‘But why do you want to be up here?’
Livy looked out at the sky and the Sentinel that she could see through the window. She wasn’t sure why she wanted to be up here, but it felt as if the room – that view – had been waiting for her.
‘You’d have to cope with the furniture that’s in here because we wouldn’t be able to get anything else up those stairs. And it’s right up in the roof!You’ll be frozen in winter and boiling in summer.’
‘I don’t care!’ Livy said. She stroked the fading wallpaper of ivy and roses trailing over a stone wall. It was like being inside a tower. She took in the chipped paintwork and the washing line strung across the boarded ceiling. She sat down on the narrow iron-framed bedstead. Mahalia would like this room, Livy decided. It would be good for epic chats.
Her mother, answering her father’s call, went quickly down the stairs again.
Livy was alone.
The silence settled around her. She allowed herself to fall back on to the soft and rather lumpy mattress, which was covered in a faded flower print. Her stomach turned as she fell.
She put both hands behind her head and looked at the window full of sky, the clouds as thin and white as smoke. From this angle, she could only see one Sentinel – of course, she thought: the one who guarded the pale, derelict tower in the courtyard. Its face was turned away as if it had just heard something and its whole being seemed alert, as if it might take off. But no, Livy thought. That was just silly. How could a block of stone fly, however lifelike?
It was hard to tell what sex the creature was, Livy thought, with those long curls and strange flowing robes. She wasn’t meant to call it an angel, her father had said, but if any creature were to fly through the infinite sky, surely it would look like this. Perhaps the Sentinel could take off and fly towards wherever Mahalia was. That thought warmed her. She hated to think of Mahalia in a cold, dark, distant and silent place with no one to talk to. She and Mahalia had loved to talk – spent all their time talking. If this creature could only reach her and let her know . . . let her know that Livy had not forgotten her. Was still talking to her – or trying to. If only Mahalia would answer.
As she stared at the wings, she saw – she was sure of it! – one of the great stone feathers tremble in the breeze.
Livy gasped.
The feather shivered again.
She continued to stare at the stone but forced herself to think sensibly.
‘I am Livy Burgess,’ she said to the Sentinel. ‘And you are a statue. There is no way that the feathers in your wings can move.’
Livy relaxed her gaze. Now the feather was still.
‘Stone is stone,’ she whispered. ‘And blood is just blood, whoever you’re related to.’
Though that hadn’t been true for Mahalia – her blood had altered into a poison that had destroyed her.
‘Liveeeeeeee!’ Tom’s voice filled her head as he clomped noisily up the stairs. ‘I got Count Zacha’s Warrior Copter!’
She turned her head as her brother shot into the room, bringing a riot of colourful plastic right up to her eyes. She smiled weakly at his bright little face – so alive – his plump fingers clutching the toy . . .
‘It can fly!’ he cried out in excitement. ‘It has swords and wings! Get up!’ Tom pulled at her arm. ‘Get up or I will fire at your head with Count Zacha’s Venom Blade!’
The night before she started at Temple College, Livy laid out her new school uniform on the table in her new bedroom. The pale grey woollen blazer with its embroidered tower on the breast pocket had been so ruinously expensive that her mother had gasped as she handed over her credit card to pay for it. She had insisted on buying her one that was too big to give Livy plenty of room to grow into; Livy was going to look ridiculous.
She lay in bed: it was already late and she had been told to get a good night’s sleep, but how could she sleep? She was too wound up even to close her eyes.
On the shelf above the desk were her tiny stack of toy animal rubbers, the stone she had painted to look like a mouse, and the snow globe with the tiny castle on the hill that Mahalia had given her for her eleventh birthday. Her books were in a little bookcase and the posters of the Korean popstars had been put up (and no, the boys do not look like girls, she said to herself, remembering the boy on the bus). Her mother had hooked up curtains made of glittering sari silk – they fell over the small window like a sparkling waterfall.
She picked up an old matchbox that had been tucked behind the snow globe. She hadn’t opened it, hadn’t dared open it since the day she had been told that she wouldn’t see Mahalia again. Taking a deep breath, she slid the box open and tipped the disc of dirty brown metal into her hand. Three feathers above a crown and the words ‘TWO PENCE’ around the edge.
‘What do you want to keep this for?’ her mother had laughed as she had bustled in to pack up Livy’s room for the move. But seeing Livy’s face she had put it back in its place. ‘Why don’t you put the things that are important to you in the same box so that they don’t get lost?’
Staring down at the coin, Livy could see Mahalia laughing as she had picked it up from the ground. ‘It’s my lucky penny,’ she’d said, looking after the person who had dropped it. ‘And look, it’s a two pence piece, so I get double the luck!’ But Livy had thought she had said, ‘I get lubble the duck’ and they had laughed about it all the way to the bus stop.
She sank down on the edge of her bed, still staring at the coin. So much had changed in the last few weeks and now it was going to change again.
‘It’s no good,’ she thought out loud. ‘I’ve made a mistake. I’ll never fit in down there.’
As the words hung in front of her, she heard a faint tapping noise.
It was like a bird’s beak against the window, but there was no bird on the windowsill. There it was again, but it sounded more like a teaspoon against a glass.
‘Mahalia?’ she whispered. Just to say her name out loud gave her a thrill.
She got up and went to look out of the window.
Just the sky, the clouds and the Sentinel. A twist of grey smoke rising up from the roof of Temple College. But nothing that could have made a tapping noise. No Mahalia. Of course. How could it be otherwise? Mahalia was somewhere else.
She was woken the next morning by the sound of her mother’s voice calling up to her to get a move on and clean her teeth. Her head felt heavy: she had gone to sleep so late and now was exhausted. She dragged her uniform on and stumbled down the stairs to the kitchen.
‘All ready for your first day?’ Livy’s father smiled at her as he stood next to the kitchen sink drinking his coffee.
Livy shrugged. ‘As ready as I’ll ever be starting at a school I’ll never fit into.’
‘Livy!’ Her mother looked surprised. ‘What do you mean? We talked about this and you said that you were happy to go to Temple College.’
Livy sighed. What was the point? Her memory was that her parents had talked to her about starting at Temple College and what a good idea it was, and that she had said very little.
‘Shall I walk you over?’ Her father said. ‘So that you don’t have to go in alone?’
‘You want me to turn up at a new school with my dad?’ Livy said. She could feel her cheeks flaring. ‘Isn’t it enough that I look ridiculous in this stupid blazer?’
Livy saw her mother frown slightly and turn away. ‘I think you look very nice in your blazer,’ she said.
‘Just be yourself,’ Livy’s father told her.
Livy groaned and left, banging the door behind her.
Only a few minutes later, she stood awkwardly in the small porter’s lodge just outside the entrance to the main courtyard. Someone was bound to come and find her if she waited here. Her brand-new blazer was too heavy and as stiff as cardboard. Her new school trousers itched. Her heart was pounding. She couldn’t leave, she had to get through this day somehow. And without a friend. ‘Just be yourself,’ her father had told her as if this
was some magic formula that would bring her happiness and friendship. But who was she? Livy was less and less sure of herself since Mahalia had died.
‘Excuse me,’ Livy said to the security guard who sat behind the desk. The man took no notice of her as he drank tea and stared at a small monitor flicking through grainy black and white images of various parts of the school, all unknown to her.
‘Are you Olivia Burgess?’
Livy had been so intent on watching the monitor that she hadn’t noticed a tall girl carrying a pile of lever-arch files enter the room.
‘Yes, but people call me Li–’ she started to say.
The girl spoke across her. ‘I’m Samira. Mr Bowen sent me to find you.’
‘Mr Bowen?’
‘Housemaster of Burgess. That’s your house. Where you have your locker and go for registration. All the houses at Temple College are named after famous scientists who were educated here. I suppose someone thought it was funny to put you in Burgess. I’m in Maskelyne. He was a famous astronomer.’ She clicked her fingers and turned on her heel. ‘Quick, quick,’ she said. ‘There isn’t much time.’
A bell rang, a deep clang that made Livy’s ribcage quiver. The noise poured over them as they stepped into the courtyard.
‘This is called the Court of Sentinels,’ the girl explained. ‘No prizes for guessing why.’ She raised her eyebrows to the roof.
Livy had the powerful sensation that she wanted to be up on the roof and away from the anxiety of the day. Up there, she felt, she could rest her head on a cloud, stretch out as if she were still in bed and, somehow, if she concentrated hard enough to hold on to her voice, talk to Mahalia.
In the courtyard, groups of students in blazers just like hers stood around in small groups or walked briskly towards various doorways. They all seemed to be talking animatedly to each other, rucksacks on shoulders or dropped to the floor. Brimming with all these voices and movement, Temple College seemed very different from the empty place that she had walked through with Dr Smythe. A football rolled in front of the girl with the files and, without breaking her pace, she kicked it, hard, back to the group of boys who shouted their thanks.
‘See that door?’ The girl pointed to the corner of the courtyard. ‘Go in there. You need the first door on the right.’
Samira moved away but turned back to say, ‘Someone will see you. Probably.’
Livy stood awkwardly outside the ‘first door on the right’. It was open, but Livy didn’t think she should go in. A small, thin girl with wide cheekbones and large violet eyes appeared at Livy’s side and observed her from beneath a heavy black fringe.
‘You have to knock on the door,’ the girl said. ‘Mr Bowen’s always busy so he won’t notice you.’
‘Thanks,’ Livy said.
She knocked on the door. Nothing happened. The girl reached out and gave the door two smart knocks.
‘That should do it.’ She turned to study the notice-board.
‘Yes!’ A voice cried out. ‘Don’t hang around out there! Come in!’
Livy took a deep breath and stepped into a cluttered office. A bald man wearing heavy round glasses sat behind a desk covered in exercise books and papers. ‘What is it?’ he said, not looking up from covering a page in red ticks.
‘I’m . . . I’m . . .’
The man glanced up and put down his pen. ‘Oh!’ he said, smiling. ‘You’re Livy! I completely forgot that you were starting today.’ He pushed his chair back and cried out, ‘Celia? Can you get in here?’ He took off his glasses and blinked at her. ‘I must say it’s very nice to welcome an actual Burgess to Temple College finally, after, what is it? Almost five hundred years! Where did Dr Smythe find you?’
Livy shrugged.
Mr Bowen looked thoughtful and added, ‘A living, breathing, Burgess!’
There was a knock on the door. ‘Ah! Celia,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think you would take so long to appear considering that I saw you outside only a second ago.’
The girl who had been standing by the noticeboard looked at Livy with interest.
‘This is Livy Burgess,’ Mr Bowen said. ‘It’s her first day at Temple College.’
‘Is this the new librarian’s daughter?’ Celia said. ‘The one who hasn’t had to do the entrance exam?’ She put her hand over her mouth.
‘How do you know that?’ Mr Bowen shook his head. ‘Well, never mind – it would be a great help, Celia, if you could show her how to register and where her locker is; make Livy feel really welcome at Temple College.’
Once outside, Celia was about to speak when she was interrupted by two girls who ran up to her, out of breath.
‘We’ve seen him, Celia,’ said one, a tall girl with long brown hair pulled into a ponytail on the side. Her skirt was short, she wore her socks pulled over her knees and her lips were suspiciously red and glossy. She had a large handbag over her shoulder and was holding out her phone – the latest model, Livy noticed – to show Celia the screen. ‘See? I filmed him!’
‘Joe?’ Celia squealed with excitement, snatching at the phone. ‘Joe Molyns?’
‘See how fast he’s running?’ said the other girl. She had a sharply cut blonde bob and pale blue eyes, with very long, very black lashes. Her skirt was also rather short and her blazer seemed too tight. Mahalia would have called her a ‘shiny girl’ and kept away. ‘He was really late for something. Who’s this?’
‘This is Livy,’ Celia said, quickly. ‘New girl.’ She craned her neck to see through the door into the courtyard beyond.
‘I can see that!’ the blonde girl said. ‘Didn’t they have a blazer in her size?’ She gave a little snort.
‘Livy looks extremely smart, Amy,’ Celia said. ‘Not everyone customizes their school uniform like you!’
‘But trousers!’ The girl with the brown ponytail pulled a face.
‘Martha. Don’t be mean!’ Celia said. ‘She can’t know everything on day one!’ All Livy had thought was that she and Mahalia preferred trousers. Celia pulled Livy down the corridor, Amy and Martha following close behind. ‘Come on, we’ve got to get your fingerprints scanned.’
‘Why?’ asked Livy, alarmed.
‘That’s how we register at Temple College,’ Celia said.
‘And we’re not going to take long,’ Amy said. ‘Because if we hurry, we can still catch Joe Molyns.’
The four girls dropped their bags in the locker room, scanned Livy’s fingerprints and set off across the Court of Sentinels.
‘I can’t see him,’ Celia turned her head from side to side, disappointed. ‘Maybe he’s in the Temple already?’
‘We would have caught up with him if we hadn’t had to spend so long getting registered,’ Amy muttered.
Livy was going to say something, but remembered how Mahalia would always tell her to keep quiet when the ‘shiny girls’ started. ‘They just want the attention,’ she would whisper as she pulled Livy away from a possible incident. ‘Don’t give them what they want.’
Celia, walking in front with Livy, took no notice. ‘What school were you at before?’ she asked.
Livy told her.
Celia shook her head. ‘Never heard of it.’
‘It’s not well known like Temple College.’
‘Did you like it?’ Celia asked.
Livy looked up to see the girl’s bright, curious eyes regarding her. She thought about the squeaky floors, leaking windows and draughty corridors.
‘It was all right,’ Livy said and then felt annoyed with herself for replying in such a boring manner.
‘Well, school is school,’ Celia shrugged.
‘Unless you’re at Temple College!’ Amy interrupted. ‘My parents wouldn’t let me go anywhere else! And, of course, I passed all the entrance exams for all the top London schools so I could choose where to go.’
Celia asked, ‘Will you miss your friends?’
Livy nodded and muttered, ‘I suppose.’
‘Who will you miss the most?’ Celia leant in
as if Livy was about to tell her a great secret.
Livy swallowed. Her throat felt as if she had a huge glass marble stuck in it. ‘My best friend. But she moved away,’ she whispered. ‘At the beginning of the summer. So I don’t really see her any more.’
‘I can’t understand anything she says!’ she heard Martha whisper behind her. ‘Her accent!’
‘And look at that bag she’s carrying. It’s a rucksack! Urgh!’
But when Livy turned round, both girls smiled at her.
‘Just saying we love your bag,’ Amy said. ‘So rustic!’
‘Did you know that Livy’s dad is the new librarian?’ Celia said. ‘That makes her nearly a celebrity.’
‘He’s on the staff?’ Amy said, horrified. ‘Are you on a scholarship?’
Livy shrugged.
‘That hardly matters, Amy,’ Celia said. ‘It’s just fascinating that Livy’s father is the new librarian. Especially after the last one left so suddenly!’ She leant in close again. ‘Dr Smythe sacked him! Let’s hope nothing like that happens to your dad.’
They had entered a cloister; a covered path led them round a square of emerald green grass towards a vast door.
‘Does everyone like Dr Smythe?’ Livy asked.
‘Total fun sponge,’ Celia sighed, then brightened. ‘Mr Bowen said that you are an actual Burgess!’ She turned to Livy as if she might be able to tell if it were true or not from merely looking at her face.
‘It’s my name,’ Livy replied. ‘But I’m not sure that it means very much.’
‘But you’re related to Master Burgess? The first headmaster of Temple College? You have a Temple College house named after you!’
Livy shrugged. ‘Dr Smythe seems to think so.’
‘And now you turn up.’ Martha snapped her fingers. ‘Just like that.’
‘You must have taken an exam,’ Amy said. ‘My parents say that everyone has to take an exam. Temple College doesn’t let just anyone in!’
‘But if she’s related to Peter Burgess . . .’ Celia whispered.
Livy couldn’t think what to say. But now they were in the crush of bodies queuing to get into the vast door – the Temple after which the school was named, Livy assumed. Celia was explaining that it was not built for religious reasons, but as a meeting place for the scholars who had founded the school to debate with each other and present scientific papers. It looked more like a cathedral, Livy thought, with its flying buttresses and stained-glass windows. It was certainly grander than any part of her last school, where all assemblies had been cancelled since the sports hall flooded five years ago.
The White Tower Page 4