
When the others offered to show Katie some more of the grounds and introduce her to some more friends Katie decided that the temptation of that was even stronger than even sleeping!
First they decided to go back to the orchard. When they got there, early on Saturday morning whilst everyone else was in bed, the sun had just risen and a thin layer of mist covered everything. It looked more beautiful, to Katie, with Suzie, Ben, Sophie and Charlotte there, as well as Charlie. They all laid their coats down under a plum tree, making a sort of picnic rug, to sit on. The coming of the autumn had brought down lots of leaves, as well as the frost, and the ground was covered in golds, reds and browns that crunched underfoot.
They sat and talked for a while and Katie finally had a chance to have some of her many questions answered. “How come I’m not in a house yet?” aske ≤d Katie. She had found out about the four houses on the coach trip to Miss Crystalwater’s school. Katie had felt oddly out of place whenever she had been to the dining hall. Everyone else had a house, a family, if you liked. All apart from the new and undiscovered whom all sat together, all 14 of them – 7 girls and 7 boys, all in Katie’s year - while the four houses, winter, spring, summer and autumn, had a huge table, each, at which the hundreds of them sat, at any meal.
“You will in time. None of us have a house yet, remember? It always takes the teachers a while to decide where to put you. You are in the new and undiscovered dorm because your families didn’t enter you for the year 7 enrolment. All those people you see in the houses have been here for 2 years longer than you. But our families did not enter us until we were 13, the age where it is obligatory that you start to learn majik if you have the potential.” Said Charlie.
“S Ωo the others have been learning majik for two years longer than us?”
“No. They have been learning about majik for two years longer but it is against all magykal laws to actually learn majik until you reach the age of thirteen. It can be quite dangerous you know – learning while you are still under age,” continued Charlie
“Really? How?”
“It’s really easy to loose control of your powers. You can do terrible things when you have as much strength as us even if you don’t want to. You see everyone has power, so potentially everyone could learn majik if they wanted to but it could take them years if they aren’t powerful. There for the schools only started taking people with at least 5% magikal power in their blood and no one with more than 9% magikal blood. It’s a small proportion but if we took anymore then we would have to have so many more teachers and so much more time on our hands.
“When you turn 7 years of age you have to have a blood test. If ≠you have a sufficient amount of power then you are sent to a Majik teaching high school, but if not then your powers are bound. The binding of powers means that mortals don’t live so long but if we didn’t take this measure then we’d have heaps of rouge bone’ts and witches causing chaos everywhere.
“So you see, it is important that we keep what we are to ourselves other wise we might cause another huge schism,” explained Charlotte.
“Oh. What happened in the last schism?”
“Why is every one looking at me?” said Ben “Unlike these guys I’m not a total boff and don’t tend to listen in a the past of charms.”
“That’s ‘cos you’re too busy staring at Sophie. Sorry Sophie!” retorted Suzie.
“Am not.”
“Are too”
Sophie, who seemed very used to these sorts of comments, just laughed, flicking her curly brown hair out of her hazel eyes. She continued for Ben “Yeah, anyway the schism. It happened a long time before we were born, or even our grea ªt-great-great grandmothers were alive. It started because mortals couldn’t take the fact that people with lots of magikal powers had decided not to let less powerful men, at this time only men could learn Majik, learn. A war began and when they decided we were winning instead of fighting properly they started burning people with strong magikal signs. It ended with the burning of a very powerful bone’t and Majik people cutting themselves off from the mortals’ world.
“In all fairness we did take away something that was very important in their lives, but you can see why we did it? Over time people stopped believing in Majik but there were always the lucky few of us who still get to learn, and it is our job to control everyone. After some time the hatred stopped and connections were redeveloped between our two parliaments. We stop wars and put out fires we find murderers and stop robberies, all under the name of the mortals’ police. We live by ≥our own laws. We don’t bother them and they don’t bother us.”
“So why don’t all parents send their kids to Majik school in year 7 if they can?”
“For different reasons,” said Suzie, who had evidently decided to give up arguing with Ben for now. “Because they are, being over protective and don’t want their baby to leave, the kid might be ill or have broken a bone, like you, or maybe because they are not doing so well in their normal school… or possibly because they are ashamed of their child’s skill-”
“Oh. Your parent should never be ashamed of you, whoever you are. It would be so hard for the child.”
“Yeah” they all nodded in agreement.

Scroll 14.
They spent the rest of the weekend in either the girls or the boys’ dorms or in the common room. Katie was getting to know the others better and better and starting to like them more and more. It wasn’t long before she had made friends with all the other ‘new and undiscovered’ boys and girl Às. They were in most of her classes and she should have got to know them better before this but she’d been so busy trying (and failing) to do the spells right!
She really enjoyed the weekend. Even simple card games such as snap, which she had found incredibly tedious before, became interesting when played with friends, she discovered. They taught her a game not unlike it called hali gali: Hali gali was a rather more crazy version of snap which involved putting down cards with fruit on them and trying to ring the bell first when exactly five of the same fruit came up. It was great fun and brought out the competitive side in everyone, especially Ben and Suzie who constantly seemed to be at each other’s throats anyway!
*****
The next two weeks were another total disaster but Katie wasn’t quite so disappointed when she was, once again, unable to make a disappearing potion correctly, turn a dove black or curl her viciously straight hair, when she was instructed. „
On the Friday of the second week Katie was sat in the common room once again. It was a large, grand room with oak panelled walls, a constantly blazing fire and many bookshelves. Big, squishy armchair sat around the room, looking cosy and mismatched. The room was bathed in the low, comforting glow of naphtha lamps. The sun was setting outside and Katie was sitting in one of the window seats, which surrounded the tower room, reading.
A bell rang somewhere and Katie got up wandering what it was. She had been reading and wasn’t quite sure what time it was. She had been very engrossed in her book and was just about to start reading when…
“Hey!” said Keegan – a guy in Ben and Charlie’s dorm.
“What was that bell for?”
“It was to tell us we’ve all got post. Comin’ with me?”
So Katie put down her book and followed Keegan into a small anti-chamber. He led her over to a bookshelf at the other end of the room.
“R…R…oh…Ro…Rosse…here it is – Rosseta.” Keegan pushed the spine of a book. The ti Ãtle happened to be Rosseta, which coincidentally, was Katie’s surname. It wasn’t a coincidence. The book swung round to show an open fronted wooden box containing several sheets of paper. “I can’t believe no one’s showed you this! Here,” said Michael handing one of the sheets of paper, “this is why the bell rang. They’ve sent us all a letter.”
Katie looked at the letter, amazed:




Invitation To This Years First Uniform Banquet.

To be held on the 28th October, in the great hall at 7pm.
You must wear your uniform for this advent, as the neighbouring school of St Cuthbert’s will also be attending, as is the tradition for our first banquet of the year.
I hope I need not remind you that as you will all be representing our school I expect only the best behaviour.
Yours truly,


Miss Crystalwater


“That’s so cool!” exclaimed Katie.
“What? That we have stupid banquets?”
“No. That is sort of scary not cool. I mean the whole book disguised a pigeon hole thing.”
“I ‡f you think that’s cool then you really need to see the rest of Crystalwater School!”

SCROLL FIFTEEN.

“I’m bored.” Charlie was lying on the floor of the common room, his eyes boring a hole in the ceiling. Suzie was slouched on the sofa, legs squashed up to make room for Katie who was making use of a Mac Book from the mortal relations part of the Library. Ben was sitting on the floor using an arm of the chair as a backrest. It was strange, ever since they met, the foursome had become almost inseparable, it was hard to believe that they had only known each other for a matter of weeks.
“I’m not,” said Katie smiling.
“What are you doing on that thing that could possibly be so interesting?” asked Ben, who had never really used a computer before.
“Just surfing the net.”
Charlie got up and walked around the back of the settee.
“Looks pretty dull to me,” he said.
“You have to get into it.”
“Don’t really want to.”
“Fair enough.” She closed the top. “I’m going outside.”
“But it’s pouring wit ìh rain!” Suzie exclaimed.
“I know,” said Katie.
She started to walk towards the door but Charlie held her back. “Seriously Katie, you can’t go out into that! You don’t want rid of us that much, do you?”
“But I like the rain a lot. I’m just going to go out for a while in it, you guys can come too if you like.”
“I ain’t going out there!” said Suzie.
“Uh uh, me neither.” Ben agreed.
“Ok,” said Katie.
“No way,” said Charlie, decisively. ‘Honestly, you’ll drown! You cannot go on your own. I’ll come with you.”
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to!”
“You cannot go out in that alone, I’m serious!”
“Well, now I’ve been told. Catch you guys later?” They murmured they’re agreement and Charlie and Katie started to make their way down the stairs to the grounds.
“That was so weird,” said Suzie, still staring at the door. “If you or I had said we were going out there he would have told us not to, but just let us g µo it alone.”
“Why did he do that? And why did she want to go out in that any way?”
“Don't ask me, I only just met her, really. But the big question is, does Charlie like her?”
“I think whether or not they come back alive is more of a question.”
“I bet you a fiver that they come back, very wet but with colds.”
“I bet they catch pneumonia or another disease like that.”
“You’re on.” They shook on it.

“Remind me again why you want to go outside?” Charlie wheezed as they ran down the stairs.
“I told you, it’s raining, it will be beautiful outside, and I don’t want to miss it.” Explained Katie for the third time in five minutes.
“So let me get this straight,” said Charlie as they approached the door. “You’re going to go and get drowned just to frolic in the rain?”
“Pretty much. You coming?”
“OK,” Charlie agreed reluctantly.
Katie walked out into the torrential downpour, feeling as free as a bird. She lifted her arms up to the sky, looking a ™t the droplets cascading from the dark grey clouds. Charlie tentatively stepped out into the open. The water was pounding on his skull, immense weights falling on him from the heavens. How could Katie be enjoying this? Were they feeling the same rain? As Katie walked forwards, he followed, getting steadily wetter with each step. Katie was smiling, she was safe in the rain, it was her rain, and she loved it. She turned round and faced Charlie, smiling uncontrollably.
“I’m wet, but I’m HAPPY!!!!!!”
Something about her smile, wet as he was, made him feel warmer.
“You’re bonkers.” He laughed, as he ran after her into the orchards.
As they sheltered under an apple tree, Charlie asked Katie what made her like the rain so much.
“I mean, being outside in the cold and the wet, nothing’s worse for me.”
“You really don’t know, do you?” she replied, smiling. Charlie shook his head, confused. “Let me show you.”
She grabbed his arm and pu lled him out into the open.
It was beautiful.
The sun was setting, light shining through the grey clouds, causing the billions of droplets to sparkle and shine, like sea of falling stars, each hitting the ground with an individual splash, causing a million rainbows to ricochet off into the open, only to fade away into nothingness, never to return. The sound of the water on the leaves was like the sound of an orchestra playing a great symphony - only this had soul, spirit, heart… He was seeing the world through Katie’s eyes. It was a good way to live.




As Katie raised her face to the heavens, her dark hair plastered against her face, Charlie realised that it was about time he began appreciating the world that surrounded him.

Laughing, they ran back to school, soaked to the skin, but not cold, warmed from the inside out: warmed from the heart. They ran all the way, back up the stairs, dripping wet. These were the back st airs - they were incredibly steep and twisty. They were careful not to slip, and they soon arrived back in the common room. They burst through the door to find Suzie and Ben waiting for them by the fire.
“Have you guys got colds?” asked Suzie, jumping out of her seat.
“Pneumonia, tell me you’ve got pneumonia!” Ben exclaimed, jumping towards them too.
“Excuse me?”
They didn’t know what had happened, but Charlie and Katie just started laughing: laughing at life in general: laughing at some unknown joke: A joke unknown to them, and to everyone else.

Scroll 16.

“Wow, look what’s in here!” Ben called from somewhere along a never-ending passageway. Katie ran through.
“Wow, awesome!” The room was entirely mirrored with a glass staircase spiralling up the middle. The mirror was curved, giving the illusion of a giant, endless space. There was not a single straight line, and as she walked up the glass staircase she felt as if she was walking on air. It was strange, Kat fiie had always been terrified of heights, but when she was with her friends she wasn’t as scared; with them she was invincible. Heights were pretty much all she was afraid of, and she felt as if she had conquered it once and for all as she stood, at the top, looking down.
As they reached the top of the spiral they realised that there was a study upstairs, circular, with a glass barrier all the way around the edge. Light was pouring through the stained glass windows that surrounded them, although many of them depicted the house crests and school badge they were largely plain, allowing them to see the breathtaking views of the grounds.
It had been raining again and after a morning of dancing in the rain even Katie was too tired to go outside again. Charlie had quickly become restless. About 15 minutes later Suzie had become annoyed with Charlie’s constant fidgeting and had told him: ‘do something useful with yourself or jump off a cliff”. The last few hours, which the four of th ™em had spent exploring more of the passages, had hardly been productive but it had kept them from mischief and that was use in itself. Having said that even Katie, who knew less of the school rules than the other three, had a strong feeling that if they were caught they would be getting something a little more fearsome than a pat on the back and a gold star!
Katie gasped. It had finally stopped raining now though and a thin layer of droplets covered every tree, flower and lawn in the gardens of Crystalwater School. Every raindrop reflected the setting sun a million and one times, bathing the whole place in gold. The mountains that surrounded this remote school wore a thin layer of snow - a promise of what was to come with the ever closeting winter. For a moment even Ben was lost for words as the beauty struck them.
“It’s so beautiful,” breathed Charlie finally. “Even Ben doesn’t have anything to moan about!”
“Nearly as ∞beautiful as Katie, isn’t it Charlie!” Ben retorted
“It looks like a different world, doesn’t it?” said Katie, who either hadn’t heard the remark about her and Charlie or had suddenly discovered some unknown acting skill.
Suzie usually scorned when people made stupid romantic comments like that but she couldn’t do that to Katie. It drove Suzie mad how she had fallen in to friendship with this ridiculous romantic but however hard she tried she couldn’t dislike Katie. She was wary of putting all her hopes in to one person. Suzie had learnt the hard way, many years ago, that that just made things worse. She liked Katie so much; she was the first real friend Suzie had made that wasn’t a boy. She had enjoyed the last month unbelievably but there was a part of her that knew it wouldn’t last.
*****

Katie sat, all her concentration focused on the rose that she was supposed to be turning white. She willed everything inside her to change t “he rose, even just make it slightly lighter, but it stayed as scarlet as ever. “Just focus your mind on it and believe that you can change it, and hay presto” (Mr. Thomas’s rose changed to as pure a white as the marble walls of the room in which they sat) “you can change a rose from red to white!” Mr. Thomas had said, after they had all filed in and found a seat.
Unfortunately for Katie it wasn’t quite as easy as that. Having only yet managed to perform the simplest possible spell – the light globe – Katie was finding it difficult to believe that she could do anything. She looked around the room. Charlie's rose was very nearly white and even Ben (who’s trouble was concentrating for two seconds) had nearly managed. Katie sighed as she admired Sophie's perfectly white rose. Sophie could do anything. All the teachers loved her. And the most annoying thing about it though was that she did it with such good grace that even Ben couldn’t be mean to her about being the wo Ÿrld’s biggest boff!
“Oh that’s very white Katie,” Miranda drawled as she walked past. Katie tried to ignore the fact that several of her classmates giggled appreciatively. The score was definitely 3 Miranda, 0 Katie.

As the 28th of October approached, bringing with it the prospect of the first uniformed banquet, the weather steadily worsened. The grounds were reduced to a bog and top pitch became slippery from the ice that formed there, making majikal games and physical education increasingly difficult.
Suzie, Katie, Charlie, Ben and the rest of their class realised how lucky they were to have Ms. Gale teaching them, as they gazed at the stormy sky from inside the warmth of her office. Apart from art, majikal games and physical education was the only lesson that Katie still didn’t despair at the thought of. It helped that Ms. Gale was one of the few teachers that didn’t petrify Katie into stupidity.

Scroll 17
Unfortunately, despite the fact that they were not far off h Æalf way through the first term, Katie didn’t seem to be getting the hang of any subjects. And so it wasn’t surprising that Katie was busy fuming, at her own apparent stupidity, after another agonising turnings lesson (which, surprisingly enough had involved turning one thing into another), when she came across her favourite and least favourite teachers having a discussion, though it was too heated to be called a conversation. Katie couldn’t quite catch what the pair were snarling to each other and, to Katie’s disappointment, when they saw she had, just happened, to drop her pen about a metre away, they broke off and simply glared at one another.
Katie breathed a sigh of relief as she slipped into Majikal concoctions, ten minuets late, to find the class in complete mayhem and Mr Harrison nowhere to be seen. This gave her time to find the others and see what they made of the teachers argument. As Katie had finished recounting her ’story she looked at the others faces to see their reactions.
“Seriously they looked murderous…” Katie concluded.
“I’m not surprised,” commented Charlie.
“Huh?” Ben looked confused
“Everyone knows that Madam Escuro and Miss Gale hate each other,” said Suzie, exasperated.
“They do?” Asked Ben, looking increasingly confused.
“Keep up Ben!” Suzie snapped impatiently. Charlie and Katie braced themselves for another argument.
But Ben simply replied, “How do you know everything about everyone?” For once he sounded impressed, rather than annoyed.
Mr Harrison hurried in five minutes later. He was out of breath despite his youth and good health. His spiky blonde hair was much messier than usual.
“I’m sorry everyone! I got a bit held up. No doubt you wish I’d been held up for longer but I’m here now. Let’s start on appearing potions.” So slowly and reluctantly everyone started setting up his or her cauldrons. They all went to and from the storeroom collecting the needed ingredi ‡ents before following the instructions on the board.
Half way through the lesson however Katie had gone so distinctly wrong that a huge hole was burnt in the bottom of her cauldron. In the process of Mr Harrison fixing her cauldron all her potion was lost and it was in rather a hurry that Katie began again. She was very behind the rest of the class now and in an attempt to make up some of her lost time she decided to skip the boiling for seven minutes. Five minutes later she discovered what a big mistake this had been when:
“What stage are you on Katie?”
“Stage 14 sir.”
“Why then, Katie, is it not a thick tar black solution?” Mr Harrison enquired looking down at Katie’s fluorescent orange potion.
“Oh god. That stuff looks poisonous. Rather like Katie don’t you think!” was Miranda’s useful comment of the day. Another point to Miranda for that one.

That night Katie was given the extra homework of writing an essay explaining why never to try and alter a potion recipe for first le »sson tomorrow. With this on top of her normal homework, which alone she was struggling to get through, it was two in the morning when a restless Charlie, who was having trouble sleeping, sent her to bed, promising that he would help her tomorrow. Katie was fiercely maintaining her none copying vow.

Katie had trouble getting up the next morning. The prospect of majikal concoctions was, if possible, a less enticing than it had been the day before. In fact the only reason Katie could think of for not faking ill was that it was the 28th of October and the morn of the banquet with the neighbouring school. This in itself was not a very positive prospect and made Katie’s stomach twist into a nervous knot. She just knew she’d do something stupid…

Charlie also had trouble getting up that morning. He hadn’t slept at all well. His main enticer for getting out of bed was the fact that Friday meant last day before the weekend. He had promised to help Katie with her µ homework and this too got him moving.

They were all half asleep when they met for breakfast. The high ceiling of the hall was filled with round windows, which bathed the students with early morning sunlight, as they ate their porridge, sausages, eggs and pancakes. The five tables – one for each house and another for the new and undiscovered – were buzzing with the air of bees over a flower. They were all rather excited about the upcoming banquet and assured Katie “it isn’t half as bad as some of the others.”
So the day passed calmly enough. The jeers that Katie received from Miranda and her gang of admirers didn’t hurt her nearly as much as they had done at the start. She still failed to curl her hair, produce the correct potions and boil a pan of water, and watching the others being congratulated on their skill and precision still hurt but Katie had learnt to push all negative and homesick thoughts to the back of her mind. For some æreason Katie had expected Crystalwater’s to be a lark; she had been a model pupil in her old school. But it wasn’t like that.
Despite the fact Katie had the best friends of her life all around her she was laughed at in lessons, and though Suzie defended her with a fierce pride (let’s just say she didn’t have any trouble with creating mechants) Katie knew they had every reason to laugh.

Walking into the dining hall at 7.00 that evening Katie let out her usual sigh of amazement. The sun, which was setting, shone through the window, bathing the usually white walls with pink. Boys and girls already lined the left side of the tables, which had been lengthened to hold the extra students. They all had black sort of gowns on: an elegant cross between a cloak and a coat, and Suzie didn’t like them one bit.
One by one Crystalwater’s students filed in. When they all finally stood behind their usual tables the benches scraped back and everyone was seated. Œ
“Welcome St Cuthbert’s.” Miss Crystalwater’s slender figure stood tall and proud, as she surveyed her school in all its prosperity. “What an honour to have you back. My students, I’m sure, will look after you and,” her voice became commanding as she finished the sentence, “be sociable! Feel free to ask them any questions, as I am sure they will be delighted to answer! What more can I say? Enjoy the feast.”
Katie looked at the members of St. Cuthbert’s sitting opposite her. Most of them were boys of about her own age. They looked very posh in their uniform and several of them were eyeing the Crystalwater short dresses and long baggy shorts with distaste. Food was sliding out of a hatch on the wall and down the wooden tables. As ever it was a splendid feast. Suzie's mouth watered as she gazed at the assortment of delicious dishes that slid past. As soon as the flow had ebbed slightly Suzie grabbed a spoon a dished mashed potatoes onto Katie’s plate.
“Eat up,” S Êuzie grinned.
“Oh that’s a great meal isn’t it?” said Ben sarcastically. Suzie gave him a scolding look before joining the potato with sausages. As Ben looked away Suzie got a massive spoonful of spouts and shoved them on Ben's plate. Katie couldn’t help but laugh at the look on Ben's face when he looked back.

Katie watched Ben and Suzie as they argued fiercely. They made her laugh. Everyone always said they were best friends really. Funny way of showing it Katie thought. She was just making her way back up the table to her seat with a full glass of water. She had gone down the other end to get it, as she hadn’t wanted to risk drawing the water jug to herself by majik in case it went wrong - this was still more than likely.
A tall figure suddenly stepped out straight in front of Katie. Without thinking, Katie shouted “Jeez Louise!” at the top of her voice.
“Watch where you’re going idiot!” Suzie jumped to Katie’s protection once more.
“I am so sorry. Seriously that was so stupid. Go Ïd. I was in a world of my own. I am so sorry,” the guy said sincerely looking at the front of Katie’s robes, which were soaked from the water.
Katie looked up into the boy’s embarrassed face. He ran his long fingers through his mess of blonde hair. He was tanned and looked like he should have a wetsuit on, not a cloak, and a surfboard under his arm. His eyes were bluey grey.
Katie grinned. “Don’t worry ‘bout it. I would have spilt it on myself sooner or later.” The boy smiled back. Her stomach gave a little back flip as she noticed he had dimples.
“I’m Kieran by the way,” Kieran told her.
“Katie. And the one that shouted at you is my dearest friend Suzie.”
“Sorry ‘bout that mate,” Suzie laughed.
“Oh it’s fine. I deserved it. Might teach me look where I’m going in the future!”
Katie and Kieran sat down opposite each other.
“I love this hall,” Kieran informed her. “It’s really cool!”
“Me too,” agreed Katie.
“What’s so great about it?” snapped Charlie.
The evening ended far too quickly for Ka Ïtie’s liking. She spent the remainder of it talking to Kieran. He was amazing. He liked all the same music as Katie, and the same books, and the same films. Kieran was from a mortal family too. It was great for once having a chance to talk to someone about computers and soap operas that didn’t think you were a complete nutter for it. Katie couldn’t resist asking him if he surfed. He launched into a great long discussion about surfing the moment she asked. Katie, who usually found the idea of being thrown about by huge waves slightly daunting, suddenly became very interested by the subject.
It was too early when, after pudding and a portion of discussion on holidays, Miss Crystalwater stood up once more. The babble died down and everyone watched her.
“Well everyone… I hope you enjoyed the food. I have to say I certainly did.” (‘She doesn’t look like she ever enjoys food’ Kieran remarked on Miss Crystalwater’s slender figure.) “But unfortunately it is time for St. Cuthbert’s to depart. So, u øntil the half term disco and end of term ball when I believe we will be seeing you again, farewell my friends.” She sat down before the burly looking head of the St. Cuthbert’s headmaster moved to stand up and dismiss his pupils.
There was a great amount of shuffling as everyone moved to get up. Kieran, who had moved round to sit next to Katie before pudding, stood up. So did Katie. He smiled at her gently and moved towards her. His soft lips brushed against her blushing cheek before he turned away.
“I’ll write to you,” he called back over his shoulder.

Katie slept soundly on Saturday night. She was tired, having decided to visit the passageways earlier that day, in an attempt to eliminate Charlie’s bad mood (It was him, rather than Ben, that was getting under Suzie’s skin that weekend.) And it was of passageways and her friends that Katie dreamt of as she slept into Sunday afternoon: she was walking slowly along a brightly lit corridor when a –cow lumbered out in front of her mooing loudly.
“Who are you?” it had demanded in Ben’s voice! Katie had indignantly tried to push past it but it had not let her. “No,” it had said. “Suzanne and Charlie are not to be disturbed. To fight a war with companions is to not fight at all. They must battle alone.” And however hard Katie tried she just couldn’t get past the cow that seemed determined to block the path to her destination…
When a shaft of sunlight that had penetrated the thin curtains suddenly roused Katie from her sleep later, she remembered nothing of her strange dream. Her long sleep had refreshed her but her good mood didn’t last long before she remembered the vast quantities of homework she still had to do. Katie dressed hurriedly. In five minutes she was in the common room, scribbling some speedy answers for her past of charms homework. She was, however, finding it increasingly hard to ignore her grumbling stomach. Her concentration was even more dis ÷rupted by the entrance of Suzie who looked both angry and disgruntled.
“What’s up?” asked Katie, seeing the look on Suzie’s face.
As though she had been waiting for someone to ask Suzie launched into a long explanation: “Oh my god. Charlie is so annoying sometimes. He really thinks he’s it doesn’t he? Thinks that his problems are the worst and that he has more right to complain than the rest of us. You know what I mean?” Katie was feeling increasingly awkward as Suzie carried on complaining. So Charlie had been a bit of a pain this weekend but surely there was no need for this? She was beginning to wish she had never asked, but it was too late now. “And he was just going on about how crap his life is – I mean come on. He doesn’t have it half as bad as most. He’s clever, popular, has so many friends, a great family… So there he is moaning away and just being a complete idiot and I was just like I don’t want to know mate. So I mean yeah I did have a bit of a go at him b Íut he had no right to go and start yelling all this crap at me. I’m surprised you didn’t hear it. God, I only told him to stop being so obnoxious and self-centred.”
“Yeah, very tactful.” Katie muttered under her breath.
“You would have done the same,” snapped Suzie angrily. “You should have heard what he was saying about me.” Not wanting to cause an argument Katie quickly gauged that it wouldn’t be a good idea to make further comment on the subject so went back to her homework.
After only a few minutes, however, Katie dropped her pen again. “I am never going to finish this,” she grumbled. “Charlie did say he’d help me. I’ll go and ask him I think.”
“I wouldn’t if I was you,” Suzie warned her darkly. “I mean I would help you, but I guess I’m not as good as Charlie am I?”
“I never said that.”
“Well how come you can never accept help off anyone else then? Because you don’t want to trouble the rest of us? Yeah right!” And with that Suzie turned on her heel and flounced off.
Katie flopped int Îo her chair, feeling stung, just as Ben rounded the corner into the common room. He had a look of surprise on his face and it didn’t take much brainpower to work out that he had just bumped into Suzie.
“What’s with that girl?” he asked rubbing his head. “She’s in a right mard today!”
“Oh god, don’t ask!”
“Oh. You two had a bit of a row have you? She’s got fire in her blood that one!”
“Everyone says you two are best mates but you have so many arguments.”
“Yeah well. We’re too similar. You know. We’re both so damn stubborn and stroppy. You get used to arguing with her. Well, at least you do when you do it as much as me. You learn that she doesn’t mean anything she says when she’s in her fighting mood… So just don’t worry about it. She’s snapping at everyone today. God, have you not done any of your homework? Here, just copy mine.” Ben said shoving his messy, but completed homework, towards Katie. She sighed and took it. Maybe it was about time she admitted how much she was struggling with h Áer work and accepted her friends help.

After she had completed almost all of her homework, combining all of her ideas with Ben’s and consequentially coming up with something far better than either of them could have done alone, Katie took the remaining piece of work to the library, where she found Alice. Alice was stretched casually over two chairs, her long, blonde, and slightly frizzy hair spread out over the back of a chair as she doodled in the back of her English book. Katie sat down opposite her.
“Hey.” She said casually.
“Hey,” Alice replied. “What’s up?”
“Nothing much” Katie sighed. Alice looked up sharply.
“Now whenever anyone says anything like that there usually is something up - and by the look of your face I’m guessing boy problems.” Alice swung her legs around so she was facing Katie. “Spill.” She smiled expectantly.
Katie sighed again, glancing at the floor. “Have you ever liked two people at once?”
“Oh yeah, all the time!” Katie relaxed.
“What did you do about it?” Sh e asked, eagerly.
“Well, I waited around for a bit, until one of them asked me out, and then I played hard to get for a bit with the other one, made a calculated decision that I’d had enough of the first one and went out with the other one for a bit, but I got totally bored because the relationship was so slow, and decided to have a break from boys.”
Katie laughed. “If only it were that easy.”
“It isn’t,” Alice replied, “boys make better mates than dates. I think I’ll wait for them to grow up a whole lot before I go out with another moron. I’ll give you one easy thing though, the rubber of fortune.” To Katie’s puzzled look, Alice produced a normal pink eraser with ‘Yes’ written on one side and ‘No’ written on the other. She passed it to her.
“Here,” she said “ask it your question, throw it up in the air and the side it lands on is the side you shall follow. But beware, if you do not heed its advice then DOOM ON YOOOOOU!!!!” She brought her arms up and shook h er fingers menacingly. Katie looked at her warily.
“Has it got some sort of spell on it or something?”
Alice looked at her as if she had just suggested the stupidest thing ever. “No,” she said with a snigger, “just throw the thing!” Katie quickly thought her question and threw the rubber into the air. It landed on the table with a thud.
It was on its side.
“Now in all my years of fortune telling I have never, ever, not even once, seen that.” She looked genuinely surprised.
“Well, what does that mean?” she asked, confused.
“It means maybe.” And sure enough, on the side of the rubber was a tiny, scrawled ‘Maybe’. “Tell me, what did you ask for? I am dying to know.”
“Well...” Katie was not sure she wanted to say. “I asked if I would ever make up my mind.”
“KATIE! The rubber is meant to help you to decide! Shun the one who misuses the amazing and mystical rubber of fortune! Shun her!!!” Alice looked disgusted. “Here - take it! You need it more than me!” She € thrust the rubber into Katie’s hands. “With an answer like that I am sure you have many more questions. Carry it always.” Alice smiled. “Go on, hop it!” And with that, a very confused Katie bimbled out of the library in a state of shock.

SCROLL 18

The rest of the week improved slightly. Suzie felt lucky that Katie seemed to have forgotten all about her unfair outburst. Throughout that week Suzie became quite familiar with a new feeling. Whenever she looked at Katie, whenever she caught Katie off guard and saw how tired she was, how frustrating she found the lessons, how she had to fight against her fury at the jibs and sneers of others, Suzie felt guilty. Her friend was struggling, and even if she hadn’t been, Suzie felt that Katie was not the sort of person you could be mean to. Katie was too naïve to argue back when people were mean to her, and this made it all the harder to have an argument with her; you always felt like the bad one.
But it was worth feeling guilty Èthat they were friends again. And maybe Katie was learning – Ben had somehow managed to persuade her to give up her annoying non-copying motto. The lessons weren’t improving much for Katie but the rest of them, to be honest, were finding it a bit of a breeze.
It was getting colder by the day, and Charlie woke up next Saturday to find a hard frost. He liked winter and the weak sunlight that was streaming through his window made him think of Christmas walks and warm fires. Sure enough, having walked the short distance down the freezing corridor, he was met by a roaring fire. The prospect of a day of lounging about around glowing fire made his spirits rise considerably. Nobody could really be bothered to even make the ten-minute trip to the library, as it took rather more energy than usual: even in a castle in the furthest northern regions of Europe you generally don’t have to put hats and scarves on to walk down a corridor.
Even Katie put aside her growing pile of unfinished homework for Êthe day. For that day only they simply relaxed. The first half of the day was spent reading, snoozing or playing sleepy games of cards. Around lunchtime Keegan returned from his pigeonhole clutching a small brown parcel. He opened it to find his order of Cecilia’s Silliest Sweets. They had been well named and a large proportion of the afternoon was spent testing them out. They had a habit of making the eater run around while making amazingly accurate chicken noises, or giving them an urge to do cartwheels around the room. Subsequently Katie ended up doing a handstand for ten minutes in a store cupboard. To Ben’s mortification he ended up dusting the head of a very pretty girl from Spring who he had ‘had his eye on’ for a while!
Keegan’s parcel was substantially smaller, and his cheeks were substantially sorer from when they started (It was really very funny watching the others make complete fools of themselves), when he hid the packet in his socks, before informing the others that the ¿y were in fact a banned substance. Not that Keegan cared. Along with his two best friends, both of who were in Summer, they had to be among the lead troublemakers of the year. Ben, who used to be in that gang before he had befriended Charlie informed the others that he was astounded that they didn’t know about the secret passages behind the mirrors as they seemed to know about all the rest! The information Ben had picked up before leaving that group had already proved useful on several occasions, in particular, when they had been late to lessons. Recently Keegan had become quite friendly with the others, as he was not in his other friends classes because they already had a house and like Charlie and Ben he was still waiting to get put into a house.

However they paid their price for their laxity towards their piles of homework. Sunday was spent catching up. Katie was woken up by Charlotte's alarm at 8.30 but, knowing she had more to do than the r Ωest of them (two 7 ounce essays – one on household charms and one on beauty and deportment – and several 5 ounce essays on varyingly difficult subjects), she didn’t follow the others who were heading for the hall. She went straight for the common room and spread out her many books on one of the small, spindly-legged tables.
“I still need one ounce more to finish this one on household charms,” Katie informed Keegan who was the only one who had returned from breakfast so far. Katie had rolled up her essay and placed it in her weighing scales only to watch the needle inform her that she still needed another ounce of writing covered parchment. She sighed.
Keegan stretched his arms. “Well I’ve finished so you can copy mine only I don’t reckon you’ll find much of any use in there.” Sure enough, when Katie had finished reading through Keegan’s essay she was mystified. She’d put all his points and more in her essay and hers was about ? longer than Keegan’s.
“Huh? Yours is shorter than mine but weighs more,” Katie told him.
Keegan laughed. “I buy extra heavy paper.” He grinned at Katie.
“Maybe I should take a leaf out of your book!”

“Blurgh,” Ben shouted loudly, jumping out from behind a huge stone pillar.
“Argh,” screamed Suzie. Ben collapsed onto the floor in fits of mischievous giggles.
Charlie raised his eyebrows bemusedly before saying: “oh Ben, that was terrifying. You scared the living daylights out of me.”
“Really?”
“No.”
A voice, emitted from one of the rooms further up the secret passageway, interrupting their rather pointless conversation. “Wow guys, come here. Look at this.”
“Ooh, let’s follow the bodiless voice. That sounds fun.”
“Shut up Ben.”
“Okay.”
The three of them turned into the room the voice had come from, through a rustic, old stone arch. In the middle of the hard stone floor Katie stood, looking around in wonder. “Is this not amazing?”
The three of them stood, just staring at her.
“You are so weird.”
A huge wall of compressed earth stood towering above them. Lamp lit, its red tinge was more obvious than otherwise, patterns pressed into its surface casting shadows that ran the entire length of the wall.
“Why? It’s magnificent!”
Charlie just shook his head. “Katie, it’s a room.”
“An amazing room!”
“But still a room…”
“But I’m not interested in the rooms, just the people! Think of all the people who stood here looking at this wall! Think of the people who created this, who designed it! It’s more than just a room, Charlie, it’s a million stories.”
They stared at each other for a second. Then Charlie smirked.
“You’re still weird.”
Katie laughed. “I’ll take that.”

To Katie’s surprise the first lesson on Monday, Majikal games and physical education, was as close to a success as any lesson so far had been. They were, once again, playing majikal bench ball – the season started on the 11th of November and although you had to in a house to play it was always great fun to watch. Despite the fact that Katie had still not got the hang of blasting the ball out of other people’s hands, she had long since improved her catching and throwing skills.
Today Ms. Gale appointed Sophie as team captain one and Miranda as team captain two. Slowly but surely a rivalry had been building between Miranda’s group and Katie’s group. Miranda had been placed in Winter before Katie had even started at Ms. Crystalwater’s but because she had started the year in new ’ and undiscovered she had remained in their lessons. About five Miranda followers had started off in the new and undiscovered dorm too. The Miranda followers had soon followed Miranda after she had been placed in Winter. At the start of the year there had been two new and undiscovered dorms housing about twenty-five new and undiscovered girls in all. For most lessons they were split in two – unfortunately Miranda had been in Katie’s dorm before Katie had arrived, so was in pretty much all her lessons. Beauty and Deportment was one of the few lessons when everyone from new and undiscovered was brought together. With the boys too there were about one hundred of them. And there was a very obvious divide between the two halves. Most people had already been put in houses. Winter and Autumn were together and Summer and Spring; it had always been like that. Katie and the others always chose to go with the Summer and Spring crowd.
So as usual, on that Monday morning, the tea ∏ms were split like that. Sophie was a clever team leader and when it came to whom she should put on the bench (to the other teams laughs and jeers) she chose Katie. Katie was so nervous that she completed messed up her first possible catch, though she usually could have caught it eyes shut. Miranda’s team was delighted. Their laughter and snide comments cut through the still morning air. Suddenly it was not only the cold temperature that was making the mood icy.
Miranda’s team were ready for an easy win. But Sophie's team weren’t having any of that. They fought back. For a long time the ball just stayed in the middle, being blasted from one teams hand to the other. Katie hadn’t watched a match like this before and it was now for the first time that she noticed the star players. Keegan’s two friends had been in new and undiscovered at the start of the year before being put in Summer, so were now back and helping Sophie's team. They were an amazing team the three of them. None of them could particularly catch but they had no problem blasting it out of people’s hands. Charlie and Charlotte were working well together. They were very good at getting the ball down the pitch fast. However the real star was Sophie. She was running around like a mad man and cheering about ten times louder than any of her team-mates.
She was also running rings around Miranda.
Katie laughed as Sophie blasted the ball out of Miranda’s hands for about the fifth time in a row. She watched as Miranda’s eyes narrowed. Katie glanced back at the game. Charlie had just chucked an excellent ball to Sophie. Katie looked back at Miranda. She was whispering something in the ear of a big guy – one of her admirers. His name was Brutace but everyone called him Brute, and for good reason. Miranda broke away from him, smiling.
Two minutes later Sophie was lying on the floor. A red burn coloured the side of her cheek. Brute was standi ng beside her, trying in vain to look innocent.
“That’s disgraceful!” Ms. Gale was screaming. “She didn’t even have the ball.”
“Ugh, sorry Miss. I thought she did,” Brute replied thickly.
His attempted explanation was drowned, however, by the torrent of the most colourful swearwords that Katie had ever heard. They flowed, none stopping, from Ben's mouth. The whole class was in uproar. When Ben finally paused to draw breath Ms. Gale pounced on the chance to restore order.
“Quiet. Everyone. Now!” she shouted above the riot. She bent down to take a closer look at Sophie's face. “What spell did you hit her with?”
“Miss I thought-“
“I asked you a question Brutace, not for an explanation.”
“A fireball mechant, Miss.”
“Miss Sugar,” Ms. Gale shot at Miranda. “You have lost a player from your team. I might request that you do us both a favour and don’t set another of your players on the opposition.”
The stunned look on Miranda’s face made the injury of a friend con úsiderably more bearable!

Five minutes later the game was back in full swing. It was to Katie’s amazement as much as everyone else’s when she made several impressive catches but each time the opposing team would pull back. They were neck in neck. If anyone had been watching they wouldn’t have believed the bitter determination that was composed on the teams faces. The atmosphere was electric. Both teams knew that if they lost then they would never be able to live it down.
Ten minutes to go. 26 all. Five minutes to go. 32 Winter – 31 Summer. Two minutes to go. 34 all. One minute to go. 34 all. Thirty seconds to go. 35 Summer – 35 Winter. Ten, Nine, Eight… The air was filled with the countdown to full time. Seven, six… One last chance. Five, four, three… Charlie threw the ball towards the bench. It flew through the air, closer, closer. Miranda jumped up to block the balls path to its goal. It bounced off her hand. ∂ The ball span high into the air. Katie jumped. She was flying to meet the ball and it was cascading down. She caught the ball before her feet hit the bench. For a moment there was silence, and then the cheers erupted.

One to Katie; four to Miranda!

It was, however, a good start to a bad week.
Katie felt so elated after their win against Miranda. She was determined not to let the other student’s voiles and vices wound her so much.
By Tuesday morning she had given up on her attempt to not let others bad words of opinions upset her so much. Her good mood had disappeared, along with the illusion that she had got one back on Miranda. What did it matter anyway? Miranda would always be more popular, clever and pretty. Maybe she should just accept that.
Katie was sitting in the glass room, as they had come to call it, reading. It was 4 o’ clock in the morning and Katie had been there since 2. She had taken to doing this when she couldn’t s Ÿleep, which was often now that the homework and stress was mounting. It seemed the only place she could escape to was her books and now the constant supply of ‘fantasy’ fiction (or as they called them here ‘real life’ novels) that might interest her was finally coming to a slow flow, she had no where except the passageways to escape to.
They began softly, quietly, evenly spaced, but as they got closer they slowly became louder and louder, and faster and faster. They echoed around the passageways making a hollow, gloomy sound. As the footsteps drew nearer, Katie suddenly remembered where she was. She wasn’t in some old French market place, but in a lonely, glass observatory at four in the morning and the way back to her warm, safe bed was through thousands of dark and dusty passageways. Nor were the footsteps those of a lonely mother, as she bought her families groceries, but of a solitary boy who was lost in thoughts about a girl, who at that moment, seemed a million miles away.
Katie stood up straight, her ears pricked. Who was this intruder? Or rather – she was the intruder, and the owner of this beautiful room may well be less than welcoming at this early hour. She flattened herself against a bookcase, where she knew the deep shadows would swallow her from praying eyes. The door groaned softly as a pair of hands pushed against the cold-mirrored glass. Katie closed her eyes and willed every atom of her existence to disappear. She melted into the old, dusty books. Katie didn’t dare breath. Footsteps echoed through the space. She pondered upon the identity of the unknown stranger. For a moment she considered looking to see the unknowns face. But once again fear gripped her, as the footsteps came nearer and she stayed still and silent. Her heart beat in time with the approaching footsteps. She couldn’t move but she couldn’t hold on for any longer. Katie fell as the world went black around her.
The first thing she noticed when the grey fuzz subsided was an extremely good-looking boy with a mop of jet black, messy hair hanging over her. He had the most shockingly green eyes she had ever seen.
“Hey, Kate… Earth to Katie? What the hell were you doing?” asked Charlie.
Oh god. I hope I don’t look as stupid as I feel! It’s Charlie. Charlie! I swear his eyes never used to be that green. I swear he never used to be that good looking for that matter.
Shut up Katie.
Thinking about whether your best mate got better looking over night certainly isn’t going to make you look any less stupid.
“I actually don’t know.” Great answer Katie. Nice one. “Well, I mean… I was… I thought…”
“God girl! Spit it out. You nearly gave me a heart attack going and fainting like that. I had no idea you were in here!”
Katie faltered, “Well, um... I didn’t know who you were, you could have been anyone just coming in like that, and I kind of hid so no-one would see me, and I stopped breathing as I thought whoever had come in would hear me, and then I sort of, I don’t know, but I couldn’t breathe-“
“That was clever.” Charlie’s voice dripped with cutting sarcasm.
“- and the next thing I know I’m falling out of the book case, and, well, here I am.”
“Hang on, you fell out of a bookcase?”
“Well I don’t know do I? I just fell. You know. I was kinda in the middle of fainting so it was kinda hard to tell what was going on!”
“Okay, keep your head on girl.”
“Will you please stop calling me girl? I have a name you know,” Katie stormed, indignantly. Her pride had been wounded enough already. “And whatever. I think I was like, part of the bookshelf.”
“That’s impossible. You have to be good at majik to become part of something.”
“Oh, thanks for that!”
“Kate, I didn’t mean it like that. Come on.”
“Oh really? I think I know exactly what you meant.”
“Kate, what’s wrong with you today? You know I didn’t mean it like that?”
“Do I? Oh funny ‘cause I think you meant it exactly like that! And did you just ask me what’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with you more like?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve been in such a crap mood since the banquet.”
“What? That’s not true.”
“Yes it is. You’ve been having a go at everyone since then.”
“At least I haven’t been blocking everyone out. You’ve barely talked to me since you met Kieran.” Charlie spat the name out, not even attempting to hide his contempt.
“What is your problem with Kieran?”
“One, he’s from Saint Cuthbert. We’re meant to hate them.”
“Just ‘cause he’s from another school doesn’t mean you have to hate him.”
“Two,” Charlie continued, ignoring Katie’s comment. “He’s so fake. ‘I’ll write to you.’”
“At least he’s not over proud and self-centred.”
“At least I’ve got two brain cells to rub together!”
Katie looked at the floor, unable to meet Charlie’s eyes. A single tear trickled down to the end of her nose and splashed onto the cold, hard floor. Charlie looked down at the small puddle that he had caused. Guilt filled him.
“Kate, please don’t cry. You know I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Oh really? Like Miranda doesn’t mean it when she laughs and humiliates me?”
“Katie - I’m not like Miranda.”
“Really? ‘Cause I’m not so sure.”
“Oh, and you know me so well?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You just come in and judge me, just like that.”
“And I met you, what, two months ago? And since then I’ve spent almost all my time with you? Well, I thought I knew you but now I think you’ve changed.”
“Oh right – as if I care what you think anyway.” And with that he walked from the room.”
Katie’s dismal figure slumped into the corner. Her heart fluttered and died.
At least I’ve got two brain cells to rub together… He’s so fake … You have to be good at majik to become part of something… As if I care what you think anyway…

As if I care…

SCROLL NINETEEN
Suzie was walking down the wide and highly decorated halls to breakfast when a boy with a cheeky grin and a head of curly blond hair jumped out of nowhere.
“Hey Suze, what you up to?” Said Keegan, grinning.
“Why did you call me Suze? No one calls me Suze. Especially you.”
“What do I usually call you?”
“Suzie. Actually more often than not ‘you’ or ‘girl over there.’”
“Really? I didn’t realise. That was probably my evil identical twin Boris - he enjoys pretending to be me (better company) – but in the event that maybe I did call you any one of those names, I will say it, I am sorry.” Suzie turned to look at him with her head on one side.
“Who are you and what have you done with Keegan Reid? Or, more to the point, what do you want?”
“Do I need an excuse to go to breakfast with my gorgeous female companion?”
“Are you asking me out?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out!” And with that he dragged a slightly bemused Suzie through to breakfast.
*
Keegan was pouring Suzie apple juice when Ben turned up.
“I don’t like apple juice,” laughed Suzie.
“Then why do you always drink it?”
“How did you know that?”
“Cause I’m not blind.”
“Have you been watching me?” Suzie asked suspiciously.
“Excuse me?” Ben asked, wandering what had happened to the world this morning. “If I didn’t know better then I’d have said you two were an item.”
“Well you obviously don’t know better.” Keegan replied with a mischievous grin.
“What? You are going out?” He looked towards Suzie and then back a Keegan.
Suzie laughed. “That’s news to me, mate!” she said before Keegan put his arm around her waist.
“What is going on today? You to are going out, Charlie disappears for half the night and comes back in an awful mood and won’t talk about Katie and I can’t find the girl in question anywhere,” Ben asked hoping that his face didn’t show the emotional turmoil that he was feeling inside.
Keegan had his head on Suzie’s shoulder and buttering her toast for her when Ben looked back, from the doorway. He wished he hadn’t; he felt sick.
*
Miranda sat; her beautifully curly, deep red hair flopped over her shoulders as she spoke to he r admirers.
“-So he said to me that he was totally in love with me and I was the only girl for him and yada yada yada and I was totally like, ‘I’ve heard it all before you loser’, and then he started reeling off some stupid old poem about eyes for eyes and the awakening of tomorrow, and I was like, ‘excuse me while I puke’!”
Ben and Charlie – who Ben had warned Charlie off the visiting the dining hall – rounded the corner into the classroom to the sound of Miranda’s cronies agreeing with her and sharing stories of similar situations, all of which Ben were sure were lies.
“Why can’t boys be simple?” asked Miranda, rhetorically.
“I’m simple,” Ben informed Charlie, trying in vain to lighten the mood.
“What did you say?” Miranda asked, her head snapping round.
“I said I’m simple.”
“Why? What did you mean?”
“I meant I’m simple.”
Miranda walked slowly towards Ben. She touched him gently on the nose. “Your funny - kinda cute too.”
“I… erm… thanks. Same to you,” Ben replied, unsure what he was supposed to say.
“This ones not bad either.” One of Miranda’s inner circle had approached Charlie and was curling his fringe around her long, bony fingers. Her hair was blonde and ridiculously straight. Her face was covered in such a thick layer of foundation that Charlie was sure if he tried to poke it then it would take about three years to get to her skin. Everything about her spoke of fakeness. Charlie laughed nervously.
Get away from me Barbie!
“Your not so bad yourself,” was Charlie’s reply.
“You don’t have to sit with those nerds all the time you know, guys,” Miranda informed them. “Come and sit with us today.”
Ben and Charlie exchanged glances but neither could think how to refuse so they were just swinging their satchels over their shoulders when Katie entered the classroom. She looked over at Charlie who was swiftly making his way over to Miss Barbie. His back was to her and she was glad. She didn’t want him to see her face.
Ben followed, slightly more reluctantly. Usually he had no trouble with girls, but to be honest he didn’t really fancy a flirting session today. Oh well. Keegan and Suzie would be here soon anyway… Katie would be fine and he didn’t want to look wrapped up. So, having come to that conclusion he sat in the seat indicated to him – next to Miranda.
“Oh, look what the cat dragged in,” Miranda laughed, looking over at Katie who had just slammed her huge pile of books onto the desk. Miranda’s cronies were laughing gleefully. Ben looked over at his best mate. Charlie was laughing too.
“Aren’t you glad you escaped? She’s so stupid I’m surprised she can hold a conversation. Honestly Charlie, what did you ever see in her?”
Katie swept her books back into her bag. She had no intention of giving him the time of day to answer. By the time she had reached the door the tears had begun. She didn’t turn back.
Katie returned to the classroom as the bell rang for the first lesson. She didn’t bother looking over at Charlie and Ben; she knew what she’d see. But she was surprised when she looked over at Suzie - the seat next to her was taken by a most peculiar occupant. The grinning Keegan took up the chair that Katie usually sat in. He looked very pleased with himself for some reason, and he kept glancing at Suzie. Katie felt slightly stung at the fact her best mate hadn’t bothered to save her a seat but it was nothing to what she felt as she finally sneaked a glance at Miranda’s table to see her whispering something highly amusing in Charlie’s ear.
Katie looked around for a spare seat. There was only one. It was next to the class nerd. Katie felt guilty at the reluctance that filled her as she sat down.
“What a good couple they would make – nerds in love,” Miranda sneered. Katie clenched her jaw but didn’t turn around. She was shaking as she put pen to paper and began taking notes.
Katie considered this to be worth two points for Miranda: not only had she humiliated Katie once again but she had stolen Charlie too. Not that Katie had ever had Charlie.
When the bell finally went to signal the end of lesson Katie was so angry that she felt that if she did not get out of Miranda’s presence at once she might explode. Her red-hot anger that had been simmering just below the surface for so long was threatening to boil over and spill out. Katie practically ran to the door when the bell sounded. No one tried to stop her.
Katie ran to her dorm and hastily pushed aside the mirror that led to the corridors. She ran into the first ever room she had found and sat there, the tears falling hard and fast, each burning as it fell to the floor with a splash. She found crying helped her release all the anger inside her, as if for one moment she and her troubles were all that existed, no one else trying to get on with their lives and hastily pushing her aside. She knew had there been someone to see her tears she would have felt weak and pathetic but somehow coping with her problems on her own made her feel stronger, despite the fact all her friends seemed to have abandoned her. Maybe they don’t matter – maybe I don’t need them, her head spoke, but the tears that were pouring directly from her heart - to her eyes, to the floor - told a different story.
Katie spent many hours in that book filled room until she was sure that everyone had forgotten her.
*****
It was hours later when Ben finally found Katie, sitting in exactly the same position, on the hard cold floor of the circular room filled with books.
“Oh my god, Katie. Are you all right?”
“Do I really need to answer that? What does it look like? Do I look bloody all right?”
“Sorry, stupid question I guess.”
“You guess?”
“Look Katie I’m sorry I only want to help.”
“Bit late for that isn’t it? Where were you when I needed you?”
“Ok, so I’ve been a prat, a git, an idiot, but I’m here now and I’m sorry.”
“Oh sorry are you? That’s helpful,” snapped Katie. Ben couldn’t think of a say to that. Ben looked around the room before walking over and sitting beside Katie.
“Do you hate me?”
“No.”
“Do you forgive me?”
“No.”
“Fair enough.”
“Why do you care?”
“What?”
“Why do you care? No one else seems to.”
“You know that’s not true.”
“Really?”
“Charlie is only acting like this because he cares too much; and Suzie’s a bit preoccupied with her new boyfriend.” Ben said, his voice full of bitterness.
“Keegan and Suzie? Oh my god, I never thought that would happen!”
“Tell me about it.”
“I mean I always knew he liked her but-“
“WHAT?! How did you know?”
“It was totally obvious!” Ben still wasn’t convinced, but he supposed it was a girl thing.
“So what’s your excuse?”
“What?”
“Well, you don’t have a new boyfriend (at least I hope you don’t!) or…well what is your excuse?”
“That I’m an idiot who doesn’t know what’s good for him.” Katie laughed ruefully at this. “Listen Katie. Hiding here isn’t going to help anyone."
“Well I don’t want to play the gooseberry any more than I want to get laughed at again. Besides, I don’t notice anyone else missing me.”
“Aren’t I good enough?”
“I didn’t say that…”
“I know you didn’t and neither did I! Come on, I’ll protect you.” Katie laughed again.
“Everything is such a joke with you, isn’t it?”
“I find life treats me better this way. So are you coming or what?” Katie tilted her head.
“Ok, just let me sort myself out first.”
After what seemed like and age of mascara smudge removing and eyeliner reapplying Katie was finally ready to face the world. She took a deep breath as Ben grasped her hand and pulled her out into the ordinary world. They walked into history of charms to several wolf whistles and a seething look from Miranda. Charlie did not seem to notice them.
The next week passed in a blur, a week of being forgotten by all but one, a week of blundering in practicals and excelling at theory, a week of copying write ups, as she had no idea how they worked. If her life had been a film, the week would be a montage of ‘nothing’. Katie often thought of her life as a series of montages, wondering what the most important events were, what it all boiled down to. The truth was, not much. What did she do in life? Sometimes it seemed so important, and sometimes she realised just how little she meant to ‘the great scheme of things’. That week she became the ‘speck upon the dresser of earth’ that she believed herself to be. She kept her head down, and pretended she did not exist.
****
Ben was sitting on the cold, hard, damp steps leading out to the golden fields and beautiful gardens of the grounds. He had his head in his hands. He had just had the worst week ever. It had been like living in a zombie world, where no one talks, just groans, gently and menacingly, like a howling wind. He had been there for a good half hour when an unexpected person sat down beside him. She was a lot taller than him, and her billowing, curly blonde hair blew out behind her.
“Hey ”.” She said, casually, “You’re friends with my sister right? How is she?” It was Lucy Rosseta from the fifth year. Ben’s mouth dropped. Lucy Rosseta, Katie Rosseta, their faces were similar, even when Lucy was so pearly white and Katie was so darkish and i-wish-i-wasn’t-me, it made so much sense.
“Y-You’re Katie’s sister?” He stuttered.
“Um, yeah.” She said in Katie’s mixed accent. “Do you know her?”
“Yeah. I don’t mean to worry you or anything, but right now she’s not so great.” Lucy’s face adopted an anxious expression.
“Really? I thought I ought to check up on her; she’s not around as much any more. What’s going on?” Ben squirmed. If he told Lucy anything, anything at all, he knew that it would flow into the emotional turmoil that they all were experiencing at the moment. It was not something he felt he really wanted to say to the coolest girl in the school.
“Well...” He started, avoiding her (extremely pretty) gaze.
“Ben,” she said firmly, turning to face him. (She knows my name! thought Ben) “Spill.”

SCROLL TWENTY

Katie and Ben were sitting at the corner of one of the four long tables that lined the hall for breakfast. They had both found mealtimes the hardest part of being forgotten, people sat in friendship groups, divided into sections by popularity. As they were neither popular, nor part of an extended group they found themselves being shoved to the side with the other rejects. Katie often ‘forgot’ lunch, it being the hardest meal to cope with as there were medium sized round tables in the dining hall, creating a normal canteen atmosphere, making it an ordinary cliqued high school, and therefore utterly vile and genuinely terrible to be a part of.
Katie almost jumped out of her skin when Lucy sat down opposite her. Smiling she passed a large, triangular, brown paper package across to her.
“A little birdie told me that you were having a tough time, so I got Mum to send this. I had a feeling you’d be missing it.”


”*
Miranda was sitting sideways along the bench positioned right in the middle of the hall. One of her legs was bent, her foot resting on the bench, her arms folded over it in a graceful fashion. Her other leg was pushed out along the floor so that it was almost touching Charlie’s. She had taken to doing this when she had new shoes; today it was a pair of designer silver studded black heels. Charlie seemed uncomfortable with this new arrangement, his body shifted as far away from her as he could possibly get. The unpenetratable gaze of her icy blue eyes bored into the side of his head as he spread marmalade on his toast. She just couldn’t work him out. A smile played on her painted ruby lips. She loved a mystery.
Suddenly, her eyes flicked to an unusual gathering. Miranda had a quick eye for potential gossip, whether it would be good for dishing the dirt to her circle of friends, or as potential blackmail material, Miranda would be the first to know. Today, Lucy Rosseta was talking to... Talking to...
“Katie Rosseta?” Charlie’s jaw clenched. He ignored her. “Oh. My. God.”
Irritated that he was not listening to her, Miranda began kicking his leg with the point at the front of her stiletto.
“Earth to Charlie! I have dirt!” He looked slowly round at her, his leg throbbing from the force of several, well placed jabs in his shin. He shook his head expectantly; it was too early to talk.
“You will never believe this! Lucy and Katie Rosseta are sisters!”
Charlie looked back to his marmalade-covered toast. Suddenly he didn’t feel like eating. “Yeah... I know. Isn’t it obvious?”
“You knew and you never told me?!? I have to go tell Emma. See you around!”
Charlie looked back to his toast. He began spreading the marmalade right to the edges. He took a bite. Yuck.
When he looked over again, Katie was gone, but he could have sworn that Ben gave Lucy a hi-five. He got up to leave. Things were getting weirder by the second.
*****
Katie was running out of the hall and into her dorm, roughly pushing aside the mirror that led to the dusty, forever repeating corridors. She was running past room after room after room. She ran past the book filled room, the glass room, the room full of writing, she ran until she reached the map room. It was a good thing she had kept the map they had found here, she did not have a mind for directions. She ran into the room, stepped upon one of the high backed chairs, and sat on the dark, polished wood of the table. She laid the brown paper package next to her and started to unpack it. She knew exactly what it was.
Charlie walked slowly towards his dorm, feeling sorry for himself. The world seemed to swirl around him in an surreal fashion, so vivid it almost made him feel ill. This wasn’t his life. It wasn’t what he wanted. Was it sick fate? Was it his fault? His real life was gone. Run off. Vanished.
A boy with blond hair approached. It was Ben.
“Hey Ben. ‘Sup?” Ben’s face fell.
“What’s up? What’s up?” Ben’s voice was incredulous. “I’ll tell you what’s up! Katie, your friend Katie, remember her? She’s making her self ill, she’s so upset.” He was gaining volume now, his voice changing from that of disbelief to that of anger. “Not that you care any more, do you? Your to busy with your girlfriend, Miranda.” Ben’s face was of pure loathing. Charlie was taken aback; he had not been expecting this. “If her sister hadn’t stepped in, I don’t know where she’d be now! Slowly dying, like the rest of us, probably.” Ben took a step back. “Do me a favour, Charlie, and get lost before I hurt you.”
The colours were swirling faster and faster as the sudden feeling of intense vertigo hit him harder than Ben ever could have. Running felt like falling, free falling from an immense height into a bottomless pit of life. Life itself had no meaning, the threads had been untied at their very roots, every feeling, every sense, every thought had been unravelled, laid bare, and then ripped from his cranium with an extreme, unknown force. Nothing mattered, except he had to keep running, running, even though running also had no meaning. He had to get out. He had to get away.
*****
Katie’s trembling fingers scrabbled away at the brown paper of her package until they found a note from her parents.

Dearest Katie,
...I trust you are having a wonderful time at school... Lucy has been writing to us often... it’s a shame the lower school are discouraged from writing home... it would be lovely to hear from you... it is so quiet without you here... it’s very strange really... big empty house... it’s good to know that you are safe and happy...

Katie choked. It was too painful to read any more. She discarded the letter and continued to unwrap her parcel. Out fell her most treasured possession in the whole world. She was home.
*****
Charlie ran until he reached his dorm. Roughly pushing aside the mirror, he threw himself onto the floor of the first room he found - the turret room. He lay still, staring at the white ceiling with such intensity it was as if he was hoping it to reveal something to him. When it did not, he sat up, looking around at his surroundings for the first time. He immediately wished he hadn’t. There on the floor were several of Katie’s favourite books, stacked in a pile. With shaking fingers, he picked up the top one, Jane Eyre, and began to read.
Suddenly, Charlie sat up. He had heard something.
He cautiously began walking through the empty, hidden halls, his footsteps echoing off the walls, the floors, round and round, again and again without pause. His breath caught, he knew that sound.
It was a voice. A clear female voice, accompanied by quiet guitar, was singing out, and it cut through him like a knife.

Katie was happier than she could have ever imagined. She had lost her surroundings; she was wherever she wanted to be. It was better than a storm. Until ”…
“Hey.” Said Charlie, standing at the door, his shoulders squared and his voice shaky.
Katie was so surprised that she almost dropped her guitar. Her fingers slipped as she jumped, and the resulting miss-chord ricocheted around the hall.
“Oh,” she said, steadying herself as she lightly jumped from the wooden bench to the floor. Her eyes darkened. “I was just leaving.”
Charlie was lost for words. He just silently watched her hanging a cord around her neck. He had never noticed before, but the necklace she always wore had a blue, plastic pick hanging from it. She hung the guitar, by it’s strap, over her shoulder, and gathered the wrappings, and the letter up. He waved his hand once, and the torn brown paper disappeared. He thought he heard her mutter ‘show off’ under her breath, and he couldn’t help but suppress a grin. Same old Katie.
Without meeting his eyes, she began to walk towards the door. When she was just past him, he couldn’t help but say something.
“I didn’t know you played the guitar.” As soon as he had spoken he wished that he hadn’t. His voice rang out loud in the empty silence.
Katie slowly turned around to face him.
“There are a lot of things you don’t know about me, Charlie.” she replied, and with that, walked calmly away from the octagonal room, where the golden light of the setting sun was pouring through the many windows and bathing the dark wood in a deep orange glow.

SCROLL TWENTY-ONE

From that day forward, Katie resolved to spend as little time behind her mirror as possible. She instead, began to discover more of the grounds, better trees in which to sit and play guitar, and slowly, she moved further and further away from the main school. For the next two days, she spent all of her free time in one tree or another; she didn’t eat much, and definitely saw nothing of her friends. No one except Ben noticed much, and he spoke to her in lessons enough to realise that she was happy, and swiftly flreported back to an anxious Lucy. She was very smug for the next few days.
Katie began to regain her bubbly, hardworking aura, and when she talked to Suzie, late at night, she did not seem to suspect anything was wrong. Suzie had become completely detached from Katie, they saw nothing of each other, Keegan had taken over. Suzie hung out with his group of friends, and lived in a blissfully happy bubble, which Katie was secretly extremely jealous of.
There was one exception to the rule that no one noticed what Katie was up to, and that exception was Alice. She and Katie had not exactly been best friends, but they saw each other all the time, and talked often, so when Katie just evaporated, Alice was less worried, more curious, as to where Katie had got. When she did happen across a glimpse of her, she always wondered who the two guys were. At that moment she had her money on Ben Grey as one of them, but she had no idea who the other might be. She was watching her, hard.
Katie Î was practically running through the trees, it was the last week before half term, when she could go home and see her family. She climbed into the branches of the best tree yet and pulled her guitar up behind her. Little did she know that she was being watched.
She played what she felt, and she felt what she played, and after playing she always felt better. But halfway through a chord was when she always seemed to be disturbed, and this time was no exception.
“Hey,” said Alice walking around the back of the tree as Katie fell out with a thud. “I don’t suppose you’d consider playing in a band?”
“Pardon?” replied Katie from her place on the ground, slightly shocked.
And that was how she found herself here, feeling awkward in front of a laid back drummer, sprawled across two chairs, a messy haired lead singer, sitting on a table, and her friend, the bass guitarist, in all her heavily eyelinered glory, introducing her to two guys, who were not exactly the sort of people who were interested in a tallish, brown (highly straightened) haired girl with an acoustic guitar.
“Nick, Joe, meet our new guitarist!” They stared. Crap thought Katie, as the pair exchanged glances.
“Alice, can I have a word?” said Nick, the singer, motioning towards the door, and not looking too pleased. Katie’s heart sank. She’d known it was too good to be true.
“Katie, I need a guitarist. 4 days time, last day of term. The school band’s guitarist walked out. Just fill in until next term, yes? If you do, I’ll love you forever.” She should have known that the rest of the band would be slightly less welcoming.
Outside, Nick was giving Alice a stern stare.
“What?” she said, ‘you said get a guitarist – I got one. Just because I didn’t consult you first...”
“It’s not the fact you didn’t consult me, it’s the fact you picked some random geek from the lunch hall!”
“Nick, you don’t even know her!”
“I know enough to know that she isn’t going to do our image any good, and I know that knowing her won’t change that!”
“Do you know enough to know who her sister is?” In response to this, Nick just shook his head in frustration.
“This is all we need, our image is already damaged enough, what with Jake walking out...”
“Lucy. Rosetta.” Alice interrupted.
“What?”
“Her sister is Lucy Rosetta.” Nick’s face changed to one of dumbstruck awe.
“Get. Out.”
*****
Alice and Nick walked back into the practice room so fast they were practically running, but nothing that either of them had been thinking could have prepared them for what greeted them there.
“And then he said to me, ‘You have gotta come talk to her, bro, she wants to meet you.’ So I agreed…”
Katie was laughing as Joe animatedly told his story, dropping comments where appropriate.
“And I said, ‘Hey, I heard you wanted to talk to me.” Katie shook with laughter.
“You so did not!”
“I so did! And she was like, ‘Yeah, you broke my house!” Katie shook with laughter.
“I do not believe a word of Ïthat!”
“You better believe it, ‘cos it’s true!”
Alice and Nick were standing motionless and speechless at the door. They could not believe that the two most unlikely people in the school were getting on so well, having known each other for less than ten minutes. Suddenly, Alice snapped into action.
“Katie, take the headband out.” Katie, having only just realised that Alice had returned, bemusedly removed the black, plastic band from her hair. “Okay, now mess your hair up a little.” Katie did so, if slightly half heartedly. “More.” Katie had long ago learned to listen to Alice’s advice, if she said, ‘get new shoes’ the vast majority of people would, because they knew Alice was the first to know what was going on.
“Eyeliner, tomorrow, switch from brown to black,” she said, throwing a pencil at her, “and more is more. That goes double for everything else.”
Katie didn’t know exactly what was going on. It had all happened so quickly. It was crazy, wha Ût was going on?
“Your official audition starts now. Do you play electric?” Said Nick. Katie did a double take.
“Um, yeah. I play both. But I don’t have an electric with me...”
“It’s fine, we can lend you a school one. Do you want to have yours sent from home for friday?” Alice took over. These people moved fast.
“Sure, sounds good. Only it’s not that great a guitar...”
“Doesn’t matter, if you’re more comfortable with it then that’s better than one of these old things.” She said gesturing around the room at the many dusty, stacked cases that were littered around the strangely shaped room. Occasionally an instrument was attached to the wall. Alice were right, they were old.
“Okay. I know this is going to sound so stupid, but what exactly is happening on friday that you need me for? I know it’s important and everything, but I’m kind of out of the loop.” They stared at her.
“Uh, Katie, you know it’s half term next week, yes?” Katie knew this well. She was counting down the days.
“Yes... I know. What’ √s happening before half term?” They were staring at her like she was the stupidest person alive.

NEEDS SOMETHING HERE

It had come.


Kieran had been looking forward to this night ever since the banquet - there would be music and dancing and Katie to think about. Clean shirts and sexy hair was what was most important to him now. He had to make a good second impression; his long time pen friend would be there, and there was no one else that he wanted to impress.
Cautiously he unfolded his note.

Hi Kieran,
I just wanted to say that I'm sorry, but I wont be able to meet you by the fountain, as previously arranged. I’m kind of busy right now, and you’ll understand why then - we probably won’t talk but you’ll see me for sure.
x3
K

Kieran looked back down at the note in his hand. The few lines, scrawled in purple ink, were both brief and disappointing. He’d just have to find another girl to spend the evening with, that shouldn’t be too hard, but he had wasted valuable time and effort on Katie when he might have been chasing a more worthy candidate. It was just her loss, he supposed.

“Oh god, you should have sewn me into these. I can’t bloody breathe!” Katie whined.
“Oh shut up Kate. You’ll look fab,” laughed Lucy, giving the zip one last yank. Katie turned around and caught a glance at herself in the mirror.
“Oh my God, Lucy. What the hell have you done to me?’

A sigh escaped Charlie’s mouth. Tonight was going to be awful. Between Miranda and Katie Charlie shuddered. He knew what the right thing to do was, but unfortunately it wasn’t the easy one.
“Ay-up. You ready to go down then?” Ben asked, wandering into the dorm, looking enviously good.
“Will I ever be?”
“Come on, you might surprise yourself and actually quite enjoy it.“
“Whatever. Can we just go.” Ben sighed, but for once he wasn’t going to let Charlie’s fowl mood invade him. He was going to have fun. He was determined. For Katie. O r maybe just a little bit for himself. So maybe it was selfish, ditching Charlie for some hot chick, but seriously, didn’t he deserve some fun?
The two boys walked down the stairs together in silence, each absorbed in there own minds. The hall was already crowded, people packed in, raving to an old rock record, obviously some teacher’s idea of what ‘kid’s these days’ like. The lights were flashing, red then yellow then blue, laser projectors showing spiraligraphic abstracted patterns, reflecting from glass window to glass window. This was the sort of thing that Charlie generally avoided. Unfortunately, there was too much he had to do tonight to go and hide somewhere no-one could find him.
The St. Cuthbert’s boys were already making themselves at home, ‘dancing and shouting like they owned the place,’ Charlie thought, walking into the mass of bodies that crowded into the dance floor.
“Oi, You,” Kieran shouted, over the noise of the party. “You’re friends with Kat ie, right? Where is she?”
“How should I know?” Charlie asked, feeling seriously peeved about being approached like this. Luckily for them, right at that moment Ben swaggered up behind them, holding two cokes, in paper cups. He put his arms around the two others.
“My friends, I would like to draw your attention to the girl upon the stage. Now if you’ll excuse me I don’t want to keep the hottest girl in the school waiting do I?”
“Katie?” Charlie asked incredulously, in response to more than one of Ben’s strange remarks. “Oh my God.”
Katie was stood on the stage, a electric guitar slung over her shoulder. Katie was shaking but down on the floor Charlie didn’t think about that. All he could think about was how amazing she looked.
In skin tight, black, leather leggings her legs looked about three miles long. Black high heels strengthened the long legged impression, topped off with a baggy t-shirt surrounding her slim upper body, hanging off her slim s ëhoulders, leaving them bare. Charlie couldn’t help but notice how perfectly Katie’s pale, bony shoulders curved into her graceful neck. Her head was held high, searching through the crowd for a familiar face. For one moment Charlie imagined it was he that she was looking for, but her eyes swept over him with no more than a glance, leaving him feeling more and more like the storybook villain. Bright red lipstick adorned Katie’s pout and a little blusher tinting her arched cheek bones and even less smudged and smoked grey eye shadow brushed across her lids finished it off. Katie messed her hair up with one thing hand, her long finger covered in chunky rings. She looked like the perfect rock queen, and to Charlie the perfect girl. But, God damn it, how to tell her that?
Nick walked forward. Ever the casual dresser, he wore a pink short sleeved t-shirt over a long sleeved grey one. His skinny jeans were compulsory. He was never seen without them. He began to check the mics.
Alice, of course, had thrown herself into the search for the perfect outfit the moment the word ‘disco’ had been mentioned. Her eighties vintage dress was day-glo yellow, it’s large ruffles starting mid-thigh and ending on the other side, past her knee. Her eyeliner matched perfectly, and there she was tuning her bass with her very artistically done nails. (She had painted them yellow to match her outfit, and then painted a black over the top and allowed it to chip.)
Joe was, as always, dressed to impress. He wore a white shirt, rolled up to his sleeves, and slightly undone at the top. His grey waistcoat hung over him, matching his trilby hat. His shirt was partially tucked into his straight cut jeans with a sort of casual elegance that many could only dream of achieving.
The music stopped, and Nick began the show.

“Put on your converse trainers,
Go outside,
It's a bright new world,
And you might find,
Something to smile about!”

The room went crazy. Charlie was speechless. He had definitely not been expecting this. Despite himself he couldn’t help but join the crazy mass of people jumping like wild things all around the room. They were really good, and as the first chorus ended Katie allowed herself the first smile of the night, or possibly of the week, or even the month. Just the fact that she hadn’t been booed off the stage was enough to make her grin from ear to ear despite the fact her guitar solo was fast approaching...
Katie was soaring. She was flying on the back of cheers and smiles, sent her way. They didn’t just love the song they loved the music and they loved her. As the solo ended she glanced down at her sister and Ben her were dancing together. Lucy beamed and gave her the thumbs up, whilst Ben wolf-whistled loudly. Katie laughed. It was going to be a great night.
Kieran cheered with the rest. Maybe her could affor öd to wait after all. The atmosphere was electric and hot and noisy and he loved it. The band was really rocking hard now and despite the fact the fact they had al been going solid for at least an hour neither the audience nor the players were tiring. Fuelled by adrenaline song after song was reeled out.
“But alas, all good things must come to an end,” Nick informed the crowd, to disappointed boos. Katie could have kept going all night but they had run out of songs to play and it was all over. “We’d just like to play you one last song.” Katie’s head snapped around, in confusion. She raised her eyebrows questioningly at Alice, but Alice just grinned in reply. “Forgotten Tomorrow, by Katie Rosetta.” Katie’s jaw dropped. She shook her head slowly at Nick. What was going on? Alice walked over to her and took her guitar off her, still grinning mischievously.
“You don’t know it,” Katie hissed, lost.
“We learnt it!” And already Nick was pushing a mic into her hand.
“No way.”
“Break a leg,” Nick whispered. Katie felt sick even before the first chord had sounded. She couldn’t do it. To sing in front of all the people would be like jumping off a cliff. But it was her cue. She opened her mouth. Nothing come out. She couldn’t do it. It was one bar in and everyone was watching her expectantly. She knew she couldn’t do it, and that’s when Nick started singing. He sang it perfectly, better than anyone else could have done, and she just stood there like a lemon. The chorus was coming up, her chorus, and she felt and arm snake around her waist. Joe, unneeded at the drum kit, stood besides her. He whispered in her ear,
“You can do it, Kate.”
You can do it. She could do it. She could do it. Heart pumping she nodded when Nick glanced at her. She closed her eyes and began to sing.

“Maybe, someday,
Could that someday be tomorrow?
Maybe you’ll notice I’m still standing here.
Or maybe I’ll have enough and just disappear.
Friends last forever so were you ever my friend?
Cause all you seem to do is cut me down and hurt me again and again.
Will you be there tomorrow?
But, thing is, I know,
That tomorrow will just be the same,
You’ll ignore me, and hurt me, again and again.
Cause tomorrow’s not a new dawn, not a new day.
Cause all tomorrow ever is, is a forgotten yesterday.”

Charlie’s heart stopped. Her eyes shut, her lips almost touching the microphone, her hand in her hair... Oh Katie, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you, or ignore you or cut you down.
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry...

The music stopped. Silence. Had they hated it? Somehow Katie didn’t care. Had Charlie heard it? Had Suzie? Had Miranda? Had they really listened? Would they even care? It didn’t matter any more.

“But tomorrow doesn’t matter any more,
Cause at this day, and at this time,
I’ve found myself some piece of mind.”

Katie’s quavering voice cut through the silence like a knife. Suddenly a cascade of noise filled the room: cheering. It was funny, she thought, a song that had made her weep made others cheer. Like life really.
Suddenly Nick, to her surprise, pulled Katie into a huge hug. Within second Joe was on top of them with Alice close behind. They let Katie go and they all stood watching each other for a moment. A tear leaked out of Katie’s eye and she held up her hand, which was shaking violently. They all burst out laughing, they were just another group of friends having fun at the school disco.
Suddenly, the records started blaring out again. Obvious ly, someone had said something, as this was all recent - and also really good. Yes, thought Katie, I can see Keegan there now. I wonder how much sweet talking that took him. A hand appeared from nowhere, and once again Katie was being dragged into the crowds by her sister. There she was greeted by a slightly hyperactive Ben with the hugest grin on his face ever. Katie looked from Ben to Lucy, and then back to Ben again.
“Riiiiiight...” she said, nodding her head slowly. Lucy laughed, and Ben’s grin got wider still, as they joined the pulsating masses dancing to ‘Low’.
Charlie wandered over to the edge of the crowd, his eyes locked on Katie. Her head was tilted back and she was laughing with Alice. He couldn’t talk to her now. Not when she was this happy.
“Awesome, wasn’t she?” Ben stood beside his friend.
“Um,” was all Charlie could trust himself to say. They stood in an awkward silence for several minutes. “So she’s your hot date?” Charlie asked, trying to sound casual, not meeting Ben’s eyes. He crossed his fingers in his jeans pocket.
“Katie?” Ben laughed. “Hot? Yes. My date? No way. I was talking about her sister.”
Charlie immediately felt both immensely relieved and extremely embarrassed. “Oh,” he said. “Oh.”
Ben laughed again. “There’s still time, bro. And she is irresistibly dateless...” Charlie just shook his head in response.
“Nah. I think I’m gonna head off. Finish packing, y’know?” Ben was shocked, but he swallowed his feelings before they could properly surface.
“Okay, Okay. Sure. If you say so. I’ll see you around then, I guess.”
“Uh huh.” was Charlie’s only reply.
Ben ambled back towards Katie and Lucy, trying, and failing, not to think about his friend.
“Where’s he going?” Katie asked, trying to put her best ‘I’m just making conversation’ face on.
“Probably going to sit and cry in his dorm.”
“What’s he got to cry about?” She sounded annoyed.
“He’s sorry,” Ben tried.
“He doesn’t act like it.”
“That’s because he’s too bloody proud.”
“It’s because he’s a bloody idiot.” Katie replied.
“Please, Katie, give him a chance,” begged Ben. Katie stood silently for a second, and then, taking a deep breath, began heading through the hall to the exit. The heavy wooden door swung shut behind her. There was silence.
SCROLL TWENTY-TWO

“Charlie,” she called after the solitary figure that was making his way up the stairs. She sprinted up after him, her heels clattering noisily. She reached out and grabbed his shoulder, pulling him round to face her.
They were standing on a platform between two flights of stairs. The whole of this back hall was carpeted extravagantly in blood, red, plush. The ridiculously high ceiling met a glass wall, seamlessly melding into an almost invisible door. Behind the glass a ferocious storm raged, the howling wind swirling the torrential rain into cyclonic effigies of towering giants and abstracted, ever changing patterns. There were no words of which to describe the sheer dread Charlie felt when he glanced over at the glass wall, before taking a deep breath and finally meeting her deep, brown eyes.
They regarded each other for a moment before Katie stepped forwards and slapped him, hard. Charlie staggered back, clutching at his burning cheek.
“Katie,” he said, “I deserve that a hundred times over.”
Her eyes were smouldering, burning, boring into his. Her jaws were tensed, the deep purple of her blusher accentuating her striking bone structure. Dressed as she was, her hair backcombed, she looked positively wild, but at the same time, very pretty. It was her newfound confidence, Charlie supposed.
“And you’ll get it if you carry on like this.” Charlie was stumped - he had literally no response. He just watched her darkly painted lips moving.
They stood in angry silence, looking at each other, silently searching for the words to express what they were feeling. "I deserve that a hundred times over," he had said - and what's more Katie could tell he meant it. Something in her heart thawed.
He looked at her lips, down turned at the corners, the perfect outline of her frown, her eyes... he breathed deeply.
Every time Charlie blinked she felt her heart jump and flutter. How had this happened? His lips were slightly parted. She watched him, both of them wrapped up in the spell of the silence, the perfect moment. Charlie moved his head towards her, Ben's words ringing in his ears, "irresistibly dateless..." His eyes searched hers questioningly.
It could have been minutes, hours or days that it lasted. Time was irrelevant; it was going both too slowly and, always, always, too fast for them. Unfortunately, if this moment were ever replayed in the minds of either (alas, they both would come to deny it) the only thing that they could thrive off would be almost.
'Babe!" Miranda called from above them. They jumped apart.
Charlie and Katie stood awkwardly, not quite a meter between them, as Miranda made her way down the stairs towards them. "Babe, what happened?" she chirped in a falsely girly voice. "You were going to meet me by the fountain," she pouted, her arm snaking around him. "Where were you?"
Charlie didn't look at her. "Oh. Sorry." he replied unenthusiastically.
Miranda's voice changed back to normal. "Is she bothering you?" She asked, glowering over at Katie menacingly.
Charlie blinked. "Uh... No..."
"Good," replied Miranda, squaring her eyes to Katie. "Because there's something we need to straighten out.” Miranda walked up to Katie until their faces were inches apart. "Rosseta." she said.
Katie's eyes were not on Miranda, but watching Charlie, the anger that had filled her eyes replaced with hurt, a look that would haunt Charlie for many years to come.
Katie didn't look surprised or shocked when Miranda pushed her. She fell backwards as Miranda stood and watched, listening for the scream as Katie hit the first step.
The hall door swung open as Ben and Lucy stepped out, obviously looking for them. Lucy gasped as her sister hit step after step, the whole scene unfolding as if it was in slow motion. Finally, when Katie was a crumpled heap at the bottom of the stairs, silence fell upon them like the heaviest weight they had ever felt. No one moved.
Suddenly, Katie's fragile frame jerked upwards, and limping slightly, ran into the ferocious storm that raged outside.
"Miranda," Charlie gasped. "How could you do that?"
The girly voice returned. "Babe, I was hurt because of her. You don't want me hurt, do you?" Her eyelashes batted.
Charlie's jaw clenched, along with his fists. "She never hurt you, Miranda," he whispered.
Miranda's voice turned to anger, her words meaningfully thrusted out. "She hit me where it hurt, babe - my reputation. She knows me, because she's a plotting, scheming, conniving-"
"It was me," Charlie cut in, unable to listen anymore.
Miranda was caught off guard. "What?"
"It was me, I hit you where it hurt, I knew your reputation was more important to you than anything - obviously more than morality!"
"What?" Miranda's voice was incredulous. "I don't understand... Wait," her tone changing to that of suspect. "Did she make you?"
"You just don't get it, do you?" Charlie laughed humourlessly. "I did it, I wanted to do it!"
"Why?"
"Why? Because I wanted to hurt you and humiliate you like you do her every day!" He was gaining speed. "I wanted to make you feel how you make her feel every day! Why don't you understand?!"
Charlie had to find Katie, to wipe that look of desperate hurt out of her eyes, to make her see just how sorry he was. With one last look of pure repulsion and loathing, he sprinted forwards, into the night.
Ben swallowed hard. He and Lucy still stood, frozen to the spot. He watched as Miranda slowly sunk to the ground, where she sat upon the step, looking forward as if in a state of shock. Slowly, he walked up the stairs. He stood for a moment, simply staring down on her, before saying curtly, "I always knew you were a bitch, but I guess I underestimated you," before walking away, back into the mesmerising and all-consuming lights of the disco.
*
"Katie! Katie, wait!" called Charlie, desperately running after her, his insides dead until he saw her, when the corrosive flames returned.
"Why? Why should I?" she screamed in response. She did not turn around. She would not turn around.
He caught up with her as they reached the clearing. He grabbed her hand, forcing her to turn around and face him.
The rain had never been harder, it fell on him with the force of a hundred men, the roar and howl of the winds were almost deafening, but it didn't matter anymore. All that mattered was her - with her hair wilder than ever, her makeup running down her face, her oversized T-shirt plastered to her body. The whole world seemed to come to a close as he whispered his words; "I'm sorry," to her, pouring his heart into them.
He hadn't known what to expect. If he had had more time to process what was going on, maybe he would have been more prepared, but not today, no, he was not prepared as she wrenched her hand away from his and screamed; "Why can't you just leave me alone?"
This time, as she ran, she was not followed.
"I can't do this any longer!" Charlie screamed to no-one other than himself, as he stood in the torrential rain of the clearing, his arms outstretched, allowing him to feel the immense force of nature that plummeted towards him from the heavens. "I've been an idiot, I've done things that are terrible, but I'm sorry! I'm sorry, okay!" He stared into the trees, where she had disappeared too, just moments before. "I'm sick of being someone I'm not! I'm sick of feeling like this!" he sunk to his knees. "I didn't mean... I didn't know..." he choked. "I've only got myself to blame." he whispered. "Please, I'm begging you, forgive me." Lightning cracked behind him. His whisper was so soft there was no way any other being could possibly hear him, his words were blown away by the breeze as soon as they were spoken. "I can't lose you."
*
Katie was lying in a heap, watching the storm progress. She had always been a storm chaser. The sky was painted an angry purple, black clouds smudged across the vibrancy, velvet texture, ever moving, ever changing, ever falling. For thousands and thousands of miles, free falling, until finally coming to rest, running over the ground, over her body, over the world.
Charlie knew exactly where to find her, the exact same storm watching spot she had shown him those few weeks ago, though somehow it felt like lifetimes.
When he approached, drenched from the storm, she did not object. They spent almost an hour in the complete silence of the heavy rain, her in his arms, before he carried the seemingly tiny girl, clinging to consciousness by the thinnest thread, back to school.
Charlie looked down at Katie's damp, pale face. As they approached the school it began to become illuminated by a golden light. "It can't be morning already,” thought Charlie, looking up into the sky for the rising sun. It wasn’t morning. It was fire.
Bright orange flames licked at the side of the school, blackening the white marble towers. Panic spread through him.
“Katie!” He shook her. “Katie, stand up, get up!” Charlie, as carefully as he could in his current state of distress, Charlie placed the bewildered and slightly disorientated girl on her feet. He ran through the entrance hall, there it was, the fire alarm. He smashed it with his fist. This was no drill.
The shrill noise pierced through the air, echoing around the hall. The doors opened. The fire was spreading to the dorms, fast. Teachers ushered the students out before running up to help extinguish the fire with their respective skills, shouting orders as they ran: “Go, Go! Get out - leave everything!” Charlie was pushing through the jostling crowd. Where was she?
The rain was relentless - down it came, hard and fast - but still the fire raged. No-one knew the extent of the damage, no-one wanted to. Not yet.
“Calm down,” Charlie felt flooded with relief as Katie came into sight, calmly walking out in the midst of the masses. Drenched, tired, barefoot, limping and bruised, Katie was acting in possibly the best way anyone could have done, taking instruction and giving it, talking things out with a couple of near-hysterical girls and organising lines for people to be registered. It was just so her to forget about everything so quickly.
SCROLL THINGY
The walk up back from the dining hall always seemed especially difficult in the sleepy, after-dinner state, which so often occupied Ben in the early evening. Four flights took him towards his new book.
Yawning, he opened the door. He stopped; totally unprepared for the sight he witnessed. A pink jacket lay on the floor. Someone stepped away from the wall to reveal a girl standing there: tall, blonde, all legs and short skirts. They both looked around sharply at the sound of the door opening. Looking only mildly ruffled, the girl (whose name escaped Ben) swiftly picked up her jacket, as Keegan smiled, and walked up to him, greeting him loudly.
“Hey Ben, what’s up?”
“Nothing,” he said calmly. “But what the fuck is up with you?”
“Right,” he laughed, “I just presumed… well, you know, can you do me a favour and don’t mention this, ok?”
“What the hell did you just presume? That I’m also the kind of guy who has no respect for a girl what-so-ever? Someone who cheats? And doesn’t even give a shit? Do you honestly think I’m the kind of guy who would you a favour? Not bloody likely.”
“Oh for God’s sake…”
“You’re going to tell her.”
“Why? As if I would.”
Something in Ben snapped. He swallowed. Keegan gasped with pain as Ben's fist slammed into the side of his jaw. Ben grabbed his shirt and pulled Keegan towards him so his face was inches away.
“You have to tell Suzie, everything, now.”
“‘Cause you’re going to make me?” Keegan laughed through his humiliation.
“If you don’t then I’m going to.”
“Tell me what?” Suzie said. Her nails dug into her palms.
At the first sound of her voice, Ben released his grip on Keegan’s shirt. He heard Keegan fall to the ground with a thud, but didn’t see, because his eyes were fixed to hers, and hers to his, her gaze idn’t even flicker to her wounded boyfriend.
“Tell her.” Ben's voice echoed.
“Hey babe,” Keegan oozed. “What’s going on?”
“For God’s sake, Keegan, don’t be such a prat, just come out with it!” Ben was truly angry at him now and had turned back to face him, subjecting him to the full force of his wrath.
Keegan was still facing Suzie, walking slowly towards her. “I don’t know what he’s talking about, babe.”
“That slut did. That you’re a lying, cheating dick head. And you don’t deserve her.” Keegan only looked slightly ruffled.
“He’s just jealous, babe, of what we have! He’s just got a pathetic little crush on you.”
“Of course,” Ben shouted over all the noise in his head, “I am fucking jealous of you. Every guy would be. Everyone knows that I’m a fucking jealous of you.”
Suzie turned and walked away.

Katie was walking towards her dorm, her arms laden with books, when something – someone - slammed into her at full speed. Dropping her load she grabbed the shoulders of the figure and pulled them towards her. Suzie was encircled and held against Katie’s body. She struggled against Katie’s grip, pushing and hitting out, but the arms kept Suzie there.
They stood silent for a moment. Katie could feel the shivers that ran through Suzie's body and she hugged her tight. Katie began to feel her friend’s tear trickle onto her own cheek. She stroked her head softly, closed her eyes for a moment and sighed. When she looked up Ben was stood at the end of the corridor. He watched them silently.
Katie felt Suzie break away and turn to look, just for a second, towards Ben. She turned back and walked into the dorm.
“What did you say?” Katie said. She found her voice was more accusing than she had meant. “What did you say to her?”
“Keegan was cheating on her.”
Part of Katie felt guilty that she wasn’t surprised. She sighed - “go find Charlie and I’ll get her to come to the common room” - shook her head and followed Suzie into the dorm.

The two boys looked up as Katie, her arm wrapped around her best friend’s shoulder, led the way down the little spiral staircase into the warmly lit common room. They weaved through the many various chintz armchairs and squashy sofas before reaching their usual spot to the left of the fireplace and collapsing into their normal places. They glowing embers from the dying fire cast a shadowy, but warm half-light over everything – making the place seem homely.
Ben and Charlie both watched Katie for instruction. She shrugged wearily, causing their gazes to fall once again upon Suzie. She curled up in the corner of her sofa and felt its friendly arms encircle her. Sleepily, Suzie rubbed her red, blotchy eyes, her small hands curled into fists. Katie and Ben exchanged glances. They all remained silent.
“I shouldn’t have let him do that to me.”
Katie glanced over at Charlie. “You weren’t expected to know, Suze. No-one knew. He’s one of those people whose worst qualities are very similar to his best.”
Suzie looked up, suddenly slightly more alert. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
“Well,” Katie started. “He’s confident and cheeky, I guess, but, well, really that’s just arrogance, and he’s unpredictable, but really, that’s not always a good thing in the long run.”
“You’ve been worried about me?”
“All the time, but you two seemed to be going fine so…” Katie finished, mid sentence. Charlie was looking at her searchingly, she’ been worried about Suzie and Keegan? How had she known?
“Why didn’t you tell us you were worried?” Charlie asked.
“In case you hadn’t noticed you haven’t been around for a while so shut up and listen to Suzie will you?” snapped Katie. Charlie opened his mouth to speak, thought better of it and shut it again.
“I mean I’ve known for a while but-”
“What?” Katie interrupted. “Why didn’t you say anything? Suze we would have been there for you.”
Suzie clenched her fists. “Because it’s fucking humiliating.” Her voice was angry, stubborn, hurt…
Ben swallowed. He could have cut the silence with a knife. “It isn’t your fault he’s a bastard,” he said quietly. Suzie didn’t look at him.
“It is a bit.”
“What?” Ben said. He sat forward and stared at her. Look at me, he thought. He bit his lip.
Katie shook her head. “You can’t blame yourself. It’s not you. There’s nothing wrong with you. He’s an idiot.”
“Damn straight he’s an idiot,” Ben said.
Suzie's voice came out ragged. “When did I stop being enough for him?”
Katie cut in. “Look, it’s not like that; he just shouldn’t have done that – he just doesn’t know how to respect a girl.”
Ben snorted. “Thus proving he’s a bastard.”
“I didn’t know what to say to him. I thought he’d tell me, or get tired of her. I didn’t know what to do.”
“Not gone out with Keegan in the first place, that’s what,” Ben muttered.
“It’s no big deal anyway,” she said, a tear rolling down her cheek.
Ben stood up abruptly. He stared into the glowing embers of the fire and tried not to wonder why she hadn’t told him any of this. A sob shook the silence. Ben turned around and hugged Suzie tight. He held her shaking body to himself and stroked her hair. Gently he sat down in the big old armchair, his arms still around her. She curled up next to him and sobbed willingly into his chest.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Ben whispered. The end of his nose brushed her cheek gently. He closed his eyes and pressed his forehead into the side of hers.
“You were right about him,” Suzie gulped.
“Look Suzie. We’re your friends, and we’re here for you, through anything, just like you’re here for us. We’ll always be here,” Katie soothed.
“Right. Thank you,” she sniffed, smiling through her tears. “The only thing I have to remember from now on is not to go out with anymore idiots.”
Ben laughed. “Idiots, hmm. I guess that’s me out then!” he smiled.
Suzie laughed. “No.”
Ben looked down at her with surprise. Carefully her pulled her towards him and hugged her tight. He breathed the clean smell of her hair and wiped a tear off her velvet cheek.
His eyes shining, biting his lip, he looked over at Charlie and Katie. Charlie shook his head laughing, and nodded over at Ben. He turned away and glanced at Katie, curled up at the other end of the battered old sofa. She looked so peaceful in the golden firelight. She smiled over at them, before tearing her eyes away, as if to give them some privacy.
They sat in a contented silence, as the clock ticked quietly and the flames crackled and flared in the grate. Slowly, Suzie began to fall asleep, her fatigue finally getting the better of her. Looking down and finding her asleep in his arms, Ben started to nod his head slowly.
“Charlie,” Ben said in a jovial voice. “Look at me now and tell me that I am not the luckiest man in this here castle?”
“You are not the luckiest man in this here castle.”
Ben's head shot up. “How can you say that? Do you not posses eyes, with which to see?”
“You asked me to tell you that bro, you asked me to.” Katie hushed them.
“Look, if your going to move around that much you’ll wake her. You should move.”
“Uh, how exactly?” Ben said, incredulously.
“Carefully - that’s how.” Charlie replied. Ben slowly lifted Suzie up before placing her, indeed, carefully back down in the cracked, brown leather chair. Placing blanket around her skeletal figure he sighed. He brushed a strand of hair off her sleeping face before sinking onto another sofa.
“I guess she was tired, huh?”
“She has had a pretty crazy day,” Katie pointed out.
“Yeah, must suck.”
Ben gritted his teeth. “I can’t believe Keegan. He’s a first class jerk.”
“Thanks Ben,” Katie frowned.
“For what?”
She shrugged. “For being there. For all of us. It means more to us than you realise, I think. Especially to Suze.”
Charlie bit his lip guiltily and nodded, knowing exactly what Katie meant.
“Yeah, bro. I guess you’re a people person.”
“No, I’m a girl person.”
“Oh, you think so, do you?” laughed Katie, raising one eyebrow.
Ben sighed loudly. “Why didn’t she tell us before?”
“She was scared of our reaction I guess,” Charlie replied.
Ben grimaced. “How bad did she expect it to be?”
Charlie sighed, “I guess she was too embarrassed.”
Suddenly Katie burst out, “we should have been there for her. I we had been proper friends she’d have been able to tell us. She knew all this time.”
“Even if we had asked, I don’t think she would have told us straight. I really don’t think she wants us to tell anybody else either. I don’t think the problem was ever us knowing, more like people knowing. Maybe she just didn’t want to talk about it.”
Suddenly Ben snapped. Running his fingers through his hair he stood up. “But she was scared of telling us. Us. No one else. Doesn’t that tell you something? Doesn’t that tell you how she thinks of us? Truth is, we’re crap friends. We never even noticed.”
They were silent in their thoughts.
“Do you two think like that?” asked Charlie quietly, breaking the silence. “Would you tell me something like that?” he asked, not wanting to know the answer, but needing to all the same.
Katie stared forward. “I don’t know. I… I don’t think I would want to.” Charlie's head sunk into his hands. “I, I didn’t mean… I think I wouldn’t want anybody to know.”
Charlie turned around to face her. “Kate, tell me one thing, would you have before… everything?” Katie swallowed hard. The answer came out dry and small.
“Maybe.”
Charlie nodded, understanding.
“I would have,” Ben sighed. Katie and Charlie turned to look at him. “I would have told her,” he said, nodding towards his sleeping friend.
Katie sighed. “We don’t know this. We don’t know anything about this. Only Suzie knows.”
“She thinks it’s her fault. That’s going to change the way any one feels.”
“How could anyone not love her?” questioned Ben angrily. The two of them looked at him in a mixture of surprise and revulsion. Katie chucked a pillow hard in his face.
“Did I just say that out loud?” Ben said.
“Your cuteness makes me want to puke,” Katie informed him.
Ben chucked the cushion back at her. “You think I’m cute?”
Katie ducked. “Believe me, it’s not a complement.”
“Too right it isn’t,” muttered Charlie under his breath.
The glass held in a flimsy wooden window frame as the clock began to chime twelve.
“I don’t understand how you could cheat on someone,” Charlie swallowed. “Just break up with them if you like someone else. It’s just selfish.”
“I know. I don’t get it. He thought every guy behaved like that.” Ben sighed. Glancing at Katie he said, “Have you ever…?” He stopped himself, feeling Charlie's tension.
She laughed. “I’ve never given anyone the opportunity! I don’t have much… experience in that department.”
Charlie looked up. He tried to swallow the familiar feeling that rose in his chest. They lapsed into a sleepy silence.
“We ought to get some sleep before it’s morning.”
“I vote sleeping down here!”
Their minds full of the day’s events they eventually, one by one, drifted off to sleep.
Two hours, later Charlie awoke. The wind outside wailed and howled and all was dark in the common room. The velvet blue hung around them, filling the space.
Katie was lying on the sofa, her legs curled up under herself. She looked peaceful, but not comfortable. He gently pulled her so she was lying along the length of the sofa, like him, their fingers entwining. He brought one of his hands up and ran it through her dark, wavy hair. Once again, she was with him, she needed him as much as he needed her.
He picked up a thick blanket and spread it over them both. He fell asleep whilst slowly caressing her hair.
Katie held her breath and wandered whether Charlie had fallen asleep yet. She opened her eyes and looked around the dark room. Her eyes fell upon Suzie first, who was fast asleep and an old armchair next to the extinct fire. She looked peaceful, the red rims around her eyes having faded. Ben lay on the next sofa along. He frowned slightly and rolled over. Katie smiled, wandering if Ben had fallen asleep watching Suzie or had just happened to end up in a position that suggested so.
Finally she looked towards the tall, athletic, boy who lay next to her on the sofa. His black hair stood on end; the high arcs of his cheekbones illuminated by the little moon light that streamed through the window. Squeezing his hand gently, she slowly began falling back asleep.

NEW CHAPTER – FIRST NON SCROLL (ZOMG!)

“For God’s sake guys, you can’t be so fucking cute when I’m in so much pain!”
Katie groggily opened her eyes and pushed the pillow off her face. She grasped hold of it and threw it back towards Suzie as hard as she could. This seemed to rouse the sleeping Charlie. Feeling the weight of Katie’s waist over his arm, he withdrew it sharply. He rubbed his forehead and swallowed.
Just as Katie was swinging her legs down to the floor, Ben opened his eyes. He closed them again and groaned. “What time is it?” He muttered.
“It’s already half eight!” said Suzie indignantly. “I figured you guys would want to be awake before anyone else came down!”
Ben closed his eyes again. “Suze, it’s Saturday, noone will be up at this obscene hour…”
The door swung open. Miss Gale stood there. “Oh, you’re already up. And in your uniform; it’s mufti day.” Her eyes swept the ruffled hair and creased clothes. “I think you had better change.” She wandered off, smiling absently to herself.
“Hm,” Ben mumbled. “Point taken.”
“Good,” Suzie laughed.
He looked at her, his gaze steady. She turned away and he flopped back onto the sofa.
Katie smoothed her skirt. “I’m going to go and take a shower. You coming, Suze?”
Suzie looked glad for an escape. “Sure,” Katie heard her say. Katie glanced at Ben, and then back at Suzie, and then back to Ben. There was definitely something up.
They walked to their dorm in silence, and then on to the shower room, before Katie closed the door, turned to Suzie and looked at her. “You know, if you ever want to talk to me, you totally can.”
Suzie sighed. “I know, I was stupid not to before, but…”
Katie nodded. “I get why you didn’t, that’s fine. Just, in future I am here.” Suzie smiled back, her eyes telling a different story. “So, are you okay?”
She shrugged. “I guess. I’ve had a long time to come to terms with it – I guess I knew we were ending, but it still sucks, y’know?” She choked a little on her words.
Katie hugged her again. “Yeah, I guess. He was such an idiot over this. Pretty soon he’s going to realise what a huge mistake he made and come crawling back.”
“Y’think?” Suzie snuffled.
“Yeah, I do. Any guy would be mad not to want to be with you.” Suzie abruptly pulled away, with an unreadable expression on her face.
“I’m going to go take a shower, okay?” Katie smiled.
“Sure. See you at breakfast?”

Ben was styling his spiky blond hair in the mirror. “No matter what I do to it, it still makes me look demented.”
Charlie laughed. “That’s not just your hair, mate.”
Ben punched him lightly on the arm. “Whatever,” he said.
“So…” he began.
Ben didn’t look away from the mirror. “So what?” he said, toying with a spike of hair.
Charlie scoffed. “You know what! How come you seem to know what was going on already? And how come you suddenly like Suzie so much?”
“Man, you knew I like her.” Ben said.
Charlie began again. “Yeah, I knew that, but I thought you never really meant it, like, you guys are friends.”
Ben thought for a second. “Yeah I guess we are. Plus I don’t even really expect her to go for a tosser like me. But then she liked that tosser Keegan so…”
“So you’re in with a chance because… you’re a tosser?” Charlie voiced.
Ben smiled. “Who knows man? Who knows?”
Throwing his towel down by his bed, Charlie made for the door. “Come on, lets go eat.”
Ben jumped up. “Yeah, I’m starving!” he said.
Charlie laughed. “Are you ever not starving?”


She could have been mistaken, but she could have sworn she saw a smile flicker across Suzie's lips. She felt an overwhelming sense of jubilation. “I knew it!” She cried, punching Suzie on her arm. “I totally knew! So are you going to tell me what happened, or what?”
Suzie looked up. “I’m not going to tell you what happened, because nothing did happen.” Katie sighed with exasperation. “But…” Katie yelped at the prospect. “Some things were said.”
Katie smiled. “Go on...”
Suzie shook her head. “I just got out of one bad relationship, I have no intention of starting a new one.” Katie rolled her eyes. “But,” said Suzie.