Featherback

Chapter One

The carriage jolted again, sending me rolling off the seat. Routinely, I put my hand out to save myself from crashing into the worn leather opposite. I'd learnt to do this after the first 5 times. I'd been mentally tallying how many times I've rolled off of the seat: So far, I'd gotten to fourteen. You'd think I'd learn after the first few times to just sit on the floor, but I'd taken one look at the still-wet muddy footprints and suspicious brown smears and decided I'd rather take my chances being thrown from seat to seat than assuming the brown stains were mud, and not something much more disgusting. So I propped myself back in my original position in the corner, hugging my satchel for warmth.

The fog had fallen fast shortly after the halfway point between the airport and my destination, when I'd been waiting in a small village called Lesser Morrbourne, and with it had arrived the feeling of sticky clothes and near unbearable cold. My father had arranged with the school before my departure that they'd pick me up from there and I'd finish the second half of my journey with whatever transport they had, which was, apparently an old black, carriage. Horse and all. Because cars are, like, so outdated, you know. But that had taken a good half hour to turn up, by which time I was soaked and shaking.

I hadn't wanted to travel to the English countryside. People often assumed i spent most of my time there as my family was considered better off than most and so we obviously must have had a holiday home in the middle of nowhere, and we did, but I'd only visited it once or twice as a child and since one bad experience, I'd insisted I stay in the city unless i wanted a holiday, in which case it would be somewhere hot with WiFi so I'd get a tan while still being able to moan about how bored I was on social media. So far, my current predicament had convinced me id made the right choice; My phone had died hours ago and from the look of the weather, a tan would be nigh impossible.

Brambles scraping across the window brought me back to the present. They clung to the windows as if they were trying to hold us in the forest forever in the suffocating mist. I shook myself, snap out of it, i mentally instructed. The school can't be that bad. Just because your father loved the idea doesn't mean it's a terrible one... does it? It always had in the past... Multiple times, I'd tried to look on the bright side of my fathers decisions but most of the time they only benefited one person: Him. I would've bet at that moment if i could have that this was actually a ploy of his to get closer to one of the higher up business men in his organisation. Maybe they had a sponsorship deal, or maybe one of the CEOs children went here and my father decided he wanted something in common with them.

The carriage slowed and started to turn. My hands clenched on the canvas of my rucksack; we were getting close. I moved closer to the window, mentally preparing myself for the first glimpse of the school. The whole way here and before id left id refused to look it up or even take a glance at the pictures my mother wanted to show me of it because i was still in denial about actually being sent there, and then by the time i changed my mind and actually wanted to see what i was getting into, my phone had run out of charge and i was stuck in a carriage in the middle of nowhere. All i knew was that it was large and old, really old. My mum loved history and wouldn't stop saying how she would've loved the chance to go to a school like this and see all the old architecture etc, but all i was thinking was, if i sulk for the next few months and take no interest, maybe he'll change his mind and i won't be forced to leave school and my friends and my house and my dog-

Emerging from the fog all glistening towers and high stone walls with stained glass windows, the school looked like it had been cut and pasted straight from the set of a medieval horror movie with all the mist too. The main building was shaped like a hexagon with a tower on each corner stretching up towards the open sky and a rectangular building at the front . There were also twelve out-buildings which were big enough to be houses in their own right. Chimneys from each of them let loose streams of billowing dark smoke that swirled in the low wind. Windows arched like gaping stained glass mouths edged with stone carvings of various plants. It looked like it was fighting to be seen and hated the mist and clammy air as much as I did.