“Remember, we are the Condors!” said Partington trying to gee us up as he led us down to the Chamber.
It was packed full again. Partington led us to our table, but we weren’t sat for long. Everyone sort of got up and introduced themselves from other forms and other years. Robin and Graham were walking round together. I sighed, just when I thought I’d made a friend. Perhaps he thought I was too tragic. Hunter had made loads of friends, he seemed to be able to make people laugh, just by laughing, his big booming laugh carrying across the whole chamber. Try sleeping in the same room as him, I thought, then we’ll see if you still find him funny. I sat at the table feeling tired and glum. There was more food, spread across the tables, nibbles and drinks littered them like this was a wedding or something. No trifle though.
The Magisteers were sat chatting and observing. The Lily in conversation with a very tall, wide and stern looking… woman? She had one thick black eyebrow, and a tight black bun on her head. Remind me never to cross her. Magisteer Dodaline was talking glumly to the expressionless Magisteer, but broke off, looking thankful as Partington took the seat next to her. Everyone else around me was a stranger, I knew, nor recognised anyone. I felt shy and embarrassed, and anxious that I might end up friendless.
Then I spotted Ross, who, soon as he saw me, came over with his tall, intelligent looking friends and sat next to me.
“Alright little brother?” he said grinning. His friends Hamish and Gascoigne sat to my left giggling like hyenas. “Settling in ok?”
He was up to something. I spotted it immediately. When you live in a house full of evil people, you are always on the lookout for trouble and my alarm bells were ringing straight away.
“Fine thanks…”
“Yeah, listen I forgive you for what you said yesterday. Thankfully most people think you were joking about not being evil,” he laughed.
“But I’m not ev-”
He held up his hands. “You don’t have to say anything, I told you, you are forgiven,” he said softly, too softly. “That’s right, isn’t it lads?”
His friends, still giggling, nodded. Perhaps he was being genuine? I couldn't tell.
“What are you up to?” I said, I looked behind me to see if there was anyone waiting to trap me in a Magic net or something. Ross held his hands up.
“Oh little brother, this is Hailing Hall, I would never be nasty to you here. We’re brothers, and brothers stick together. And hey, I like your new robes and… oh a new channeller, where dya get it?” he actually sounded genuinely interested.
“… lost property,” I said. “Mum and Dad didn’t get me anything, so this ghost took me.”
“Yeah. Mum and Dad they can be… heartless sometimes. Too busy for us, aren't they?” He sighed.
I nodded, still frowning.
“Anyway, take care little brother, see you around. If you want or need anything, just give me a bell. My dorm is on W wing,” he touched me on the shoulder and left.
“Sure,” I said. “Erm… thanks.”
I sat there feeling a little stunned, feeling my body all over to make sure he hadn’t done anything to me. Perhaps he was just acting evil when he was at home, perhaps this was the real him at school? Feeling a little better I stood and went to mingle, hopefully this time would be a little more successful.
Robin and Graham were talking to two girls, they all looked really awkward. I saw a large group of people I could join, Hunter was standing there too. They were sort of in a circle and consisting of four girls: two snooty ones, a pretty one and a plain one. Simon was there too, as well as three other boys. One tall bullish lad was regaling them all on a previous victory of some kind. I walked up slowly, feeling stupidly nervous.
“And then, I mean I had to duck,” said the bullish lad. “Otherwise the Wolf-raptor would have had my head off.” They all applauded, even Hunter who looked transfixed.
“What’s a Wolf-raptor?” he said.
“You don’t know what a Wolf-raptor is?” said the bullish lad, as if Hunter was a bit special.
“He’s from the Outside,” said one of the snooty girls, she was dressed in a red skirt, which looked pretty silly with her new turquoise robes. I snuck into the circle next to Hunter who didn’t acknowledge me at all.
“And then,” said the bullish lad, he had a really nasal voice, which I didn’t like, he sounded like Ross. “I drew my fathers carving knife and showed the Wolf-raptor who was boss!”
I couldn't help but frown with suspicion, he must have been talking about a dream he’d once had. Then he spotted me and my frown. “Oh hi,” he said. “Who are you?”
“Avis Blackthorn,” I saw him recoil instantly at the sound of my name. I stuck my hand out, he checked my hand and shook suspiciously.
“Hi, I’m… David Starlight.”
I waved at everyone else in the circle, they all nodded back, friendly enough. “Sorry, please carry on… What was that you were saying before?” I said, urging him to carry on. It may have come out a little sarcastically.
“Yeah…” he looked unnerved now. “I was just talking about the time I defeated an army of Wolf-raptors.” He said smarting. I think my presence had spooked him and for once I was glad I was a Blackthorn. “And I…” then he stopped speaking, looking directly at my chest.
“HAHAHA!” He burst out laughing, pointing at my chest. Then, the rest of the circle began laughing, except Hunter who looked around the room. I looked around with him, what were they laughing at? I followed their eyes down, down to my robes. Which were flashing up pictures… of me! I went bright red as a picture of me crying flashed up, with “cry baby” written next to it, from three years ago when one of my brothers, I don’t know which one, ripped off my teddy Sedrick’s head. More embarrassing pictures began to flash all across my clothes. Behind me I heard more laughs at this impromptu presentation of my most embarrassing moments.
Me on the toilet. Me naked in the bath. Me hanging upside down by the ankle with my brothers standing around laughing. Me hanging out of the window from the topmost tower of the castle by my pants. The horses eating my ice cream, and an assortment of these kind of horrible memories I’d locked away hoping no one would ever reveal again - let alone to people I was trying desperately to impress.
I tried in vain, to cover it up, but the images showed through no matter what I did. This could have only been one person… Ross! The sly git almost had me convinced. I saw him now, watching with glee from across the room giggling and slapping his friends. Then the whole Chamber was laughing. You should have seen it, honestly, a whole room full of people you want to impress, all in hysterics laughing at your most barest moments from your past, all laid out in front of you, unable to get rid of it. Hot tears welled up in my eyes, and a large lump in my throat. I swallowed. I couldn't and wouldn’t cry in front of all these people.
One of the Magisteers came over. I didn't hear what she said, but escorted me by the shoulders out of the Chamber. I stared at the ground so I didn’t have to see any more laughing faces. I could still hear the laughing as the Chamber doors shut.
“Are you ok?” she said. I felt so numb I honestly didn’t know so I just nodded. She put a hand on my shoulder as the images kept flashing. Hold on, this wasn’t a Magisteer. I looked up and saw the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. My sad watery eyes met these big, brown, saucer shaped eyes that sparkled back at me. She had skin like golden sunshine and a perfect, symmetrical face full of freckles. Her hair, a silky, shiny brown, swished around behind her.
“I thought, y-you were a Magisteer…” I stammered.
She laughed. “‘Fraid not,” we stood there in silence, the picture of me in the bath flashed up again. “My name’s Tina by the way. Tina P.”
“Nice to meet you Tina. I’m er… Avis… Avis B,” she laughed, she knew what my last name was really.
“You a new year too?” she said.
“Yeap.”
“It’s tough the first few weeks isn’t it?”
“Well you’ve made one,” she grinned and these shining, bright white teeth dazzled my eyes. Honestly, she was a walking model for Toad-Eye Toothpaste. “And, what I find used to work for me was, if you laugh with them, make a joke out of yourself, then they can’t laugh at you, they have to laugh with you.”
She was bloody right, you know. This angel had to just walked into my life and saved me. As I watched her walk off back to the Chamber, I half expected her to flap a pair of white angel wings as she waved goodbye.
At midday, lessons official started. We had Partington all day, except the last hour when we had Practical Magic, which everyone was very excited about.
Partington returned ten minutes before the rest of the class, I was already sat waiting, he said he would remove the photo illusion for me, it was kind of fading by now anyway. He waved his hands a couple of times and it completely vanished. Thank god for that.
The rest of the class came up together talking about all the cool new people they had met. Jess, Jake, Grettle and Dennis and even flipping Ellen had a giggle as they saw me. I could see Simon gearing up for his ultimate put down and as soon as Partington went outside the room to get something he was off—“Hey Avis, I hope you're not wearing the same pants as the ones you were dangling out of the window on…” On cue, they all laughed.
I remembered what Tina said and smiled. It really hurt.
“Pants? I don’t wear pants Simon…” Ok, so it wasn’t the best comeback in the world or whatever, and most of the girls grimaced. But I could work on that.
“Right!” announced Partington as he launched into the room. “Let’s learn Magic!”
He gave us each some of this Magic parchment stuff. I was more fascinated with that than the lesson to be honest. Robin, who was sitting to my left and Hunter on my right, were as fascinated as me. What you had to do was write on this sheet of parchment and when you got to the bottom, the text would vanish. But it would appear on another sheet inside your Main Book, as Partington called it. He had all our Main Books laid out in front of him, on his desk, so he could check what we were writing all at once. Clever huh?
The pens were simply fountain pens with ink pots. Robin said he preferred it. Hunter however, was getting in a right mess, he would have been better with one of those automatic pens I’ve seen some of the Outsiders with.
Partington stood regally, fingering his lapels and began to teach. “Magic is a difficult thing to teach because it’s an abstract art. We can split Magic up into many different categories, to do with everything in our physical and non-physical worlds. Everything you look at can be affected by Magic, if you learn how. As Wizards, you have a responsibility to stand up for good and challenge the darkness of our worlds. We are the ones who rebalance. I am not expecting you all to choose now what category you want to go into and be a specialist in, but you should keep it in mind. There are specialists working with plants, animals, with minerals even. We have seers who can read the future, or necromancer capable of taming the most difficult of demon. You can be a spirit raiser, a defence specialist, a charmer, a hexer, a dragon tamer, an elemental worker, a weather worker, a builder, a traveller, or a master of black Magic - although I would advise against the latter. Or you can be all of these things. There’s so many things to do and be in Magic you can never be bored, yes it’s hard work, but fortune in Magic favours the hard working.”
After this introduction, we wrote down all the categories of Magic that we could think of.
“Hunter,” said Partington frowning and looking down his nose at Hunter’s Main Book. “Do you think you can write, perhaps, a little more neatly. Your Main Book is full of blotches and ink spills, it’s leaking onto my desk.”
“Sorry sir, it’s just I’m not used to this pen.”
“Well, use one of these automatic pens of mine,” he handed Hunter this strange clear pen. “It’s a Biro. One of my last form, an Outsider, gave me a box full as a present, she knew I liked them.”
Partington would, occasionally, add another category to the board, which appeared with a wave of his hand. We went through, one by one, putting a description of what we thought a person who did that job would entail. It kept us busy and I liked it. I felt quite at home here, doing work, so much so that I nearly felt all better after this mornings incident. I looked up at everyone else working hard, the view out of the window was pretty cool now I’d got used to it. The clouds looked like they were playing as they chased each other through the sky. One of the clouds started to mould and change in front of my eyes. I blinked and looked closer as it changed into Tina’s face.
“You ok Avis?” I jumped, watching Partington frown at me. “You haven’t finished already have you?”
“What? No… I mean, yes, I'm fine... No, I haven't finished”
I looked back at the cloud, but it had vanished. Strange.
At the end of that lesson we had our first external class. Everyone was buzzing as Partington escorted us across the school and down many stairs to this dark, underground corridor lit by fire brackets. A very tall man stood in the gloom and watched his own form leave. David Starlight brought up the rear. I kept my head low, but he still spotted me.
“Hey cry-baby-Avis…” he whispered loud enough for all to hear. I gritted my teeth.
“Yeah,” I said as cheerily as I could muster. “Boo hoo, that’s me…” it sounded a bit forced, but… success, no one laughed. This was major progress. Or perhaps they were just bored of it? I don’t know.
This Magisteer who watched his form leave looked kind of strict. Partington nodded at him then scurried away.
“I am Magisteer Straker, you will address me as Sir. Enter…” He had a barky, short voice and looked really miserable. He wore a grey corset type thing that did up all the way up to his neck, as if his head needed suspending. His robes was as grey as his personality.
We had all been really pumped for Practical Magic lessons, but now that joy had just been sucked out by this fun sponge Straker. His eyes followed us as we entered, but he didn’t move his neck at all, and I didn’t see him blink once, like a lizard. We trudged into this large dark room with no windows and the cold… brrrrr, it was like taking a dip in a frozen lake, soon as you walked into the room, the ice slid into your bones and wouldn’t leave.
Magisteer Straker made us line up in alphabetical order, which was harder than it sounds. I was first. Then he looked at us one by one to choose who would sit next to whom. I had to grind my teeth to stop them from chattering as he pointed me to a seat. The room was strange, it was big and split in two. Desks and chairs one side and a open hollow the other, with nothing in it. The only light in the room was coming from these gas lamps that admittedly supplied zero heat. I had Joanna on my left and Dennis on my right. The table we were on was just one long desk facing Magisteer Straker who stood with his hands pressed tightly together, as if in prayer.
The joy that had been sucked out of the room, remained sucked out. Magisteer Straker proved to be an immediately dislikable Magisteer and person. He spent most of the first lesson telling us about the numerous rules that we must abide, if we didn’t, it was Magical punishment. However, the rules were so convoluted and confusing and numerous that I, for one, lost track. I got the impression that it boiled down to: don’t do anything, unless Magisteer Straker tells you to. Instead of putting our hands up to answer a question, he would just randomly point.
“Most people who start these lessons with me, think they would be jumping straight into some practical Magic. Well, you are gravely mistaken,” he said with great pleasure. “In these classes we will be learning the foundation for your studies of practical Magic… and if I don’t pass you, hec, you might never get to do any,” he smiled, his teeth were all brown in the cracks - he needed whatever toothpaste Tina used. He had, I noticed, long fingernails too. I didn’t like that on a
man. It looks kind of strange, like he was a part time mole. “You boy!”
Hunter, who was staring off into space, jumped and fell of his seat. “What was rule 37b? … Always look at me, unless I expressly tell you not to.”
“Right Sir, sorry Sir…” said Hunter getting back on his seat.
Straker was scanning a list of paper that he made jump from the desk to his hand. “Ahh,” he said the most active I’d seen him all lesson. “We have a Blackthorn.”
I swallowed and cowered a little. I couldn’t tell if he sounded impressed or wanted to take the mick. “Which one of you is the Blackthorn?”
All their eyes turned to me. I raised my hand slowly. “Me Sir.”
“Oh,” he said as his black disappointed eyes rested on me. “You weren’t the one snivelling in the Chamber earlier were you?” I felt that stone drop again in my stomach.
“Erm, yeah, kind of… my brother Ross he—”
“Great boy! Great boy Ross Blackthorn, real eye for Magic he has, just like his parents.” I was starting to get a picture of who and what this man was, and it certainly meant trouble for me. I kept my head down and stayed as quiet as possible for the rest of the lesson.
That night, I stayed up. All the other boys were asleep by half past nine. I put a few more logs on the fire and poked it a bit, trying to get the last bit of cold out of my bones from Straker’s room. I went over and sat on the window seat and stared out. Hunter was snoring softly, he sort of sounded like bear choking to death. The moon was bright tonight, and it seemed bigger from the grounds of Hailing Hall. I felt cosy sitting there, with the fire crackling, my pyjamas and dressing gown on and the glow from the moonlight streaming in. And then I thought how grateful I was, that I was here and not at home. No matter how bad it got here at Hailing Hall at least I was not at home. I thought about my first couple of days at school: meeting Tina was the highlight, every time I thought about her, my stomach went all fuzzy, it was such a strange feeling, I wondered if it was love.
Avis Blackthorn: Is Not an Evil Wizard! Page 5