Fiddling with her yellow Stratus prefect sash, Binah glanced sideways at Lottie from behind her round glasses. Her already large eyes seemed to double in size, heavy lashes making her look like a wise owl. ‘The person who broke in –’ she shuddered, clearly not wanting to repeat it – ‘they were a reporter; they grabbed one of the boys from Year Eight, Dom Nguyen, and they threatened him. It was really traumatic.’

‘That explains the security,’ Lottie replied, her eyebrows knitting together with worry.

They were just outside the sports hall, a smell of lemon-scented cleaning products washing over them as students filtered in to find a seat on the tiered benches.

‘What aren’t you saying?’ It was Ellie who asked the question, grabbing Binah’s arm to get her to look at them face on.

Binah let out a long sigh, ushering them over to the side of the doorway and out of earshot. They regrouped by one of the water fountains, away from the other students who were gossiping among themselves.

‘The guy who broke in,’ Binah began, pushing up her glasses, and Jamie noted how her lips pursed, like she was trying to hold back the story. ‘He was deranged. Dom said he was like a zombie, that he could hardly communicate with him.’ She paused, letting the information sink in, all of them thinking the same thing, that the symptoms sounded dangerously like the effect of the Hamelin Formula. ‘And he kept saying the same thing over and over again.’ Binah gulped, looking at each of them in turn. ‘He kept saying he wanted a picture of the princess’s pretty new hair.’

4

They’d been gone for two days, just two days, and in that time the safety of the school Lottie loved so much had been destroyed, and, worst of all, she was sure she knew who the culprit was.

The hall was buzzing with feverish energy, every inch of the tiered benches occupied, with everyone grouped by their house colours: purple, yellow and red. None of them wanted to be there, and they kept staring at Lottie.

Trying her best to ignore it, she focused on the lines on the basketball court, following them like a maze, anything to stop her from looking at the crowd, or, even worse, at the furious faces of Ellie and Jamie beside her.

‘Good evening, students.’ Headmaster Croak took his place in the centre of the court, right hand resting against a simple wooden walking stick. He’d always looked old, spongy and mottled like a dried-up baked bean, but since the summer he seemed to have aged about a hundred years. Yet it didn’t make him appear any more frail. Instead he looked more like an ancient wizard, and his long patchwork cloak and what could only be described as an emerald Santa Claus hat that further served to cement that image.