“That’s because she probably isn’t,” I said.

Amelia raised an eyebrow. A moment later, she checked her watch and got to her feet. “Class is about to begin. I have to make some copies for the student council first, do you think you will find your way there yourselves?”

“I’m sure we’ll manage,” Seth said.

“All right. Don’t forget the assembly later today! Mrs.

Whitworth is going to welcome all the new students and give you a tour.”

Seth waited until she was out of earshot before he said, “Bit strange, that one. And proper posh.”

I nodded, watching as she disappeared through the door. “She definitely likes her rules.”

“God, she got off on them when she read them to us last night,”

Seth snorted. “It’s all a bit much though, isn’t it? Especially the whole no girls in the boys’ wing and vice versa thing to prevent intimate relations.” He shook his head with a crooked grin.

“Fools. I’m bisexual, these rules can’t stop me.”

I was silent for a moment, taken off guard by how casually the words rolled off his tongue. Before I could stop myself, I said,

“I’m—I like girls.”

“Sick. We’re really conquering the system, huh?”

“Looks like it,” I laughed, almost incredulous at how easy that had been before I suddenly realized that the hall was almost empty. “And we’re also late.”

Seth immediately got to his feet. “Shit. What class do we even have?”

“English Lit, I believe.”

Seth groaned. “The name makes it sound like so much fun but once you need to interpret poems, nothing’s lit anymore.”

“You don’t like English?” I asked in surprise while we crossed the entrance hall. Using the map of the castle that had waited on my bed along with a bunch of other pamphlets last night, I managed to lead us to the hallway with the classrooms that were located in the west wing.

“I like reading, but I don’t like writing. Technology, maths, physics, that’s the kind of stuff I understand.”

“At least I know who can help me with my homework now.”

“Only if you write my essays.”

“Deal.”

Seth wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “You know, Eve, I can already tell that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

I couldn’t help the smile that spread on my face at his words.

With Seth, it all seemed so easy; we had met reading the same book and naturally started talking, came out to each other in a joking conversation, and now he considered me his friend. He embodied everything I had wished for when I had agreed to my parents’ idea of going to a boarding school.

However, before I could express any of this, a thin voice sounded from my left. “Excuse me? Excuse me, children?”

Seth let go of me as we turned around to look at the short woman trying to get past us. She appeared to be about sixty years old, with gray curly hair that spilled out from underneath a big purple hat. “You two must be new here!” she chirped. “Are you in my English class?”