The Other Side (Thomas Skinner Book 1)

by S. I. Anderson

  Tom didn’t want to go, not now, not yet. He had questions to ask. He thought he understood what Wanderers were. They were the people on the Other Side, the... normal people. And wizards, were they a different species? It seemed like they were, which raised the question, how was it possible for him to be a wizard?

  The headmaster watched him carefully. “You’re a wizard Thomas, and that’s all that matters.”

  “But how do you know, sir? How can you be so sure?”

  “Because I can see,” the headmaster said gently. “Ah, this is all new to you but you can see too, my boy. There is something about wizards. They seem-” he paused, looking for the right word. “Familiar.”

  The door opened and Tom almost shrieked at what he saw. He thought it was a headless person. But it wasn’t. They were just so tall that from where he sat the person was visible only up to its neck.

  The headmaster gave a little bow. Tom took that as his cue to leave. He stood up and hastily did his best to mimic the bow before he grabbed his luggage and walked out through the door.

  Caretaker Byrne was indeed a tall man, by far the tallest he had ever seen. He knew it was rude to stare at people, more so if they were different somehow. But Tom did exactly that as he trailed behind the caretaker. He couldn’t help it. He was in awe.

  “You find my height fascinating?”

  Tom quickly averted his eyes to the ground. “No sir,” he lied.

  “I am considered short for my kind.”

  He wondered if Caretaker Byrne was one of those giants Cindy had mentioned.

  “Your kind...?”

  “Yes.”

  He had hoped for a bit more than that, but Caretaker Byrne didn’t seem like a man of many words. Tom decided he was a giant. He had to be. He was much too tall to be anything else.

  They walked the rest of the way in silence. Caretaker Byrne led him down the corridor and out into a courtyard, through another corridor and then out again, into the open.

  The school was on a hill. They had walked through it and come out on the other side. A stone path led down the hill, surrounded by a forest on both sides. The further they went, the closer the trees grew to the path.

  At the bottom of the hill, just before the forest began, was a single white tree. Set against the backdrop of rich greenery, the tree seemed to almost glow. But it wasn’t the tree or the scenery that had Tom staring with his mouth half-open as he walked. It was what was on the tree.

  The trunk of the tree was large and round and it rose up straight for a few metres, and perched on it, with the branches spreading out on all sides, was what looked like a small cottage.

  It was a tree house...

  “You will be staying here,” Caretaker Byrne said in that deep booming voice of his. “Supper is served between six and eight in the main hall,” he added and he turned and walked off.

  Tom watched him go, his mouth still half-open. He was going to come back. Caretaker Byrne was going to come back, he was sure of it. This had to be a joke. They weren’t going to leave him here all alone.

  Caretaker Byrne disappeared over the hill.

  Tom waited for him to reappear.

  He didn’t.

  Chapter 6

  The Baron's Treasure was an inn located on one of the hills opposite the House of Lords. Cindy sat in its darkened common room and absently stared out through the window as she sipped on her drink.

  She had been a regular at this inn for the past week. There was nothing particularly alluring about the place, though the company was helpful. The common room of the inn was filled with wizards and witches in similar attire – long dark cloaks with hoods that covered your hair and more. She was anonymous in here.

  It was the view she came for. From its vantage point on the hill, and armed with a pair of binoculars from the Other Side, it was the perfect spot to sit and watch as lords and other self-obsessed important people walked in and out of the House of Lords.

  Her days of hard spying had paid off, sort of.

  She knew Lord Dragunov’s routine. The problem was that it wasn’t a fixed one. Sometimes he came in the morning, other times the evening, once even late at night. There was one thing almost consistent. On most days, he spent just over an hour inside the House of Lords.

  It hadn’t been that long yet since she had seen his carriages pull through the front gate. As she waited, her thoughts drifted to Tom.

  She shouldn’t have left him there like that. She should have told him who he was, what he was. She had wanted to. But she could never find the right words to begin with.

  How did you tell someone they might be a freak of nature without using the word freak? And Tom wasn’t a freak. He should have been. Living his whole life amongst the Wanderers – the loneliness, it should have affected him in some way.

  She looked at the time on her wrist. It was close to an hour since Lord Dragunov had entered the House of Lords. It was time for her to go, time for her to put the horrible plan into action.

  As Cindy walked down the hill, she reluctantly took off her dark cloak. Underneath, she wore her Guardian one. They wouldn’t let her into the House of Lords without it. Her heart began to beat faster and louder with every step. Not for the first time, doubt began to creep into her mind.

  She was doing this because she needed an advantage. It wouldn’t be enough to just set up camp in the forest behind the school and keep an eye out for any danger that came Tom’s way. She had to know what the Le Fays were up to, what they planned to do.

  The only way to know that was to shadow Lord Dragunov. He was the most prominent leader of the Le Fays. Any decision on Tom would surely go through him.

  As Cindy approached the front gates of the House of Lords, she wasn’t so sure anymore. Her whole plan seemed full of flaws. For starters, he knew her. Sure she had changed the colour of her hair, lips and eyes, but was that enough?

  Beyond the gate, three carriages pulled up in front of the archway that led into the House of Lords. They carriages were black with golden borders and a leopard's head adorned in gold on each door. They were Lord Dragunov’s. He would be coming out soon.

  Cindy stepped up to the gate for the guards to notice. Her hands trembled as she held her cloak wrapped around her. She feared they wouldn’t let her in. They could see her shaking. They would question her.

  The side gate opened.

  Cindy glanced at both the guards, but neither made any eye contact with her. She stepped through the gate and walked up the steps and into the large entrance hall. Chewing her bottom lip, she made for the sitting area beneath the golden chandeliers.

  It was a waiting game now. She glanced around nervously, hoping no one would notice her and ask what she was doing.

  Luckily, she didn’t have to wait long before Lord Dragunov came lumbering down the stairs, looking as large as ever. With his head held up high, he stared straight ahead as he walked.

  Cindy had this theory that lords were so arrogant and proud that when they looked at commoners all they saw was this mass of... commonness. She hoped she was right, because she didn’t have much faith in her disguise.

  She waited until he passed her and was almost at the door before she stood up and ran after him.

  “My lord, my lord!” she called.

  Lord Dragunov turned around just as Cindy flung herself onto him. He was a big man. The aim was to knock him to the ground.

  It worked.

  Sort of.

  The lord raised his hands defensively and grabbed hold of her as she crashed into him. He moved back at the same time and tripped. They both fell to the ground, Cindy on top.

  “M-My l-lord I’m s-so sorry. My lord p-p-please forgive me,” Cindy stammered as she quickly got up.

  “Are you blind, you stupid girl!” the lord roared as he struggled to get up, his face red from effort and rage. “How dare you touch me? Do you know who I am?”

  Of course she knew who he was. She had just run after him shouting “My lord”. But
Cindy didn’t say that. Instead, she dropped to her knees and kept her head down as she apologised again.

  “I’m so sorry, my lord, I slipped.”

  “What the bloody hell did you do to me you stupid girl?” Lord Dragunov asked as he rubbed a spot on his belly.

  “I-I thought I saw you drop this.” She raised the hand that held the quill in it. “I must have...” Cindy briefly looked up to indicate a stabbing motion with the quill before she lowered her head in shame again. “I’m so sorry my lord.”

  Lord Dragunov snatched the quill from her and stared at it. Cindy looked up cautiously to see the lord’s eyes mesmerised by the sparkling diamonds. It really was a beautiful quill. A shame she had to give it to the fat oaf.

  “Ah, yes, I must have dropped it,” he said, his tone of voice different, the anger replaced by absence.

  “I am so sorry my lord. I hope you can forgive me for my clumsiness,” Cindy continued, trembling as she spoke, playing the frightened commoner perfectly.

  “Yes, yes,” Lord Dragunov said, seemingly annoyed that she was still there. “Be gone.” He shook his hand irritably.

  Cindy duly obliged. Backing away before she rose, she turned and walked towards the stairs leading to the upper floors of the House of Lords. She didn’t know where she was going. But it didn’t matter, so long as it was far away from Lord Dragunov.

  It wasn’t the quill that had poked him in the stomach. It was her wand. She had done it. She had cast the shadowing spell on the lord.

  She wanted to hug the next person that walked past her she was that happy, that relieved. But you couldn’t just hug a stranger, not here in the House of Lords. She wrapped her arms round her and hugged herself. It was all she could do to contain her glee as she walked around with a big smile on her face.

  Chapter 7

  They couldn’t be serious. Leaving him out here all alone at the edge of the forest – it was funny. Caretaker Byrne was probably in the headmaster’s office now, the two of them having a good laugh.

  He could see the headmaster doing something like that. He was a bit odd – and very old. Maybe he thought it would be amusing to scare a young boy on his first day to a strange new place. But Caretaker Byrne, he didn’t strike Tom as the type to joke around. Or smile.

  Tom looked up at the tree house and sighed resignedly. He really was going to be staying here.

  Wooden planks were hammered into the trunk of the tree and led up it like stairs. With one door and window at the front, a porch and a neat straw-thatched roof, it wasn’t bad to look at, the house. If it were in his garden back on the Other Side, he could see himself spending a lot of time in it. But here, seemingly in the middle of nowhere and so close to the forest beyond...

  Tom took a deep breath and with luggage slung over shoulder, he put one foot on the bottom plank and two hands on the plank just above his shoulder. It was quite easy to climb and he soon found himself at the top, standing on the front porch.

  He opened the door and walked in. It was fairly large inside. A bunk bed and a large dirty-white wardrobe covered one side of the room and on the other was a table, chairs and a dark-blue sofa. At the other end of the room were two doors. One led to a bathroom and the other to a back porch facing the forest.

  Tom stood outside for a moment, facing the forest behind. It wasn’t as close to him as he had thought. There was at least fifty metres before the trees began. He stepped back in.

  In the centre of the room on a rug sat a large wooden chest with a note on it. “School Necessities” it read. After a brief struggle, he managed to open the chest to be greeted by a burst of dust floating out.

  Inside were books and a small leather bag. Quills – there were quills inside it.

  They used quills!

  He picked through the books, brushing aside the dust to read the covers. Languages, Maths, History, Biology, Basics on Staffs – wasn’t this supposed to be a wizard school? Where was the magic?

  Tom settled down on the bottom bunk with the history book. Flipping through the pages, he stopped as he came across The Werewolves' War. That sounded interesting.

  And it was.

  Wizards had never seen werewolves before and knew nothing of them until they suddenly came from the west, tearing down villages, biting and killing. He found himself engrossed. Only when it became difficult to read because of the lack of light did Tom realise what time it was.

  He put the book away, rushed down the wooden planks and up the stone path as fast as he could. He was panting as he reached the main hall and he stood by the door with his head lowered, one hand holding on the door for support, the other hanging loosely by his side as he paused to catch his breath.

  “But I’m hungry!”

  “Well, you should have come earlier.”

  Tom raised his head to see a boy with curly black hair and a stout woman standing in the middle of the hall.

  “But-”

  The woman raised her hand. “No buts,” she said and walked off.

  The boy watched her go, his mouth still open as he stared after her. He turned and, muttering something under his breath, began to walk out. He paused at the door.

  “Here for supper?”

  Tom nodded.

  “You’re too late.”

  He nodded again. That much he understood from the little of their conversation he had heard.

  “Saafir Malik,” the boy said.

  “Thomas Skinner.”

  “Where are-” Saafir stopped midsentence and his eyes narrowed. “Thomas Skinner the Wanderer?”

  Thomas Skinner the Wanderer – he hoped it wouldn’t catch on. With a title like that, he wouldn’t fit in very easily.

  “It’s just Tom, actually.”

  “Are you the Wanderer?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Thomas Skinner the Wanderer? How nice to meet you. I’m Madam Sue.” The stout woman was standing over him now, having apparently appeared out of nowhere. “Are you hungry?” she asked as she fawned over him. “Would you like dinner?”

  Tom was very hungry. He hadn’t eaten much all day. He had been too excited for food. But he remembered Saafir walking away, sulking, so he asked, “Aren’t I too late?”

  “Oh, it’s OK. It’s only fifteen minutes past.”

  “What?” Saafir fumed. “You said I was fifteen minutes too late.”

  Madam Sue’s face turned sour as she looked at him. “It was your own fault you were late,” she scolded. “I’m sure Thomas has a perfectly good reason,” she added expectantly.

  Tom thought he did. He was reading a school book. If there ever was a good reason for being late, surely this was it?

  “I was reading.”

  “Already with the books,” Madam Sue beamed. “Such a good boy you are.”

  Tom didn’t know Saafir very well, but he was sure there was something wrong with the boy. His mouth was open and his eyes were wide, like he was horrified and speechless. And now he was shaking his head furiously.

  “What?” Madam Sue frowned at him.

  “I was reading too. You said-”

  “Do you want dinner or not?”

  Saafir scowled but nodded.

  “Take a seat, Thomas dear,” Madam Sue said. “I’ll be back,” she added and she disappeared through one of the doors to the side of the hall.

  Tom pulled a chair out and sat down. Saafir sat opposite him and stared at him. The hall was lit by flaming torches hanging off the walls. He had seen one of those same torches in the tree house. He wondered how they lit them.

  Saafir was still staring at him.

  “What?”

  “You’re not much to look at, are you?”

  Tom didn’t know what to say to that. He didn’t know if he liked Saafir much. Constantly staring, and then saying that, he was definitely a bit on the rude side.

  “I mean, you look just like us,” Saafir said. “Not what I expected.”

  “What did you expect?”

  “Something
different, maybe two heads.”

  “Why would I have two heads?”

  Saafir shrugged. “Why would you have one head?”

  “What?” Tom asked incredulously.

  “What?” Saafir repeated passively.

  Just as their conversation reached an impasse, Madam Sue arrived with a trolley in tow. She gave a wave of her hand and knives, forks, spoons, plates and dishes floated off the trolley and onto the table.

  “Enjoy,” she said and she smiled at Tom before she walked off, completely ignoring Saafir.

  “What hall are you staying in?” Saafir asked as he filled his plate with food.

  “I don’t think it’s a hall,” Tom said as he told him where he was living.

  “I wish my parents had gotten me a tree house,” Saafir said wistfully.

  Tom could see why it sounded appealing. But it wasn’t really. It was scary. And the thought of having to sleep there by himself at night frightened him a little. Who knew what lurked in that forest behind? But he didn’t tell Saafir that.

  They finished the rest of their meal in silence.

  There were clear skies above and the moon shone brightly as Tom stepped onto the stone path that led down the hill. Surrounded by dark greenery, the white tree at the bottom of the hill glowed. If he wasn’t so terrified he might have thought it looked beautiful.

  But he was terrified.

  There were just so many trees.

  Tom wasn’t exactly a tree-hugger, but he did normally like them. They were nice and green. And they didn’t really do anything to him, or anyone. They just stood there. They weren’t doing much here either, the trees, but there were just so many...

  The tree house wasn’t much further away when Tom broke into a run. He climbed up the wooden planks as quickly as he could. He thought it would be better once he was in the tree house. But it wasn’t.

  It was dark.

  And he didn’t know how to light the torch.

  Tom slept on the bottom bunk. Eventually he stopped worrying about what could come out of the forest and eat him. It would be his first day of school tomorrow. He had a three-hour class first thing in the morning. Magical Development it was called. That had to be the class where they taught magic.