Wealdenmynd - Chapter 2 The End

- Chapter Two -

 

The End

 

Inside the Grand Hall, the atmosphere turned a musky, oppressive brown as the light that had been poring in through the high set windows disappeared behind a steamy summer cloud. Only dim patches of light played across the old roof beams as the oil lamps on the desks below flickered. Tall, flowing figures and their spirits brushed past them, throwing light in all directions in their wake. Their slow footsteps echoed off the rich wooden walls before fading away to mingle with the sound of the ticking clock coming from the topmost table.

 

Sat at the desks, organised into four long rows stretching right to the back of the hall, sat young men and women, hunched over the paper in front of them, their spirits huddled close for comfort or support.

 

Searah, a tall girl with long, dirty blonde hair and dark green eyes was sitting a few chairs back from the front and was starting at the words written on the paper jammed under her oil lamp.

 

Question 2

“What, in your opinion, are the arguments for and against the legality of the war that eventually led to the separation of the Tomarian and Entarian Territories? Use specific dates and events to support your arguments.”

 

She read the question again, and for the fourth time came to the same conclusion; she had no idea what the arguments for and against were. History had been one of her favourite subjects for the last few years, ever since she and her friends had walked into class for the first time after a summer holiday to find a new teacher. She had found history boring and dry before he had arrived, but somehow his relaxed manor and never ending knowledge had brought the subject to life. That life however was quickly fading. For a fifth time, now with an added touch of annoyance, her mind failed to come up with any form of answer.

 

Absent-mindedly doodling on her piece of scrap paper, she thought it unlikely they would accept the answers ‘they had nothing better to do’ or ‘they made the laws so how can it be illegal’. She could hear the scratching of pens from all around the hall as the people she had grown up with used every frantic minute to throw as much information as they could remember on their rapidly filling papers. One of her spirits drifted down from the side of her head, where it had been playing with a lock of loose hair, and down onto her pen, as if trying to push an answer out of it.

 

She racked her brains for some form of answer, painfully aware of the clock ticking her time and possibly her future away. Searah closed her eyes and tried to think back to the revision she had been doing the night before. She and her two best friends had been sitting on Dounaton Green, under their favourite tree watching the sun pass down through the leaves. A voice swam into her head along with an amused and exasperated face, curtained by a few strands of jet-black hair, the rest of which she knew was tied up in a messy bun behind her friends head.

 

‘If they ask anything on the illegality of war just argue the precedent of Dwara’sed and breaking of Royal decrees.’

 

In her minds eye she gave the face a puzzled look. The face laughed at her.

 

‘It has happened before but was going against laws laid down by the king or queen.’

 

Searah looked up at the back of the black haired girl in front of her, mouthed a silent ‘thank you’, before she looked back down at her answer paper, and started to write.

 

An hour went by, filled with the never ceasing sounds of manic pens, the clomping shoes of the examiners, the ticking of the clock and the occasional hoot of a bird as it flew past one of the high set windows. Searah’s spirits flicked over her scrap paper, caught pens she had accidentally pushed off the desk and gave her little nudges whenever she started to drift off. She past through questions like

 

Question 4

‘Explain, with examples, what significance religion played in the history of The Isle of Nitefayre during the seventh age (Nitefayrian Calendar)’.

 

Whenever she lost track of where she was, or couldn’t remember the answer to a particularly difficult question, Searah would close her eyes again and think back to the previous night. Each time either the face of a black haired girl or that of a brown haired one would swim to the surface, and she would continue with a smile and a silently whispered ‘thank you’. At last, after spending the last fifteen minutes of the exam on

Question 5

‘In your opinion, what factors lead to the second Ardent of the Carasian Temples decision to ban the hunt for treasures in 2189 (Carisian Calendar) and its revocation in 2191’.

 

The Master, an elderly man in long black robes whose spirits were drifting into every corner of the hall, picked up the bell that had been sitting on the top table and swung it. The sound of its ring thumped through the hall, shocking some of the students so much they blotted their paper.

 

‘Thank you ladies and gentlemen,’ the Master called out in a long, low voice, ‘I would ask you to please stop writing and put your pens down.’ Searah put her pen down and grinned at her almost completely full answer paper. The black haired girl sat at the desk in front continued to scribble madly for a few more seconds before finally relinquishing her pen and flexing her fingers, trying the stretch out the cramp.

 

‘The teachers will now collect your papers.’ Called the Master once more. ‘Once all the papers have been taken to the front desk you may leave. Four at a time, starting at the front if you will. This must be done in silence,’ he said sternly, casting an eye over all the faces now turned to look at him, ‘and I thank you for being such patient students and, I hope, for not cheating. I wish you all the best in your results.’

 

Slowly the hall in front of Searah emptied and as the black haired girl in front of her stood up, she turned and winked a pretty brown eye at her and disappeared off with light step, her spirits lingering at the desk for a second, as if desperate to prove they had more information to give. And then Searah was up and walking away from her desk, before turning back to pick up the pens and paper she had left. The brown haired girl whose face she had been imagining was sat behind her and, in turn, Searah gave a wink and a smile before half running for the freedom of the outside air.

 

She had barley a moment to enjoy the speckled sun and fresh breeze playing down the alley between the Grand Hall and the Art Building before she was set upon by a mop of black hair.

 

‘So, do tell all,’ she said, grabbing Searah by both shoulders, ‘how did you find it? I bet you got stuck on the legality of war question.’

 

‘Hello Kaytee,’ Searah replied, placing a finger on Kaytee’s head, playfully pushing her away, ‘how did you know I’d get stuck there?’

 

Kaytee was a tall, messy girl who, despite her best attempts to hide it, was stunningly pretty. Her clothes, covered in faded purples, greens and reds were baggy to the point they seemed to be held on her by pins and belts. She had spent years perfecting the art of wearing clothes that looked like they shouldn’t be able to stay on. She was a well-spoken girl whose style betrayed nothing of the strict and sometimes binding lifestyle that came with wealthy and well-connected parents.

 

‘Because I know you my dear,’ she said, throwing her head back in laughter, ‘and you always get stuck on that sort of question.’

 

‘I suppose I should thank you really.’ Searah mused, searching through her bag to make sure she had put all her pens and bits of paper away, one of her spirits diving into the bag to light the bottom.

 

‘How so?’

 

‘It was you that told me the answer or at least my imagination of you.’

 

‘That’s creepy.’ Said Kaytee with a twinkle in her eye. ‘Unless, that is, I can have your marks to add to my own?’

 

‘Oh very funny.’ Mocked Searah.

 

‘No?’

 

‘No’ said Searah with a grin.

 

‘In that case my dear,’ Kaytee said, holding both of Searah’s shoulders again and planting a kiss on her forehead, ‘it’s just creepy.’

 

Searah batted her arms away with a smile, closed her bag, and started to walk along the ally between the two buildings. The school itself wasn’t that big, the art building as it was known also housed the science rooms, numbers classes, staff room and library. The school was privately owned by the Master and his family, but the local children went there free of charge. The school made its money by charging children from other towns and by holding private functions and events. The Master’s family, all of whom taught at the school, were one of the richest in the town and anything they didn’t spend on their own houses and children went back into the school, meaning the pupils usually had the best facilities. It was separated into three main buildings, the Grand Hall, the Art Building and the Studies Block as well as a large open sports field.

 

Searah had been going to the school for the last five years, ever since she was thirteen and her parents had conceded it was probably better than their old school, three towns over.

 

Five years later and her time at the school was almost finished. With her last exam over, Searah couldn’t help but look back at her time there, at her friends, the good times and the bad. She was woken quickly from her musings however, by Kaytee’s voice.

 

‘Shouldn’t we wait for Reacca?’

 

Searah turned and looked back down the alley at the brown haired girl she had winked at, now talking to a tall blonde boy whose spirits were hugging close to his chest. She rolled her eyes.

 

‘No, she’ll catch us up.’ At Kaytees puzzled look she jabbed a thumb back towards the hall and started to walk off again. She heard Kaytees showy laugh before she jumped on Searah’s back.

 

‘Come on Sarry darling!’ Kaytee was half singing, tapping Searah on the head. ‘That’s it, we’re done! We’re free spirits’ she said throwing her spirits high into the air in a giant spiral. ‘At least until our parents tell us to start getting jobs and the like, that’s it, it’s the end!’

 

Grinning more to herself that to anyone else, Searah emerged from the end of the alleyway, having shrugged Kaytee off, into a blaze of sunlight.

 

‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘it is.’

 

Reacca caught up with them half way along the road that eventually led out of town, her spirits drifting over to Searah's and Kaytee's, spread as they were along the road. The town was cut neatly in two by a river that ran through the middle. On one side, the side with the school were the houses and streets where all the locals lived. A little way outside the other houses and streets stood the mansion of Lord Dryhten whose family had founded the town several centuries previously. On the other side of the river stood the shops and industries, metalwork and pottery, Money Traders and market stalls that kept the community alive, meaning it was common for locals to live on one side of the river and work on the other.

 

In the middle, where the river split in two, was a large open area. It had been promised to the residents of the town a century before, during a time of great expansion. No business or dwelling was allowed on the Green, leaving it relatively unspoiled and the favourite place for schoolchildren and elderly couples to take walks.

 

Every year the town carnival was held there, run by a group of travellers from further south, and everyone who lived there would descend upon the Green, leaving it a brown and muddy state for the next few months or until the next rain came to wash away the brown and bring the grass back to life. The first signs of the carnival were starting to in preparation for the first night.

 

Banners had gone up and the first of the tents were starting to be erected by tanned and weathered men and women in dirty working clothes.

 

The two roads in and out of the town ran along the two streams of the river either side of the Green, and it was along the school-side road that Searah, Kaytee and Reacca now walked.

 

‘What was all that about?’ Kaytee asked as soon as Reacca had her breath back.

 

‘Pardon?’ Replied Reacca absentmindedly, looking behind her as if expecting someone to be following. ‘Oh, I had to end it, poor Garrad.’

 

Reacca was shorter than the other two, with long brown hair, unnaturally straight, that came down almost to her waist. She wore well fitting clothes that, to the untrained eye, looked very expensive. She had a ring on almost every finger and a long silver necklace tucked into her top. She looked every bit the product of a rich family that Kaytee did not, except she had made the clothes herself and Kaytee had made most of the rings.

 

‘What was wrong this time?’ asked Searah, putting a sympathetic arm around Reaccas shoulders, but rolling her eyes just the same.

 

‘He was too…clingy. He followed me home.’ She said, looking behind her again.

 

‘Did you invite him?’ asked Searah.

 

‘No!’ exclaimed Reacca indignantly. ‘I was talking to him, but that doesn’t give him the right to assume I wanted him there.’

 

‘Well that’s a new one.’ Said Kaytee, laughing again and rearranging her top. ‘We’ve had too tall, too short, too boring, too energetic, too smart, too stupid…’

 

‘Too self obsessed.’ Interjected Searah.

 

‘Ooh, that was a good one!’ said Kaytee, smacking a drumbeat on her own legs. Reacca pulled a face and wafted one of Kaytee's spirits away that had been drifting closer and closer to her head.

 

‘Well he was, even you said it.’ sniped Reacca, pointing a finger towards Kaytee.

 

‘Its true, I did. Still, we’ve never had clingy. You’re going to run out of boys soon. People might start to call you a tart.’

 

‘If it wasn’t for the fact that none of them get to spend more than a couple of days with you.’ Searah said, patting her on the back and moving out of the way to allow Reacca and her spirits onto the bridge that crossed the river to the Green.

 

‘I was with this one almost two weeks.’

 

‘A new record.’ Said Kaytee, bowing her head but not hiding the grin. ‘I’m proud.’

Reacca, choosing to take this as a compliment rather than a joke simply said ‘thank you’ and walked past the two tall hedges that served as an entrance and onto the bridge. ‘I think you’re right though.’ Said Reacca, walking backwards and looking at Kaytee.

 

‘Of course I am.’ Said Kaytee with a flourish of her wrists sending her spirits into spirals once again. ‘What am I right about this time?’

 

‘I think I have run out of eligible men.’

 

‘Well, if you will be so picky.’ Said Searah.

 

‘I could always start on the taken ones…’

 

‘Don’t even think about it.’ Searah scathed, pointing a finger at Reacca and settling herself down under the speckled shade of a tree.

 

‘It was just a joke.’ Said Reacca, settling herself down next to her.

 

‘You could try working through the girls.’ Suggested Kaytee in a helpful tone, only to receive a handful of grass from Reacca. She sat down between her two friends, completing the triangle.

 

‘I’d rather be terminally single like you two.’

 

‘I’m not single, I’m independent.’ Sighed Kaytee, lying down on the grass with her head in the sun. ‘Searah’s single.’

 

‘That’s true.’ Searah agreed, opening her bag again. A spirit darted out of it before she had it completely open and rushed back to its usual spot next to her ear. ‘Oh, sorry.’ She said, putting a hand up to make sure it was alright. It was warm to the touch, like glancing your hand across something that had been out in the sun, almost insubstantial, like a bubble that wouldn’t burst.

 

‘Why don’t you do something about it then? I mean, Kaytee's a lost course…’

 

‘Hey!’ exclaimed Kaytee half-heartedly, kicking Reacca gently without looking up.

 

‘…but you still stand a chance.’ She concluded, ignoring the interruption. Searah looked up at the leaves dancing in the breeze, at her spirits drifting amongst them and felt her freed spirit playing with her hair again.

 

‘I guess it’s just not that important. I’m happy as I am really.’

 

‘Hopeless, your both hopeless.’ Reacca said with a touch of exasperation, following Kaytee's example and lying down.

 

They sat beneath the tree for hours, so long that the sun was starting to disappear towards the horizon. They talked about the exams, what marks they hoped for, about the time they met, previous summers and previous carnivals. Each of them was feeling a sense of sadness at the end of their school days and a certain unease about what the future would hold. Slowly the tents, games and stalls started to take shape around them and even the basic skeleton of the central arena could be seen starting to rise from ground a little way off.

 

It wasn’t until the tent nearest to them started to develop ropes that Searah spotted a young boy in clean, dark clothes, his spirits hugging close, walking towards them. She poked Kaytee with her toe and said ‘Kaytee, your brothers walking this way.’

 

A groan came from the direction of Kaytee's head as the young boy stopped next to her.

 

‘Yes, brother dearest?’ she said without looking up.

 

‘Mother says you have to come home.’

 

‘How did you know I’d be here?’

 

‘You and your friends are always here.’

 

‘He has a point.’ Said Reacca, raising a lazy hand into the air.

 

‘You know the last night of term is grandfather’s party,’ continued Kaytee's brother, ‘and mother and father say you have to come and get ready.’ He gave her messy looking clothes a distasteful look.

 

‘Ok, ok I’m coming, I just need to pack up my things and I’ll be along.’ He stood there uncertainly for a second. ‘Off you go, tell them I’m coming.’

 

‘But…’

 

‘Eddin, Go!’ she said as her spirits shot at him from all directions. He disappeared off in the direction of the bridge, making sure to keep his distance from the men and women putting up the tents, some of whom had been looking over at him and laughing.

 

‘Ok, I should be off, best not keep the Master waiting.’

 

‘Good luck,’ said Searah.’ Wish we could keep you company.’

 

‘Master, teachers and family only I’m afraid. Still, thanks.’ She gave them a faint grin, it was obvious she didn’t like having to do this, but knew it was not something she had a choice over. Looking the most deflated she had all afternoon, she gave Searah and Reacca a final wave and picked up her bag. ‘See you both later. Carnival is in two days, should be fun.’

 

‘See you.’ Said Searah and Reacca in unison and Kaytee disappeared in the same direction as her brother, some of her spirits flicking briefly towards the tents.

 

Author's Note

i'd love to hear comments on the voices