Breaking the Ice

First Period:

My homeroom class was a wide, circular room. The shape of the room was hardly used, as all of the rectangular desks were still spaced evenly throughout, facing forward in unfettered rows. There were various countries’ flags hanging from a string that ran along the wall behind the teacher’s desk. They had nothing in common. Poorly printed posters of different kinds of foxes were stuck to the walls, some slowly peeling like they were on the wall of a jail cell.

Ms. Snowfox was my homeroom teacher this year. Bruno grabbed the chair beside the desk I was sitting on. I had a chair behind me, but I had no use for it when I could just sit on the table instead. Another girl grabbed him by the wing, “Not there, bird-brain.” Pippa’s catlike tail swished behind her as she pushed him aside. Her pointed ears folded downward at the sight of him. “You don’t getta sit there.”

He nodded, “No-no, you’re-you’re right. Sorry, Pippa. Sorry, Alice.”

“Like you really mean that, freak,” she hissed.

“You-you must be right,” he whimpered, “I don’t mean it- not enough…” He trudged around the table to the back of the class. Ms. Snowfox watched him sadly as he did. She didn’t say anything.

Finally, Pippa sat down beside me, “Stupid bird won’t keep bothering ‘ya. How was your summer, Teeny?” she always spoke extremely quickly, her tail flicking back and forth as she did.

“He didn’t mean anything by it,” I said.

“Well he’s a bird and I’m a cat, so if he ever tries anything.”

“He won’t.” I insisted, “Mina and I were just working together on our search all summer.”

“Your mom? Didya find anythin’? Ya’ hadta!”

“No. Not really.”

“Well it’s probably a lost cause y’know,” she said matter-of-factly, “even adult fairies aren’t allat big, and little fairies die all the time. Frogs, spiders… Birds.”

“Yeah, Pippa. I know that.”

“Oh! Right! Of course… you… do.” Pippa giggled, “I talk too fast. Mina said I hafta work on that.”

“I’m sure she did,” I said.

“Ya think so too?” Pippa deflated, “I thought ya might say she was wrong for me, just for me, y’know!”

“You talk so fast it’s hard to understand you sometimes,” I said.

“Really? I understand me just fine!” She announced, “I understand me super fine! Ah, your ears are this- no, this- big! I should speak louder!” She yelled.

“No-no that’s not how that works!” I pleaded.

“Oh, I generalized again…” She leaned forward suddenly, slamming her chin against the desk. “It’s like that time James Lorraine said cat-people use litterboxes. Remember that? Back in third grade? He was wrong.”

“I know he was wrong.”

“Alice,” she casually placed one finger against my head, “you’re always so cute. Like Mina is too, but ya got it better.”

“Thanks, Pippa,” I reached up with both my arms to try pushing her finger away, but she kept it there. Her tail kept swishing quietly behind her.

“I was reading about beastfolk anatomy, and y’know catfolk like me have a Jacobson’s organ, and snakefolk don’t have legs cause they have a tail.”

“Oh, that’s nice.”

“Do birdfolk have a gizzard?” She asked innocently.

“I don’t know, Pippa.”

“Oh. I thought you would.” She grabbed my wing between two of her fingers, “You’re more like a butterfly than a bird, I guess.”

“They’re fragile, Pippa.” I said. She dropped it suddenly.

“Spread them out for me!” She kept staring at the pattern, “They’re so yellow. Have they always been so yellow?”

“Yes. We’ve known each other for years.”

“How am I supposed to remember something like that?”

“You have red-orange fur around your tail,” I shut my eyes as I talked, “but it’s a softer orange around your ears. You have bright, yellow eyes. They’re really beautiful. You have pink freckles and big, pointy teeth. But, your breath stinks.”

“You’ve smelled worse though,” she excused.

“I have. It’s still bad, Pippa. Like old fish.”

“I eat fishies a lot!” She paused, “Ya eat salad a lot. I bet your breath smells like tomatoes or caesar. Can I sniff it? What did it smell like when you came back- y’know- with no food in ya.”

“Pippa, I didn’t stop to think about that.”

“Well if you ever get revived again… Mathematically, you will, only one eighth of fairies survive to adulthood, y’know. Tell me then!”

“Let’s cross that bridge if we get there.”

“I’ll be really mad if ya forget, okay!” She showed me her flashing teeth.

“Sure, I’ll remember, Pippa.” I was sure this conversation would completely slip her mind by the end of the day. That’s just how she was. But, it was just trivial enough that she might somehow keep it in the back of her head. I couldn’t pose to myself who else would ever care about such a thing.

She smiled broadly, “You’re so nice, Alice!” She sniffed at me, “Hmmm, sometimes I wonder how it was only Bruno.”

“What?” I spun around.

“I was just kidding. People aren’t crazy, y’know. Well, y’know.” She pulled a stick of gum out of her pocket, “Want one?”
“I couldn’t fit that in my mouth, Pippa.”

“You couldn’t?” She seemed to think about it for a second, “Huh, I didn’t really think about that.”

“I know you didn’t.”

“Shhhh,” quietly extended from the front of the class. Ms. Snowfox walked in a little circle, and perked her snout up. Her white, fluffy tail flicked behind her. “Sixth grade… Sixth grade, good morning.” The chatter in the back of the room slowly died down as Ms. Snowfox waited. “I’m happy to be your homeroom teacher this year, class of 2011. I can see some very, very interesting faces throughout this room. And, I will take it upon myself for you all to have a better year than… some of you have had before.”

“Uhh… not everyone, right?” Pippa called out.

“Are you asking me to exclude somebody, Pippa?” Ms. Snowfox trotted across her desk. Her eyes wandered to the back of the room. “No.”

Pippa whispered to me, “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed… Den… What does she even sleep in?”

“Quiet,” I kept looking forward. We were both sitting in the very front. I always had to be in the front, or else I’d not be able to see anything.

Ms. Snowfox continued, “Now, I heard some things from Ms. Merri about when you all were in her homeroom. Three-four years ago. This is so long ago now that I was still a senior here back then. I understand this class has some lingering disagreements, but as I’ve only seen you in elective classes before, I haven’t had the chance to get to know you all together. Mrs. Oskarsdottir doesn’t seem to think you were any better last year, but maybe she was being a bit harsh. Let’s prove her wrong this year, okay?”

She pushed her paw against the whiteboard and watched it slowly rotate around to its other side. There was an agenda written on it, “There’s papers on my desk. Passing them out would take hands… or magic. Can someone come grab them and hand four to each set of desks, please?”

Pippa ran up and snatched the papers. At the top, the read Icebreakers. They were full of basic questions about a person, the things they liked. When she saw them, Natasha Hardy loudly yawned, “Bianca-Bianca!” She called Ms. Snowfox by her first name, a common thing among the student body, “We know each other already!”

“I know that,” Ms. Snowfox casually lay across her desk, her front paws hanging off, “while this is mostly for me to get to know you, I thought it would be a good way for everyone here to restart.”

Pippa snorted, “We’re all friends already. What’s there to restart?”

Ms. Snowfox ignored her. She looked over to me, “I had your sister last year,” she said all too loudly. As much as her eyes followed mine, her mouth was open to everyone, “she went on and on about this class, about how terrible some of the students were. But, I’m really not seeing it.”

I wondered if she knew how much the middle school students all wanted to listen to Mina. I grabbed the hem of my skirt, “Well, she hears about the class from me. Everyone remembers bad things.”

“Good. Then, we reset.”

I looked at the thing as I tried to fill it out. There were pens made small enough for me to use, but I never bothered. Instead, I used a simple spell Mina taught me to create inky marks across the page, following my finger. Ms. Snowfox watched me as I used it, “I invented that spell, you know?”

I froze, “You did?”

“I got frustrated trying to make pens useful for me. Well, I made a better version of it for when I’m in this form, too. It’s really useful, and I like being bigger anyway. What’d you get for number four?”

“Favorite movie? Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.”

“Casablanca,” she said. She shuffled around in the papers on her desk until she pulled one out in her paws, “I did the whole thing too.”

“Why?”

“I hate the idea of asking you to do something I wouldn’t do.”

Name: Alice Sparrowbane
Species: Fairy
Birthday: February 17, 1995
Favorite Movie: The Empire Strikes Back
Favorite Book: Of Mice and Men
Favorite Food: Pistachios.
Favorite Magic Type: Memory Spells.
If you could go anywhere, where would you go: The North Pole. It’s never hot, and I’d like to see the Northern Lights.
Who is your best friend: Pippa Twitch or Fern Greenleaf.
When did you feel your strongest: Early second grade, before the winter.

I had just finished mine when I heard a scream from the back of class, “Oh my god!” Natasha snatched Bruno’s assignment. “Oh my god! You have to see this!” She ran toward me. I couldn’t look away as she flashed the page in front of my face.

Name: Bruno Stafford
Species: Birdfolk
Birthday: May 22, 1993
Favorite Movie: I don’t know. I don’t watch movies.
Favorite Book: The Three Little Pigs
Favorite Food: Soup. The gross chicken stuff you have when you’re sick.
Favorite Magic Type: Healing Magic.
If you could go anywhere, where would you go: Point Nemo.
Who is your best friend: Alice Sparrowbane
When did you feel your strongest: This is a stupid question. Ask somebody else.

I looked up at her, “Why are you showing me this?”

“He says you’re his best friend,” she pretended to gag.

“Just give it back to him,” I waved her away, “it’s not graded. He can write whatever he wants.”

Natasha halfheartedly walked back over to Bruno’s desk. She dropped the paper on the ground and stomped on it, “Oops.” She said cheerily.

Bruno picked it up off the ground. He wiped it off, and looked down at the smudged ink. He took his pen and tried to clean up the lines where they’d been blurred. He finally looked across the room at me. I wasn’t sure if he expected me to say something.

Ms. Snowfox followed me out when the class ended. “Does he know you left him out?” She said quietly.

“He’s not one of my best friends,” I whispered back.

“That’s a shame,” she hummed.

I turned to her, “Sure… How would anyone react, I mean… Everyone knows everyone, everything. It would be too weird.”

“Who cares?”

“Ms. Snowfox, I do.”

She stopped, “I see. I’ve said all I need to, Alice.”

“Fine,” I flew on toward my next class.

Second Period:

My next classroom was decorated with posters of Art Deco buildings. A hatrack sat behind the teacher’s desk with different kinds of expensive hats dangling from it. Over one of the windows was a carefully framed DARE flyer.

Through middle school, Ledoric’s students had to take three different English classes, but had the freedom to take them in any order. The suggestion was to take the hardest of them, English in Arcane Fields, last. It was taught by Mr. Archstar, who few liked, and it was widely considered to be more difficult than the others. It was the difficulty of that class that attracted me to it. When I flew through the open door, I noticed most of my classmates were eighth graders, and a few seventh graders. As I flew up to the front, I found myself sitting beside Mina. She raised an eyebrow at me as I sat down, “I thought you were taking Ms. Merri’s class.”

“The other ones don’t involve magic,” I admitted.

“Yeah, but it’s Mr. Archstar.” She said.

His silver tail swished behind him, and long black horns hung over his head. He bent down to the two of us, “I see we have a little commentary to be made. Sparrowbane the Small… and Sparrowbane the Smaller.”

Mina cleared her throat, “I was making sure my sister came to the right class.”

He flashed a pointed, toothy smile. “The top scorer. She’s more ready for my class, than you are… Vice President. This is a class where you will face your fears, and that is something I know your sister is capable of. He touched his sharp claw against my side, “Isn’t that right… little one?”

Some of the eighth graders laughed to themselves. A crumpled up tissue flew across the room. It caught fire, being reduced to nothing but ash before it landed. “You don’t laugh when I compliment your fellow students. You clap.” Mr. Archstar teased, “This is the prodigy, Sparrowbane, we’re talking about.”

“Now,” Mr. Archstar continued, “Somebody tell me about Dane’s Conjecture. Go!” He glanced around, seeing no hands raised. “Nate Rivers? How about you?”

Nate twirled his hair in his fingers as he sat up. “I… Conjecture? Isn’t that math?”

“Are you saying we cannot use conjectures in speech?

“Nossir!” Nate sat back down. He muttered something.

“Loudly.”

“I don’t know.” He finally said.

“Good,” Mr. Archstar smirked, “Dane’s Conjecture is a pile of bird dung. It doesn’t exist. More specifically, guano does exist. This does not. This nonsense I made up is rather, less than bird dung. Maybe the only thing less.”

I raised my hand. He didn’t say anything but quietly pointed at me and waited for my response. I asked, “Was it supposed to sound like Dame’s Law- not a conjecture- magical creations always form in measurements of prime numbers? A magical cube can be 2, 3, or 5 inches wide, but not 4?”

Mr. Archstar smiled. He cleared his throat, “I see, I happen to have said something that sounds vaguely like something else. There is no evidence of my intentionality, nor any reason for it. Did you just mean to recite a well-known theorem?” He looked around the room, “She’s nine. How come none of you beat her to the punch?”

He looked around, seeing nobody react. “Fine, I’ll give you all another chance. Since, you need one so badly. Somebody tell me how Riemann’s Zeta Function could be helpful for spellcasters in the future?” He looked at me, “Not Alice, I don’t need you to prove this one. How about Trent Hallmark? I’m sure your experience on the football team will be helpful with this one?”

The half-hippo looked up at him broadly, his eyes bulged at the question, “Because the solution of the Zeta Function would help predict the locations of prime numbers?” He offered, “And, whoever solves it gets a million bucks.”

“Thank you!” Mr. Archstar exclaimed, “I know there are two competent students in here. At least one of them is half my height.”

I continued watching as he passed out a thick packet of papers to each student, “Here is your syllabus for the year. Our Fall finals will be on December 10, and our Spring finals will be on May 21. I hope none of you will have a conflict for either of those days. I won’t give you a makeup if you’re being resurrected in Nurse Var’s office. There will be no class during the week of October 18 for my cousin’s wedding. You may return to your student apartments or come here for a study hall instead during that week. Do not forget this.”

“What is that, six weeks from now?” Mina whispered to me.

“I’ll remind you.”

“No, you don’t have to.”

Mr. Archstar waited a moment for everyone to flip through the syllabus. It was five pages longer than it needed to be as a result of its meandering, legalistic writing. A good deal of space was also taken up by high definition images of hats that had been ruined by the garbled, black-and-white printing. There were top hats, and bowler hats, and fedoras, but they looked like a mush of black and white pixels on the actual paper.

Finally he continued, “Now, I know most people come in here and see the name of the class: English in Arcane Fields. This does not mean we will be reading books about magic or cute little fairy tales.” He grumbled, “If you want fairy tales, ask the Sparrowbane sisters. I’m sure they can tell you a bedtime story twice as gruesome. Instead, English as it is used in magic, is English in its most precise form. This is the language of magic, it is the syntax of the very laws of the universe. This is where words cross science and science crosses into the realm beyond understanding. I will have office hours during lunch and after school every day, for I implore you to do anything that will avoid yourself falling behind. It will be nigh impossible to recover lost time without an excess of effort.”

Two of the seventh grade students got up and walked out of the class. During the first week of school, students were permitted to request a class transfer if they preferred to take something else. They would have to come back here a year later, so I wondered how determined they really were to kick the can down the road. All middle schoolers had to take this class eventually. Mr. Archstar smiled as they left, “I respect when people know their limits, you know. Anyone else?” Nobody took the advice.

We spent the rest of the hour discussing the minutiae of the class agenda. The most important dates throughout the semester, and the ultimate learning objectives. I was almost disappointed when it ended. If this class was all Mr. Archstar was claiming it to be, I was going to be bored in the other middle school English classes that I had to take over the next two years.

He stopped me before I left. I watched as everyone else filed out then finally turned to him, “What do you need, Mr. Archstar?”

“I’ve heard plenty about you over the years. I thought I would despise you once you wandered into one of my classes. A certain type, all too sure of themselves, and just a little too smart for their own good. I didn’t expect to like you, not like I have. Keep it that way, Sparrowbane.”

“I will,” I said. I picked myself up to fly away.

“Wait, Sparrowbane.” He faced his whiteboard, “You know theoretical magic, more than just practical spells. What brought this on?”
“I learned from my older brother.”

“Please, I know Edward. He couldn’t enchant his shoelaces together.” He stopped himself, “No, you fairies don’t even wear shoes.”

“I read the journals that Ms. Snowfox suggests to me.”

“Bianca?” He thought out loud, “She’s never been interested in theory. She prefers to be a trailblazer of sorts. Her and I were in some of the same classes when she was a freshman. I was a senior, then.”

“I read some on my own, too.”
“Good,” he said, “how did you get such an interest in theory?”

“It’s magic. Who wouldn’t be interested?”

Mr. Archstar smiled, “You’d be surprised. Let me rephrase the question. How did you start, what topic drew you in?”

“Biology. Magical creatures in particular,” I said. This was true, I’d read about biology and extrabiology to the extent as information seemed to even exist.

“And there is Bianca’s influence. I’d suppose you sought her out because you were seeking more information on shapeshifters… of a different sort from her own. An obsession?”

“I just had to answer a question,” I said.

“Did you get your answer?”

“Not the one I wanted.”

He ran his hand along the scales on his neck. A long, jagged scar ran between them, and he barely avoided it with his claws, “New spells are still being created. At your pace, you could still be in time to be the one to invent certain kinds, important kinds. A cure to an incurable condition… or something like that.”

“Is that a suggestion?”

“I could make it an assignment if you’d like,” he laughed, “but then you would need to have a deadline, and I would need to give you a grade whether or not you succeed. You don’t want to rush a magnum opus.”

I nodded, “I’ll consider it, Mr. Archstar.”

“Good,” he said. “Go to your next class. I can see my next group clawing at the windows. So, so eager… if only to get out of the cold.”

Third Period:

Until middle school, students didn’t have to take a second language. Instead, they would spend an extra period in their homeroom. Japanese I, taught by Mr. Takagi, had a mix of students from middle school and high school. The language classes were always as diverse as the elective classes after elementary school. There was nobody in this course who I knew all that well. Pippa was taking Farsi, Mina was continuing with French, and for some reason, Bruno had been extremely excited to take German.

It was a generally interesting class, but little happened on the first day beyond general introductions. I chose to take Japanese because I’d fallen in love with Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura, and Ojamajo Doremi, along with various other anime series. In this case, it was a cigar that was a cigar.