A New Beginning \\\ Iris Miller

Chapter 6

Iris got off the bus with her friends and headed into her new school. "See you later Iris!" Maci shouted, waving at her.

"Bye!" Iris shouted back and headed towards her locker. Iris was luckily able to get her locker open on the third try, so she wouldn't be late to class. Iris grabbed her binders and pencil case and walked to class with her schedule in hand. "Room 116," she mumbled to herself, scanning for the classroom numbers. Once she was able to find it, she walked in and found a desk to sit at. After a few minutes, the bell rang and announcements started.

"Welcome back to school everyone!" The principal said over the loudspeaker. "Today's lunch will be tachos." Iris didn't even want to know what that was. "And today for class meetings we will have a club and sports fair. That is all we have for today, have a great first day back at school!" The loudspeaker cut off, signaling that class had begun.

The teacher, Mr. Wahid, started talking about class expectations, and what they would be learning about. The class was essentially about the history of Herington, along with some other American history thrown in.  Iris listened as best she could and took notes of what the teacher was saying.

"In 1792, five families came together to make a town where people of magic could reside in peace. They protected the area with powerful barrier magic that still stands to this day," Mr. Wahid said, showing a slideshow on the smartboard. "Can anyone tell me the names of the five families?" A girl raised her hand. "Yes?" Mr. Wahid picked on her.

"The family's names were Euria, Keahi, Enki, and Zephyr," the girl answered.

Mr. Wahid nodded. "The fifth family?" He asked her. The girl stayed silent. "The fifth family's name was lost to time. It is believed that their last name is Herington. Has anyone here met Kevin or any of his family?" Iris along with many others raised their hands. "His family protects and owns the town as they were the fifth family. But since their family has been around for so long, around 2000 years, they lost their surname." Iris was quickly jotting down notes as she listened to her teacher go on to talk about the schools.

"The first family's surname is Euria, meaning rain in Basque. So they named their school Rainrun, which is our school. The second family's name is Keahi or as in the last 100 years, we learned means fire in Hawaiian. They named their school Brightburn," Mr. Wahid paused for a moment as people scribbled down notes. When most pencils had dropped to a desk, he began to speak again. "The third was Enki, meaning earth or ground in Sumerian mythology. They decided to name their school Rockskipper. The last was Zephyr or the west wind in Greek mythology. Their school is named Skyfall."

Iris quickly finished her notes along with the others around her and returned their gaze to Mr. Wahid's slowly graying hair. "I know many of you already know most of this but as we go on into the semester, you will learn more deeply about the town. We will have 8 units. One that broadly covers what we are going to be learning, a unit for each family, one that explains origins of the town, and the last about American history as it is required by Herington law." Mr. Wahid told them when everyone had looked up from their notebooks. "And that concludes our lesson for today, syllabi are due Friday."

Iris looked up at the clock. Three more minutes until the bell rang and she went to chorus. Lovely. Iris sat and waited until the bell rang and she went to chorus. The class had mostly consisted of going over the syllabus. Then they were given 10 minutes at the end of the class to talk. Iris took this time to talk with Maci and Kendrick. "Maci, do they not do semester scheduling?" Iris asked.

"Oh, they do. Halfway through the year, Science or Intro to Magic will change to an actual science class or you'll major in a magic class. Spanish and art will be removed so you can take more magic classes, other art classes, or some of the classes you would take next year. And with Social studies, you'll take midterms and if you don't get above an 85 you have to retake the class," Maci told her.