The fairy Rachel had seen at the welcoming ceremony was nowhere to be found, in the academy. Two schooldays had passed uneventfully before Rachel decided she needed to ask her teacher about where she could find the fairy. Her classes in agriculture had been highly informative, but the teacher she asked for information about the fairy only knew that the military teacher knew her well. The military students and teachers exercised, practiced, and studied at different times from Rachel, so it was no bother to seek out this teacher and ask him about the fairy. But she feared the military students who were often wearing or wielding a weapon. Rachel’s home country was so peaceful that there was only one military school and it was not located in her city.
The next day Rachel, during her free time between morning class and lunch, went to seek out the military teacher. She knew that the military students would be practicing with their weapons and had often seen the teacher watching off to the side. With her courage mustered, having located the closest exit from the academy to the giant field that was near the teacher, Rachel, carrying her books, walked onto the field. The military students who were practicing stopped to watch her walk towards the teacher. Rachel was approaching the teacher from behind, so he didn’t notice why they had stopped and yelled at them to keep at it.
“Excuse me, sir” Rachel called out to the teacher.
“What, oh. How rare, what can I do for you?” The teacher replied surprised to see a non-military student.
“Sorry to take up your time, sir. I was wondering if you knew where I could find the fairy that officiated the welcoming ceremony a few days ago?” Rachel asked.
“Hmm, I do know the answer to your question. But why do you want to know?” He remarked.
Rachel currently didn’t know if it was safe to let anyone else know that she was a fairy. She figured she had to make up something believable on the fly. “I was honored by her certification of the ceremony and want to thank her!?” Rachel exclaimed. But she knew she had messed up. The teacher could tell she was lying and decided to prod her further.
“Listen, I don’t know why you want to meet the fairy, but I won’t let you meet her if you keep lying to me. She is to be protected at all times. Fairies are rare here, and they are very important to forming our history” He said sternly.
“I understand, I just need to learn more about what it is like to be a fairy,” She said honestly.
The teacher felt that Rachel’s last statement was true. So, instead of asking her more questions, he told her she would be back at the academy the day after tomorrow and that she could meet with her then. Rachel knew that she was a little too honest about wanting to learn more about what it’s like to be a fairy, she knew that the teacher knew.
“My name is Reginald, why don’t you stay and watch these students perform some practice matches?” Reginald adamantly insisted.
Rachel felt as though this was an offer she couldn’t refuse. “Okay, can I sit on this bench?” She reluctantly replied.
“Sure.”
Reginald called to the students and arranged their sparring partners before Rachel. Some of them were men who seemed intrigued that Rachel was there to watch, while the others didn’t care either way. Then she heard those words that Rachel learned three days ago that were the only magic spell humans could use. “Let these matches be officiated.” Rachel grew pale and then hot. She clutched her chest in pain and fell off the bench trying to fight the magic. Then the hotness stopped. Reginald had called off the officiation, just as Rachel fell to the floor. He walked over to her and told her “I don’t know why you hide the truth, but your secret is safe with me.”
Rachel took time to recover from her collapse but acknowledged the fact that Reginald knew her secret. Reginald had already moved on to directing the sparring practice, while Rachel decided to leave. Leaving the bench was extremely embarrassing for Rachel, because she had all her eyes on her, minus Reginald’s. She turned to face away from the military students, quickly gathered her books, stood up, and left. She had even left the small book that was essential for her Agricultural Methods class.
It was the next morning and Rachel couldn’t find her small book anywhere. She knew she was going to earn poor favor from the teacher who required it for their class without it and not be able to take part in the lesson. So, she rushed through her morning routine. Oh, darn, Rachel thought. I only have a dress to wear that is clean, everything else is dirty. The agriculture classes were mostly indoors, but the methods class required hands-on activities in the soil when they weren’t visited by an authority in the field that would discuss their knowledge with them in the classroom. Unsurprisingly, pants or shorts worked best during the activities, but surprisingly dresses were allowed. You just had to bring your apron if you wanted to protect your dress from kneeling in the dirt. Rachel grabbed her red dress, the only piece of clothing she had that wasn’t black, brown, or gray, and threw it on. The skirt’s hem fell just above her knees, and it had a scooped neckline, which meant she didn’t have any sleeves to worry about getting dirty. Then she quickly slipped in her boots and gathered her books and apron, before setting off to the military practice field to look for her book.
Rachel saw that the field was empty when she arrived. There weren’t any students nearby either, as they were probably all getting ready or eating breakfast. But she did notice that the field was already set up with weapons on the tables. She walked directly to the bench but didn’t see her book on top or beneath it. She wandered around the area a bit, even retracing her steps from the door she entered and exited the field with. Having found nothing, she decided to wait for Reginald. Maybe he had her book. But he nor the students would appear. So, she searched for them and found their section in the academy. There were windows in all the rooms, so she went one by one looking to find Reginald. He wasn’t in any of them. She turned the corner and found their infirmary. In it, some students had been hurt in training and were laying in the beds bandaged up. Rachel tried not to look at them while looking for the person in charge of the infirmary.
The person who looked like they were in charge was wearing a white coat and deeper into the room, bending over a bed examining someone. Rather than approach them, Rachel decided to wait at the door, nervously. She knew her time was running out and the class was going to start 30 minutes from now. The door to the infirmary slammed open and two students, still clad in armor, walked in one propping up the other one at the shoulder. As they passed Rachel, the one that wasn’t hurt looked at her. He thought she looked familiar but couldn’t remember where he had seen her. But the girl in front of him was beautiful, he thought, unlike that girl from yesterday’s sparring practice. That girl was just a nuisance for him. Reginald found her book on the bench yesterday and tasked him with returning it to her. I didn’t win all the sparring matches just to return a weird girl’s missing book, he thought to himself.
“Hey, Annie, can we use any empty bed in here?” asked the unhurt boy.
“Yea, yea, that’s what they are for, just leave James, there George.” She quickly responded.
“Alrighty.” George acknowledged setting James down to sit on the bed.
Then George turned to the girl in the red dress, noticing that she looked nervous about something, deciding to ask her what she needed since Annie was so busy.
“Hey, Annie’s going to be a while, do you need something from her?” George asked Rachel.
Rachel was caught off guard at the sudden voice speaking to her. The voice was stern and very serious, which spooked Rachel, but she knew she didn’t have any time left, so with all her courage, she blurted out everything. “I am looking for Reginald, I left a small book yesterday on the field and I thought he might know where it is. I need it for class right now.” Rachel spoke exasperated and out of breath.
“Ohh, so you’re that girl,” George said with disapproval. He thought momentarily about whether he should get the book from his locker and return it or not.
Rachel didn’t reply. She hadn’t thought about how much the students had seen or heard of her interaction with Reginald, so she decided to try not to attract any more suspicion than George or any other student might have. Since Rachel didn’t reply, George realized she was trying to not be any more imposing than she already was. That reversed some of the disapproval he had felt towards her. “Well, Reginald told me to return that book to you. If you wait here for a moment, I’ll get it for you.” George said unhappily.
“Oh, thank you.” Rachel bowed her head to him.
George left and a minute later returned with the book. When George reached out the book towards her, Rachel gently grabbed the book with a large sigh and a happy smile. She was so relieved that she even grabbed George's hand while thanking him. George was a little surprised but stayed calm waiting for Rachel to leave. Rachel felt she owed George something. He did save her from developing a poor academic performance, so she asked him out, “Um, George, I feel like I need to do something to thank you for returning my book to me. Could I buy you a meal in town? I must go now, but I’ll find you to set a time and date. Okay, bye. Thank you again.” Rachel left without hearing George’s answer. He was taken aback, no one has ever taken him out to eat. He was one of the wealthiest students at this academy. His father helps fund this academy, in exchange for spots for his children in the classes. So, how could a girl, one he had never heard of, ask him out?
After George recovered from the shock, he looked at James, who had been in earshot of the whole conversation. James, just, sat there with pain on his face, while laughing at George. “Ha, ha, ow. Wow, you already have a date, and it hasn’t even been three days since you’ve been here. I wonder if she knows who you are?”
“Maybe, she does have an ulterior motive.” George speculated. “Guess, I’ll have to find out for myself.”
“So, does that mean you are going on a date?” James smiled.
“Well, I’ll do some recon first and learn more about her, before I decide to go. I don’t even know what her name is.” George pointed out.
“You could just learn all that stuff on your date but do whatever you feel you must.” James sighed.
Running across the academy from the military area’s infirmary helped Rachel make it to the field, the Agricultural Methods class was located. Having arrived with a few minutes to spare, she quickly donned her apron and grabbed the gloves and tools set out with her precious book in her hands. Noticing that her long hair was lying around her shoulders after rushing out this morning, she also quickly pulled it up into a bun. Rachel was able to join her classmates and receive the teacher’s instruction, without any problems.
Comments (0)
See all