Miss Mabel's School for Girls (11 page)

Candles cluttered my desk and provided the only light in the room, casting agitated shadows. Outside, the wind rattled the windowpanes and sent occasional bursts of cold air through the cracks in the glass. I shivered and pulled my shawl closer around my shoulders.

A heavy book on the proper cultivation of herbs and spices lay open in front of me, but every time I looked at the pages, the flash of butterflies in my mind distracted me. My thoughts meandered from the darkness of the first match to the unknown of the second to Leda’s conversation with me before breakfast and then to my grandmother. Did I have time to save her life?

When I snapped out of my troubling thoughts, a long tear ran down my cheek. I brushed it away and shut the book with an emphatic slam. The sound reverberated off the stone walls with a dull echo. Self-pity wouldn’t help.

I glanced back outside. What I wouldn’t give to be able to sneak outside and run through Letum Wood one more time, abandoning all my fear for just a few minutes. I mourned the loss of my time outside with Papa, training and running, deep in my heart. These four walls made me restless. It felt unnatural, being trapped inside, learning by ink and paper.

The flowers tied into the letter dropped even further when I pulled on the twine. A square of paper fell into my hands.

Darling Bianca,

Congratulations! You passed your first match and will advance to the second round with two other Competitors. This match decides the final two. I look forward to seeing you in six days. Meet that evening in the library after dinner.

Your loving leader,

Miss Mabel

The sight of her name made me sick. I shoved the paper back into the envelope and held it over the candle. It caught fire at the corner; the rolling yellow flame left a black trail of ash behind. I forced the window open and threw the remains into the windy night.

An unbearable six days.

I dropped my head to the desk and closed my eyes until the wind faded and sleep overcame me.

•••

“Now remember, students. When you address a Member of the Council, you do not use their first names unless given permission to do so. It’s a breach of conduct that I will not tolerate. If I hear you have done so, I will bring you back to Miss Mabel’s and teach you this etiquette lesson again.”

Miss Scarlett’s voice rang over the dining room with all the force of a rolling storm, filling in the warm cracks and crevices while simultaneously preventing any of us from having a nap at her expense. An etiquette class during our usual free hours after dinner was a fresh form of hell. I stared at the tops of my shoes and wished I could pull my hair out of the tight bun at my neck. It pulled on my temples, giving me a pounding headache. Despite the falling rain and the bone-numbing chill, I’d still rather be outside. It had only been two days since the first match finished, and already my gut churned with nervous fear of the next one.

At least I’m not sitting alone in my room, thinking about how nervous I am,
I thought, in my last attempt at being optimistic. Then I laughed under my breath. A dry etiquette lesson only made me think of the second match more, as that would be less painful, surely.

“Can you imagine?” Camille asked, leaning her back against the table and folding her hands on her lap. “I’d love to have tea with a Council Member.”

A distant look came to her face. It was the first thing she’d said all day. An unusually melancholy air hung around her, and I wondered what could be horrible enough to drag Camille into a slump.

“So would I,” Leda muttered. “Then I can tell them what I really think of what they do for a living.”

“Yes,” I said in grouchy response, agitated from being inside all day. “But then you’d be kicked out for calling them imbeciles and telling them how to do their job.”

“Someone needs to tell them how to run the Network,” she replied without taking her eyes off of Miss Scarlett, unruffled by the snap in my voice. “Because some of them don’t seem to get it. Did you see the article in the newsscroll today about the Council Member that wants to put a tax on messenger paper? He plans to charge a sacran for every ten sheets of paper. It’s outrageous.”

I hadn’t seen the article, and, at the moment, didn’t care. A golden sacran wasn’t that much money to spend. I wondered about Leda’s agitation over it. Instead of giving my thoughts too much energy, I stared dully at Miss Scarlett, wishing myself far away.

“Now, if you are lucky and earn a chance to meet the High Priestess,” Miss Scarlett said, annoying me with her strict aplomb, “which I hope all of you do, you will have one opportunity to introduce yourself to her. Use it well. Never address her by anything but her title, and be sure to start by saying
merry meet
. Everyone practice together.”

A chorus of diffuse voices mumbled it back, but none with as much growl as Leda. I joined, but only faintly. If I ever met the High Priestess, I’d like to find something original to say. She must tire of the same old drivel. I would.
Beautiful day to be one of the most powerful women in Antebellum, isn’t it, Your Highness?
I imagined myself saying, the required curtsy exchanged with an arm grasp, as a Protector or Guardian would.

“Don’t you agree, Miss Monroe?”

I startled back to the class with a jerk.

“What?”

Miss Scarlett’s bird-like eyes locked onto me.

“We were discussing the importance of punctuality when meeting with a Council Member, or anyone else for that matter. I hardly dare think I need to go into the merits of paying attention?”

A few girls snickered nearby, Priscilla, Jade, and Stephany in particular. I suppressed an embarrassed blush.

“No, Miss Scarlett.”

She eyed me. “Very well. We’ll continue, now that I have your attention again. And won’t lose it.”

Her emphasized words were a command, not a request. I nodded once. The class resumed again, with Miss Scarlett rambling off on which blessings and invocations were appropriate in a Network setting. Boredom returned on swift wings despite her reprimand. It wasn’t long before other students became noticeably fidgety and restless.

“You should run for office as Council Member one day, Leda,” I said in a low voice, half-joking, hoping to provoke her into a conversation to remove the misery of sitting there without moving. “I think you’d be wonderful because you’d tell people exactly what you thought.” 

“Why else would I be here, Bianca?”

Leda’s cool tone told me she didn’t mean the etiquette lesson. I felt a mixture of amusement and anxiety. If Leda did gain power, I feared for her secretary.

“The Central Network could benefit from your,
ahem
, gift,” I said, marveling over how Miss Scarlett’s back didn’t seemed to bend or fold at all as she executed the perfect curtsy. Despite her wide shoulders and thick frame, it looked quite graceful.
Well,
I thought.
I’m sure I’ll manage to make it look atrocious.

“No,” Leda said. “The Central Network isn’t ready for me yet.”

I looked out of the corner of my eyes, expecting to see a smirk. Leda surprised me with a serious expression. Did she ever joke?

“Yes,” I agreed after mulling it over. “I think you’re right.”

“Now,” Miss Scarlett called the attention of the class. “Everybody stand and practice together. Any witch who cannot fulfill my expectation will stay after for more practice. Remember: this is the High Priestess. Represent yourself, and Miss Mabel’s, with pride.”

Leda rolled her eyes. Camille and Jackie were already dipping and bowing to each other while critically assessing the other’s performance. Jackie folded with a lithe grace I envied. I turned away, watching Miss Scarlett instruct a second-year as I gained my feet.

“Do adults really curtsy to the High Priestess?” I asked. It seemed like an outdated tradition, but then, I felt that way about skirts sometimes too.

“I doubt it,” Leda scoffed. “But we aren’t significant yet, remember? Let’s just get this over with.”

The beauty of Network education. Some traditions never went away, even if the High Priestess didn’t enforce them. While I didn’t know the High Priestess personally, from what I knew of all the positive changes she had brought to the Central Network, she certainly didn’t seem like someone stuck in the past.

“Right,” I muttered. “This wouldn’t be half so boring if we didn’t have to wear shoes.”

“If you wore real shoes then I might feel pity,” Leda said, glancing at the leather sandals Papa had fashioned for me. They had a low rise, making them perfect to wear inside. So far, no one ever had asked me about them. It made me feel deliciously wicked some days, like I’d circumvented tradition with a careless
ha!

“You first,” I motioned to Leda. She bobbed an awkward rendition of a curtsy.

“Close,” I said. “Not so deep next time. You aren’t cleaning the floor with your nose.” 

She repeated it. I copied her with dramatic flair.

“Council Member Leda, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’d like to discuss the current horrors of the first-year common room at Miss Mabel’s. My toes have massive splinters I can’t seem to pluck out because of the deplorable floors.”

Camille sat back down on the bench and stared past us with a distant, sad expression. I recovered from my exaggerated curtsy and motioned towards her with a jerk of my head, looking at Leda in question. Leda’s face fell. She opened her mouth to explain but stopped and shook her head. A glimmer of silver around Camille’s neck caught my eye. A chain fell down onto her chest, holding a round silver ball the size of a fingernail. I’d never seen it before. Camille’s curtsy must have knocked it out of its hiding place beneath her dress. My breath stalled.

A memento.

Mementos kept a piece of someone who had passed on, normally a lock of hair, close to the heart. They were meant to be worn on the anniversary of the loved one’s death. I sat down next to her.

“Camille,” I said quietly, startling her from her reverie. “Tell me about your memento.”

Her hand wandered up and wrapped the little ball into a fist. She didn’t fully recover from her daze, her voice sounding wooden and distant.

“It’s my parents,” she said. I looked to Leda, who turned away to watch Miss Scarlett correct the awkward attempts of several first-years. “They died when I was eleven.”

“Five years ago?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“Is that why you live with your aunts?” I asked, recalling the first day I met her.

“Yes. They died in the kimeral plague. It was so sudden. Within two days. And then Bettina came and arranged the funeral. I moved in with her and Angie, my mother’s sisters.”

I swallowed back the rising hysteria this conversation evoked in my chest.
Death. Loss. Failure to save them. Pain.

“What’s in your memento?” I cleared my throat, desperate to get away from my own thoughts.

“A lock of my mother’s hair.” A flicker of a smile came to Camille’s lips and she looked at me for the first time. “She had thick curls just like mine. Papa loved cigars, so I kept some of his favorite tobacco.”

Her hand tightened around the memento until the knuckles turned white. A watery flash appeared in her eyes, but she smiled through it, acting as if the tears weren’t there. I let it go, hoping Camille would cry it out in the loneliness of her room tonight. Part of me told me not to let it happen, to reach out and be her friend, help her through the bitter loss so she didn’t feel alone. But I couldn’t, because grief was too personal.

Too real. Too close to my own future. I wasn’t brave enough to help Camille through hers when I could barely face the possibility of feeling it myself.

Instead, I squeezed her hand, like a coward.

“Will you show us how to do a curtsy? Leda and I did a horrid job, as you probably saw. Leda is going to go into politics, and she can’t jeopardize her career because of a bad curtsy. Miss Scarlett is positive that one breach of etiquette will end it before it begins.”

“Of course,” Camille brightened. “Bettina taught me how.”

We laughed and made a show of our exaggerated curtsies until Miss Scarlett called us back to order. The laughter and merry change in pace jarred the awful gloom in my heart as we sat back down, breathless and giggling. Then Miss Scarlett dismissed us with a wave of her hands, grateful to be done with us, and we all escaped to our freedom.

•••

A couple of days later, Camille fumed at the off-white square of paper in her hands with a cherry-red set of cheeks that made me laugh.

“Agh!” she muttered. “It never works!”

Miss Bernadette sat at her large desk in front of the class, grading papers and remaining purposefully oblivious to the struggling first-years. A list of instructions on the board explained how to fold messenger paper into an envelope that would deliver itself. It was flighty stationary. Most girls that came from bigger villages already knew how to fold it because so much communication in the cities relied on messenger paper. Grandmother ran the
Tea and Spice Pantry
in the small town of Bickers Mill, which meant I’d been working with it since I could fold a straight line. The rest of the students who came from the smallest villages, like Leda and Camille, had never used it before.