Faith Heights

Chapter 3

I filed inside the hall with a mental gulp. The building's echoing clamor had been greatly exaggerated; there were only forty or so students shuffling around, all appearing my age, and the majority looked as anxious as I felt. There was a small cluster of girls in a corner to the left, but most of the bodies were left to their own company, taking in the imposing circular room with identical expressions of nervous wonder. The girls, perhaps five of them, each held the same timid yet excited smiles. The longer I stared at them, the more I could have sworn that there was something similar about their features, although they couldn't have looked less alike. I couldn't put my finger on it, but it was certainly there, even if only in the way they held themselves.

The rest of the crowd around me gazed up at the raised ceiling with round, awed eyes. With the long, raised windows filtering in light onto the beautifully carved white walls, the hall could have passed for a modern church- minus the pews. 

"It's as frighteningly beautiful as you expected, isn't it?" A voice beside me remarked.

I spun to face a short girl with pale skin and large, glossy green eyes that would better fit a person twice her size. Her hair was trimmed into a silky black bob just above her shoulders, and the tips were tinged a dark, copper red that she'd have to remove before classes began.

I returned her nervous smile. "It's like the entire campus was designed by the lovechild of a gothic architect and a nineteenth century aristocrat."

Her emerald eyes lit with approval. "I'm Rhea. Did you just move in today?"

I responded with my own name as I nodded. "Just an hour ago. When did you arrive?"

"Last night. My parents practically shipped me here the minute the letter came."

I knew the feeling, although I didn't have any reason to mimic the bitterness of her tone. Even though my parents had been ecstatic at my acceptance, if I'd said I hadn't wished to leave home, they would have thrown out the letter and that would have been the end of it. My Mum would have watched me with concerned, puppy-dog eyes and her curls would have deflated for a few hours, but there would have been no struggle to return to our long-held routine. 

"So getting accepted into Faith Heights wasn't your first choice of lottery tickets?" I asked.

"No, no- I didn't mean it like that. I was on cloud nine when the letter arrived. But actually being here is a completely different story." She noted, with a dry laugh.

I knew exactly what she meant; the entire school seemed to be bathed in an otherworldly atmosphere of prestige and expectancy. A mile-long parade couldn't have prepared us for it.

I trundled further into the crowd alongside Rhea to gain a clearer view of the raised podium at the front. An older man with wispy grey hair combed to the left peered down at us as if we were all unbroken stallions. His frozen stature reminded me of a gargoyle, polished and refined to perfection. The woman closer to the centre of the stage, however, looked anything but stone-like. The contour of her body seemed to thrum with a palpable energy, writhing in the air around her like a second skin. I'd never seen such an aura of power, and from the looks of unease on the other students, I was guessing that they felt the same. I'd seen pictures of Headmistress Isabella Leclair on the school's website, but they didn't offer her an ounce of justice. The tall woman wore an expensive fossil grey pantsuit, clearly custom-made, and hanging loosely around her lean figure. She had one of those timelessly beautiful faces only seen in black and white films, impossible to pin an exact age to. Anywhere between mid-thirties to fifty. Her auburn brown hair was tied in a thick knot at her neck, tightening her olive features, and her flickering blue eyes brightened as she took us in.