Manipulation

Ch 1: Enter the house

Everyone on the bus was intimidating. By the time we were off and waiting for the principal I felt more then out of place. Everyone around me clustered in little groups, and it wasn't like the nerds, the jocks and the emos. No, this was worse. Where the hell would I stand? People were clustered in groups of about twenty. There were twelve groups altogether, which was about two-hundred and forty kids - give or take - and it was only the first years. My worry levels were through the roof.

The weird thing about these groups that I noticed? They weren't clustered into their stereotypes, but instead they mixed together. Like the jocks weren't just with those bitchy cheerleader types, but also with the nerds, emos and everything else, packed like a bag of mixed lollies; you got everything. I felt really out of place standing by myself and looking at everyone. I had this weird feeling in my gut that was telling me that something defined these groups, like they were made to be like that.

It was frustrating. And mum said I should make friends easily. Yeah right. Why did mum send me to Night Grace Academy? Oh yeah, scholar ship, did you note the sarcasm. I should tell you now, Night Grace Academy is a night school. The classes went from 9pm to 3am. I also noticed all the people here didn't look the same a age, there were thirteen year olds and others who looked eighteen or nineteen. Hmm, strange.

Instead of paying attention to the students around me I looked at the school. From where we stood at the front gates I could only see the office, which was to my left and a path leading down between two buildings, the path leading out of view. The lights were on in the buildings and I sometimes saw a shadow move. Beside the right hand side building was another path, this one stretched down a small hill and a large oval was at the bottom along with some basketball courts.

Three teachers stood on the outside of the groups, watching everyone talk and laugh. Then a lady swept out the office and moved our way, her strides long and graceful, like each step was measured. Her clothes fit perfectly, her shirt hung of her shoulders perfectly and her dark blue jeans looked designer, everything she wore looked designer. A black belt circled her waist and her blonde hair swayed in wind I could not feel.

Everyone one became silent and looked at the lady, her lips formed a smile and she straightened her back. "Welcome to Night Grace Academy. I'm your head Mistress Mrs Fray," her voice was like silk and she smiled at everyone who was looking at her. "Please follow me to the auditorium." Mrs Fray then proceeded to turn and walk down the path to her left.  

People shuffled after her and she lead us to the building on the right, but we caught a glimpse of the main building which stretched around in a c shape. In the middle of the building stood a garden like area and a path lead to more buildings but unlike the rest of the school which was one or two stories high, these ones were three. Mrs Fray lead us into an empty room, the only things in there were six seats with people sitting on them, a microphone and more teaches standing around the edge of the room.

"Sit, sit." Mrs Fray waved her hand and everyone sat on the floor, like dogs. I restrained the urge to glare at her. "Now, this will be your home for the next 6 years," she didn't even use the microphone as her words rang around the silent room. "You will study here, and may go home on breaks. But otherwise you will stay at this school. Now, there are six houses, or what you could call buildings. You will stay in one house and may not move. If you have issues with your roommate talk to your senior house mate,"

Her hands swept over the people sitting on the chairs. "They can make arrangements for you to switch rooms. You will get your timetable off your Senior housemate in a few minutes. First off you might like to hear about the houses," Mrs Fray started babbling on about the houses. They all had weird names; the Wayfarer house, the Valour house, the Rereant house, Astute house, Zeal house and the Traduce house.

"I invite the Senior house mate for the Valour house up." Mrs Fray stepped away from the microphone as a guy stood up and took her place. He called out some names and said for those people to meet him after the assembly. He then invited someone else up and so one.

"And finally, Milly Barns," The girl says looking around the room and then looked to the people left. "Now we have Damian from the Zeal house," The girl said and walked back to her seat. Another guy stood up and started reading a list.

"Katsa Sundrea," The guy said my name making me look up. After a few minutes more names being called, four other people calling them and Mrs Fray talking some more we stood up to get our timetables. After waiting in line a few minutes i had my timetable and was scanning over it.

There were only nine subjects minus electives, and it didn't appear to have Maths, English or any other normal class. Like whats OD, or even W-Studies? A small idea formed in my head but I pushed it away. The only ones that were normal were my electives and Gym.

Then our senior house mate lead us outside and towards the building we were staying in.We were in the second last on the right side. 'ZEAL HOUSE' was written in big letters over the door. There was no turning back now, and I didn't know how right that was, it wasn't just a figure of speech when I said it. There really was no turning back, cause the second I learned the truth about this school there was never going to be a way back, you can't just forget everything or shrug it off. No, this doesn't work like that. I was from now on, trapped at this school.