Shadows of Winterspell

In the moment of dawn, the song of the centauride: a full-blown horn that rolls over misted grass. The forest is new, the first reaches of sunlight barely caught in the beads of dew that hang from every leaf and every blade. The centauride is down upon her knees in the deepest glen, still dark, and she pounds her fists against the ground to wake the trees, who wake the birds, who wake the world. Morning does not come easy; it does not come free. It comes with a fight – especially in the forests where the moon and her children like to dwell.

1

‘Estelle!’

‘Yes, Nan?’ I try to sound calm, but her voice often sends a little wire of shock through me. She has a knack for catching me just when I’m doing something I know she wouldn’t approve of, like using ancient words of magic to make strawberries come in October. I pull a dishcloth over their growing red hearts and turn from the sink as she billows out through the fireplace and swirls in front of me, slowly gathering into her usual shape.

‘This house is a mess. When was the last time you dusted?’ she asks, brushing at the front of her dress. ‘The whole place needs a thorough going-over.’

‘I think it’s OK,’ I say, looking around, fingering the silver acorn at my neck. I mean, it’s a bit cluttered, and actually I really can’t remember the last time I dusted, but I don’t mind, and I’m the one living here, after all: Nan’s a ghost, and my parents are only distant memories.

Nan was the one who brought me up – with books and gardening, with forest explorations, and adventures through the trees. We spent so many days on the outskirts of the forest, watching the creatures from afar, while she told me their secret ways and warned me never to go beyond our well-trodden paths without her. We tended our orchard and played hopscotch on the crumbling patio by the back door. She made jam sandwiches and told me tricksy tales of fae children and enchanted treasures, of goblins and of the palace locked deep in Winterspell Forest, lost to all, and she taught me how to look after our home. Nan is pretty awesome, but she’s been a ghost since before I was born, and it’s hard for her to do much these days.

When I was younger, she was a little more solid; she could cook, and she could hold me. But as I got older, she got thinner, and now she mainly hovers over me, making sure I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing: keeping the herb garden going, harvesting the vegetables, making the jam with the damsons and gooseberries, feeding the chickens. Oh, and learning the old spells that keep us safe here, hidden between the realms of fae and humanity.

She says we belong with neither, not while the Shadow King reigns in Winterspell.

‘How’s the spell-work coming?’ she asks now, hovering over the kitchen table, where the books are heaped in a pile. ‘Oh, darling, you should look after these better – some of them are centuries old! Irreplaceable!’

‘I know,’ I say, shoving them to one side, away from the breakfast honey spill. ‘I am doing my best. But it’s lonely.’ There’s a long silence. Her grey eyes stare into mine, unblinking. ‘So I wondered if you’d had the chance to think about, um, if it would be OK if I . . . you know . . .’ I pull out one of the chairs and drop into it, putting my chin in my hands and staring at Nan, making my eyes as wide as they can go.

‘Oh no you don’t,’ she says with a firm shake of her head, coalescing into the chair opposite mine. ‘That trick won’t work on me, my dear. The answer is no.’

‘Please, Nan.’ My eyes start to prickle.

‘It’s just not a good idea, Stella,’ she says. ‘I’m sorry, but don’t you have enough on your plate with looking after this place and your lessons?’

She smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes – she’s afraid for me. We don’t go far from the house any more. The forest is forbidden now that she’s weaker, and we hide as much as we can from the real world too. I get it – or at least part of it. The world of magic is not a sparkly love-fest; it’s a dark, fickle wilderness. And we know that better than most. Nan’s taught me the spells to keep our house protected from the fae, and we have a whole library full of texts on fae and magic, so it is a fairly full-time job, keeping the boundary live and looking after everything else.

But I’m lonely, and I’m tired of hiding. The chores keep me busy, and books keep me company, but it isn’t enough. I need people. Friends. The feeling keeps growing, no matter what I do. And so that’s at the crux of the campaign I’ve been waging for the last few weeks. Since I’ll never be welcome in the world of the fae, I’ve decided – I need to be part of the human world. I need human friends.

I want to go to school.

2

The nights are getting longer, now that summer’s over, and tonight the moon is hiding behind stubborn clouds. The forest behind the house is thick with the ethereal light of the creatures Nan taught me about, the ones in my favourite books – centaurs and fairies, dryads and goblins, and water sprites who can curse with one flick of their tails. Brambles catch at the silver wire fence hung with charms, which divides the forest from our garden. I pluck a blackberry, checking it over closely before putting it in my mouth.

‘Shouldn’t have done that,’ says Peg, fluttering before me, his red wings a blur.

‘It was on our side . . .’ I say, savouring the sharp tang of the berry.

‘The roots aren’t. You’ll be corrupted.’

‘I’ll be fine.’

Peg sniffs. He’s an imp, and his favourite form is a small red bird with a golden beak. Whatever guise he’s in, he’s very beautiful, very vocal, and regularly very annoying. He’s a real stickler for the rules.

He’d be horrified at what I did earlier.

Because I really did it. A shiver of apprehension runs up my spine just at the thought of how I’ve disobeyed Nan. Peg peers around at me.

‘What was that? Are you poisoned?’

‘No! I was just thinking about something.’

‘Dark thoughts, ominous tidings – it’s the berry!’

‘It’s not the flipping berry! Now go and see what you can find out there . . .’

Peg is Nan’s familiar, and nowadays our watch imp; he scouts out the forest for trouble. I mean, there’s always trouble, but he’ll find out if anything’s about to start trouble here. There’s a magical boundary, just at the point where our fence divides the garden from the green marshland that leads to Winterspell, and the creatures in the forest don’t cross it, but sometimes I hear them at night, faint whispers of parties, the clamour of hooves, the high-pitched call of fierce, flying things. I’ve never managed to actually see them from so far away, no matter how many nights I’ve spent curled up on the cold windowsill, watching.

Our family ruled them all, long ago. We were the kings and queens of fae. But the Plaga came when I was two and killed my mother within a day. And my father was lost too – to illness, and to grief. With her dying breath, my mother called Nan back to the world of the living and charged her with bringing me up, safe and well. Nan saw the danger in the forest, and so we fled, and here we are, hiding from the forest, while the Shadow King’s legions grow stronger, day by day, fighting with the fae over the fate of Winterspell. We keep to our house, with all our books and wards and spells that apparently protect the rest of the human world from his creeping shadow magic.

When I was small, we ventured into the forest – under Nan’s glamour so that none of those creatures could sense us – and we searched for the palace, which is the heart of the Shadow King’s power. But we never found it. His darkness has warped the land, made it impossible to find even for us. And every time we went in there, the shadows were harder to hide from; they gathered thick about us, and the fae who fought them had to fight all the harder on those days. So we left. I could see how it upset Nan, to walk away from Winterspell and all the fae, but we only made it worse for them. We couldn’t go very far – her power, the thing that keeps her with me, is tied to the magic in the forest. So we have spent all these years hiding between the forest and the town. Nan used the last of her real magic to glamour the whole house, and us inside it – when I look in the mirror, I am human.

Only, I’m not. It’s just that her spell made a shield that disguised me. And it’s been there so long that we don’t know what I’d look like without it. Every fae is different, and sprites like us have many forms. Would I have horns? A tail? Nan has pointed ears and moon-round silver eyes, but I am a mystery. She says it doesn’t matter; that I am Stella, whatever shape I’m in. She says I can find friends in books, and that is true. And we have many, many books, so I have spent days and weeks caught up in adventures with the characters between the pages. But the longer I’m here alone, the more I crave my own adventures. My own friend.

I mean, Peg is a friend, of course. But he’s very small and a bit flighty, and he can be pretty superior. I haven’t got the courage to tell him yet what I’ve done. It’s going to be a Big Deal.

I phoned the school.

After I talked with Nan and realized she might really never let me go – and that the forest may be out of my reach for as long as I live – I really did it. I checked the perimeter, set the charms swinging, silver sparkling in the low sun all along the fence, and muttered the familiar words Nan taught me that keep the fae and the shadows of Winterspell out of our home – our sanctuary: ‘Not mediocris, nor twisting umbra-form, shall pass between these acies, for they mean domum; our domum be our sanctum, free from inimicus be.’

And then I made the call we’ve been arguing about for so long.

It wasn’t easy. First, I sprinkled salt in a circle around the kitchen table. (If Nan had come back, she’d have known I’d hidden myself from her and Peg on purpose, but I could have just told her I wanted some privacy. She wouldn’t have known what I was really doing.) Then I picked up the phone. Put it down. Picked it up again. Dialled. Cursed my shaking fingers and wondered what on earth I was going to say.

‘Broadmere Academy – how may I direct your call?’

That was as far as I usually got. I’d tried many times . . . and put the phone down. But I had already told my reflection that today was the day, and the face that looked back at me had beamed with hope and possibility.

‘Um. I’m new to the area. And . . . how do I register?’

‘Register?’

‘To come to school.’ My cheeks blazed.

‘Oh! Well, usually your parents would apply, through the usual authorities.’

‘Oh.’

Silence. And then a long sigh.

‘One of those, eh. Name?’

‘Estelle. I mean Stella. Stella Brigg.’

‘One minute . . .’ Sound of papers shuffling, a lot more sighing. ‘OK. Hold,’ the woman’s voice snapped.

The phone line crackled, there was a pipping sound. I stared at the phone. It wasn’t really going how I thought it would, so far.

‘And why are your parents not making this call?’

Well, you see, my mother died long ago from fae plague, and my father didn’t die of it, but he did not survive it whole either, so now he haunts Winterspell from his hidden palace, and all his shadows are at war with the fae.

He is the Shadow King, you see.

‘Um, it’s just my nan. She’s in the other room . . . She said I should do it to . . . teach me independence.’ I winced, crossing my fingers as I realized I should have pretended to be my mum or something. Why do I always have these thoughts too late?

‘How curious,’ the voice said after a short pause. ‘Come along in the morning, and perhaps we can sort something out. There are usually various formalities, but I suppose you’ll be coming alone? As part of this independence drive?’

‘Ye-es . . .’

‘Very well. Tomorrow – 9 a.m. sharp.’

The line went dead. So tomorrow morning, everything will change. Everything has already changed, actually; I’ve never defied Nan before.

I watch Peg flute up into the darkening sky and head back inside, where only shadows greet me. There’s a storm building in my chest. Nan appears as I pour hot water into a mug with fresh mint from the garden, but I can’t speak, can’t even meet her eye right now. She frets around me in a spiral of motion, and I wish she would sit down – a real body in a real chair. I wish she could hold me; that I could feel her paper-soft hands on mine, like I used to. Sometimes, here, my own skin aches for the touch of another human being – even just by accident. A nudge, a flick, anything.

Tomorrow, that might even happen. The storm inside me becomes a bright spark of hope. I hold my hand up in a silent goodnight as I head upstairs, and she holds hers out to meet it – except, of course, they don’t touch.

The imp is a master of disguise and can shapeshift at will. Clever, naughty, not entirely trustworthy, they are the preferred familiars of many fae for their ability to spy and their fierce loyalty.

3

It’s hard to leave in the morning. I stare at myself in the mirror for a moment, thinking of Nan’s old glamour spell and whether there are features I should be hiding, but I can’t see anything out of the ordinary: brown hair, brown eyes, round face. Me.

I huff at myself and flit down the stairs, hastily undoing charms to get out of the door and the gate, then whispering the familiar words to restore them behind me. Then I charge off down the lane on my own, for the first time, while Peg flutters and spirals over my head demanding to know what I’m doing, chirping about duties and responsibilities. He’s so panicked, it would be easier – kinder – just to forget the whole thing.

But if I do that now, it’ll never happen. I’ll just spend my whole life trapped in the house. I look back at our home, glowing pink in the early morning light, nestled between folds in the foothills that lead to Cloudfell Mountain, where all things are wild. Winterspell Forest snakes from the moorland that borders our garden and makes a broad swathe around the mountain, and even from here, I can see the sparks and the sweeping shadows that mean something in there is having a good old fight.

‘Stella, please!’ Peg says, fluttering next to my right ear as the lane gets wider. ‘Where are you going? Please stay! What will I say when Nan asks after you? What about the spiders?’

‘You can just tell her the truth.’ I sigh. ‘I’ve gone to school. She’ll work it out anyway. And I’m not going to stay just because you’re weird about spiders. I don’t know why you’re so scared of them.’

‘They’re itchy,’ he says darkly. ‘And they don’t follow the rules. They shouldn’t be able to get into the house at all with all your wards set. And you won’t be here to get rid of them! You’ll be at this school of yours.’ He flies faster so that he’s in front of me, a blur of indignation. ‘I can’t believe you’re doing this, after all those discussions – all those times she said no! What if you don’t come back, Stella? What if it swallows you up, and you never come home?’

‘I will come home, lovely Peg,’ I say, holding up my hands and cupping them around his tiny warm hum. ‘I promise.’ Dark eyes stare into mine and see everything in an instant; there is no hiding from Peg. ‘Do you see?’

‘I see you give your promise honestly,’ he says, breaking away from me with a huff. ‘Can’t account for chance, though!’ he calls back, heading back towards the house.

I adjust my bag on my shoulder and turn my back on home, heading towards the river path and the town that creeps up slowly from isolated old houses to small redbrick terraces, to the main roads of towering grey.

I’ve never done it without Nan, and we haven’t done it for so long. It feels colder and stranger now, and the pedestrians I pass all have their heads down, swaddled in scarves and hats. It’s still early, and the sky is misty with fine rain. I pull up my hood. Soon, I’ll be at school. And the other kids will notice I’m new, and I’ll have to smile and talk and be human, and I really, really wanted that – but right now, it’s a fizzy kind of terror that makes my feet go faster, over cracked roads and past a noisy construction site where vast yellow machines dig their teeth into the cold, dark earth.

I keep to the shadows as I cross the town streets, my head down, feet quiet on the slippery pavements. Cars swoosh by through the puddles, and the bakery on the high street is already open, its blue sign gleaming. The smell draws me in, and before I know it, I’m standing in the doorway, wishing I’d brought some money with me. I ate porridge and packed my lunch this morning, but it’s just a yellow pear, a carrot and a piece of cured sausage, and suddenly I’d do pretty much anything for a hot pasty, or one of the raisin-studded buns on the shining glass counter.

A couple of men brush past me on their way out, clutching paper bags. They don’t appear to register me, but the woman behind the counter stares, her brow furrowed.

‘Sorry,’ I say, taking a step back. We don’t shop here. I shouldn’t have stopped. I shouldn’t be here at all. I should go home now. Feed the chickens, because Peg will probably forget, and curl up with a book by the fire. Why would anyone want anything else?

‘Hang on,’ says the tall fair-haired woman. ‘What did you fancy, lovely?’

‘Oh, nothing . . . I, um. It smelt good.’ I force a smile. ‘I’m just . . . heading for school. It’s my first day.’ I clench my fists in my pockets. It is my first day. I am doing this.

‘Ah,’ she says. ‘A bit of nerves, then. I thought you looked worried. You’ll be fine. They get all sorts at that school – some real characters . . . You don’t need to worry.’

‘Thank you,’ I manage. ‘I should go.’

‘Wait a minute,’ she says, drawing my eyes up. There’s a sparkle in her blue eyes that makes me wonder, just for a second, if she has a little magic. Some people do. A bit of fae blood, passed through generations, or an affinity with the words in books of magic. The closer you are to fae, the more you open your eyes to it and the more you can do. That’s what Nan says, anyway. ‘You can have a teacake, if you’d like.’

‘Oh, but I didn’t bring any money,’ I stammer.

‘That’s why I didn’t say buy, my dear,’ she says, shaking her head. She reaches out and plucks one of the buns from the top of the pile on the counter. ‘Call it a first-day treat; you look like you could use one. Horrible out there today, and that forest was fair howling last night.’ She shivers. ‘I think I’ll have one too, come to that. I’ll toast it for you. Butter?’

‘Um. Yes, please.’

She cuts two of the buns in half and slides the pieces into a gleaming toaster. Then she thrusts her hands into massive oven mitts and turns to rearrange the trays of pastries in the oven on the back wall. I watch her, shuffling my feet and hoping it won’t make me late. When the toaster pops, I jump half out of my skin. She shakes her head at me with a little smile, removing the mitts and buttering the teacakes with a practised hand.

‘Here,’ she says, putting mine into a paper bag and handing it to me. Her eyes sparkle again as she takes a bite of her own. ‘That’ll get you warmed up. Have a good day, lovely.’

‘Thank you,’ I say, past a little lump in my throat.

She nods, and I back out of the shop, clutching the bag between my cold hands. I hold it like that for a couple of streets, and only when the school looms into view do I take my first bite. I can’t believe I’m actually here. The teacake tastes as good as it looks, and it soothes me while I loiter on the edge of the pavement, getting up the courage to make the next move.

4

The school is a rambling collection of redbrick buildings that rears up on the east of the village, behind a complicated road junction of traffic lights and underground tunnels. The River Bat, which starts in the mountains behind our house, has grown wide here, and it rushes past, caught behind the concrete wall that leads to a squat bridge.

It took me a while to cross the road – I didn’t know which way to go, and the pedestrian tunnel was dark and damp. It’s a relief to be out of it now and in the right place, staring up at the sprawling jagged skyline and the huge old brass bell that swings in the tower over the main school building. I shiver as the sun disappears behind it.

BROADMERE ACADEMY reads the shining green sign on the metal gate. There are points on the ends of all the letters, like spearheads. I smooth down my good dress – a faded dusky-blue one that Nan made for me to grow into – and retie my boots. It’s suddenly quiet, all the noise of the town behind me, and I have no idea what I’m about to get myself into. From out here, I can’t see anybody. No students on the steps; no movement in the windows. Nobody loitering out here like me.

I take a big breath, push open the gate, and head up the steps.

The wide glass doors open automatically as I loiter outside them, looking at my own reflection. My heart is tripping; my fingertips numb. I take a breath and step into a small lobby. There’s a silver box on the wall and a button that says PRESS FOR ATTENTION, so I swallow hard and press it.

There’s a long silence. I stare at the silver box, wondering whether to press the button again, and then there’s a buzzing noise and a woman’s voice breaks out, making me jump.

‘Yes?’ it demands.

‘Uh, my name is Stella Brigg. I called yesterday . . .’

‘Come in,’ says the voice.

There’s another buzz, and the door opens out into a bright reception area with a ridged navy carpet and a long, pale wooden counter. A tiny woman with short curly hair and a sharp chin sits behind it on a stool, peering at me.

‘So you’re our trial student,’ she says with a thin smile. ‘Welcome to Broadmere. I am Mrs Edge.’

‘Hi.’ I manage a smile, sidling up to the counter. On the ledge behind it is a computer, a phone, a tray of papers and a huge silver spike.

‘What papers do you have?’ Mrs Edge asks.

‘Uh, none. Sorry . . .’

‘Ah, one of those,’ she says, tilting her head with a small frown. ‘And you’re all alone in the world? No parents?’

‘They, um . . . They died when I was small. But I do have my nan.’ I don’t mention that she’s a ghost. ‘She’s . . . housebound.’

‘I see. Well, I’m sure you’ll find yourself in good company here. Sign here.’ Mrs Edge thrusts a clipboard at me, tapping at the bottom of a heavily typed page, where there’s a dotted line. ‘I take it you’re from the forest. You can write?’

‘Yes.’

The reference to the forest unsettles me, and I don’t quite know what she means by one of those, but it doesn’t matter, because I can hardly concentrate on anything she’s saying. I try to read the page before me, but my heart is thumping so hard, it’s difficult to see straight. I catch the words behaviour and discipline but not much else.

This isn’t how I thought a school would be. It doesn’t seem like the ones in books, where there are corridors full of kids, and fish fingers for lunch, and kindly librarians. Maybe there will be once I’m through this bit, I reassure myself. There’s a pen caught in the clip at the top of the page. My hand shakes, and the snap as I pull it out makes me jump.

I wanted to come to school, I remind myself. This is the school, and I’m here now. I take a deep breath and finish the signature, handing the clipboard back to Mrs Edge. Her eyes flick from me to the page, and then she whips the paper off the board and thrusts it on to the gleaming silver spike. I flinch.

‘Wait over there,’ she says, indicating a row of plastic chairs along the wall next to a wide door with little green wire hexagons in the glass. ‘I’ll get somebody to show you to your first class.’

‘I didn’t see anybody outside,’ I venture. ‘Are the other students already here?’

‘The school day begins at 8.40 a.m. sharp,’ she says. ‘So they are already in their classes. There will be plenty of bustle to come, don’t worry about that!’

‘OK.’

I settle back into the chair, clutching my bag on my lap. My calf muscles twitch with the urge to run out of here, so I shift in the seat, screwing myself more firmly into it. Mrs Edge gets a brass call bell out of the top drawer, sets it on to the counter, and then slams her hand down on to it twice, two clear notes sounding out. She returns the bell to the drawer and folds her hands upon the counter, staring at the door.

Who would have heard that, through the door and the whitewashed walls?

Just a moment later, though, a slender boy with longish chestnut hair opens the door.

‘Yanny,’ she says, looking him up and down.

He is a bit scruffy. And a bit . . . something. He catches me staring and gives me a glittering smile.

‘This is Stella. She is here with us for a trial period, while we sort out paperwork. Could you take her up to your form room and introduce her to Miss Olive, please?’

‘Yes, Mrs Edge.’

Yanny stares at me while I unpeel myself from the plastic seat, picking up my bag with numb fingers. He indicates for me to go before him, and the door slams behind us, the sound echoing through a wide hallway with a polished wood floor. There’s a staircase leading down on the left, and another leading up past a row of windows on the right. The sun blazes in over a green sports field, where a group of kids are playing what looks like hockey.

I stare at them. I didn’t bring any sports clothes with me – I’m not sure I even own any. There’s so much I have never thought of. So much I’d never imagined, even with all the books on schools I’ve read. My stomach is churning with nerves, and my head thuds with the beat of my heart, but there’s also a little glow wickering deep within me, because I really did it – I got this far.

Let the adventures begin, says a little voice inside my head, and I hold on to it, even as Yanny leads me through a maze of white-walled corridors.

This is school. This is normal. This is what I wanted.

5

I don’t know about normal schools, but I don’t think this is one.

Here, there is a great staircase that shimmers like a trick and leads up to an old, ornate wooden door. Silver charms hang from the sweeping curved banister that remind me very much of the ones I set at home.

How can that be? Am I imagining it? Is it the berry Peg warned me about yesterday, making me see things? I train my eyes on Yanny and ignore the staircase, focusing on everything else that’s going on around us. So much buzz and noise and heat and tripping down steps and through corridor after corridor, it’s a relief when finally we stop in the doorway to a classroom where the sun streams through wide glass windows, and bags and coats are flung about like autumn leaves.

What was that staircase? Did I really see it?

‘What do those stairs lead to?’ I ask in a whisper as I follow Yanny into the room, trying to sort of hide behind him. The room is warm, and my coat itches, and there are at least two dozen other kids in here, most of whom are chatting in low tones while a woman with grey-streaked hair glowers at a computer screen.

‘What?’

‘That weird staircase, with all the charms.’

‘Charms?’ He frowns. ‘I’m not sure which staircase you mean. Probably just more classrooms.’

But now he’s staring at me, and his eyes are just a little too wild. That staircase is definitely hiding something. Can there be magic here, at the school? This nice, ordinary school, which I came to because I wanted to know what it was like to be truly human, in a truly human world? Nan’s told me that some humans have an affinity for magic, but surely not to the extent that they’d hang charms? Why would they even need them? Unless there are fae here?

Why would there be fae in school? The very idea is laughable.

Yanny lifts his brows. ‘You OK?’

‘Yep. Sorry. Fine!’

‘Miss Olive, this is the new girl, Stella.’

His voice seems to boom, and all of the easy conversation stops as everyone looks at us. At me.

‘Good morning, Stella.’ The teacher looks up from her screen and smiles, standing. ‘8E! This is Stella . . . ?’ She looks over at me.

‘Brigg,’ I whisper, my skin prickling as I look around at all the curious faces.

‘Stella Brigg,’ she announces. ‘I’m sure you all remember your first day, so I expect you to be welcoming!’ She turns back to me. ‘Take a seat with Yanny; he’ll see you through. I’ll print out your timetable now, once I can get the thing working . . .’

‘Thank you,’ I whisper, darting with Yanny to a table at the back of the room, my face burning under all the intense stares.

‘Sure you’re OK?’ Yanny asks, staring even harder while I try to get my coat off. It’s become some sort of woolly mammoth and wants to smother me entirely.

‘Yes,’ I say, finally yanking it off my arms and letting it fall in a heap on the floor behind me. Some of the kids are still looking. I take a deep breath and hook my ankles around the chair legs, fixing my eyes on the table. Slowly the room settles, until it’s just Yanny peering at me.

‘I’m fine,’ I say.

He’s still staring.

‘What?’

‘Nothing,’ he says. ‘Nothing at all. Welcome to Broadmere.’

His smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but my heart lifts a little anyway because here I am, in my first ever classroom.

After a while, Miss Olive hands me a timetable, which is a grid that seems to have been written in code, and then a bell starts clanging, and everyone rushes out.

‘Where are we going?’ I ask Yanny.

‘Lessons!’ he says. ‘Let me see . . .’ He looks at my timetable. ‘You’re with me for science – come on.’

I follow him gratefully, through the clatter of bodies that yesterday I craved so much. I had no idea how loud they would be, or how close. I get jostled and bumped and nearly go flying down the stairs, but somehow, keeping Yanny in sight, I make it in one piece to science.

The teacher, Mr Hocking, hands me a thin blue-covered book and barks my name to the class, before starting his lesson on force and trajectories. I clutch the book and squeeze in next to Yanny, barely noticing anything else about the class in my rush to get rid of my coat and find my pencil.

It’s a heads-down kind of lesson. Mr Hocking has sharp blue eyes and an even sharper tongue, so there’s no talking. I look over at what Yanny’s doing, and he indicates the massive text book between us.

‘That one,’ he whispers, pointing to a triangular diagram.

I have no clue what any of the writing means, but I copy it all down anyway, and then Mr Hocking draws a simplified version up on the big board and begins to go through it all.

It’s a huge relief when the lesson is over, I’m not sure I like Mr Hocking, but when I turn to Yanny to find out where we’re going next, he looks hassled.

‘Uh, right,’ he says, glancing at my timetable. ‘I’m going in the other direction. You have maths . . . Zara, don’t you have maths next too?’ He turns to the girl next to him, who nods.

‘Mr Goodenough?’

I look down at the timetable. The piece of paper is crumpled already, and I don’t even know which bit to look at.

‘Here,’ she says, tracing her finger down one of the columns. ‘M8, Mr G. You’re with me. Come on.’

I look up to thank Yanny, but he’s already gone.

‘Oh, he does that,’ Zara says. ‘He’s nice enough, but not what you’d call steadfast. He’s gone off to have one of his special lessons . . .’

‘Special lessons?’

Does she mean magic lessons? Is he going up that weird, magical-looking staircase? I squint after him, but he’s disappeared already.

It can’t be that.

‘Honour-student thing,’ she says. ‘No such luck for us.’

I’m a little bit in awe of Zara. She fills the space with her words and just her general presence. She’s a head taller than me, her dark hair spools down to her waist, and her eyes are honey gold, narrowing as she gives me a quick, appraising glance.

‘So, where’ve you come from?’ she demands, swinging out into the corridor, scattering smaller kids and bowling through them.

I hurry after her, hunching my shoulders, making myself small. ‘Um. Just home.’

‘Home?’ She turns and arches one eyebrow. ‘What, like home-schooled? Wow. This must be a bit of a change for you, then.’

‘I wanted to come to school.’

‘Well, you chose a weird one,’ she says. ‘I only started last term myself, and there are lots of things going on that I haven’t worked out yet. Including Yanny and his secret lessons. Come on.’

She sweeps off into a classroom and sits at the back of the class, which is a relief, because it turns out being the new girl is a bit of a challenge when you’re used to being in your house alone with a very small imp and a ghost nan. There are just so many people. So many warm bodies, rushing and nudging and staring and whispering.

Zara has a lot of stationery. She pulls it out of a huge fluffy pencil case and lines it up on the table. Biros, highlighters, sparkling pencils, and a huge blue rubber that says For Big Mistakes, which makes me smile.

I get out my old striped pencil, scratched and scored after a run-in with Peg, and the folding wooden ruler I found in the study. Zara looks at them and then at me. And then with a tiny sigh, she carefully pushes all her stuff over so that it’s in the middle of the table.

‘Help yourself,’ she whispers, as a man with white hair in the shape of a candle flame walks in and perches on the edge of the table at the front of the class, pink socks winking between trousers and shoes.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper.

She smiles, as yellow exercise books are handed out from the box at the front of the class. The teacher looks at me with a frown.

‘You must be Stella.’

‘Yes.’

‘Welcome,’ he says, as the rest of the class stills to listen. His voice is round and shiny as a new conker. ‘I’m Mr Goodenough.’ A shiver of energy rushes through the room. He walks over to Zara and me, a yellow book in his hand. ‘Here you go.’ His eyes glint as he stares at me, handing over the exercise book before striding back to the board at the front of the class. ‘Division!’ he says, picking up a pen.

Zara copies a complicated sequence of numbers and symbols into her book with great care and a number of different pens, so I follow her lead.

The cafeteria is even busier than the rest of the school and full of noise. There’s a lot of laughter, and talk, and charging about with trays and bags and coats. I sit with Zara at a table beneath the window, and she gets out a plastic box with lots of different compartments. There are grapes, small wedges of flatbread called barbari, a little pot of yogurt-and-cucumber dip, a packet of very thin crackers, called crisps, and a wrapped chocolate biscuit.

I get out my pear and my old bit of sausage, feeling a bit embarrassed. Zara looks over and purses her lips.

‘Do you live in Winterspell Forest?’ she asks.

‘No,’ I whisper. ‘My house is quite close by, but not actually in the forest.’

She looks like she’s going to say more, but then Yanny careers into the cafeteria and swooshes through all the other kids to land with a clatter and a grin at our table.

‘How’s day one going?’ he asks, sliding into the chair opposite us. He pulls a battered tin out of his bag and opens it. Tiny golden pastries nestle in waxed paper along with a shiny red apple and a wedge of dark, sticky-looking cake.

‘Yanny has the most ridiculous lunches.’ Zara sighs. ‘But he is very good at sharing.’ She gestures to her own box, and Yanny takes some of the crackers, shoving his tin towards us.

‘Help yourself,’ he says with a smile. There’s a pull in the air when he does it, which makes the world darken for just a second. My chest aches. And then it’s gone, and the buzz of the cafeteria returns.

But it was there for a moment; I’m sure I didn’t imagine it. Magic. Forest magic, dark and alluring. How can that be? He’s human. Isn’t he? I stare at him, and he stares back, and Zara reaches over and takes one of the pastries, putting it whole in her mouth.

‘Mmph,’ she says, closing her eyes. ‘So good . . .’

‘I don’t have much to share,’ I say, looking down at my meagre spread. I wish I’d thought to bring more. I could have made a cake . . . or brought some of the good cheese.

Zara shakes her head and charges off, returning quickly with a knife. She smooths out my paper bag and lays everything out, sausage and pear neatly divided. The pastries collapse into layers of buttery goodness in my mouth, and Zara’s salty crisps are delicious, too. The pear from our orchard is smooth and tastes of summer. One of Nan’s favourite stories is the one where her human grandfather built our home and planted the orchard, and of how he’d trade with the creatures in Winterspell Forest: golden pears for the rich, dark berries that made his favourite wine.

Of course, that was before he met the fae queen and became a part of their world. Long before even Nan was born, and an age before the Shadow King – my father – began to destroy all the goodness there . . .

I stare at Yanny. His food tastes incredible, but the way it dissolves makes me wonder if there’s magic in it. If he lives in Winterspell, he must know all of its secrets. He doesn’t look much like a fae warrior to me. Especially not with pear juice all over his chin.

‘So,’ begins Zara, scrunching up the crumb-festooned bag and throwing it with an expert flick of her wrist into the nearest bin. ‘Are you going to tell Stella about your secret lessons?’ She grins as she says it, but there’s an edge to her voice, and Yanny’s dark eyes glint.

‘They’re not secret,’ he says. ‘Just extra languages – that sort of thing.’

I think it’s meant to fend me off, but it doesn’t, because a lot of magic is about language. Many spells are written in Latin or Ancient Elvish, and there are books full of Greek and Norse in our library. One of Nan’s favourite lectures is about the study of language being the most powerful there is.

‘I like languages,’ I say. ‘Who’s your teacher?’

‘Miss Capaldi,’ he says. He closes his lunch tin and shoves it back in his bag, just as the bell rings. ‘Come on. We have art together.’

‘If you find out,’ hisses Zara as we head off through the corridors in his wake, ‘you will tell me, right? I’ve been trying to get it out of him for weeks, but he’s immune to my questions. You already have him rattled. Maybe he can see you’re on to him. Are you on to him? Do you know what’s going on?’

‘No idea!’ I manage. And it’s true, but this whole thing is disconcerting. If Yanny is a creature from the forest, if there’s some kind of magic going on up there, I can’t share that with her. The fae and the human worlds don’t mix. Or at least, I didn’t think they did. Here, anything seems possible, and it’s not what I wanted on my first day. I wanted a normal school, not one with magic on the top floor, and secrets that seem to make awkward spaces between friends.

Even as I think it, I smile. Because however complicated today might have been, it’s been a day. A day of school. Of lessons, and lunch, and new friends who talk and share, even though they hardly know me at all.

No matter what Nan might say, I know I won’t regret that.

6

Nan is furious. I round the corner to our house, and she is billowing out of the chimney in a great dark cloud of worry and fear. All the lines I’ve been rehearsing, the stories I’ve held in my head to tell her, vanish completely. I loiter, walking slowly down the lane. I need time to work out how to talk my way around her, and my mind is still working through everything that happened today.

It was chaos. Loud, and hot and completely bewildering. I hardly remembered to breathe for much of it, and I still don’t know anything about any of the lessons, or how to read the flipping timetable. The smells and the sounds still clamour in my mind, and that fizzing feeling of nervous excitement I had this morning is still there in the pit of my belly.

But.

I grin. It was fun. And I made friends.

Peg darts up to me as I bend down to pick up an acorn, searching through dried amber leaves for its cup.

‘Well, I hope it was worth it,’ he says, whirring about my head.

I sigh and plonk myself on to the ground, cross-legged, catching him in my hands and holding him up to eye level. He blinks. His presence is so small, and yet it fills me up. He’s been with me for as long as I can remember; there is no part of my life that he couldn’t sing.

Except today.

‘Peg, I think it was,’ I say through a sudden lump in my throat. ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry that it upset Nan, and if it caused trouble for you, but I wouldn’t change it. I won’t change it!’

‘You’ll go back?’ He tilts his head.

‘Tomorrow.’ I look at the dark earth, packed and dry beneath the leaves. Peg flutters to my knee as I start my search once more. ‘And all the days after that.’

‘Every day?’

‘Not weekends. Just Monday to Friday. Nan will get used to it,’ I say, finding the pitted acorn cup and holding it up with a grin. It’s bigger than the silver one around my neck, but even so . . . they’re such small things that the great oaks grow from. ‘She will, Peg. She loves me. She’ll see that it makes me happy . . .’

Funny how such a tiny creature can make such a sound of deep disapproval. Peg manages it, and then he launches off and away into the forest.

He keeps secrets. All the time, off in the forest, and he’ll never tell me anything about what’s really in there. I want to hear news of the centaurides and the sprites, and the mirror lake where golden fish speak bewitching tales to unsuspecting passers-by, just as they do in all Nan’s best stories. I want to know of the shadows, of my father. But all Peg ever says is that the forest is fair, and frightful wild besides.

I tuck the acorn into the earth by the side of the path with a little wish, touching my own silver acorn and hearing Nan’s voice, years ago, on one of the days I yearned for more. ‘It is here,’ she’d said, reaching out and touching it with pale fingers. ‘It is not whole, and it is not the shape we may have hoped for, but there is family here, and if you hold it tight, Stella, you cannot lose it. It will grow . . .’

‘I said no!’ Nan howls when I finally gather up the courage to walk through the back door. She’s writhing around the kitchen table, clasping her mist-thin hands together.

I dump my bag and lean up against the table.

‘How could you, Stella? After all these years of you and me, all the trust, all the lessons . . . How could you just abandon it all?’

‘I haven’t! I can still do lessons here. You can’t just keep me locked up forever. What happens when I’m older? Did you even think of what would happen when I grew up? Am I supposed to live my whole life here alone?’

‘Of course not,’ she snaps, coalescing into her true shape. Nan shape. She reaches out to me, and I feel the chill of her touch, see the regret on her face when it makes me flinch. ‘I wanted to keep you . . . keep you safe for a while longer. That’s all.’

‘I am safe,’ I tell her. ‘There are hundreds of kids there. It’s a normal school!’ I push away the thoughts of magic and secret lessons. ‘I did maths, and English, and PE, and I shared my lunch with some of my classmates. How can that be wrong?’

‘It is wrong if you go against the wishes of your family. I am not holding you to others’ standards – I am holding you to ours! We are the keepers of this house, the only ones who stand between the shadow forest and the human world. The time will come when that will mean everything. Isn’t that enough excitement for you?’

‘It isn’t exciting! It’s silver wire and books and rules and old, musty things that aren’t even alive any more!’

‘Well, I hope that’s not me you’re referring to,’ she mutters after a shocked silence.

Peg is being a small golden lizard. He stares down at us from the wooden beam where copper spoons hang, catching the firelight, and I feel horrible. Like I turned myself inside out, and they can both see all the messy bits that are normally hidden within.

‘What do you mean by the time will come, anyway?’ I ask after a while.

‘The forest grows, and so does your father’s darkness,’ she says. ‘His shadows seek to swallow the world whole. One day, you will be the one who stands in his way.’

‘Me?’

‘Of course you!’

‘We can’t even get into the forest, Nan. We have no idea where his palace is any more, or even if he’s still there!’

‘Legend says you will face him – I’ve told you so before. When you are grown. This house and all the magic we have gathered here is headed for that day.’

‘Well I’m not doing it. I don’t know how to face him. I don’t even know what I’d be facing! Besides, every time we’ve tried to get close, all we’ve done is make it worse. I need to have more than just legends, Nan.’

‘Just legends,’ she splutters. ‘All the world is made of legends!’

‘No! It’s made of people!’ I shout. ‘I need this. I can keep our barriers strong. I can study and make the house safe. I will be here when the time comes. But I need to have this too.’

‘It’s a bad idea,’ she says.

‘Can you stop me?’ I demand.

‘Well. I could lock up the house so you can’t get out . . .’ Her eyes gleam.

‘I could unlock it.’

‘With magic?’

‘I do know a spell or two.’

‘I should think you do! I’ve been teaching you for long enough. And you’ve been reading the books, no?’

‘Of course I’ve been reading the books. The books are all I’ve had for years!’ I fling myself into the old armchair by the fire, and she floats to hers opposite.

‘And your old nan,’ she says with a growl in her throat.

‘And you . . . and Peg. But you’re not . . . You’re not people, Nan!’

‘People.’ She sniffs. ‘I think I’d take a ghost or an imp any day, over people.’

‘I do. I have. But I really want to at least know some people before I decide they’re all rubbish.’

She sighs, and a ravel of her essence puffs out like smoke.

‘Perhaps it will be a relief, not to have you trailing around like a lost cloud,’ she concedes after a moment.

My heart leaps, and I grin, dancing my feet on the floor.

‘A trial period,’ she says, raising a finger. ‘And you must tell me everything.’

So I do. I tell her about the lessons, and how the corridors fill with charging crowds and flapping bags. I don’t tell her about Yanny, or the magic I felt in him, or about the hidden corridors. I don’t really know anything about them, anyway.

‘And there’s a lot of stationery,’ I finish. ‘And . . . good lunches.’

‘I didn’t go to school,’ she says. ‘We had a tutor, my brother and I.’ She folds her arms. ‘What’s this about good lunches? We don’t have good lunches here? Cheese from the cellar and sweet apples? Bread from Mrs Mandrake?’

Mrs Mandrake delivers food every Saturday morning. It’s a standing order Nan has, and she’s paid up to infinity, she always told me. The bread Mrs Mandrake makes herself, and there’s milk and golden butter from her cows. Sometimes, there is elderberry cordial; sometimes, she’ll bring cake. She stays and drinks tea and looks out of the window towards the forest and talks about when she was a girl and she discovered the fae magic in Winterspell, and Nan rescued her from the lake where the mer-fae like to sing. Nan loves to see her; she puts so much energy into being here when she visits that I barely see her on Sundays.

‘They had crisps.’

‘Well, you have brown potatoes and Mrs Mandrake’s salty butter. And you have a whole house of wonder. You don’t need crisps. Or special stationery. What is special stationery?’

‘Bright-coloured rubbers, scented pens, sparkly things . . .’

‘Oh the world does love a sparkly thing,’ she says darkly. ‘Until they see what lies beneath.’

‘What?’

‘We can ask Mrs Mandrake to bring you supplies if you need them,’ she says then. ‘I want happiness for you, Stella. I just didn’t think it would take this route.’ She exchanges a look with Peg and shakes her head. ‘Humans. Let’s hope they’re as good as you think they can be.’

‘Your grandfather was human, and he wasn’t so bad, was he?’

‘Hmph.’ She folds her arms. ‘Make a list of all these stuffins you think you need. And then chores. And an omelette for tea, with some of those lovely brown potatoes . . .’ Her voice drifts as her body pales into nothing. She doesn’t stay as long as she once did, back when I was smaller. She isn’t so solid. She’s wearing out.

One day, maybe she won’t come back at all.

I swallow hard and pull an old notebook towards me and start my list, and I think about tomorrow, and Mrs Mandrake’s visit on Saturday, and I fill my mind, and I pack my heart with all the sparkly things I can imagine, and Peg flutters about me, warm and full of song.

That night, the chores are easier. The chickens – Onion, Basil and Salt – seem pleased to see me; the carrots come out of the loose earth without a fight; and the silver wire that holds the boundary between our garden and the edge of the forest is a bright moonlit line, hung with charms and tatters of spells from generations past. I can touch them when I’m here. My parents, my grandparents, the reality they left behind. Paper they wrote on, folded and tucked into glass baubles, enchanted copper bells and tiny vials of blood and thistle-down, all collected by Nan and used to hide our house from the fae and the shadows that live in Winterspell.

I trail my fingers through it all and let my mind fill with who they were. My mother, the artist; my father, the mechanic. Fleeting images of them appear in my mind as I touch the essence they left behind: moving scenes of laughter and tears and dancing between endlessly tall trees. Splashing through the river, the drift of snowfall. Snatches of their lives before the Plaga, caught in tiny glass jars. My father had a plaited beard with copper strands that fell to his waist. My mother had pale hair that flew out like a starburst around her head.

‘I went to school today,’ I tell the moon, hoping that somehow my mother will know it. I recall my day, as if she can see straight back into me from wherever she is. Yanny, and Zara, and chaos and crisps.

‘You won’t leave for good?’ asks Peg in a tiny voice, fluttering over the wire and making it hum.

‘No, of course not. This is home.’

‘Good.’ He stares at me. ‘Don’t you forget that. I’ll keep it safe while you’re gone – but you must always come back, Stella.’

‘For the day I’m grown?’ I sigh.

‘For me!’

I hold out my hand, and he curls in my palm, a golden lizard once more, and we go back in together. Then he and Nan boss me about the kitchen until I’ve cooked a pretty good omelette and just-soft potatoes, and I light a candle on the table and crank up the radio, and Nan tells one of her old stories about the centaur who fell in love with his reflection and was only saved from drowning by the silver birch who threw her seeds into the water to break the spell. The scrape of cutlery is only mine, and it is only me who can clear up afterwards, but right now, it doesn’t feel so lonely. It feels like home.

That night I don’t stay up staring across the field towards Winterspell. I don’t sit on the windowsill while shadows dance between the trees, wondering about the fate of the fae in there, or what my bitter, broken-hearted father is doing. I close the curtains with a shiver and think about tomorrow.

But my dreams are tangled things of forests that grow thick along school corridors, and strange creatures chasing me down endless staircases, and in the morning, while I gather pears and cheese, and I butter the last of Mrs Mandrake’s soft, dark crusted bread, the anticipation of the day sends fizzles through my veins. And there’s something else. A little fear. What is Yanny hiding, with his special lessons and the way he makes the air change? Could he really be fae?

No matter, I tell myself. Whatever he is, I’m not about to miss out on school, after all this, and now that I’ve got Nan’s blessing. I dart through the door before she can take it back, and let myself be soothed by the reflection of the yellow sky in the slow-moving river, the mist still clinging to the moorland that bounds the forest, the weight of my bag on my back, the acorn around my neck that means family.

I’ve got everything I need.

Nothing I can’t handle.

7

Zara is waiting for me at the gate, the only still point amid the mass of kids’ bodies streaming through the vast wrought-iron gates. A little rush of joy squirrels through me as she raises one hand in a wave. As if I wouldn’t notice her. As if I wouldn’t stop.

‘OK?’ she asks, as I get close. ‘It’s nice that you’re punctual. Normally I wait for Yanny, but he’s always late, and I really hate being late.’

‘Should we wait for him, then?’

‘No – he doesn’t like it much. I can’t help telling him he’s late, and he already knows he is, so it’s not the best start to the day. Let’s go in, and he can sort himself out.’

It’s funny to think she doesn’t like going in on her own. She seems so confident; she glows with a kind of ready-for-anything energy.

‘Are we in the same form room? I didn’t see you there yesterday . . .’

‘Oh, I think you must’ve come in late, I was running an errand for Miss Olive. She has trouble with printers. So, about Winterspell,’ she says, as we head in, her voice low. ‘Do you live there? What can you tell me?’

My heart thuds. Why do all things lead back to Winterspell?

‘Uh, I don’t know. Like what?’

‘I wanted to go for a bit of an explore in there, but my mum says it’s forbidden – something about pollution in the water and ancient trees that fall without warning. And the kids at school say it’s haunted. Which can’t be true?’

She stares at me as we head up the steps to our form room. Unblinking owl eyes.

Can you start a friendship with lies?

No.

‘Ah, I don’t know about haunted, exactly,’ I say. ‘But my nan says we should avoid it.’

‘Even though you live so close?’

I hold in a sigh. She’s not going to give up so easily, but it’s the last thing I need this morning. My worlds are getting tangled already; with every step I take towards humanity, Winterspell creeps further in.

‘We used to go in there sometimes,’ I say, ‘but it’s creepy, and it’s got worse. Strange noises at night; weird lights flashing between the trees.’

It was supposed to be a little bit of truth to put her off, but now her eyes are glowing. ‘Really? Wow. I do believe in ghouls, you know. My Mamani has some very creepy stories about them. And if you were a dark spirit like they are, then an old forest like Winterspell would be the perfect place to hide . . . I’m not sure I’d want to be there, but everyone’s different. Mum says it’s the pollution that makes the mist rise when the sun sets, but I don’t know. And Yanny won’t tell me anything.’

‘He lives in there?’ I ask, my voice thin at the thought of the dark spirit who does hang out in Winterspell, somewhere. My father, who does not love strongly enough to find his way through.

‘Well, I think he does. He gets very strange about it when I ask him.’

‘Where do you live?’ I ask, taking my coat off as we find seats in the form room.

‘In town,’ she says. ‘It’s OK. I didn’t really want to move, but Mum got a new job, and so . . . here we are.’ She stares out of the window. ‘We lived in the city before; it feels quiet here. Everything’s a bit strange. Mum says it’s just because it’s new, but I don’t know. I think it’s genuinely weird.’

I grin as Miss Olive starts reading out the register. ‘It’s definitely weird.’

‘Zara Nassar?’

‘HERE!’ she shouts in reply to Miss Olive, before lowering her voice again. ‘I don’t know why Yanny won’t talk about it.’

‘Maybe it’s not weird to him. If he lives there.’

‘I s’pose.’ She sighs. ‘But there are definitely secrets in that forest, and up that weird staircase.’ Her face grows serious, and she plays with the cuff of her jumper. ‘I do not like secrets, Stella.’

‘Here,’ I say, raising my hand as Miss Olive gets to my name. I look back at Zara. ‘But doesn’t everybody have secrets?’

‘You talk far too much sense for this time on a Friday morning,’ she says. ‘Everybody might have them, but that doesn’t mean they should!’

Just then, Yanny rushes into the form room. Miss Olive glowers at him, and he gives her a smile that I swear radiates straight to her. She checks his name off her list with a gentle shake of her head, and then the bell rings, and we all pick up our stuff and head out again, catching him in the tide and swirling back out into the corridor.

‘G’morning,’ he says, untangling himself from the knot of kids heading in one direction, to come with us towards science. ‘Missed you at the gate, Zara.’

‘No you didn’t.’

‘I don’t know how it happens,’ he says, charging up the steps two at a time. ‘I leave at the right time – Ma hassles me enough . . . It just seems to take too long to get here.’

‘Maybe you dawdle,’ she says. And then, with a wink at me: ‘Maybe it’s the spirits in the forest, slowing you down.’

He falters on the landing for a split second as she charges up past him, and she doesn’t notice how he blanches, as if she hit him in the stomach. It’s there and gone in a blink, and then he rushes on after her, bag swinging, bright as ever, but the feeling remains in my belly all through the morning, and I can’t look him in the eye, even when we have art again without Zara. It’s just me and him sitting at the end of a big table, and the teacher is late, so everyone’s chatting, except I don’t know what to say to him.

‘How’s it going?’ he asks.

His freckles glow under the artificial lights; it’s dark, and the clouds are stormy outside, and the whole place suddenly feels claustrophobic. Every lesson is a different textbook, a different teacher, a different classroom down a different corridor. I’ve got lost every time I’ve looked for a loo, and I don’t know anything. I take a deep breath in, filling my chest, and breathe it out slowly, lowering my gaze to the old wood table with its scored lines and crossed-out words.

‘Stella?’

‘It’s different,’ I say. ‘I wanted it so much. I still do. But it isn’t what I thought it would be.’

He doesn’t say anything, and it takes me a long time to look up from the desk. When I do, he’s staring at me.

‘Sorry . . .’ I start, but he shakes his head.

‘I was trying to imagine how it feels. You really never . . . You never went to school before?’

‘No.’

‘So what did you do?’ his curiosity is suddenly needle-sharp.

I shrug. ‘It’s just me and Nan at home, and Peg, my . . . my pet. There’s lots to do, but . . . it was lonely.’

‘You’ll like it here,’ he says. ‘You’ll fit right in. I can feel it.’

He smiles. There’s that flicker of magic, only this time it doesn’t tug at me. It soothes, like the flame of a candle. I remember when Nan used to glow like that, before she faded.

Our last visit to Winterspell was the winter I turned ten. That was when I knew for sure what Nan was. She’d talked to me for years about the legends of the fae, and the Plaga that strikes every few generations, and that this time took only my mother. About how the grief of my father, a fae king in his prime, had become a visceral thing that birthed the shadows that have blighted Winterspell ever since.

How she’d hidden me so that his shadows, grown into their own power over all this time, would not be able to reach Winterspell’s last future hope: me.

She never told me what she was.

I thought she was flesh and blood, a sprite just like me. Like my father, the tree sprite who I barely remembered, just a blur at the edge of my mind – stern one minute, laughing the next. Like a storm in spring. I wanted to know him, even as the very idea of being close to him now terrified me.

That night, we stole between the glowing stalks of winter trees at sunset, and she held me close as ever and used her magic to shield us, and we watched as tiny, bright figures leaped between branches. Spiderwebs gleamed like copper wire, and the trees flexed their roots beneath the hard earth with deep sighs, and there was singing in the distance. We skirted around them, watching, listening, and we trod on our familiar path, searching once more for the cursed palace.

But as we went, the way grew colder. Frost gathered in every nook. Trees hung with bright daggers of ice. And between their stark branches, the shadows came. They were wolves, and men eight feet tall, showing their teeth and claws, howling into the grey winter air. We pushed on, for only if we reached the palace could the king be raised – maybe even brought back to himself. Back to me. But the shadows were bolder. They were snakes upon our path, and bats in our hair, they were great monsters, and when they touched me, it hurt. With every breath, they took something from me – and as they took, they grew.

The terror overtook curiosity.

‘Nan,’ I managed, when I could barely move. She turned back, and horror whickered across her face. She rushed back to me, howling, cutting a swathe through the shadows.

And then the thundering hooves of the centaurs approached, and the shadows turned at the noise, and we scrambled back, hidden from the fae beneath Nan’s glamour. Our breath steamed as we tripped on tangled roots, and the barren sticks of willow reached for our clothes, as roiling dark clouds withered through the trees. A great stag bellowed, rushing through the forest by our side, and when I looked at Nan, she was barely there at all.

‘Nan,’ I hissed, pulling at her hand, but my own went through hers. ‘Nan!’

‘Hush,’ she whispered, and her eyes were dark hollows. ‘Don’t let him hear you now, Stella. Come after me. Come, come, Stella – as fast as you can.’

She was like bright smoke herself though, her form twisted as we flew back through the forest, and while I got scraped and tripped, the branches snapping with every pace, nothing touched her at all.

‘Stop,’ I whimpered, stumbling as we got out on to the moorland that ran up to the orchard at the back of our house. ‘I don’t know . . . Who are you? What’s happening?’

‘Keep coming, Stella!’ she wailed, turning and clutching at me. Her fingers gripped my wrist, and they were cold and hard. ‘I’ll tell you – I’ll explain – but we must run. We must keep going until we get home!’

Home.

The word flashed through me. What was home, on the edge of this wilderness? What was home, with this Nan who grew thin as cloud, until I could see the stars through the outline of her body, as her hand gripped mine, and we flew over uneven ground to the silver wire of home, as we ran from my father’s hordes of fear and malice?

That was the night I discovered Nan was a ghost. I knew, after that, there was nothing for me there, in that forest. My father was only a memory, impossible to reach, and Nan had used everything she could to hide us from his shadows. That was why she’d got so thin, and she never really recovered from it. That was how the magic of that other world soured. It’s a terrifying, wild place where nothing is as it seems. Where I am not welcome. And it’s the real world – the warmth of the humanity I read about in my favourite books – that I need.

That was the night I started to dream of school.

8

Mrs Mandrake is late, and I cannot help but flit, watching for her. First from the windows, and then in the orchard, where I decide it’s finally time to pick up the fallen apples. Nan laughs at me when I collect the basket from the top of the washing machine, and Peg hops in, a tiny brown mouse huddling into the twist of willow. I grab a carrot and chop it small, and when Onion bustles up to me, I scatter the pieces across the grass.

‘You spoil them,’ Peg says, winking up over the side of the basket as Basil and Salt rush up to grab their share. ‘They’re not even laying at the moment!’

‘They will,’ I say. ‘In spring.’

‘Not much use until then.’ He sighs. He does love a good egg. ‘We could always have chicken for dinner . . .’

‘Peg!’

I turn to the orchard, a dozen stocky apple and pear trees, their leaves golden brown now and starting to drift to the ground. In the summer, I climb up and read in the branches of my favourite tree – the one closest to the boundary, where the fork between two branches is wide and smooth.

The apples are small and sweet, their skin a dusky pink that bleeds into pale yellow. I leave the ones that have already been half eaten by insects and gather the rest, carefully dropping them into the basket. Peg organizes them as I go, so that by the time we’ve finished, they look like a rolling sunrise.

‘Very pretty,’ I say, carting them into the kitchen, just as the front gate squeaks, setting off a row of tiny bells over the fireplace. ‘Mrs Mandrake!’

‘She’ll be happy you’re going to school,’ says Nan, settling into the armchair and stoking the flames with a wave of her hand. ‘Always on about it, she was.’

‘I didn’t realize,’ I say, picking up my list, unfolding it, and folding it again.

‘Oh, she did it on the quiet. Little hints – worried you’d be lonely.’

‘Imagine that,’ I say, watching through the window as Mrs Mandrake bobs around the side of the house before knocking on the kitchen door. She pulls a trailer with her, loaded with food, and I rush to help unpack it as Nan gathers all her strength to look like a real, flesh-and-blood person. There’s bacon, and chestnuts, a jar of cocoa, a fruit loaf and orange juice, a bag of oats, dried pasta, and a basket of tomatoes and shiny bell peppers.

‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ I say when we’re done putting it away, and Mrs Mandrake sits at the table opposite Nan and looks down at my list. Her brown eyes are dancing when she looks up again.

‘What’s this about scented pens?’ she asks with a smile. ‘And a calculator? A PE kit! Did you win her over, Stella?’

‘No. She was flagrantly disobedient and off she went without permission,’ Nan says. ‘And she’s determined to continue, so we’re calling it a trial period.’

‘Good job,’ Mrs Mandrake says. ‘About time she got herself out there in the world.’

Nan huffs, and Mrs Mandrake winks at me. And then she dashes back out to her truck to get the crumpets to go with the tea, and I light the fire. I love Mrs Mandrake’s visits.

The warm feeling stays long after Mrs Mandrake leaves for her other errands, and even after Nan has disappeared again. Peg stays close, and after we’ve eaten all the chestnuts and about half the fruit loaf, I head out in a bit of a dream to set the charms.

The night sky is soft, stars flicker between scattered clouds over the moors, and the wind is singing through the silver wire. Peg has taken his true form for the night: a gleaming bronze imp with tiny red horns just above his ears, and curling, nimble hands and feet.

I love it when he’s just being an imp; I could watch him for hours. Only he doesn’t like it too much, being peered at. He bounds up now and sits on my shoulder and folds his arms and scowls, when suddenly the charms begin to ring.

‘What’re they doing in there?’ he mutters.

‘What they always do, I suppose,’ I say.

‘No. Nothing stays the same in there for long.’

‘I thought you went back in sometimes. You know, as our watch-bird?’

‘Watch-bird,’ he scoffs. ‘Well as to that, I did,’ he says. ‘For a long time. But it’s changed in the last weeks. It’s darker now, and I am not welcome. The shadows are everywhere. Most of the good folk spend their lives fighting or plotting escape.’

‘There’s a boy at school . . . I think maybe he lives in the forest.’

‘Don’t tell Nan,’ he says, but he doesn’t sound surprised. ‘She’ll worry. It’s one of the things I discovered, last time I was in there. Some families send their children to the school so that they get a human education and live in the human world, away from the forest. They started when the shadows took over, but only some are able: those who can pass for human, and those who are good at glamouring. I guess your boy is one of them, and Nan’s glamour does the job for you. For now . . .’ He looks me up and down, as if to check it’s still working.

‘I didn’t realize that was happening. Why didn’t you say anything?’

‘These things are for you to discover. You made your choice when you started at the school.’

‘And you were cross, so you thought you wouldn’t tell me something so important?’

‘Nobody ever said the school would be a safe place, Stella. Nobody said it would be a good idea. You decided to go anyway. And now you are discovering things for yourself. Isn’t that what you wanted?’

‘I always thought you’d tell me if something important happened in there. I know you like your secrets, but—’

‘But nothing. You need to use your own eyes, and your own judgement. If I truly thought you were in danger, I would tell you. It was always a tricksy sort of place; now, even the skies are darker for it.’

I look at the sky over Winterspell and notice for the first time that the stars above are glowing red.

‘Shouldn’t we do something?’

‘You and I?’ He grins, his sharp teeth glinting. ‘And Nan? Against all the king’s army of shadows? We tried that, Stella. Your presence in Winterspell only made them fiercer. You’re doing what you can, with all your learning.’

‘That doesn’t help the fae in there, though.’

‘They are fighting,’ he says. ‘And mostly, they are winning. The fae have always loved a good battle.’

I stare into the gloom.

‘Aren’t we ever going to try again, then?’

‘Oh, we will,’ he says. ‘When the time is right.’

‘So for now, we just have to wait? I don’t know what we’re waiting for, Peg. It’s stupid to live so close when we can’t go in there.’

‘It is not stupid!’ He draws himself up with indignation, a spiral of smoke escaping his nostrils. ‘Nan’s power is connected to Winterspell; that’s why we stayed so close. And one day, the time will be right, Stella. You will go in there, and you will find the palace.’

‘Well let’s just hope that’s before the shadows have spread too far to be contained,’ I say with a shiver, a little bit cross and a little bit relieved. As much as I want to march in there and find that cursed palace and stop the shadows’ sprawl, the thought of fighting through them again is terrifying, and so is the idea of my Shadow King father. I cannot imagine ever feeling ready.

Peg doesn’t say anything, because there isn’t a right thing to say. We both know it’s happening. Young ash trees encroach further every season, their grey bark catching the moonlight and making stripes across the ever-diminishing moorland that stretches between the forest and our perimeter. And with them, come the shadows.

9

I hit the dusty old books over the rest of the weekend, while storms rage about the house. There’s little else to do. Nan is recovering from Mrs Mandrake’s visit and only really emerges at mealtimes to make sure I’m eating my greens, and the rain drives down into the soil and makes a swamp of the garden.

I want to know more about fae curses, and the grief of kings, and how we’re going to fight the shadows. Something like this must have happened before, somewhere. But the books that line the study shelves aren’t exactly organized, and many of the covers are so worn, it’s impossible to make out the writing along the spine.

Peg pretends he’s scandalized by the turn of my study. He thinks I should leave the whole thing alone, but I can tell he’s not really that cross. He loves the old books – a little too much, actually.

‘Peg!’

‘It just smelt so good,’ he manages around a mouthful of paper. It smokes a bit in his mouth.

‘I might need that page!’ I stare at him. ‘What’s got into you?’

‘Change,’ he says. His eyes glow. ‘It’s uncomfortable – good for the soul, I always thought.’

‘Well I don’t know about that, I’m trying to find some actual solutions here. What if you’ve just eaten the spell I need?’

‘It was a diary entry about tatting lace,’ he says, smacking his lips. ‘Was that how you were planning to wage war against the forest?’

‘I don’t know! I don’t know what lace . . . tatting is, and now I never will.’

He belches and doesn’t look sorry at all. ‘Lace tatting is the construction of particularly durable lace. It’s useful for making doilies.’

‘Doilies –’ I spread my hands – ‘are what, exactly?’

‘Those little frilly mat things that go under sugar bowls.’

I huff at him and pull my book closer. ‘Please don’t eat any more. You never know. Maybe lace tatting is really good for anti-shadow armour . . .’

‘They’re not clouds, Stella. They have teeth. Real teeth, real claws. You’re going to need more than a lace doily against all that.’

‘OK,’ I say.

For a few minutes, there’s silence while I try to translate some old Germanic that seems to be hinting at something to do with the blood of a yew tree. But I’m too distracted to concentrate.

‘Peg?’

‘Yes, dear Stella,’ he replies from the nearest pile of books, reaching into a small copper bowl of pumpkin seeds.

‘Why are you going along with this? You didn’t exactly like it when I started school.’

‘Change,’ he says, tossing a bunch of seeds up into the air and sending them spinning with a gesture of one small hand. He huffs, and they form a smouldering ball, which fragments piece by piece as each finely toasted seed falls into his waiting mouth, until only a crescent-moon shape remains.

I breathe a few spell words, and the crescent becomes a fiery bird that swoops down over our heads before collapsing into ash on to the table. Peg watches me.

‘Sometimes, it’s inevitable, and you may as well just go along with it. You wouldn’t have tried that spell before. Last week, you wouldn’t have called the school. Last year, the shadows hadn’t spread the way they have now. We are drawing closer to our futures, Stella. May as well read up on it.’

‘Very sage advice,’ I say. ‘Coming from a paper-eating, seed-shuffling imp.’

He grins.

But it’s not quite funny. The way he said it, the flicker in his eyes, there was something dangerous there. Something different, even in him.

Peg was Nan’s familiar when she was alive. When my parents died, Nan was called upon by my mother to look after me, and he came with her. I don’t know that she could have done it without him. And I don’t know why my mother didn’t linger as a ghost. Why all this happened in the first place. I have wondered. More than wondered – I have felt it burst from the hollow place deep inside that hurts, when the dusk is yellow, and the swifts gather in the sky in tumbling, swooping tides, and summer is over. A why and a where and a how – but mostly the why. Why did it happen? Why is Nan a ghost and my mother isn’t?

Nan says it’s because my mother was a better person than she is; her spirit went straight where it was supposed to go. I wish it hadn’t gone anywhere. If she had survived the Plaga, everything would be different. My father did survive it, but not really. His illness, combined with his grief, cursed everything in Winterfell. Why? Why did he descend so deep into shadows that he couldn’t even see me? Does he even remember I exist?

So many questions and no answers. Even if I had answers, they wouldn’t bring my family back. That’s what I tell myself when I check the wards one last time, trudging through the wind and the rain, bitter-cold fingers touching every glass vial, every brass bell, every silver coin. I know the pattern of them so well, I could do it in my sleep. Sometimes, I do dream of them. But in my dreams, my mother walks with me. Here and now, it’s just me, and the fog of my breath. And a glimmer, a flicker of red light blooming between the trees, and the darker shades that nestle between. There’s a howl, and the enraged call of a stag. Thunder of hooves, flash of movement, and then the slightest whisper of song, low and haunting . . .

I used to fall asleep to those songs.

I hold my breath, straining to hear more, my hands still on the silver wire—

‘Stella! I made hot chocolate!’

It’s a rare treat, Peg’s hot chocolate. He does something to it that makes it spicy. I catch up the last charm, a small wooden acorn, and breathe the old words of protection over it, satisfied when it flickers with the amber mist of spell-magic. And then I dash back through the puddles to the warmth of the kitchen, and Nan is there, curled into her old blue armchair with the frayed cushions, bickering with Peg.

When she sees me, her eyes light up. I shut the door behind me, shuck off my boots and my coat, and pull on my thick wool socks, then I dive into the other deep chair by the fire – this one of soft green cord. Nan sits opposite me, and in the flickering light, she’s as vivid as any living thing. Peg stretches out on the mantelpiece with a deep, dreamy sigh, and I reach for the wood bench and my hot chocolate, curling my cold, brittle fingers around the heavy mug as Nan clears her throat to begin.

‘Long ago, when the stars were young, and the world was greener . . .’

I lift my knees and curl them under me, and I let her words do their magic.

10

Monday morning, and Nan doesn’t exactly wave me off from the front door, but she does flutter about making suggestions of more fruit while I make my lunch, and she wishes me a day without drama. I hunch into my coat and shift my bag on my back, and bird-Peg flies over me in loops and whorls, showing off to the rest of the dawn chorus, until I reach the river road.

Mrs Mandrake stopped by to drop in my supplies last night, and though Nan made a point of tutting, I could tell she was curious as I unwrapped paper parcels to find a new pencil case, a neatly folded PE kit and a whole hoard of sparkling things: silver pencils, miniature star erasers, a pencil sharpener in the shape of a rainbow cloud.

‘Very fancy,’ Nan had said after a while.

‘I picked them out myself,’ said Mrs Mandrake, looking satisfied as I unwrapped a flexible blue ruler and a tube of glue.

‘Thank you,’ I’d said, and her eyes twinkled, but she’d not stay for tea, thank you – there were other errands to be done.

Now, I race up the steps to reception and dart past Mrs Edge. And then people turn as the door clatters shut behind me, and my footsteps slow. I don’t know quite what to do, without Zara or Yanny by my side. It’s fine, I tell myself. I can’t be with them all the time. But I’ve noticed that some of the other kids sometimes stare at me a bit, and they’re doing it right now.

Zara says it’s normal for a new kid, and she’s glad I’ve taken over the role. But it makes my skin itch, so I’ve taken to staring back at them when they do it.

Then.

I smile.

A really slow, impish sort of smile.

And that normally makes them stop staring, even if it’s just to turn to the next person and start whispering. I wonder what they see. I wonder if it’ll always be that way. Would people have stared the same if I’d started in year seven, instead of partway through year eight at the grand old age of twelve? If I’d gone to school at four, like everybody else? Sometimes, I wish Nan’s glamour upon me would slip, just a little, so that I could see the sprite in me – but right now, I’m glad of it.

I head for the form room, hoping Zara won’t be long. I should have waited for her – I understand better now why she waits out the front in the mornings. I finger the new pencil case, wondering if she’s waiting for me somewhere, and then she bursts in, late and flushed.

‘OK?’ I ask as she slides into the chair next to mine, Yanny following after her.

‘Yep.’

‘She hates being late,’ Yanny says, shaking his head in mock disapproval. ‘And it wasn’t my fault this time . . .’

‘Mum’s started night shifts, so I had to get the bus, and I miscalculated,’ she says. ‘That’s all. It won’t happen again.’

‘How was the bus?’ I ask.

‘Smelly,’ she says. ‘And it seemed to go so slowly. Anyway, I made it. How was your weekend?’

‘Good.’ I think back to my studies with Peg, and Mrs Mandrake’s visit, and the rain. ‘Wet.’

‘You went shopping!’ she says, noticing my new things. ‘Mum and I went back to the city to see some friends, and Dad took me bowling –’ she rolls her eyes – ‘which we were both rubbish at because we’d never done it before. Then we went for pizza, which was pretty good. Anyway, we only got back last night . . . What about you, Yanny?’

‘Fine,’ he says, offering nothing further.

Zara tuts and starts investigating the contents of my pencil case, and I look up to see one of the girls staring. I stare back with a nice smile.

‘What are you doing?’ Zara asks, catching me at it again later in our English class.

This whole new-girl thing is getting old.

‘She’s giving them the imp,’ says Yanny.

‘What?’ Zara looks baffled.

We both turn to look at him.

‘The imp. Staring at someone, smiling, giving them the creeps.’

‘I’m not sure the creeps is what I was aiming for . . .’ ‘Well, you weren’t being friendly,’ he says.

‘They were staring at me first!’

‘This is a very strange and immature conversation,’ Zara sniffs. Then her eyes sharpen on Yanny. ‘What’s that about imps? Are they real?’ She leans in closer to us. ‘They’re real, aren’t they! I know there are strange things going on here . . .’

‘It’s just a turn of phrase!’ Yanny says, shaking his head and picking up his rather battered book.

‘Nope. Try again.’

‘It’s a thing,’ I say, feeling my skin heat. ‘You know, like an impish grin. You’ve heard that before . . .’

Zara frowns, but she doesn’t get a chance to say anything more because Mrs Arnott is giving us all a stare that has nothing to do with imps, and we spend the next half-hour writing about the downfall of humanity in Animal Farm. Well, I do, and Zara does. Yanny spends most of it pretending not to stare at me, until I give him the imp.

‘Where did you say you live?’ he whispers, as soon as we sit down in history. His eyes glow, and there’s a tiny little pull, deep in my chest.

Magic. He’s using magic on me.

‘Just outside the forest. How about you?’

‘On the other side.’

‘The other side?’

‘Of the forest.’

‘I didn’t say which side I was on?’

‘Well, we clearly don’t live on the same side, so it must be the other side.’

All the time, that little glow, that smile, that pull of power.

There are different kinds of magic, Nan says. There’s the kind that comes from within, when you are a creature of fae, that is in your blood and your soul and in everything you do. And then there’s the kind you can learn from books – words of power that can be used to make spell-magic with just a little bit of heart. I can do a little of both, same as she could. But Yanny’s definitely using the first kind right now – I’m sure of it.

‘Stop it,’ I whisper.

He pulls back. ‘So you do have magic.’

‘Enough to know when it’s being used on me!’

‘You should be enrolled.’

‘No I shouldn’t! . . . Enrolled into what?’

I stare at him, while the teacher starts talking about Joseph Lister, but he doesn’t answer. My hand reaches for a pen, and when Mr Allen starts making notes on the board, I follow the rest of the class in writing them in my book.

Yanny does really have fae magic.

‘What should I be enrolled into?’ I ask him again as we make our way to the cafeteria.

‘Can’t tell you if you won’t do it.’

‘How can I do it if I don’t know what it is?’

He spreads his hands. ‘Frustrating, isn’t it.’

‘How would I? When?’

‘Meet me in the science corridor, after school.’

‘What about Zara?’ I ask, as I spy her through the glass doors of the cafeteria. She’s already grabbed a table, and she’s shoved all her stuff into the two seats beside her, a fierce look on her face. ‘She hates not knowing things. She’ll hate it even more if it’s the two of us . . .’

‘I know,’ he says. ‘But we can’t tell her.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’s part of the enrolment. One of the rules.’

‘But I haven’t enrolled yet.’

He pulls me aside, behind a wave of kids who bang their way through.

‘This isn’t a joke, Stella. I don’t know who you are, or what you are, but if you’re even part fae, then it’s your job to play by the rules. You don’t tell a human about magic. And you don’t let them see you when they stray into the forest.’

‘So you do live in the forest!’

‘Maybe,’ he says, and his voice shakes.

‘Why are you at school if you’re fae?’ I demand.

‘Why not?’ he says. ‘Why shouldn’t we?’

I don’t have an answer for that; I’m way out of my depth here. He looks utterly furious and not at all friendly right now.

‘Zara’s my friend,’ I say. ‘Can’t we trust her?’

‘Just wait,’ he says under his breath as we enter the room. ‘Wait until you’ve seen what you’re doing. Come with me after school. I’ll show you, and we’ll talk then.’

‘And then I’ll tell her.’

‘Then you can decide.’

But my stomach is full of wiggling nerves, and lunch tastes dry and strange. I don’t know how to look Zara in the eye when there are secrets between us. I tell her I’ve got a headache, and try to lose myself in the food, but Yanny’s pastries are definitely unsatisfying today. They turn to dust in my mouth as soon as I bite into them, and I notice he barely touches them, preferring the red apples and buttered rye bread I brought, and Zara’s tiny round cheese biscuits.

He doesn’t show a sign that he’s bothered about anything, and that only makes me worry more. If he’s truly fae, and my Nan’s books are accurate, he could probably hide just about anything and never let it show on his face.

11

I have to head out with Zara at the end of the day. She’s been so sweet about my pretend headache all afternoon, I genuinely now feel a bit sick. I walk with her to the gate, and then she spots her mum waiting down the road.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ she says. ‘Hope you feel better.’

‘Thank you,’ I manage, and I watch as she bolts down the road. I stand for a long while, watching her get into the car, watching it manoeuvre into the busy road, wondering what I’m doing. I came here for school. For humanity. For a friend like Zara. That’s all I wanted. But I also want to know what’s going on in Winterspell. I want to know what it means to be fae. And since I can’t go in there, this is my chance.

I whip back in through the gate and race up the steps to the lobby before I can change my mind. Mrs Edge watches me crash through reception and shakes her head, but she says nothing. I head up the wide enchanted staircase to the first floor, and then on to some older, worn steps, where Yanny is waiting.

‘Ready?’ he asks.

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I don’t like lying to Zara.’

‘If you weren’t ready, you wouldn’t be here,’ he says.

And there doesn’t really seem a good answer to that. I nod, and he whispers a word at the top of the steps, and the old wooden door swings open. On the other side, candles flare in sconces on the walls of a narrow corridor. It’s cold up here, and draughty. It’s like another school entirely. I pull my coat tight as Yanny walks on.

‘What’re we going to do?’ I whisper. The candles gutter as we go, making shadows swoop and dance.

‘Just have a look around so you know what you’re missing. Don’t worry – nobody’s going to eat you!’

He grins, turning to me, but the grin is full of sharp teeth.

‘Yanny!’

A man swoops down the corridor to us, cloak flying, his small round face creviced and pitted with scars.

‘Ooh, a new student!’ the man says, coming to a stop and peering at us with his head to one side.

‘Ah, not really,’ says Yanny, looking between us with an awkward grimace of a smile. ‘At least, she is new, but . . . I was just showing her around. Sorry. I didn’t think you’d be here, sir.’

‘And yet, here I am!’ The man gleams. ‘You have been caught out, Yanny.’ He gives me a sharp look. ‘Perhaps you had reason. Stella, is it?’ he asks. ‘I heard about your trial period. Mrs Edge was most curious about you.’

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

‘She says she doesn’t know much about fae magic,’ Yanny says. ‘But there’s something there. So I thought . . .’

‘Quite right,’ the man says with a brisk nod. ‘So, Stella – not a forest dweller, then?’

I shake my head, trying to calm the fizz in my blood. Whoever this man is, whatever this place is, there is power here. How are these worlds colliding? I thought the forest was magic, and that school would be . . . not magic. I stare into his unblinking gaze.

‘But Yanny’s right – there is something,’ he says, tilting his head to the other side. ‘How curious. Well, now you are here, so welcome. This is the Magical Department. I am Principal Ashworth. Come along – let’s have a talk. Onward!’

He hustles down the corridor to a narrow, winding staircase that takes us up into a round study with crinkled glass windows on every side.

‘Now,’ he says, perching on the edge of a broad wooden desk. ‘Stella. You’ve seen our magical underbelly. You will have to sign the contract. Yanny generally has good instincts. Have you magic?’

‘A little,’ I say. ‘Spell-work, charms – nothing very exciting.’

‘And you are?’

I stare at him. ‘Pardon?’

‘What sort of a creature are you? There are humans with some magic. Are you one of those?’

I stare between him and Yanny. There’s something searching and eager about both of them. If I told them the truth about my heritage – that the dreaded Shadow King is my father – what would they do to me? Nan always worried they might never accept me after all the misery he’s caused.

‘Ahh, yes. Human,’ I say. ‘We have lots of books. My nan says there is fae blood in our history . . .’

‘I see,’ says Principal Ashworth. ‘Well, they say that we all have a little fae in us, somewhere. In some, it is more pronounced.’ He fingers the tiny sharp horns that poke through his curling brown hair.

How did I miss those?

‘And we may choose, sometimes, to hide the signs,’ he says. ‘So. Perhaps you are hiding; perhaps all that you possess is an instinct for our words. In any case, you must sign the contract.’

He produces a scroll from a small drawer in the front of the desk. It unspools, inch after inch of brown paper rushing to the floor, and he holds out an old ink pen with a wide brass nib crusted in black ink.

At least, I hope it’s black ink. Right now, in this sun-flashed room, with this strange small man, and Yanny staring beside me, it could be almost anything.

‘What is it?’ I ask.

‘Security contract,’ says Principal Ashworth. ‘Provides that you will neither take nor insert any magic from this place; that you will keep our secrets; that you will take all precautions when entering and exiting; reset the charms; respect the boundaries of your fellow magical students; work hard on your lessons . . .’ He thrusts the pen at me. ‘So, sign!’

‘What if I accidentally let something slip?’

He takes back the pen. ‘Are you prone to accidents?’

‘No.’

‘And you have some familiarity with the fae world. With our words, and our spells. So, you already know how to keep such things safe.’

‘Uh, yes. But. Can I tell my nan?’

‘Is she human?’

‘She’s a ghost,’ I say, my tongue already too tied from the unfamiliar lies.

They stare at me, and I shrug.

‘How interesting!’ Principal Ashworth nods. ‘Then you may tell her. Besides, there are life-and-death provisos, should the need arise. Now sign, or I’ll have to eject you, and there will be no coming back!’

I look at Yanny. ‘You didn’t say . . .’

‘What are you worried about?’ he asks, no help whatsoever. ‘You already knew there was magic out there, and you knew to keep it a secret . . .’

‘But magical contracts?’ I hiss. ‘Everyone knows they’re a bad idea.’

‘You’re confusing your fae stories with your fairy stories,’ says Principal Ashworth. ‘We’re not the Grimm brothers, and you aren’t a little girl in a gingerbread house. Now, if you’d like to continue this little tour, you’ll have to sign!’

He grins, and his teeth are a little pointed, but his eyes are warm, so I take a deep breath, pluck the pen from his outstretched hand, and sign the paper.

‘Excellent,’ he says, winding it back up again. ‘You will join our lessons. Whatever affinity you have for our magic, we must explore it and work out what to do with you. There are rules – and customs – that you should know, whether you’re human or fae, or something in between. Magic is not something to be taken lightly. Nor to be discussed downstairs in the regular lessons. Yanny will advise, if you need it. He is a fairly good student, and he has already asserted himself as your guide, so I will entrust you to his care.’ He casts a glance at Yanny before turning back to me.

‘Lessons start at 7.30 in the morning,’ he continues, ‘and finish by 8.45. And there’s the odd differential, such as history and science, when you’ll come to us. Welcome, Stella. I am sure you’ll find what you need here, and perhaps a little more besides . . .’

He winks and flaps us out of the room, his cloak billowing.

I turn to Yanny at the top of the narrow steps, and he blows his cheeks out.

‘You could have warned me,’ I say, as he hustles me down and whisks us along the corridor to a circular, cavernous hall, where the ceiling rises in a spire, bookshelves winding up its sides. Shining wood ladders stretch right up through all the shelves, getting narrower as they go. The whole place sings at me and makes my head spin.

‘The hall-slash-library,’ he says.

‘What have you got me into, Yanny?’

‘What have I got myself into,’ he retorts, not looking the slightest bit apologetic. He looks up at the rows of books, and his eyes flash with streaks of amber. ‘Stupid. I should’ve left it all alone.’ He looks back at me. ‘I thought I could show you around without Ashworth finding us. I didn’t mean to scare you.’ He sighs, but there’s still a glint in his eye as he leads me out.

‘What kind of magic do you have?’ I ask.

‘Hmm?’

‘You and Principal Ashworth – you both have the same kind of magic. Only, not the same . . .’

He turns back to me. ‘How do you know we’re not the same?’

‘It just feels different.’

He frowns.

‘You’re very perceptive for someone who claims to have so little magic of their own.’

‘We have books. Words. I know the old legends.’

‘Ah well, then you should know what I am,’ he says.

And he marches off again.

I watch him go, registering the lightness of his tread, the length of his limbs, the way his shadow on the wall is not quite a true reflection. It flickers at the edges, dancing and shifting as he moves.

‘Well, you’re not a centaur,’ I say, catching up with him. ‘Are you?’

‘I’m a fairy,’ he says. ‘And you’re taking all the fun out of this.’ He scratches at the back of his neck. ‘We should have done this in the morning. . . I need to get home.’

‘I thought fairies were smaller.’

‘That’s because you’ve only seen pictures in books. Are we supposed to wear bluebells on our heads too, as hats?’

I try to hide a smile; he looks very cross about it.

‘No . . . but I thought you had wings.’

He winces and keeps on moving.

‘So –’ he indicates a darkened room on the right of the corridor, empty and lit only by a red-filtered lantern swinging from the ceiling – ‘this is history. Lessons are on Mondays, after last bell.’

‘OK,’ I say, drawing my timetable out of my bag and grabbing one of my new sparkly pens to make a note of it.

He rolls his eyes and moves on again. ‘Next is earth science. Trees, water, elements, the natural world.’

‘Does that mean things like mer-fae . . . and dryads?’

‘Your books are getting old,’ he says, and there’s a shiver in his voice.

‘Yanny?’

‘What is it?’

‘You’re angry. I’m sorry if I’m not saying the right things . . .’

‘Dryads are mostly in hiding these days, and nobody has seen a mer-fae for years. Your books clearly don’t cover recent history. Let’s just get this done.’

He flits up the rest of the corridor. There’s a room for fae ethics and practical magic, glamouring and bewitching; and another, where the walls glow in soft amber shades, and low chairs are arranged in small huddles.

‘What’s this for? Why is it so dark up here?’

‘No electricity,’ he says. ‘It doesn’t work well around magic. This is time-out. Most of the fae kids are glamouring while they’re downstairs, and it gets hard.’ His voice sounds strained.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘I’m fine,’ he says. He looks at me, gives a shadow of a bleak, sharp smile. ‘I just need to get home.’

‘What’s it like, in Winterspell?’ I ask carefully. ‘Are the stories about the shadows true?’

His face tightens, and I immediately regret asking.

‘I don’t know about stories,’ he says. ‘The shadows are real.’ He winces, arching his back. ‘And I’m not talking about that now.’

‘Sorry – I just wondered . . .’ I frown, as his eyes flash amber again. ‘Does it hurt, to glamour? You don’t need to do it in front of me. I’m all signed up now, remember?’

‘It isn’t about you,’ he hisses. ‘I need to get through the school, and town, and home.’

‘Should we sit here for a moment, then? It’s safe here, isn’t it?’

His shadow writhes behind him, and there’s a dark flash of tattered shadowy wings.

‘I can’t,’ he says. ‘Got to get back. I should’ve done this another day . . .’

‘I’ll come with you.’

We rush through the corridors, down the shining steps, and he is a bright force beside me, static like a silver needle pricks through the air between us.

‘How many magical kids are here?’ I ask, as we get out of the front gate.

‘Thirteen.’ He grins. ‘Lucky to have you, makes fourteen.’

‘Thirteen is lucky in some cultures,’ I say, making my voice bright and chatty. ‘In China, and the—’

‘Not in ours,’ he cuts me off.

‘That’s why you wanted me to start lessons?’

‘Partly,’ he says. ‘Also, because you have magic. I can feel it, and so can you.’

‘I don’t know about that,’ I huff, as we dash through the streets, and the lights of the shops make the pavements shine beneath the pale mist of rain. Our footsteps are quick and light, and Yanny is panicking, I can feel it. We cross the road by the bakery, and he stumbles on the kerb.

‘I’ve got to run,’ he says. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow – 7.30. Ashworth does assembly on Thursdays. The others will be there.’

‘OK.’

‘Sorry,’ he whispers. ‘Grumpy.’

‘It’s OK. See you tomorrow.’

He nods, and the air around him vibrates. Then he’s gone, fleet-footed, darting between cars and away towards the forest.

I stand there in the rain for a moment, my feet are numb, my hands prickle.

There were wings. Flimsy things that curled over his shoulders, broader than his back, but hardly more than shadows. I saw them unfurl and snag at the air. Saw the way they fluttered as he fled, with nothing more than an echo of movement.

What happened to his wings?

One of the boldest, most mischievous of the fae, the fairy is large in number and of earth, and air, and water, and fire. They tend to have large families, and some would say more courage than sense. It is they who defend the fae realm, and they who play tricks on passing humans. They are the ones most frequently spotted, but they are very good at glamouring, which means they may easily hide or change their appearance.

There is tell of earth fairies who live in the human world as humans, using their magic to round their ears and veil their wings. Hiding magic, though, is no mean feat, and fairies are prone to sickness. Their bodies are fragile in the world of men.

12

It’s getting dark as I reach home, the forest is more shadowed than ever. I skirt the house and linger on the moors by the river for a while, knowing Nan and Peg will be full of questions about my day, and not having a clue how I can answer them truthfully.

As I watch, I spot movement between the trees. Something small and bright bursts out and races fast as lightning towards me. I squeal, staggering back as it bounds up to my chest, all sharp claws and static and . . . soft fur. A small, vaguely triangular face looks up at mine, claws latched firmly into my coat, green eyes flashing.

It’s a cat!

What kind of a cat bounces out of the forest like that?

‘Hi,’ I say, reaching out and untangling it from my coat, holding it at arm’s length. It’s a tiny little tabby, its fur striped in shades of white and silver-grey flecks glinting in the darkening light. ‘Who are you?’

It doesn’t answer; it just stares at me. I put it down on the cold grass, and it walks around my ankles, before sitting on my left boot.

‘Oh!’

Then another wild creature bursts out from the direction of the house and whizzes to my shoulder. Peg, being a bird.

‘Look, Peg,’ I say. ‘It’s a cat!’

‘Is it though?’ he demands, his golden beak snapping by my ear as he peers down.

I pick up the cat. It nestles into my arms and starts to purr.

‘Seems like it to me,’ I say. ‘Maybe it strayed into the forest by mistake, and that’s why it bolted out so quickly.’

‘Hmmm.’

‘Nan will know,’ I say.

And so we head to the house: me and a small, trembling tabby cat, and one rather cross bird-imp.

It’ll be a good distraction from school news, anyway.

‘I’m dreadfully allergic to cats,’ says Nan, perching on the edge of her blue chair, her lower legs and feet only vaguely visible.

‘Nan.’ I stare at her.

The cat is sleeping in my lap, and Peg sits on the mantelpiece, his tail swinging over the flames.

‘What? I am!’

‘I really don’t think ghosts can be allergic to animals.’

She frowns.

‘Well, I might be. I’m not your ordinary sort of ghost, you know.’ She narrows her eyes. ‘Did you bring her back to distract us from news of school?’

‘No!’

‘So,’ she says. ‘Tell me about your day. Don’t leave anything out.’

‘It was pretty normal . . .’

‘No such thing. Come on – out with it.’

‘The lunch was good. And I like maths. Zara is really nice. She’s new too. Her mum moved them here a little while ago . . .’

And there’s a whole floor full of magic, where the fae learn their history. And I lied. I lied, and I said I was human, and Yanny’s eyes knew that I was lying, but what could I say: ‘I am the child of the fae king who cursed your home’?

‘Zara?’ Nan leans forward. ‘Who is Zara?’

‘A girl at school!’

‘Human?’

‘Yes, Nan. Of course.’ I hold my breath, hoping she doesn’t ask any more about that. I’ve never lied outright to her face; I’m not sure I could. And I know she isn’t going to be happy about me being in a school with the fae she’s spent so long trying to keep me away from.

‘Bright, “Zara” means,’ she says. ‘Bright and shining, I think.’

‘It suits her.’ I smile, looking down at the cat. It’s very small; perhaps even just a kitten still. I always wanted a pet.

‘This little cat must go,’ says Peg, shaking his head, twin plumes of steam escaping his nostrils.

The kitten opens one green eye and stares at him.

‘You said she came out of Winterspell.’ Peg’s brow furrows. ‘Who knows what she might be.’

‘She’s a cat, and I’m keeping her. She can be my familiar – like Peg is yours, Nan.’

They huff together.

‘How do you know it’s a she?’ Peg demands. ‘Something magical? I mean, if it’s going to be a familiar, it needs to be a bit magical. Can’t just have any old cat being a familiar.’

‘You just said that she was probably a monster! Now she’s any old cat?’

‘She is an unknown, to be treated with caution,’ says Nan.

‘Fine. I won’t tell her all our secrets. Yet. But she is staying.’

‘Well aren’t you growing up quickly with all your new attitudes?’ she says drily. ‘What are you going to call this pet of yours, then?’

‘Teacake!’ I blurt.

Peg puts his horned head in his hands, and Nan opens her mouth and snaps it shut again. Teacake’s purr rumbles through me.

‘Really?’ Peg asks, raising his head and staring at me. ‘You do know that a familiar is an important creature? That if it’s true, your bond will be unassailable, that she will be by your side until the day you die – or even after.’ He gives Nan a look. ‘That she will be your champion when you need one, your adviser, your closest ally, your most magical weapon in times of need? That she will sacrifice everything to be with you, that your care for her must be foremost in your mind, no matter what comes your way?’

‘Yes, Peg.’ I meet his eye. ‘I know what a familiar is. It’s one of the only things I really do know for sure. Do you think you haven’t taught me that?’

‘She’s probably just a lost kitty, and she’ll be gone back home within a week,’ Nan says. ‘For all your melodrama, the pair of you, let’s not get carried away. She looks fairly ordinary to me.’

I bury my fingers in Teacake’s thick fur and tickle her neck. She rolls over in my lap, showing us all her pale belly, and gives a little chirrup, staring at Peg and flexing her claws. The flames roar in the fireplace, and Peg’s tail makes sparks as it swishes, and Nan settles back into her chair, her eyes dancing as she watches.

I think she likes Teacake, really.

Ahh, lucky is the soul blessed by the sprite. They are few and far between, and their power is vast, for it is the power of trees, and rivers, and mountains, and of the moon itself. Nimble, stalk-limbed, they might even pass for human, were it not for the verdant hues of their hair and the tiny horns that sometimes grow from their upper brow.

Peaceful, they may be – but ware, fisherman, to ask for permission before you plunder a water sprite’s river. And ware, woodcutters, for the wood sprite’s rage is as vast as all of Winterspell, if harm should come to its dearest. A wood sprite who has lost its tree is a terrible, howling creature. A monster made, indeed.

13

It’s dark when I leave for school, and the ground is winter hard. My breath steams against the brittle cold air. Teacake follows me all the way down the lane to the river and when I look back the house is just visible, lights glimmering in the windows, frost sweeping down over the roof. I reach down and give her a fuss and tell her to head home. Green eyes linger on mine, and then she turns and starts to head back.

‘Good girl,’ I whisper with a smile, watching her go. She’s a tiny bright figure trotting down past the unruly hedgerows. I wonder where she did come from. As I stand there watching, I can just make out the call of the centauride, deep in the woods. Winterspell is a dark sweep up Cloudfell Mountain from here, a chill mist gathered about the lower reaches, and folds of new snow at its peak.

Teacake stops dead, her ears pricked. And the dawn chorus begins with a clamour. I take a deep breath and turn my back on all of it, heading into school, and up the stairs, through the charms to the hall in the round tower for my first magical assembly.

Principal Ashworth is like a cricket at the front of the room, constantly moving, his fingers fiddling with the edge of his cloak. I scoot in, find Yanny, and take a seat in the rickety wood chair next to him. Round windows look out to a still pink sky, and the metalwork on the spines of all the books in the twisting vaults of the tower gleams.

‘Morning,’ I whisper.

I’m shaky with nerves; it feels like the first day all over again. There are about a dozen kids in here, and most of them are looking at me. I smile, and a couple smile back. Others definitely don’t look as friendly.

‘Drop your glamours, if you’re still wearing them,’ Principal Ashworth says. ‘Save your energy. You are among friends!’ He beams.

‘How do we know that?’ asks one girl sitting towards the back of the room, looking at me with a scowl on her face. Her dark hair is piled up on top of her head, held there with what look like ice-blue knitting needles.

‘Because you put your trust in me, and I have kept your safety for generations,’ snaps Principal Ashworth. ‘A little scepticism can be forgiven. But a lack of manners, Tash – that is an ugly thing indeed.’

She folds her arms and slouches down in her chair, letting her glamour slip. Her features change by infinite degrees, so that her eyes are silver, with narrow, catlike pupils, and her hair is roped like fine looping vines around the needles. She glares at me as I watch and bares her teeth at me; they are steel-bright and dagger-sharp. I turn back to the front of the room, trying to repress a shudder.

‘Don’t mind her,’ Yanny says. ‘She’s always grumpy in the mornings. Moon sprites don’t like daylight.’

‘She’s pretty fierce,’ I reply, stealing another glance and wondering if I’d look anything like she does without Nan’s glamour.

There are so many fae here, it’s a bit like a dream, or like one of Nan’s stories got tied up with one of my favourite books about human schools. There are some who look a little like Yanny – perhaps fairies too – and there’s a girl who looks like she could be Tash’s cousin. There’s a boy with a greenish tint to his skin and hair like dark moss, and a couple of others who seem entirely human, save for their pointed ears and shadow wings, and a girl with golden skin and the same tiny horns as Principal Ashworth. A couple of adults, who I guess must be teachers, sit to one side looking faintly bored. One has the same neat, twisted horns; the other is grey-skinned and stocky, with curling silver hair and the most beautiful dark lacy wings. He catches me looking and winks.

‘That’s Mr Flint,’ Yanny whispers. ‘And that’s Miss Fern. She’s a sprite—’

‘Our new girl here is Stella Brigg,’ Principal Ashworth booms over him, gesturing at me with an outflung arm. ‘Welcome, Stella. We are excited to have you with us.’ He grins, and the whole room is silent as everybody turns to stare at me.

‘What sort of a fae is Stella?’ asks Tash, her voice all innocence and curiosity. ‘Might we be permitted to know?’

Principal Ashworth glares at her, but it’s clear everybody wants to hear my answer. What am I going to say?

‘I’m not fae,’ I whisper eventually.

‘Stella hasn’t worked that out yet,’ Principal Ashworth says. ‘Our lives are not all so simple – so cut and dried. Stella has some magic, or she would not be here. That is enough for me, and it will be enough for all of you.’

He pivots on one heel and makes for a whiteboard in the corner of the room, where a new timetable has been drawn in wavering lines, and gets everybody to copy down the revisions while he talks about Mrs Ingot, who will be joining the school next week to cover Ms Spicer’s maternity leave. It’s a lot like an assembly downstairs, to be honest, only there’s the odd warning about glamours easily slipping during PE, and about the spell room, which must not be used without a teacher present.

‘Finally,’ says Principal Ashworth, ‘end of term is coming up, and I’m sure you’re looking forward to some well-earned rest. Be warned, there will be homework – you must not let all the work you’ve been doing go to waste over the break!’

‘How can you stand keeping secrets from Zara like this?’ I whisper at Yanny as we head back upstairs to history later on. Zara was definitely suspicious earlier, when we’d clattered in late together after the assembly, and I can’t help feeling it’s only going to get worse. ‘It’s making me feel horrible.’

‘It’s just necessary,’ he says. ‘It’s not against her; it’s just not anything to do with her either. Some humans have magic – you know that, apparently. If she has any in her, she hasn’t worked it out yet. Most people never do.’

Miss Capaldi is the languages and history teacher. She has pale, wiry hair that spirals down over narrow shoulders, and silver eyes that flash, and she welcomes me with a hungry grin that sends jagged splinters down my spine.

‘New blood, I see,’ she hisses, tilting her head as she studies me. ‘Have you all met Stella Brigg, my dears?’ She glances around at the rest of the class. Everybody is here – all staring, as usual. ‘Isn’t she quite the enigma? Neither fae nor fully human . . . And what a name! A star and a bridge. What do you bridge, little star?’

If I ever knew words, I do not know them now. They have left me entirely. I barely remember how to breathe.

‘Well, we shall see,’ she says, releasing me from her stare. I stumble to the nearest seat and fall into it, ignoring Yanny and everybody else. My heart is thumping like a drum through my body. ‘For now, our studies turn to darker things than stars, my dears.’

Miss Capaldi turns to the blank wall at one end of the room and raises an arm. A map of what I suppose must be Winterspell rolls out across the white space.

‘We come to the place where few stars now shine. You have all heard of our generations of peace under the Cloudfell Mountain. That was before the Shadow King; before the stag came upon us and brought ruin in his wake. Who can tell me how such a thing occurred?’

Nobody stirs.

‘No,’ she says. ‘I don’t suppose you want to. However, we must. Through history, we learn. Through mistakes. What were the mistakes?’

‘They thought they were safe!’ Tash calls out from somewhere behind me.

‘Yes. Under the king and queen, they thought they were safe, all those fae folk. They knew that danger may come from humanity, and so that is where they fixed their eyes. The danger came from the wilderness itself. From the Shadow King, fae through and through. Our own king, torn asunder by sickness and grief. Who hides in the cursed palace that none can find, and who has blighted our own Winterspell with shadows, thick and fast as the cruellest beast. And so we fight, especially in the night, when they obscure the moon and all the stars. The days are hard; the nights are harder. That is why your parents take such care. Why so many of them spend their nights out in Winterspell. Sometimes we win, and sometimes we lose. But you already know that much . . .’

She is quiet for a moment, and the class is silent before her. Yanny’s eyes are lowered, his hands clasped tight on the desk. Sorrow shudders through the room and makes my eyes sting.

Why did I not know how bad things were?

‘And so. To legends!’ Miss Capaldi turns the mood with the bright silver of her voice. ‘Remind us, Yanny.’

‘The Lost Prince.’

Yanny says it quietly, but it sends a rush of energy through the room, and his voice is echoed by all the others. It isn’t just a name, or an idea; it’s a bolt of iron, welded to them with absolute certainty. Miss Capaldi nods, her eyes glinting.

‘His arrival will herald the change we need. Some doubt he exists – and who knows the truth of it? Legends were ever vague and quite often completely wrong. Some say he is the one who will find the palace and challenge the Shadow King. In the meantime, it is our job to live. To fight and to keep our homes and our children – you – safe. To prepare for our futures, no matter where they might lie. And so, children, we will today be looking at the history of tree preservation, our most important role.’

She stares about the room. I slide low in my chair as the map on the wall redraws itself so that we are now looking at the swaying forms of bright oaks and willow trees.

Who is the Lost Prince?

I have a horrible, terrible feeling that it might refer to me.

Is that why Nan was so keen to keep me away from everybody? Because she knows they’re waiting for some fictional child who definitely isn’t me? I breathe through a wave of panic, relieved when Miss Capaldi turns to the illustrations on the wall and begins a fierce lecture on the patterns and preservation of the oldest trees in the woods.

There’s a strange silence between her words, and the light filters through old windows almost like mist. There is no sniggering, no shuffling or whispering – just her warrior voice blooming through us all, speaking of the greatest bonds between trees and ancient heroes. I watch as the scenes come to life on the wall by her side, as she twists from the images to us, her hands spread, her eyes flashing.

I need to know about that legend.

‘Nan!’ I clatter into the kitchen, and she blooms through the fireplace, bright eyed. Teacake is perched on the hearth by the embers of this morning’s fire, and Peg is swinging from the copper chandelier, eating tiny fish from a little porcelain dish.

‘Yes, dear?’

‘What is this about a Lost Prince?’

Peg chokes on his fish, and the dish crashes down towards the table. Nan catches it, and then settles herself at the table, gesturing for me to join her.

‘Haven’t you worked that out?’ she asks.

‘But you’ve never told me anything about it!’

‘I needed to hide you,’ she says. ‘From your father, and from the shadows. From all of the fae, for goodness knows none of them can keep a secret. So I hid us here, and I glamoured us all . . . and I left behind me the legend of the Lost Prince. So that they would know we had not forgotten them, and so that if they should ever catch a glimpse of a small brown-haired girl playing near the forest, should my glamour fail for even a moment, they would not suspect. You are the Lost Prince they speak of. But –’ her eyes narrow – ‘how do you know about this, Estelle?’

‘It was just . . . something I picked up.’ I wince, realizing too late that I’ve given myself away. She only calls me Estelle when I’ve done something wrong.

‘Pardon?’

‘There’s lots of talk about Winterspell at school,’ I say. ‘I mean, there’s bound to be. It’s right on the doorstep of the village, and they think it’s haunted. The kids talk about the strange lights, and the sounds of battle . . . How they have to avoid the whole place. And the legend of the Lost Prince . . .’

Peg glowers, but he doesn’t say anything, and Nan seems to be satisfied with my rushed explanation.

‘People talk.’ She nods. ‘And so close to Winterspell, there has always been fae blood in the village. People with a little magic, a little faith in what they can’t see – like Mrs Mandrake. I suppose it’s no surprise the children would have heard the legend.’

‘Lost Prince,’ I say, looking down at myself. ‘Oh, Nan.’

‘You’ll see.’ She smiles. ‘Just give it time, my love.’

But she obviously doesn’t know how bad it is in there for the fae. She’s been away so long, she doesn’t know they send their children out to a human school just to give them a chance of a future. She’s spun them a lie about a Lost Prince, but he’ll never come for them. I don’t have that kind of magic, that kind of power.

I don’t belong in there at all.

14

The week rushes past in a tumble of falling autumn leaves, bitter frosty mornings, and the dash from lesson to lesson, from magic to non-magic, from ancient legends to the tinkle of glass beakers in science lessons. By Thursday morning, my head is buzzing. Assembly is fraught with tension after another bad night in the forest, and Tash is looking more venomous by the day. Yanny stays close, but he looks troubled, and I cannot keep this up.

Of course I can’t. Ever since I heard of Nan’s ridiculous legend, it’s been haunting me. How can I let them wait for something that doesn’t exist? That will never come to pass?

‘What’s going on with you?’ Yanny asks as we scramble up from our seats after a grim-faced lecture from Principal Ashworth about staying out of the forest canopy. The gathering winter, he told us, has made it more brittle than ever, and shadows are waiting to catch those who fall. Playing up in the higher branches, we were warned, is strictly forbidden. ‘I know this stuff might not seem important to you, but you should know it anyway. If you’re ever in Winterspell, it could save your life. Did you even hear a word of what he said?’

‘Of course!’ I say. ‘I was just . . . I was distracted. Sorry.’ I take a deep breath while Yanny stares at me. ‘I need to tell you something.’

‘OK,’ he says. ‘But not here.’

He pauses at the door by the charms to settle his glamour over himself. It’s a bit of a struggle, by the look of it. Tash glares at me, and he turns to talk to her in a lowered tone that sounds part angry, part reassuring.

‘Later, then,’ I say, leaving them to it, feeling guilty. I can see how it strains them all to hide their best, most magical features.

Would people really be that horrified if they saw Yanny for who he really is? Or me, for that matter? What is the difference in me? What am I, underneath Nan’s glamour? I’m starting to wonder if I’m the monster my father is. Why have I let this carry on? Why didn’t I tell Yanny right from the start?

Because I was afraid.

I dig my nails into my palms and swear to myself that I won’t waste another moment, but Zara is hovering when I get downstairs, and she spots me as soon as my feet land on the shining wood floor.

‘Hey,’ I say.

‘Stella!’ she says. ‘There you are. Did you get past me? I’ve been here for ages!’

‘I didn’t see you. I got swept in the tide.’

She seems to accept it easily enough, and we head off to tutorial, and for a while, I think I’m going to get away with it. But Zara is no fool. And Yanny knows now that I’ve got something to tell him, so his eyes blaze every time he looks at me.

By lunchtime, it’s clear to Zara that something is going on, and I don’t know how to steer us all back in the right direction.

‘What?’ she demands, once Yanny is done hoovering up all our food. ‘What’s up with you two?’

‘Nothing,’ I say, focusing on very neatly refolding the wax paper I’d wrapped my sandwiches in.

Zara scowls at us and folds her arms.

‘It’s fine,’ Yanny says through a yawn. ‘My mum knows Stella’s nan, and she’s invited them both for tea tonight. And Stella’s just worried that you’ll feel left out.’

‘Oh!’ says Zara. ‘How weird that they knew each other all along! Did you know, Stella?’

‘No!’ I squeak.

‘Well of course I don’t mind,’ she says, looking between us with a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. She packs up her lunchbox, taking a really long time to file away all the little pots. ‘Maybe we could all do tea together another time?’

‘Yes,’ I say, relief coursing through me as her face brightens. ‘Come to mine next week. I’ll check it out with Nan, but I know she’s really keen to meet you.’

It should be OK. As long as Peg stays a bird, and Nan stays in her chair . . .

After school, I head back towards home with Yanny. Zara waved us off cheerfully enough, and we live in the same direction, so the lie looks true enough. I’ve promised to talk to him, but the words won’t come, and the further we go, the harder it gets, until even my footsteps are clumsy, and the space between us is full of tension.

‘Are you waiting for a written invitation?’ he bursts out eventually, as we reach the lane by my house. His eyes are brighter, his hair glints with gold strands, and the shadow wings are just about visible against the darkening day.

‘What? No!’

‘Then tell me. Tell me what you are, Stella. I knew from the very start that you were something. I tried to tell myself I was wrong – but I wasn’t, was I?’

I take a deep breath. Finger the acorn at my throat.

‘I’m sorry,’ I whisper.

‘For what?’ he demands.

‘For lying to you. I wanted to make friends, and I didn’t know when I started at the school that you’d be there. That fae would be there. I just wanted . . . I wanted to meet people . . .’

‘So you are fae?’

‘Yes. No. I . . . Yes. I’m a sprite.’

‘So why do you live out here? Why don’t you live in Winterspell?’

‘My nan took me in, when my mother died. She raised me here, to keep me safe from the shadows. The house was built by her grandfather – he was a human. And Nan glamoured me when we fled. She used the last of her magic to do it, and it’s stuck. I don’t even know what I truly look like!’

‘If only we all had enchanted houses to hide in,’ he says, his eyes flicking up at the red brick house and the smoke curling from its chimney.

‘I’m sorry.’

He shrugs. ‘You may as well come back,’ he says, registering the charms on the silver wire fence around the house. ‘If you want to. Aren’t you curious about your true home?’

‘Ye-ess . . . but what about the shadows?’

‘The shadows I fight every day?’ He shrugs. ‘You’ll survive them.’

I stare at him, and then Peg comes wheeling over, landing on my shoulder and staring fiercely at Yanny. Of course, he can’t say anything, because he’s pretending to be a normal never-before-seen breed of bird, but his claws dig into my shoulder like curving question marks, and I’ve had enough of deceptions for the day.

‘Yanny, this is Peg,’ I say, as Yanny watches intently. ‘Peg, this is Yanny. He’s a fairy.’

‘Well I guessed that much,’ says Peg, as Yanny’s eyes widen. ‘What sort of a fairy is he?’

‘Um . . .’

Peg glares at Yanny.

‘I’m a fire fairy,’ Yanny says. ‘And . . . what sort of a bird are you?’

‘Ha!’ caws Peg. ‘You think I’m a bird!’

‘I think you’re parading as a bird,’ Yanny says. ‘It seemed rude to ask what sort of imp you are.’

Peg mutters something under his breath and then sighs as Teacake charges up to us, winding around my ankles with a yowling sort of purr.

‘And who is this?’ Yanny smiles, crouching.

‘I call her Teacake.’

He gives me a quizzical look, tickling Teacake behind her ears. She scooches in close and gazes at him adoringly, her green eyes flickering like cold fire.

‘It seemed to fit, at the time,’ I say.

‘I think it’s fitting; she’s got about as much brain as a teacake,’ Peg says. ‘Caught her attacking her own tail earlier and looking surprised when it hurt.’

I sigh. ‘She’s a kitten, Peg. Playing.’

He mutters again, and I wonder if Nan is about to join us at the gate, just to make this whole experience fully surreal, but as I stare towards the house, Peg announces that she’s resting. Mrs Mandrake called in earlier with some more bits for me and tired her out. We’re on our own for tea.

‘Ah, actually,’ I say, watching as Teacake licks Yanny’s hand and makes him laugh. The sky is leaden over our heads and our house looks cold; he’s the brightest thing for miles. ‘I’m going to go to Yanny’s for tea.’

‘In the forest?’ Peg demands, lifting from my shoulder and hovering in my face, golden eyes sparking.

‘Yes.’

‘But, Stella! Nan wouldn’t like that!’

‘I won’t be late,’ I tell him, reaching out and cupping him in my hands. ‘Promise, Peg, dear.’ I lean in and kiss him.

‘I forbid you to go in,’ he says.

‘Peg! If you’re that worried, you should come too . . .’

‘Ah, no. I can’t. I told you – I’m not allowed in there now.’

I stare at him. ‘You didn’t say you weren’t allowed! Why?’

‘I’ll tell you –’ he sighs – ‘inside!’

‘Later, when I’m back,’ I say, steeling myself and setting off before he can say anything else.

I’m tired of his secrets. The sun is low in the sky, and shadows stretch across the golden plain, and when I dare to look back, he’s watching us, a darting, whirling thing among the brambles. Why can’t he come with us into the forest? I should have stayed and found out. I hesitate, full of guilt and tangled feelings, but Yanny walks on, and Teacake looks up at me with a questioning chirrup.

‘I’m going in,’ I whisper, steeling myself. ‘I need to, Teacake. You understand?’

She sits down and winds her smoky tail neatly over her front paws.

I sigh.

Yanny reaches the edge of the forest and turns, raising one eyebrow as if in challenge, as the shadows cluster behind him. It’s only tea with a friend, for goodness sake. Most kids do that all the time. I blow a kiss at Teacake and walk to Yanny, to the forest.

‘OK?’ he asks. His shoulders are set and stiff, his face drawn. ‘You don’t have to come in. I shouldn’t have pressured you.’

‘It’s fine,’ I manage.

If he can do this every day, I can do it too. They’re only shadows after all.