The Gifted

Chalter 4

Staring at Gracie with wide eyes I started shaking my head.
"Look Lyra I know it sounds crazy, I'm sorry I though you knew!", she said with complete honesty.
"Knew what! That I'm some witch?", I stated.
"Actually witches aren't real, we're called the the gifted."
"Whatever, I'm not like you I'm normal!", I yelled at Gracie. Obviously shocked Gracie took a deep breathe. "Follow me," she said while walking out of my dorm room and into the corridor. Complying I followed her and locked the door behind me, already feeling shitty for yelling at her. As she was taller than me I had to walk slightly faster to keep up with her, but I almost felt she was doing it out of frustration. Taking many turns, we finally made it back to the stairs, taking them back down to ground level. Following her back outside she led me down to the right and past the building we were just in. As we rounded the corner I was pleasantly surprised, a large courtyard with grass and a tree in the middle filled my view. Surrounding the courtyard were multiple buildings.

"What are all these buildings?" Gracie stopped walking and turned to face me, "These building are classrooms, the mess hall, the library and the church", she said pointing to each one as she named them. "We are going to the library, I'm giving you a crash course into the gifted". Still skeptical about the whole situation I just nodded, but the small spark of interest was getting harder to ignore. After walking across the courtyard we climbed up the library steps and entered the building. Once again the buildings interior was beautiful, the high ceilings and large windows cast rays of sunshine into the library. At the front were tables and chairs, behind that stood the books stacked on shelves that reached the calling.

Passing the tables we ventured into the forest of books. Gracie made a sudden left turn towards two sofa chairs nestled into the corner. Sitting down onto one of the seats I looked up at Gracie. "Gracie, I'm really sorry for yelling at you, I'm just surprised".
It's alright, in your defense I probably would have acted similar if I were in your situation." Giving her a small smile I folded my hands in front of me. Gracie pulled out a book I hadn't realized she had been holding, "The history of the gifted", she said handing the book over to me.

After several hours of reading and asking questions what I had put together was that; the gifted is a term used to call people with powers such as telepathy, telekinesis, animal control, weather control, the ability to heal, it went on and on. Hundreds of abilities had been discovered over thousands of years. Their government was complicated and therefore I decided to skipped over it in the books. The school such as the one I was at, are all around the world, which allowed for our kind to be unknown to the the human world.

Looking up from the book I placed it on the table, "what's your gift?"
"I'm an empath," I can feel people's emotions and also alter them. Widening my eyes i sat up further in the chair. "So you know what i'm feeling now?"
"I can sense your aura so I know your basic emotions, but to get a deeper understanding I need to make physical contact." Pushing my arm out I nodded to her, understanding what it meant she took hold of my hand. Closing her eyes she took and deep breathe and sat still. A silent minute past which was broken by her abrupt letting go of my hand.

"So, what did you feel?" I questioned Gracie. Giving her time to settle back down she looked me in the yes and said, "I'm not sure, I can usually pick up people's emotions pretty quickly but yours, it was just a jumble, I couldn't focus on one thing." Pulling my hand back into my lap I was less shocked than I should have been, not knowing much about magic I just assumed there had been a mistake. Before I was able to ask anymore questions she stood up and headed back the way we came. Looking over her shoulder she moved her head in a way that suggested to follow her, standing up i did exactly that.

After leaving the library the rest of the day was spent touring the academy with Gracie and learning a bit more about her. She was born into a practicing family, therefore having magic be a part of her life from the time she could remember. Her older sister also attended this academy in the year above us, making her the youngster in the family. Once we had seen all that we could, Gracie and I headed back to our dorms, parting ways as we made our way into our own rooms. Now sitting on the couch the setting sun cast a deep orange across the dorm, looking up at the clock it was almost 5:30 pm. I remembered Gracie saying something about dinner being ready at 6:15.

Shuffling over to my bedroom closet I opted for something casual yet also light as the summers heat continued its torment into the night. Chucking on a pair of high-wasted black shorts and a striped white and black top tied at the front, I ran to the bathroom to touch up my hair. Grabbing my phone off the table a knocked sounded through the dorm.

"It's open," I stated knowing that it must be Gracie. Throwing on an old pair of converse i swung the door open. With a smile Gracie was standing their with someone standing behind her. With the resemblance between the two of them I came to the conclusion that it must be her older sister. "This is my older sister, Lucy," Gracie said confirming my previous thought. Lucy took the lead as we headed downstairs and into the mess hall. By the time we entered, the hall was already packed with talkative students and teachers. A small group waved us over, "must be their friends," I thought. As we moved closer I noticed that the group consisted of two girls and two guys. Coming to stand in front of them i felt a little self-conscious being the new one.

"Hey!" The group said in unison, eyes directed towards Lucy, Gracie and me. "Everyone this is Lyra, she's new so be nice!" Gracie proclaimed looking at one guy in particular with blonde hair and hazel/blue eyes. Smiling we all exchanged hellos as me and Gracie sat down. Turning to my right I looked up at Lucy, "Aren't you going to sit?", "no," replied Gracie, "she's gonna go hang with her "friends," she said in an unison.
"Hey be nice, they aren't all bad," Lucy rebutted, smiling at she made her way over to a large group of people take up a full row of tables.

"What was that all about?" I asked no one in particular. "That's the popular group, if you want to call it that. A bunch of kids with rich parents and powerful family members." Answered one of the girls across from me.
"Oh, okay," was all i said, not knowing much about the gifted's hierarchy. A silence hung after that as we all sat not knowing how was going to talk next. Finally Gracie broke the silence, "Anyways," she said looking at me, "Lyra this is cam," she said pointing to the blonde guy on the end. As our eyes locked he gave me a smirk and a wink, now I knew what Gracie meant before about him behaving, he was a playboy." Next she pointed to the second guy named Tom, he had black hair with stunning green eyes like me and from where i sat he was probably the tallest out of the group.

Cuddling up to Tom was a girl named Darcy (who I assumed was his girlfriend), she had beautiful long, dark, brown hair and deep blue eyes, also tall but not as tall as tom. Lastly came Bella, she was also very pretty with short blonde hair that stopped just above her shoulders with light blue eyes. Finally caught up with everyone we jumped into conversation, discussing what they had been up to, what classes I had and so on.

After we had all finished our meals I had been informed that curfew was at 8 meaning that we had half and hour till we needed to be back in our dorms. "Alright everyone, what shall we do now?" asked Cam as he leaded up against the tree in the middle of the court yard. "There really isn't much to do," Bella answered looking at the time on her phone. "Should we just call it a night?" After all agreeing we moved as a group towards the dorms. Walking up the stairs Tom and Cam left first being the boys dorms were on the first and second level. Gracie, Darcy and me stopped at level three saying our goodbyes to Bella as her dorm was on level 4.

Arriving at Gracie and I's dorms, we waved bye to Darcy. Gracie then turned to me "Wanna come in?" Thinking it over i replied with a no, "I think i should sort out what I need for my fist day of classes tomorrow." With a nod of her head Gracie gave me a quick hug and we separated into our own rooms. Suddenly realizing how tired i was i decided i would figure out everything tomorrow morning. Pulling on my pj's and giving my face a quick wash, i jumped into bed. Within seconds of my head hitting the pillow I went off into the dream world.