I have no clue what any of the writing means, but I copy it all down anyway, and then Mr Hocking draws a simplified version up on the big board and begins to go through it all.

It’s a huge relief when the lesson is over, I’m not sure I like Mr Hocking, but when I turn to Yanny to find out where we’re going next, he looks hassled.

‘Uh, right,’ he says, glancing at my timetable. ‘I’m going in the other direction. You have maths . . . Zara, don’t you have maths next too?’ He turns to the girl next to him, who nods.

‘Mr Goodenough?’

I look down at the timetable. The piece of paper is crumpled already, and I don’t even know which bit to look at.

‘Here,’ she says, tracing her finger down one of the columns. ‘M8, Mr G. You’re with me. Come on.’

I look up to thank Yanny, but he’s already gone.

‘Oh, he does that,’ Zara says. ‘He’s nice enough, but not what you’d call steadfast. He’s gone off to have one of his special lessons . . .’

‘Special lessons?’

Does she mean magic lessons? Is he going up that weird, magical-looking staircase? I squint after him, but he’s disappeared already.

It can’t be that.

‘Honour-student thing,’ she says. ‘No such luck for us.’

I’m a little bit in awe of Zara. She fills the space with her words and just her general presence. She’s a head taller than me, her dark hair spools down to her waist, and her eyes are honey gold, narrowing as she gives me a quick, appraising glance.

‘So, where’ve you come from?’ she demands, swinging out into the corridor, scattering smaller kids and bowling through them.

I hurry after her, hunching my shoulders, making myself small. ‘Um. Just home.’

‘Home?’ She turns and arches one eyebrow. ‘What, like home-schooled? Wow. This must be a bit of a change for you, then.’

‘I wanted to come to school.’

‘Well, you chose a weird one,’ she says. ‘I only started last term myself, and there are lots of things going on that I haven’t worked out yet. Including Yanny and his secret lessons. Come on.’

She sweeps off into a classroom and sits at the back of the class, which is a relief, because it turns out being the new girl is a bit of a challenge when you’re used to being in your house alone with a very small imp and a ghost nan. There are just so many people. So many warm bodies, rushing and nudging and staring and whispering.

Zara has a lot of stationery. She pulls it out of a huge fluffy pencil case and lines it up on the table. Biros, highlighters, sparkling pencils, and a huge blue rubber that says For Big Mistakes, which makes me smile.

I get out my old striped pencil, scratched and scored after a run-in with Peg, and the folding wooden ruler I found in the study. Zara looks at them and then at me. And then with a tiny sigh, she carefully pushes all her stuff over so that it’s in the middle of the table.