School began at 8:30 the next day. Henry said that with ‘ample time’ he would help support us with getting books and the sort. The school that we had been enlisted to was Hercules School for Mutany. The name sounded really cool, I had to admit. My friends and I got there at about 8:10, as Henry had advised. He’d also given me a pen. I had insisted I didn’t need a backpack, and I couldn’t use my old one as it had been destroyed on Tuesday.
The uniform was a bit different from what we were used to. The blazer was grey, with a white shirt, and the tie was striped with black and red. The trousers were a slightly darker shade of grey than the blazer, and the socks were black, just as we were used to. I had made sure to tuck my knife safely into one of the blazer’s pockets before leaving, for safety reasons, of course.
Walking into the reception area, we were met with a place similar to the lobby. In the direct centre of the room, roughly six feet from the front door was the receptionist's desk. Sitting there, gazing at some papers through her semi-circular glasses, sat a middle-aged blond woman with short hair. Faint wrinkles coated her face.
On the left of the room were two grey sofas, each with enough seats for four people. The right wall, however, had three doors, all equidistant to each other. They appeared to be doors to offices, but I was too far away to read the names on the signs.
There was no carpet on the floor, and I was not too sure what the floor was exactly made from, all I knew was that it was a nice shade of dark blue. The walls were all a shade of light grey and were decorated with photos of previous students.
Ethan and Asbel were the only two brave enough to approach the receptionist, so the rest of us stood two feet behind them while they asked the questions.
‘Um,’ Asbel began, ‘could we have some timetables please?’
‘And a map of the school?’ Ethan added hopefully.
The receptionist looked up, her eyes cold. ‘Are you the new intake that Steven bought in?’
‘Yeah,’ Asbel said, straightening his back. ‘That’s us.’
‘Names?’
Ethan started quickly because he knew Asbel would falter. ‘Ethan Brown, Quinn O’Neill, Maltor Confussée, Albert Santrrer, Jay Stewart, Natasha Acclere, and Asbel Jacobs.’
The woman began scrolling through something on her computer. She nodded every so often. Something next to her began to whir, and it was only then that I noticed the huge printer on her desk.
Whilst the timetables and maps were printing, the receptionist handed out the ‘school’s planners’ (which was where we were told to write our timetables) and introduced herself.
‘Welcome to Hercules School for Mutany, my name is Mrs McDonald, and that’s how I expect you to address me.’
I was certain I heard Asbel and Quinn scoff at each other, but I dismissed it.
‘Your timetables are on a two-week rotation. This week is Week 1, so look at your ‘Week 1’ section and go to Thursday. Your timetables will also tell you the timings of each period, as well as the times for Break and Lunch. You will also see the initials of the teacher you have for each class. It shouldn’t be too hard.’
She handed out the timetables and gave a map to Maltor and Jay. Looking at Thursday in the Week 1 area, I noted that I had Maths, English, Potions, Science, and Charms. I nearly blushed with excitement. Strangely, I noticed that only Natasha and Maltor had Potions and Charms with me, whilst the rest of my friends had PE and French in replacement.
Natasha, Asbel, and Jay were in my Maths, Science and English, whilst Ethan and Maltor were only in my English class, and Quinn didn’t share a class with me today at all.
We look at forms and discover that Ethan, Natasha, and I are all in the same form. Jay and Maltor landed together, too
We weren’t sure what to do for the next fifteen minutes, so we used Jay’s map to find the canteen. It was labelled as ‘Hall/Canteen’ on the map, so it must have two purposes. It was quite a sizeable room. The floor was wood, and multiple tables lined the entire room. On the far left, there was an area to get food, along with tills to pay, of course.
A few kids are littered around the tables chatting and eating toast or some other breakfast item, and our little group finds a secluded spot to quietly chat.
‘I’m with nobody,’ Quinn said glumly.
‘I’m in your Maths,’ Ethan added, trying to lighten his mood.
Quinn lifted his head to look Ethan in the eye. ‘I would rather have Maths with literally anybody else.’
‘Oh.’
‘Don’t be so rude,’ Maltor said, stunning me. Of course, I didn’t show that I was stunned but I was. ‘I’m with nearly nobody today either.’
‘We’ve got Potions and- never mind,’ I began but stopped at the look on Maltor’s face.
A somewhat awkward conversation is held after that point until we heard the first bell. Jay jumped at least half a foot in the air, claiming he thought it was the fire alarm and that we were all going to die.
Ethan, Natasha, and I all head down to Room 8, which was our new form room. We were the first people there. The room appeared to be a Geography classroom, and a huge world map hung on the right side of the room as we entered. There were eight tables in the room, four on each side, and they each had four chairs. Windows lined the back wall, along with numerous boxes and drawers beneath them. To the left of the classroom door was the teacher's desk. Sitting behind the computer was our new teacher.
She stood to speak to us. At first, I was surprised by her large height, but then I noticed the three-inch heels she was wearing and felt better about myself. She had long blond hair and her eyes seemed to be a dark shade of brown. She also wore makeup. A lot of makeup. Not so much that it changed her appearance completely, I assumed, but you could tell that it was all there.
‘You must be the new three that Steven bought in!’ she said, seeming genuinely happy to see us. ‘Ethan, Albert, and Natasha, yeah?’
‘That’s us,’ Ethan says, whilst Natasha gazed around the room and I stared at my feet.
‘Well, you can call me Miss Thomas, and I’ll be your form teacher for, hopefully, the rest of your time here.’ She pointed at two seats in the second row on the right. ‘Albert, Ethan, you can sit together there.’ She pointed to a chair on the row behind us. ‘And Natasha you’ll be there. I tried to keep you three close but this was the best I could manage. If it’s too big of an issue, you can always ask me to change your seat.’
‘Thanks so much, Miss,’ Ethan said, walking over and slumping his bag under his chair. Natasha did the same but under her chair of course.
I did not have a bag. Miss Thomas looked at me as though expected me to follow what Ethan and Natasha had done, but her face seemed to drop upon noticing my lack of baggage.
‘You alright, Albert?’ she asked softly.
I nodded slowly. And that was when the next person walked in. The loudest person I had, and probably ever would meet. A blond girl about my height walked in. She had light blue eyes and wore purple framed glasses. Her uniform seemed perfect. Her blazer, tie, and trousers seem perfectly in line with one another.
But the first thing she did upon entering the room was push me and Ethan out of the way so that she could greet Natasha. Ethan and I knew how uncomfortable that would make her. Ethan tried to jump into the conversation by introducing himself but stopped when he was given a dirty look.
Immediately, I knew I didn’t like this new girl. Barging in here, pushing past me and Ethan and giving us scornful looks when we tried to introduce ourselves. Natasha looked from Ethan to me and then back to the blond girl.
‘And who are you?’ she said, squinting at me and Ethan.
‘Louise, there’s no need to be so rude,’ Miss Thomas said whilst typing on her computer.
‘Well now you know who I am,’ Louise said grumpily. ‘But you still haven-’
I walked past Louise to sit in my seat. I’d been in this room five minutes and I already felt like screaming. A school where I could fit in, yeah? A place where I would feel normal for once, yeah? The place of my dreams, is that right? Tell me then, why I felt like pulling my hair out. Why I felt like screaming at the top of my lungs. Why I felt like flying as far away as I could.
Louise’s jaw dropped at this display of apparent rudeness. Ethan tried to quickly intervene.
‘My name’s-’
‘Hush. I wanna know who this blond kid is first.’
By this point, there were about 15 other students in the room, yet none of them appeared to be paying any attention to us. Natasha was visibly growing more uncomfortable, and Ethan began to speak to her, as though trying to calm her down, but they both kept their eyes on me and Louise.
‘Are you tone deaf or something, what’s your name?’ Louise said, and I found myself quite enjoying her annoyance.
I looked up at her, pouring as much steel into my gaze as possible. She tried to do the same, but the effect was lost on me. After being tortured for over half of my life, a little hard stare didn’t even faze me.
Then the bell rang, and Ethan quickly sat on my left, whilst Natasha took her seat. To our dismay, Louise’s seat was on Natasha’s right. The two genuinely seemed to get along, but I still didn’t like her. I could hear them having a nice chat, and I was happy for Natasha. I’d only known her for two months and I knew that she was uncomfortable with meeting new people.
Unfortunately, Miss Thomas introduced me, Ethan, and Natasha to the rest of the class. I had my fingers crossed, hoping that she wouldn’t make us go to the front of the classroom and give three interesting facts about ourselves. She did.
Ethan and Natasha did it with no problem, but I didn’t have any interesting facts to give. Unless having a 12-foot wingspan or being tortured for seven years of your life counted as an interesting fact.
Everyone looked at me expectantly, and even Ethan and Natasha were staring at me. I looked at the almost 30 faces staring at me, and the scowl from Louise. I felt my palms begin to sweat. I could also feel my feet and wings getting jittery, I was on the edge.
‘My-’ Damnit! If I hadn’t spoken maybe I’d be allowed to sit back down. ‘My name is Albert, and, um, I-’
Ethan nudged me. ‘You okay?’
I ignored him. ‘I lived a mostly normal childhood, I don’t know which God I come from, nor do I know how to give any, um, interesting facts about myself.’
‘Those aren’t facts,’ I heard Louise murmur. Nobody else heard her, yet my genetically enhanced hearing was good enough for her to earn a dirty look from me.
I felt it happening again. I felt myself growing hot. I cursed myself. Here? All I did was give three interesting facts and I’d already almost lost it. It had been years since I’d seen The Power. The last time it happened was in 2017 when Rob had fallen ill. I’d hurriedly flown to the canal and let it all out. I didn’t want to lose him.
The Power scared me. It was my own, yet I didn’t know how to control it, how to stop it. It caused me to become angry, untalkative, and even scary. Looking down, I saw the dreaded yellow energy crackling all over my arms and chest. I tried my absolute hardest to think happy thoughts. About Rob. No. About Grandad. No. It was all too much.
‘A-Albert?’ Miss Thomas whispered, so that only Natasha, Ethan, and I could hear.
‘Whoa,’ Ethan said, staring at my chest. He reached out to touch it but I stepped back.
‘Don’t.’
I tried to sit back down, but Miss Thomas insisted on asking if I was okay. I kept my head down and answered yes, trying my absolute hardest not to look at anyone. Trying to get back to my damn seat.
In the end, I got there, but I felt everybody’s eyes burning into the back of my head. Apparently, even fellow Mutants had never seen something like The Power before. I even heard one kid whisper, ‘What’s his deal? Yellow lightning? On his first day? Just who does he think he is?’
Just like most other times when I had felt The Power, I felt as though my body were splitting in two. I felt myself drifting away, my mind becoming someone else’s. Just like in Form the other day, I saw glimpses of something.
I saw a scene where I was tall. Very, very tall, at least a few metres. I appeared to be in the nude, and my feet were absolutely gigantic. Looking up, I saw about 5 people flying towards me, yet I did not know how. They appeared to just be streaming towards me, flying at tremendous speeds. I let out an unearthly roar, stretching out my huge hands, attempting to swat the people out of the sky.
I could tell I was sweating. I was panicking. For the Gods’ sakes! Why couldn’t I have a normal day at school? Why couldn’t I just learn?
Miss Thomas tried to continue with the normal Form proceedings, and apparently, today’s topic was the dangers of drugs. Miss was visibly distressed, she kept sneaking glances at me. And that’s when I made my first new friend.
The boy on my right introduced himself as Joshua but said that Ethan and I could call him Josh. He had dark skin and very short curly brown hair, seemingly styled in waves. His eyes were also dark, and he appeared to be on the larger side. Not very large, but certainly larger than average. But I was in no place to talk, as my metabolism was genetically much faster than usual.
Ethan asked about Josh’s parents and he got really excited.
‘I got Claimed only about six months ago,’ he said, in a surprisingly deep voice for an 11-year-old. ‘I remember the day when it happened clearly. Each Claiming is different-’
‘Josh!’ Miss Thomas said, trying and failing not to sound annoyed. ‘Please wait until I’m finished to have a conversation!’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ he whispered so that only Ethan and I could hear. ‘Each Claiming is different, yeah? Some kids get like a hologram of the God’s symbol above their heads, others get like a physical thing, like me. I’m a son of Hades, yeah-’
‘Hades?!’ Ethan interrupted. ‘That’s really damn cool! One of the Big Three!’
‘Man, why have two people interrupted me?’ Josh said, smirking. Ethan opened his mouth to apologise, but Josh continued hastily. ‘So yeah, I’m a son of Hades and I got a physical Claiming. I was in the garden helping my mom, when the ground seemed to shudder. I’m not kidding, the plants we were tending to kinda wilted.’
I was actually invested in his story. I saw a girl in the row in front roll her eyes, as if Josh had told this story a thousand times before.
‘Then I got draped in a black cloak. Bit big, to be honest, I couldn’t see anything because it was covering my eyes, but when I moved it my mom was crying. She knew, of course, who would forget having sex with a God? She flew us over here, cuz this was the only safe place she knew, and it was confirmed: I was Hades’s son.’
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
‘Holy s-’
‘Boys, this is the last time, please be quiet,’ Miss Thomas cut in again. She gave us a stare for three seconds before continuing on her rant about cocaine.
Josh, Ethan, and I all smirked at each other. So, we were gonna be the troublemakers of the class, now? Count me in. Disobeying a teacher’s orders was nothing compared to murder.
‘Seriously, though,’ I spoke for the first time since The Power scare. ‘Being a son of Hades? You’re one kid I don’t wanna get on the wrong side of.’
Josh smiled. ‘I don’t know whether that’s a good or bad thing, but I definitely don’t want to make that yellow lightning angry.’
Now that, that made me struggle to contain my laughter. I bit my lip, curled my toes, and buried my head in my hands, sniffling as I tried my absolute hardest not to bust a kidney laughing.
Ethan put his head on the table, unsure whether to laugh or not. Seeing my reaction, he gripped his legs to try and stop himself from laughing, too.
Peering through a gap in my fingers, I saw Josh smiling proudly, and Miss Thomas glaring at me. Clearly, I would not be one of her favourites. I didn’t care, that joke was funny. I put my head on the table, to better cover my face, but my Gods that was a funny joke. Josh was stifling his own laughter, very obviously pleased with himself.
Ethan kicked my leg. ‘S-st-’ but he couldn’t finish speaking due to the effort it was taking to not laugh. ‘S-st-stop…’
I tried, I really did, but it was difficult. When I finally raised my head again, I saw Miss Thomas shaking her head.
‘I’ll let you off this one time because you’re new and Josh is clearly trying to be friendly, but next time I won’t be so friendly, yes, boys?’
‘Yes, miss,’ we all replied in somewhat broken unison, as we each paused at different points to contain ourselves.
Wiping faint tears from my eyes, I tried to focus on the thing we were actually supposed to be focusing on, but Ethan didn’t help when he murmured to himself, ‘Don’t wanna make that yellow lightning angry’.
‘Stop, I’m begging,’ I whispered faintly, feeling the laughter rise to my chest again.
‘Spooky yellow lightning,’ Josh whispered, joining Ethan. They were trying to get me in trouble. Did friends usually do this?
Ethan prodded my side. ‘Don’t let that spooky yellow lightning escape.’
‘If that spooky yellow lightning escapes it’ll be Hell for us all, oh no!’
The longer the sentences became, the harder it was to stop myself. I had to feign dropping a pen so I could sit under the table biting my hand in a last desperate attempt to stop myself from laughing. The only thing that stopped me was seeing the faint yellow energy reappear where I had bitten myself.
I re-emerged and sat on my seat, red in the face, and definitely not ready to start a school day. Ethan was wiping faint tears from his eyes, and Josh was taking deep breaths. That was the best experience I had had in a while.
When the first bell rang at 9:00, I read my timetable and saw that I had Maths in Room 18. Natasha and I walked down together, and once we got there we found Jay and Asbel waiting outside the room for us.
‘Watch us all get bullied,’ Jay said. He was only half-joking.
Walking in, the room was quite different to Room 8. The tables were square rather than in rows, and there were seven of them. Each had four seats down the sides parallel to the walls. Three of them lined the sides of the room, whilst one table was in the middle of the back.
Everyone else was already in, Jay, Asbel, Natasha, and I were all last. Our teacher was a short man with a bit of stubble on his chin. He had warm blue eyes, and his hair was grey and cut short. He dressed smartly, with a white shirt, and a blue jacket and trousers to complement it.
‘Ah, you four must be the new students,’ he said, smiling. ‘I’m Mr Mullins, and I’ll be your Maths teacher until, hopefully, the end of the year.’
‘Yeah, we’re the new kids,’ Jay said grinning.
I leaned closer to Asbel and whispered. ‘Oh no, he’s doing that grin again.’
‘I’m Albert,’ Jay continued, beaming, and Asbel glanced sideways at me. Jay jabbed his thumb at Asbel. ‘That’s Jay.’ He jabbed his thumb at me. ‘That’s Asbel, and the girl is Natasha.’
I could have sworn Mr Mullins’s eyes gleamed for a second. ‘Funny how easily you lie, I can tell, you know, Jay.’
Asbel’s eyes widened and he stared at me in horror. ‘Reckon that’s magic?’
I realised he was probably right. ‘Probably, but it’s still horrifying.’
Mr Mullins’s looked at me and Asbel. ‘Albert, Asbel, you two are on that middle table on the right, with Harry and Sophie.’
Looking over, I saw a blond boy and a black-haired girl sitting at the table Mr Mullins had mentioned. There were two empty seats, and Harry and Sophie had looked over at the mention of their names.
‘Jay, Natasha, you two are on the table at the back, with Emily and Charlotte.’
Asbel stifled a laugh. Jay walked to the back and slumped his bag down, and Natasha joined him shortly after. Asbel and I walked over to the table and we sat opposite each other, Asbel next to Harry, whilst I sat against the wall next to Sophie.
The moment we sat down Harry pounced. ‘So, what God do you two come from?’
Asbel and I looked at each other. It felt like I was missing out. All this talk of being normal here, and I still felt off. Everywhere we went, people were talking about their Godly parentage, whilst my friends and I had only got here two days ago. First Josh and now Harry.
‘Shut up, Harry,’ Sophie said. ‘Not everyone here is a demigod, some are just wizards or witches.’
‘That’s it, then!’ I said, trying to keep my voice down. ‘That’s why me, Natasha, and Maltor got put in Potions and Charms and you lot didn’t!’
‘What?’ Asbel said, clearly not catching on.
‘Natasha, Maltor, and I are wizards and a witch! I’m not sure how they know, but that’s got to be it! The rest of you can’t do magic, no offence-’
‘None taken.’
‘But they can’t put you in a magic class when you can’t do magic. That has to be it!’
‘That does make sense. It sucks, but it makes sense,’ Asbel said.
‘Wasn’t that just obvi-’ Harry began before Sophie cut him off again.
‘Will you shut up? They just got here, there’s no need to bully them.’
‘Alright, calm down, calm down,’ Mr Mullins said before Harry could argue. ‘Can I teach now?’
There was a general murmur of ‘Yes, sir,’ from around the room.
‘Thank you.’
Now, I am good at Maths. I don’t know what it is. I missed three and a half years of school, yet I had gotten the hang of Maths almost instantly. Something about there always being a definite answer probably helped. But the problem was, Maths was just boring. Most people assumed that because I was good at Maths, that must mean I enjoy it, but, no, I don’t. Listening to a teacher drone on and on about numbers and algebra for half an hour when I’d caught on within five minutes wasn’t exactly my thing. I understood that some kids needed those extra 25 minutes of teaching, but that didn’t make it any less boring.
And my first Maths lesson at RoCity followed that pattern. I understood what Mr Mullins was talking about almost instantly, but he spent over half the lesson explaining it, and we only spent 20 minutes or so on the actual questions, which I am not ashamed to admit that I did not whiz through. I took at least a minute break in between each question, purely because I was bored.
When the bell rang again at 10:00, I was ecstatic. I had English next, with everyone else except Quinn. I loved English a heap more than I loved Maths. I had a notebook at Rob’s house that I’d write stories in; dragons levelling entire cities and just heroes fighting the world’s most powerful villains. And the fact that nearly all of my friends had it with me was just an extra layer of icing on the cake.
Our teacher was a tall, olive-skinned man with a thick beard sporting the same colour as his black hair. He wore a grey shirt that was left untucked from his square-patterned trousers.
‘I swear this man is wearing pyjama trousers,’ I said, smirking, as my friends and I walked in.
Room 25 was very similar to Room 8. There were four rows on each side of the classroom, each with four chairs. However, the wall was decorated with English decorations rather than Geography ones. I didn’t even know you could get English decorations. The walls were a nice grey. Not an important detail but the walls were nice.
Louise was in our English class too, which caused me and Ethan to audibly groan. The teacher sat Natasha on the edge of the left-back row, next to, who could’ve guessed, Louise. Ethan sat on the edge of the right-back row, and there was a girl on his left. Jay sat on the other side of her.
‘That poor, poor girl,’ Asbel said, watching Ethan and Jay sit on either side of her.
Asbel and I were placed on the front row on the left side. Asbel sat on the edge, next to the aisle, and I sat on his right. There was another person in the row too. A boy with dirty blond hair and a long fringe. His eyes were blue, too, and even though he was sitting down, I judged that he was about an inch taller than me.
‘He literally looks exactly like you,’ Asbel said. ‘You’ve both got the same hair and eye colour.’
‘Damn, bro, you’re so funny,’ I said, with the straightest face I’ve ever pulled. ‘I’m struggling to contain my laughter.’
Maltor was seated in the row behind me and Asbel, against the wall, so he was diagonal from the boy on my right.
Whilst the teacher, who had named himself Mr Lloyd, explained some complicated English terms, the boy next to me opened his school planner and turned to the page near the back with the Periodic Table.
He pushed the planner towards me and pointed at two elements that spelt a wildly inappropriate word.
‘Them two together spell inappropriate things,’ he said, with a straight face. He then pointed at the element that sat between the two. ‘They only put that one there so it wouldn’t spell-’
‘A wise man once said,’ I replied, also with a straight face, nodding slowly.
‘If you just removed that one, it would spell-’
‘I see where you’re coming from,’ I spoke in a wise-man voice. ‘Extraordinary thinking.’
He smirked, and I was so proud of myself. I came across as confident, as a ‘people person’ but in reality, I hated socialising. Just making light-hearted jokes about the Periodic Table made me nervous. Funny how quickly I would put a knife to someone’s throat, and how difficult I found it to simply talk to people.
Mr Lloyd started talking about something called ISPACE, which was a way to vary sentence starters. It was an acronym for Ing (Words), Simile, Preposition, Adverb, Conjunction, and Ed (Words). I could see how it would be helpful, but I was too busy having fun with the boy on my right.
‘By the way, what’s your name?’ I asked, trying not to sweat.
‘Peter,’ he replied simply. ‘And those two elements definitely spell-.’
I smirked, and half-jokingly held out my hand for a handshake. ‘I’m Albert.’
He gripped my hand firmly and we shook. ‘Albert, yeah? The wonderboy himself.’
Dismissing my apparent new title, I raised my lips from a smirk to a smile. I had a feeling Peter and I would become very good friends. But that’s when Mr Lloyd became the second teacher to dislike me, as he gave me and Peter a stern look.
‘Boys…ISPACE…’
Peter and I stifled our giggles. Mr Lloyd spoke almost like he were in a trance. Asbel was giving me weird glances, so I introduced him to Peter, and the two seemed to get along very well too.
The three of us laughed so hard together that Mr Lloyd sent Asbel outside to calm down. When he came back in, his face was red from laughter. Peter had a funny laugh, too. I don’t know how to describe it, but something about it was so horrifyingly contagious.
The bell rang once more at 11:00, which meant that it was time for my first Break at RoCity. I was starving, but my friends and I had agreed to all meet on the playground first thing, so I couldn’t go to the dining hall to buy any food. Even though my enhancements meant that I required much more food than the average human, I would just have to make do.
There was this secluded corner of the playground that we pretty much colonised for ourselves. The playground itself was pretty standard. It was quite large. There were bathrooms on one side of the playground, and there were a few basketball hoops, some benches, a place to play cricket, and even an area with Astroturf, which got me pretty excited. The playground was so huge I would have been able to fly around it and nothing would have gotten in my way.
Peter joined us outside, and Natasha whispered in my ear that he and I seemed to get on really well.
‘You seem so much happier it’s kinda scary,’ she whispered. ‘Even after everything with Amy, it’s good to see you have some source of happiness.’
I smiled. I really was getting along with Peter. We were laughing so much.
My friends and I discussed our first day, and I was surprised that Peter didn’t ask about our Godly parentage. Jay, however, enquired about Peter.
‘Wait, Peter, right? Are you the son of a God, or are you just a wizard?’
‘I think I’m a demigod,’ Peter said, but his mood had changed. ‘My mom won’t tell me which one, she says ‘I’ll know when the time is right’ but no time seems to be right, I’m twelve and haven’t been Claimed, most kids are Claimed at ten.’
‘Ten?’ Maltor said, seemingly appalled. ‘We’re all eleven and twelve and not a single one of us has been Claimed yet.’
That noticeably lifted Peter’s spirits. I understood how he felt. How it felt to find people like you, people you fit in with.
And Break of course ended how every Break must end, with bullying the living soul out of your friends. Ethan got it the worst. Even Natasha joined in, picking up sticks and throwing them at him. Peter was a god at throwing. Even whilst Ethan was running, Peter still hit him, every single time.
Once the fifth bell of the day rang, I realised with a cold heart that I had Potions. With only Natasha and Maltor. The rest of my friends had French. I genuinely felt bad for them.
Natasha, Maltor, and I headed to a separate, smaller building. Walking inside, we were greeted with an area similar to the Atrium at our old school. A large central area, with numerous tables and chairs dotted around. Our room was ‘Room M2’, which I took to mean ‘Magic 2’, and I didn’t care what anyone said, I was right.
We walked in and the smell was…strange. Like a mixture of herbs and life itself. The room seemed smoky, and about 30 cauldrons were spaced equidistant from one another, all facing the front, where a blackboard was positioned. The teacher was a pretty brunette woman, with small round glasses and quite a bit of makeup on. She was dressed in a flowing black cloak, and underneath, she was wearing a black shirt that was tucked into her black skirt.
Peter nor Josh was in the class with us, either.
‘Alright, guys,’ the teacher said. ‘Settle down. For the new students in the room, my name is Miss Warren, and I will be your Potions teacher for the remainder of the year, fingers crossed.’
Maltor and I glanced at each other, half intrigued, half disgusted. Why, I do not know.
‘First things first,’ Miss Warren said cheerfully. I definitely knew why Maltor and I were disgusted. ‘I need you to partner up.’
The moment the word ‘partner’ came up, Natasha grabbed my arm, and I looked at Maltor sorrowfully.
‘Don’t worry, I know some of this lot from my Maths class, I’ll just partner with Hugo.’
Luckily for Maltor, Hugo was not already partnered with someone. Natasha and I stood at Cauldron 21, in the third row, and Maltor and Hugo took the cauldron to our left, Cauldron 20.
‘Continuing where we were last lesson, can anyone tell me the key ingredient in a Potion of Growth?’
Hugo’s hand shot up. ‘Miss! Miss! It’s the hair of a blue whale, right?’
‘What the Hel-’ Natasha began.
‘Correct, Hugo!’
I was quite disappointed with my first Potions lesson. I had expected to be brewing a potion, not learning how to. Only when we were about five minutes to the end did we actually start something. We each added three blue whale hairs to the boiling water in our cauldrons.
Miss Warren collected some liquid from each cauldron into separate vials, saying that we would resume with these potions next lesson, and despite the fact I had enjoyed speaking to Natasha, I had not really enjoyed that Potions lesson whatsoever.
Natasha and I walked to Science together, however, which we also had with Jay and Asbel.
‘Well, that was,’ Natasha said glumly as we walked through the corridors, ‘disappointing.’
‘What do you mean?’ I said, my voice oozing with sarcasm. ‘I’ve always dreamed of handling slimy blue whale hairs.’
‘Oh, don’t remind m-’
‘Ah, two of my new students,’ came a deep, chilling voice from behind us. ‘Albert and Natasha, hm? Blatantly walking past my class, do you think you’re funny?’
I turned, panicked, planting my feet in the ground.
‘What in the-’
The man in front of me was well over six feet tall, and he was thin. He had long black hair that fell in strands over his face. He stared at us down his nose with dark brown eyes. There was nothing warm about those eyes. His lips were tightly pressed against one another, causing them to turn almost white from the pressure.
‘I’m Mr Fowler, and I’ll be your Science teacher, unfortunately until Christmas at least. You two will be sitting with the other two at the front, where I can keep an eye on you all.’
He stepped out of the way of the door and gestured for us to get in. Before I’d even reached my seat next to Jay, I heard the door slam with a loud bang behind me, making Natasha jump.
Mr Fowler stood at the front. ‘I won’t bother introducing the three of you, I’m sure everyone knows who you are by now, you do know how to make a name for yourself, Mr Santrrer.’
‘Wha- Me?’
I looked around to see if there was anyone else I knew, and I saw Peter and Louise sitting together in the third row.
‘Don’t look around for attention, boy, you’ve got enough of it.’
‘Who do-’
‘Oi, sit down,’ Asbel hissed at me from the other side of Jay.
Mr Fowler stared at me with loathing eyes.
‘Open the textbooks in front of you,’ he said in the same chilling voice as Science textbooks whizzed around the room, landing on the tables with enough to share within pairs, ‘to page 72.’
Natasha and I did just that. Seeing the Periodic Table on the page, I turned quickly in my seat to see Peter smirking at me from the third row; he knew.
‘You are to read the information on the page and answer the questions at the bottom. In silence.’
Jay raised his hand. ‘Sir, we don’t have boo-’
Mr Fowler threw a wad of lined paper at Jay, hitting him in the chest. ‘Write on that, I’ll find you books for next lesson if you’re lucky.’
Jay flattened the pieces of paper after picking them up from the floor and gave me, Asbel, and Natasha all a page. I wrote my name and date at the top of the page and put the title as simply ‘Elements’.
I already didn’t like this Mr Fowler, speaking to me like that, throwing the paper at Jay, who did he think he was?
Asbel and I finished the questions within half an hour, and I raised my hand to let Fowler know.
‘Hand down, I’m not taking questions.’
‘I’ve finished the w-’
‘Then sit in silence.’ Mr Fowler was rifling through some papers, and occasionally he typed something up on his computer. I was seething. For half an hour I sat there, my feet jittering and my head nodding as I struggled not to fall asleep.
The moment the bell rang, I leapt out of my seat, and the second Mr Fowler said we were free to go I dashed into the corridor to catch a breath of Fowler-free air. Natasha and Peter found that funny.
At lunch, I discovered that you paid for things by putting your finger on this machine at the till, and then the person behind it tapped the food you had on their screen, and the transaction was complete. I had £15 on my account, presumably put there by Grandad, and I bought a pizza and a cookie. Neither lasted more than five minutes once I sat down. I was a beast, wolfing them down.
I sat with everyone, and Peter and I were crying with laughter because Ethan spilt his water on his chips. Like full-on, thumping the table, struggling to breathe, crying with laughter. We were clutching each other for support as we tried not to fall from our seats, and our faces were red with laughter.
I enjoyed that lunch very thoroughly.
After Lunch came Charms, which was another magic lesson, so only Natasha, Maltor, and I went, while the rest of my friends had PE. At the beginning of the lesson, however, we ran into a problem. To perform charms, you needed a wand. Maltor, Natasha, and I did not have wands.
Our teacher, a short blond woman, told us not to worry and gave us some spare wands from the cupboard. I did not like it. It felt different to holding Amy’s wand. Amy’s wand had felt like an ordinary stick, yet the wand I was given felt wrong. It felt like someone had wrenched my hand from my body and replaced it with somebody else’s. Natasha and Maltor felt the same way. We swapped wands a bit, but it didn’t help in the slightest.
We were learning how to levitate things. I didn’t really pay attention to anything as I was too busy trying to make my hand comfortable. We didn’t get the hang of it anyway, and I don’t think I could because of the wand.
The teacher, who hadn’t even introduced herself, seemed very disappointed in us. I was very disappointed in her ability to give us good wands.
At the end of the day, my friends and I grouped up outside the front of school, and had about 10 minutes of cheerful banter, before Peter had to go to his car because his mom was picking him up. The rest of us took that as our signal to also leave.
The Tower was about a twenty-minute walk from school, and we spent most of that time listening to Quinn complain about his day, but I understood; he’d spent most of his day all alone.
Once we got back, I excused myself and went upstairs to my room. I took off my shoes, went into the bedroom, and punched the pillow as hard as I could. I smothered my face in it so that nobody would hear me and screamed as loud as I could.
Today had been the best day I had had in a while.