The day after, the tenth of January, would be Cecilia’s and Harvey’s first day at school in RoCity. It would be my first in six months.
After Cecilia and Harvey had had their naps, the three of us travelled around the Valley a bit. I showed them where the café was, we visited some of the shops, and even went to Wizards’ Haven, which was somewhere that I had not visited in a long time.
Spending the day with the two of them had been great. It had served as a well-needed break from everything. I don’t think I could’ve asked for anything better; a day spent with my cousin and the girl that I was undoubtedly falling for.
Speaking of Cecilia, she was in my Form. When Mrs McDonald, the reception lady, had given Cecilia her timetable after giving me mine and informed her that she’d join 9STH, I felt like jumping for joy.
The feeling did not last too long, however. As Cecilia walked to Form with me, Ethan, and Natasha, I noticed my growing feeling of unease.
I hadn’t been to school in six months. Before I had even entered the building, I’d been getting weird stares and people calling my name. But walking into Form would be different. I couldn’t just ignore the people in there as I did the small eleven-year-olds; I knew the people in there.
And, Gods, it would be strange to see Miss Thomas. The last time the two of us had seen each other, I had been missing half my left arm, a shoe, parts of my stomach and neck, and one of my eyes had been forced shut from blood. Then I had passed out.
There were some people I was looking forward to seeing, however. Well, to be more accurate, there was one person that I couldn’t wait to see. And that was Joshua Moore.
As Natasha opened the door to our room for Cecilia, I froze where I stood.
‘Come on,’ I spat. ‘You’ve done worse.’
Ethan raised an eyebrow at me. ‘You’re doing that thing again. Where you don’t speak English.’
‘Sorry, I can’t help it,’ I murmured.
‘Don’t stress it,’ Ethan replied, grinning. ‘You’ve just gotta teach me some time cuz you do it more than you realise.’
‘It sounds like a made-up langu-’ Cecilia began, but she was interrupted by the man himself.
‘Is that the Albert Santrrer?’ came Josh’s booming voice from behind Cecilia.
My mood immediately shot up. I glanced over Cecilia’s shoulder, and there he was, barrelling towards me.
His dark skin shone under the classroom lights, and his short dark brown hair, still styled in waves, seemed almost vibrant. Those same dark eyes glistened as they met mine, and his grin extended simultaneously, revealing those shockingly white teeth.
The two of us clasped our hands together tightly and pulled each other into a tight embrace, thumping each other’s backs.
‘Give the rest of us a chance, Gods!’ he exclaimed excitedly as he thumped my back. ‘Leave some muscle for the rest of us!’
‘I only took what was left after you had your share,’ I retorted sarcastically, grinning.
When Josh and I first met, he had certainly been on the larger side. Not necessarily an incredible size, but he was on that side of the line. When I had left, he had explained his plan to embark on a fitness journey, using the departure of me and Ethan as his inspiration.
And, Holy Mother of Titan, he had done a journey and a half.
He was taller, too. He had always been shorter than me by about two inches, but that difference now rested at a rather uncomfortable half-inch.
The two of us separated, grinning.
‘How was it?’ he asked excitedly as he turned to Ethan and repeated the gesture of a tight embrace.
‘Did you even read the news a few weeks back?’ Ethan replied, and he was positively beaming behind Josh’s back. ‘Albert kicked ass.’
‘How much?’ Josh said slyly.
‘Enough to scare the living shit out of Maltor.’
‘That’s the Albert I know!’ Josh replied, pulling away from Ethan in favour of putting his arm around me.
‘Gotta do what we gotta do, right?’ I joked.
The five of us walked into Form, and Miss Thomas beamed as she saw me.
Miss Thomas was my Form teacher. She had long, straight blond hair and dark brown eyes. The last time that I had seen her, she had been a fan of large heels and a lot of makeup, but now both aspects of her character seemed to have been lessened. The shorter heels were great, as it put the two of us on a more equal height.
‘How are you two?’ she exclaimed, looking at me and Ethan in turn. ‘How was the training?’
‘Cold,’ Ethan said plainly. ‘The coldest thing I have ever experienced.’
‘We’re alive, though,’ I said positively. ‘And I take it you saw the news, miss?’
‘Oh? All the articles about you destroying Maltor? Yeah, I may have seen a few.’
Multiple people in the room were staring at me and Ethan. And, as egotistical as it sounds, most of their eyes lingered on me more than on Ethan.
‘Excuse me, miss?’ Cecilia said quietly. ‘Where do you want me to sit?’
Miss Thomas pulled Cecilia over to the side and began a conversation.
I looked around the room for a moment. It had barely changed since I had last been in it. The large world map still hung on the wall on my right, Miss Thomas’s desk was still at the front on the left, and the windows and boxes of books still lined the wall at the back. There were still eight tables of four arranged in four rows on either side of the room, and Josh soon confirmed that Ethan and I would be sitting in the same place next to him. That fact alone set up the day to be great.
Whilst I engaged in casual banter with Ethan and Josh, I saw Cecilia take her seat. Where was her seat? The seat on the edge of the second row on the left. That’s the table that Ethan, Josh, and I sat on.
Unfortunately, Josh sat next to that seat, and I was on the other side of him. I wouldn’t be sitting next to Cecilia.
‘Josh, please,’ I practically whimpered, turning to face him. ‘Let us switch seats.’
Josh looked around for a moment until he finally found out why I wanted to sit in his seat. He turned to me with the slyest of grins coating his face.
‘Yeah, sure. Is getting a girlfriend on your list of things to do as well as saving the world?’
‘Shut it.’
Miss Thomas asked everyone to sit down so she could begin doing whatever it was that was done in Form and Ethan, Josh, and I obeyed the order.
This was my first day of school in Year 9. I left for training back in June, near the end of Year 8. This was the year that we would pick our GCSEs, and I had missed out on five months of learning to help me pick.
As I took my – well, Josh’s – seat next to Cecilia, I could see her watching me out of the corner of her eye.
‘You sit here?’ she whispered.
I heard Josh scoff from my left.
‘Yeah, that okay?’
Her face became slightly pink.
‘Yeah, of course it is,’ she murmured. ‘Why wouldn’t it be?’
I smiled at her. ‘Just checking.’
For about five minutes, the two of us sat in complete silence, listening to whatever it was Miss Thomas was saying. At least, she was probably listening. I wasn’t.
I spent those gruelling five minutes trying to come up with a way to start a conversation. I wanted to talk to her. All I needed was something to talk about.
Loads of people around the room were engaged in hushed conversation. I felt like the odd one out.
This feeling only got worse when Miss Thomas finished her announcements or whatever and told us that for the rest of Form, we could all just talk. My stomach was inverting.
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I thanked every single God when Cecilia was the one to start a conversation.
‘Can I see your timetable? I wanna see what lessons we have together.’
I pulled it out of my pocket and unfolded it before handing it to her wordlessly. I hadn’t even considered the fact that we might be in the same classes.
A grin grew across Cecilia’s face as she scanned the two timetables.
‘I’m in every lesson with you today other than Maths!’ she exclaimed.
I glanced down at my timetable.
‘Oh, great, you’re gonna get to see how bad I am at Potions,’ I sighed, half-joking.
‘Surely you can’t be that bad.’
I stared at her. ‘You haven’t seen me.’
‘On the plus side, though,’ she continued, ‘we’ve got General Battle today; you’re gonna ace that, right?’
‘I should hope so,’ I smirked. ‘If I went through six months of training only to be worse than the curriculum says I should be, I should be ashamed.’
She giggled at that. The sound of it made my heart flutter.
‘Won’t you get bored of it?’ Cecilia asked. ‘Surely the class is gonna be below your level.’
‘The teacher’ll probably ask me and Ethan to help or something if we outshine that much.’
She smiled warmly at me, and I returned the favour.
‘It’s English first, right?’ I asked. I already knew the answer, but I wanted to hear her voice.
‘Yeah, with some bloke called Mr Lloyd.’
I smiled. ‘‘Some bloke’, huh?’
She shrugged. ‘I’ve never met him, so that’s what he is to me.’
I thought back to my last English lesson. Although it had been months ago, I still remembered one key thing. There were four seats on my row at the front, and only three were taken. Perhaps I could bargain with Asbel to swap with him so that I was next to the empty seat at the end. And maybe, if I was lucky enough, Mr Lloyd would put Cecilia in that empty seat.
Cecilia and I held a conversation right up until the end of Form, only stopping because Miss Thomas told everyone to go to their first lesson.
As I stood up to leave, Josh elbowed me in the side.
‘You like her, don’t you?’
I thought for a moment. Then I smirked at him.
‘Yeah, I think I do.’
He grinned at me. ‘Go get her, man.’
I grinned back at him.
Looking up, I noticed Cecilia waiting for me by the door. A strangely warm feeling spread throughout my body at the thought of her waiting for me.
Without realising what I was doing, I froze on the spot. The only thing that snapped me back to reality was Cecilia beckoning me toward her.
The two of us walked through the corridors to English happily, and Asbel tagged along halfway. And in that moment I could’ve bear-hugged him in the corridor.
He leaned close to my ear as Cecilia was talking and whispered, ‘You can take my seat next to the empty one. Good luck.’
‘Thanks, man,’ I murmured back, before returning my attention to Cecilia.
‘We don’t have English at Apercaput, you know,’ Cecilia said as we entered the room. ‘Is it hard?’
‘Depends,’ was my response. ‘It’s either absurdly easy or really hard.’
‘There they are!’ Mr Lloyd’s voice boomed from somewhere to my right.
I glanced to my right, and our eyes met. Mr Lloyd was tall, olive-skinned, and had a thick black beard that was the same colour as his hair. He wore a white shirt that was untucked from his grey trousers.
‘How was it?’ he asked excitedly. ‘Reckon you could write me a piece on it?’
‘If I get the time,’ I joked exasperatedly. ‘It’ll be at the top of my to-do list.’
‘And I take it you’re one of the Apercaput students?’ he said, looking at Cecilia.
She nodded. ‘Cecilia, sir.’
‘Well, good morning, Cecilia. I take it you’re friends with Albert?’
She nodded again.
‘Good. There’s a seat on the front row near him.’
‘Next to me,’ I mumbled before hurriedly taking my seat. From the wall on the right, it went: Peter, Asbel, me, and now Cecilia.
Cecilia grinned and thanked Mr Lloyd before happily taking her seat next to me. I was beginning to think that she didn’t quite hate me.
I found it quite strange how she didn’t, in fact. I was trying to kill her brother. Surely there was at least one negative thought in that pretty little head of hers. I had killed the woman that had killed my family. She had to have at least been annoyed.
English held absolutely nothing of importance. Mr Lloyd droned on and on about some other boring thing, and Cecilia and I spoke quietly for the entire hour. It was nice, speaking to her. I forgot everything else when the two of us locked eyes.
Somehow, Cecilia had still managed to make decent notes whilst the two of us had been talking for the entire hour. I, on the other hand, had not. My page was practically blank when everyone stood up at the end of the lesson.
Science came next. When I walked into the room, my heart sank when I saw that Mr Fowler was no longer my teacher. During Year 7 and Year 8, he had been. Not only that, but he had helped fight Robert when I had been in Year 7. He had never liked me until that fight together, after which he started to act a tad warmer toward me.
My new teacher was Miss Allen. She was a short, middle-aged woman with ginger hair and hazel brown eyes that immediately seemed warmer than Mr Fowler’s. White teeth glistened under the classroom lights as she beamed at me as I walked in.
‘I didn’t really believe that I had Albert Santrrer in my class until now!’ she said brightly. ‘What an honour it is!’
I awkwardly smiled at her. ‘Nice to meet you? Miss…’
‘Allen. Miss Allen.’
I nodded tightly. ‘Where do you want me to sit?’
She directed me to my seat on the third row. I was directly behind Peter and Natasha sat two seats to my right. Cecilia was placed next to Natasha. I was a bit pained that the two of us had not been seated together, but I couldn’t have nice things all the time.
I had never been that good at Science, which was kinda strange. One would think that, after being held by an organisation that did nothing but push the boundaries of the subject, I would at least be decent. Well, I was good at chemistry. Biology and physics were where it all went wrong. They were just atrocious.
It was boring, too. I sat there in silence listening to Miss Allen drone on and on about plant leaves or something and praying that she didn’t ask me a question as I tried not to fall asleep.
Occasionally, Peter would angle himself perfectly in his seat so that the two of us could talk quietly without Miss Allen noticing. Every time he made a joke, he would turn around back to the front and leave me to sit there, red in the face, as I tried not to burst into a chorus of laughter. It was evil.
I felt like a horrible student whenever I wasn’t talking to Peter and was awake. Why? Because on the front row, I could see Ali listening intently and taking as many notes as possible. That was a good student.
After what felt like aeons, the hour of Science finally ended, and Break began. And Peter was an absolute genius for the idea that he came up with. I cannot fathom how he did not think of it sooner.
‘Hey, Natasha,’ he began, not seeming to care that she was talking to Cecilia at the time. ‘You’re good at Transfiguration, right? Can’t you transform a rock into like a football or something for us to play with?’
Ali, who was standing next to me, let his jaw drop. Ethan’s eyes lit up and even I found it a bit hard not to seem too excited.
‘I think I could, yeah,’ Natasha replied as every single pair of eyes drilled into her.
She pulled her wand out of her blazer pocket. I remembered the day we bought it vividly. The wand was ten and a half inches long, beige-ish in colour, and had a spiral, golden in colour, of jagged material running up from the base of the wand to the tip.
And all of us watched, completely gobsmacked, as she murmured something under her breath, causing an insignificant pebble on the ground to morph into a football. It wasn’t even like a run-down football, either; it was really good quality and felt like heaven when you kicked it.
We spent the remaining twenty minutes kicking the football to each other and against the wall. Ali was a beast with the ball. Every time he kicked it, you could see the power generated. And don’t even get me started on the noise that was created whenever it hit the wall. It could’ve sent Hades running.
I was secretly trying my absolute hardest to impress Cecilia, as I was certain that she was watching me whilst engaging in her quiet conversation with Natasha. In fact, both of them seemed to frequently glance at me. It was a shame that, although I was good, I was being completely outclassed by Ali and Peter.
When Break ended, Natasha returned the football back to its original form, and I wondered whether it was actually quite sad that we had technically been kicking a rock around.
‘General Battle next, huh?’ I murmured as I stared at my timetable as I walked.
‘Yeah, you can show everyone how good you are,’ Cecilia said, and I hadn’t even realised that she had been next to me.
‘You really think so?’
She stared at me blankly. ‘I know so. You trained for six months, didn’t you?’
There was no practical work in that General Battle lesson. It consisted more so of Mr Davis, a large muscular man with short brown hair and green eyes, teaching us the art of a good jab.
Of course, I liked to think that Ethan and I could perform a pretty good jab, but I still paid close attention. I stared intently at Mr Davis from where I sat on the bleachers between Cecilia and Isaac, and Cecilia seemed to find my interest quite humourous.
‘You looked like a zombie in General Battle,’ was her comment as we walked to Maths. We didn’t have Maths together, but I was walking her to her class before going to mine.
Shrugging, I responded, ‘It’s interesting. Even if I can already throw a decent jab.’
She giggled. ‘This is my room, right?’
I hadn’t even realised that I’d nearly walked her past it. ‘Oh, uh, yeah, I guess. Have fun? It’s Maths so that’s a bit difficult.’
‘You can say that again. See you at lunch, Albert.’
Cecilia smiled warmly at me before turning and entering her classroom. The image of that smile stayed in my mind for the entire hour of Maths. I found it hard to concentrate because it radiated through my mind so clearly.
At Lunch, Peter begged Natasha to make another football, which she did after a while. About halfway through Lunch, Stephen kicked it up onto the roof, and I had to fly up to get it.
Just like at Break, Natasha and Cecilia tossed me quick glances as we played. I was trying my hardest not to make a fool out of myself, but I was still being outshone heavily by Peter and Ali. It was insane. They looked like professional players compared to the rest of us, and we weren’t bad by any means.
The final lesson of the day was Potions, which I had with Cecilia. Ever since killing Amy, I had practically flunked every single class that involved magic due to my lack of a wand. I had to use a spare wand every lesson that it was needed, and every wizard and witch would tell you that using a wand that did not pick you was a bad idea. I struggled with the most basic of spells.
Luckily, like General Battle, that day’s Potions class was theory. We all sat at our cauldrons as the teacher droned on about some potion that I had literally never heard of before.
Cecilia had chosen to sit next to me, which I found strange. The cauldrons were arranged in pairs around the room, meaning that Natasha, who I thought Cecilia would sit with, was separated from the two of us by an aisle.
‘You should ace this, right?’ I teased midway through the lesson. ‘You went to Apercaput for two years, didn’t you?’
Cecilia smirked at me. ‘You’re right. You can ace General Battle and I can ace Potions. Seems like a pretty even deal.’
‘It does indeed.’
The two of us talked pretty much all lesson, just as we had done in English. At the end of the lesson, Natasha had described the act as ‘flirting’, but I insisted that I had no clue what she was on about. While having a fat grin on my face, that is.
It seemed as though Cecilia knew everything that our teacher was talking about. I had kinda expected as much, but I was still shocked at just how much detail she knew. Every so often, she would change the topic of our conversation to either correct the teacher or expand on her point. I listened intently to everything she said, but I doubt anything was properly registering in my head.
The two of us even walked home together. Sure, this may have partially been because we lived in the same building, but it was still great. It was definitely something I could get used to.
Harvey joined us on the way home as well. He was absolutely buzzing about his day. He wouldn’t shut up about it. He told me and Cecilia countless stories from his day, and I was amazed that so much could happen in just a little over six hours. Nevertheless, I loved seeing him so happy.
It felt strange. I hadn’t felt such joy in what felt like decades. I constantly reminded myself that something bad was bound to happen to level it off, but I didn’t know when. The joy I was feeling was so immense, surely something bad would happen. The only question was what it would be.