As it turns out, the dining hall is in fact one big room that’s been divided into several smaller rooms with walls that only goes halfway up towards the ceiling. In each room there is two or three circular tables set with six chairs at each. The rooms are placed so that one straight hall goes between them and along it stands several students in line. Even though I can guess that at the end of the line, food is presented, but I do not get the chance to see it for myself for only a few seconds after we’ve arrived, everyone’s looking at me. At first, Seth doesn’t seem to notice, for he only leads me closer to the line.

“Seth!” I hiss and pulls at his arm slightly to make him stop. He turns to me and opens his mouth to say something, but before any sound leaves him, another shrill voice cuts him to it.

“Ah! Rez, how nice to see you up and going again! I hope you’re feeling better?” It’s Marigold.

“Yes, thank you, Ms Blee. Though, I am however quite hungry.” I sigh. “After all, I missed dinner yesterday and breakfast this morning.”

“But of course. Why don’t you follow me? I’ll take you past the line in an instance!” Almost succeeding to make it look incidental, she grabs my hand while pushing away Seth and drags me past the line.

“No, but the line-”

“Don’t worry about that. They know how to pay respect to those superior to them, and as you said, you need food quickly.”

“Oh, well, it’s not that urgent for sure-” I try to break free from her grip but find it rather pointless to try excessively much as she only tightens her hold of me. Instead I turn my head and looks pleadingly to Seth who just shrugs at the end of the line.

“Nonsense, and don’t you worry, I know how things are managed around here, so I’ll take great care of you.”

“Alright,” I sigh, giving up on the situation as a lost cause, though I can’t really escape the feeling of angry eyes thrown at me.

I spend the hour listening to the other girls’ meaningless chatter about this and that that obviously only matters to upper class people. I am upper class people now, I think sadly. But I am still quite sure that I never will be like them. Curse the world if I will. Flashes from the previous nightmare appear and I lose control of reality. I can no longer see my plate of rice and beef stew but instead I see the piles of bodies beneath my feet. As I see a puddle of blood expand to a lake, my heart rate increases in the same rapid acceleration and it doesn’t take long until I find it hard to breathe at all. Next to me I hear someone call my name. I turn towards them and see that it’s Marigold. She’s standing next to me in the grand clothes of a nobility and she looks at me worriedly.

“Rez, are you okay?”

I shake my head slowly and try to clear my head. This is not real, I think, this is not happening. The sentence doesn’t quite get to me though for I can’t pull out of my fog. I’m left to look at the fire eating up the entire square in front of me. Until a strong pair of hands grab my shoulders and shake me slightly.

“Hey, Rez, I’m here, it’s okay, you’re safe. Can you hear me?” I nod. “Good, listen to me. You are standing inside the dining hall of St. Brielle’s school. Can you see that?” I shake my head. “Oh, right, you’re sitting upon a brown chair of oak wood, and I’m standing in front of you. To your right you have a table, do you remember what those looked like when we got here?” I nod. “Great. Upon that table you have your plate, do you remember what’s on it?”

“Rice and stew,” I answer while focusing my mind to look at the boy holding me steadily. Not surprisingly, the first thing I finally can make out is his dark eyes. I let my own eyes lock with them as I slowly get aware of my surroundings.

“Right, good, you can relax now, Rez, you’re back and nothing’s gonna happen, okay?” Seth’s worried gaze burrows its way into my heart and I can feel myself melt into him, into his touch. “Good. That was great. You did really well, but it’s high time for you to eat.” He turns my chair towards the table so I’m faced with my food again. “My ladies, enjoy your meal,” he adds to my table mates before he swiftly leaves us.

“Gosh, that was kinda scary, Rez,” Marigold says when he’s out of earshot. “Are you alright?”

“Yes, I’m okay now.” I mutter.

“Good, cause I want you to tell me everything about how you managed to earn Sirtiore’s interest.”

I shake my head furiously. “No, I’m gonna eat now, and you may not distract me from that.” I promptly picks up my fork and studiously refuse to meet anyone’s eye for the rest of the meal. As soon as I’ve finished it, I raise to my feet and leave. It’s no until I’m outside the entrance to the hall that I realize that I have no idea where I’m supposed to be. I look around to get any sort of clue of what to do but I see nothing. Since yesterday, I’ve only spoken to a few different people, and none of them are here with me right now. With lack of other ideas, I conjure an image of the way Seth and I ran before and then follow it back to the infirmary.

When I get there, though, the door is closed and locked, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone inside to open it for me. Confused, I look around the hallway in search of someone that can help me, but there is no one there either. It’s strange to see the school - well, a school - this empty in the middle of a normal school day. As I hurry to the expedition hall, I run into no one and when I arrive I’m so worked up about it that I almost scream out in relief when I see Tamzin sitting at her usual place.

“Oh, hello, Tamzin.” I greet her when I arrive.

“Well, hello there, Rez, can I help you with something?”

“In fact, yes, you can. You’ve probably heard of what happened yesterday, just like everyone else…” She gives me an apologetic smile which answers my rhetorical question. “Yeah, so, I’ve been at the infirmary all night and only left a while ago to go eat lunch with Seth. But when I got back it was closed.”

“Of course, the infirmary is always closed for those who do not have a need to be there.”

“But-”

“And since you’re up and running, you’re classified as healthy enough to not stay there anymore.”

“But my things…”

“They have naturally been moved to your sleeping cabin.”

“My slee- but I don’t know where that is.”

“Didn’t you read the papers we gave you?”

“I didn’t really get a chance to read them through entirely yesterday, and since they’re in my cabin now, well, you see the problem right?”

“Aha, yes, well, let me just look through here and we’ll see.” She sorts through some papers and soon finds what she’s searching for. “Here! No, wait, this can’t be right, it says you’re sharing cabin with a group of boys.”

“No, but that’s okay!” I hurry to cut in. “There’s no problem at all, I can stay in that cabin.”

“If you’re sure. Well then, I suppose your mates will be there now to gather their things for the afternoon’s classes so if you just make your way to cabin number 93, you’ll get your things.”

“Thank you! Have a nice day!”

Obviously not ready for the extra greeting, Tamzin looks surprisedly at me before a broad smile sets upon her face. “Thanks, you too!” She calls after me right before the door closes behind me.

Luckily for me, I have seen the cabin area before, when I arrived here yesterday, so I don’t have any problem finding it. And unlike pretty much everything else at this place, the order of the cabins is logical and number orderly so I quickly find my way to number 93. Before I get too anxious I go up to the door and knock three surprisingly solid knocks. It doesn’t take long until it’s opened and I’m standing face to face with a brown haired guy who I suppose is one of the boys I will henceforth be sharing my life with.

“Uhm, hi, I’m Rez,” I say tentatively and the moment my name leaves my mouth a smile makes its way to the boy’s face.

“RIght, the new girl who’s extremely strong whom we’ve been waiting since yesterday to meet!? Welcome!” He quickly stands back so I easily can enter the small house.