When Lior entered the main building, she found a small group of students in various states of nervous clustered around Ms. Essie as she spoke to them. Ms. Essie looked up at the sound of the closing door and smiled at Lior. “There you are, Lior. Feeling alright?”

Lior nodded. “Y-yes.” The eyes of the other students were making her a bit nervous. “I’m sorry I-”

Ms. Essie promptly interrupted her. “If Diana said something, don’t pay her any mind. It takes her at least a week after her parents leave to thaw out.” She turned back to the rest of the group. “Now where was I? Ah yes, if you’ll follow me, I’ll show you the library, which happens to be much cozier than this drafty place.” She waved her hand around the entrance hall, which was warmly lit by an elaborate chandelier now that the sun had started to go down.

Lior trailed at the back of the group as Ms. Essie led up some stairs, down a few hallways, up more stairs, and then down a different set of stairs. As they walked, Ms. Essie told them all about the history of the building and pointed out interesting features. Lior thought the overabundance of stairs was interesting enough.

Finally, they came to a pair of large double doors, one of which had been propped open to spill light into the hallway. Beyond the doors were rows upon rows of bookshelves, interspersed with sets of tables and chairs. On their right was a wooden desk stacked with books, but it appeared to be unoccupied. To their left, a fireplace was being put to good use within a circle of plump beanbags. The floor was made of the same wooden floorboards as most of the building, but it was mostly obscured by numerous mismatched rugs. It seemed the sort of place a person took their shoes off at the door and hosted a pajama party.

The new students had a moment to gape at the library while Ms. Essie disappeared into the shelves. She reappeared a moment later with another woman in tow. This new woman was rather short with long, brown hair flowing loose down her back. She wore floral overalls, a flower crown, and no shoes. The wire framed glasses perched on her nose seemed out of place with the rest of her ensemble. She smiled brightly at the students when she spotted them. “Welcome to Galerose,” she said in a rather wispy, high-pitched voice.

“This is our librarian, Ms. Alina Merryweather,” Ms. Essie introduced her.

“Oh, but most of the students call me Ms. Al. It’s a pleasure to see new faces. I do hope you all will come visit me in the library. We have beanbags!” She fairly sang the last part as she drifted over to the previously vacant desk and began writing in a massive volume.

The children were unable to gawk at the eccentric librarian for any longer as Ms. Essie led them to the beanbag chairs and invited them to sit, plopping surprisingly gracelessly on her own. “Well, dears,” she began. “I’ve spoken with all of you before, though some of you may not remember.” Most of the new students exchanged confused glances, but Lior merely frowned. “You may have all sorts of ideas about what this institution is, but now that you’re here, I can tell all of you the truth.” The children were clinging to her every word as she began to answer the questions that had been piling up in their minds.

***

Elena and Diana returned to Whimsy Hall, among a trickle of other students who had been herded away by Ms. Blanchet. They entered the common room to find a horde of students clustered around an irritated Kaena and a flustered Mrs. Colby trying to disperse them. Mrs. Colby was short, a bit plump, and always smelled of cinnamon. Her gray hair was tied back in a low bun with wayward strands of hair escaping in every direction. In fact, the bun seemed on the brink of coming apart all together. Despite the mayhem, Elena flew across the room and flung her arms around Mrs. Colby.

“You’re back,” Elena squealed.

Unperturbed by the small child clinging to her, Mrs. Colby continued trying to disperse the crowd around Kaena. “Yes, dearie, of course I am.” She was a bit out of breath from her efforts, but she still managed a smile for Elena. “Do you suppose you could use that boundless energy of yours to get everyone’s attention? I’m afraid everyone else seems to have forgotten me.”

Elena grinned. “Consider it done.” She skipped up the stairs and balanced on the second floor railing so she could see everyone below. Then, she took a deep breath and shrieked, “Be quiet!” It was the sort of piercing noise that made a person’s ears feel like they were bleeding. The room fell mostly silent, many of the students covering their ears. “Mrs. Colby is trying to get your attention and you’re all ignoring her. It’s rude!”

Several pairs of guilty eyes turned toward Mrs. Colby. “Good,” the woman in question said. “Now that I’ve got your attention, stop crowding your classmate. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’d lost all your manners over the break.” A wave of muttered apologies washed over the room. “Remember, if we all work together, Kaena won’t have to do all the work and wind up collapsing in exhaustion afterwards.” Now the guilty eyes turned to Kaena and she shifted uncomfortably. “Is Amanda here?”

The girl in question stepped out of the crowd. “Here, Mrs. Colby. Do you have something for me to drop?”

Mrs. Colby thought for a moment and patted all over her person, nevermind if she actually had pockets or not. “Ah, right!” She snapped her fingers and a deck of cards dropped into her hand. “These should do, but I was planning to play solitaire later, so don’t lose any of them.”

Amanda nodded, taking the deck. “Someone be on pickup duty. Elena, can you drop them for me?”

Amanda raced up the stairs to the second floor balcony. Meanwhile, Mrs. Colby directed the other students to gather the scattered luggage. Once all involved parties were in position, Elena dropped the first of the playing cards. Contrary to what an outsider might expect, the card seemed to fall in slow motion, fluttering back and forth as it normally would but much, much slower. As Amanda focused intently on the falling card, Kaena used her own ability to lift the first suitcase up the staircase. A group of students waited at the top to pull it to the side. Kaena managed three suitcases before the first card hit the floor. The students took a quick break before Elena dropped the second card.

They continued this process until all luggage was on its proper floor and most of the students dispersed into their respective rooms. Kaena flopped on one of the armchairs in the common room, joined by Elena and Mrs. Colby.

“They wouldn’t know what to do without me,” Kaena complained, gratefully accepting Mrs. Colby’s offered iced tea.

“Whoever decided we didn’t need elevators was evil,” Elena agreed.

Mrs. Colby chuckled. “Perhaps they wanted you all to learn to work together.”

“And they just knew about me and Amanda?” Kaena demanded. “It’s ridiculous. We’re doing most of the work.”

“We all know you like showing off,” Diana said as she came back downstairs. “Besides, I’m sure there are other ways students could use their finniks to circumnavigate the lack of elevators.”

“Just let me feel important,” Kaena groaned. “It’s all I have.”

Elena rolled her eyes. “That hurts.”

Kaena smirked and leapt up from her seat to tackle Elena from her own. Elena shrieked and fought back while Mrs. Colby and Diana sat back and watched, the latter sipping on pilfered tea. When Kaena had her pinned, Elena glared up at her. “It’s not fair. You’re so much bigger than me.”

“Too bad,” Kaena sang, letting her up. “Guess you’ll just have to catch up.”

Elena scowled at Kaena’s much larger frame. “Not likely to happen,” she grumbled.

“You wanna go again?” Kaena asked with a grin.

Elena dove behind Mrs. Colby’s chair and peeked out. “Nope,” she squeaked.

“Too bad!” Kaena gave chase.

Pale pink contentment and lemony happiness began floating around Mrs. Colby, but Elena was too busy running from Kaena to notice.

***

Though Ms. Essie had long ago finished her prepared talk, the new students continued crowding her with questions. “Are we going to become superheroes?” A boy named Rohan asked. He had olive-toned skin, mischief-filled brown eyes, and black hair that might charitably be called artfully messy.

“That’s up to you,” Ms. Essie responded. “Some graduates choose to become heroes and others go live a normal life.”

A girl named Alice raised a timid hand, voice trembling as she asked, “Is it dangerous to be here?” She was the picture of a wealthy brat with golden ringlets, pretty blue eyes, and a dress to match them, but she seemed more scared than anything else. Certainly, she was no Diana.

“Of course not,” Ms. Essie replied gently. “You’re here because we want to protect you. If the wrong person finds out about your finnick, it could be very dangerous for you without the training and friends you’ll find here.”

“But couldn’t I just not use my finnick?”

Ms. Essie sighed. “I know it seems less scary to just hide, but you’re still growing and your finnik will likely grow with you. It might not always be so easy to hide.” Ms. Essie dragged her beanbag next to Alice and sat back down. She leaned in as if telling a secret. “You know, sometimes I slip into dreams accidentally, but I learned to control when the dreamer could see me.”

Alice shrank deeper into her beanbag. “Really?”

Ms. Essie nodded solemnly. “I know it feels scary to open up to people, but everyone here shares the same secret.”

Alice slowly nodded. “Thanks Ms. Essie.”

Ms. Essie gave her signature warm smile and squeezed the girl in a quick hug. “Any other questions?” She asked the group at large, but they had finally gone silent. “Well then, if there are no more questions, let’s head to the dining hall. I hear our kitchen crew is making an apple themed dinner to welcome everyone back.”

“Apples?” Alice asked.

“Jesper has a rather, shall we say, experimental finnik, but I can assure you it’s usually delicious.”

The students exchanged doubtful glances but followed Ms. Essie nonetheless.

***

The dining hall was flooding with children of all ages by the time the new students and Ms. Essie arrived. Lior was surprised to see some children who looked even younger than Elena, and some that looked like they could be adults. Or maybe they were just really young teachers. It was difficult to tell as a number of the faculty was mingling with the student body. There were also several things that should not have been possible under normal circumstances, like the large red creature sitting at a table reading, or the moose serving food.

When all of the new students stood frozen at the door, Ms. Essie tried to shoo them away. “You’re welcome to all grab a table together, but I promise the other students don’t bite. Well, except Patricia, but that’s only sometimes.”

Feeling not at all reassured, the group moved toward the nearest empty table. Once they all slid safely into their seats, the aforementioned moose came to drop off a fruit salad featuring apples. A ruddy cheeked boy with a shock of ginger hair and an oversized apron followed behind with utensils and a basket of apple bread. “Enjoy!” He grinned before skipping away.

Conversation at the table felt stilted as none of them really knew each other beyond names. This problem was soon resolved by a bundle of energy that jumped onto Lior’s back.

“Hey, Elena,” she giggled as the younger girl wiggled her way in between Lior and Alice.

“Hi, hi, hello,” Elena chattered. “I am Elena Rosencrantz, official welcoming committee. “So, welcome! Let’s get to know each other!”

Since everyone else was a bit too taken aback to respond, Lior took the lead and properly introduced herself. “My name is Lior Sova. I’m from around here, and my favorite color is yellow.” She very much hoped that was good enough. Elena had better carry the conversation from here.

“Ooh!” Elena cried. “My favorite is yellow, too! But I also like pink. And also, I kind of live here. Who’s next?” Elena turned toward Alice, who looked like she wanted to disappear.

“I-I’m Alice Chesterton and, um, my favorite color is light blue.” Everyone at the table had to lean in to hear her.

The girl beside her saved her from needing to speak more. “I’m Viola Dan, my favorite color is red, not purple, and if any of you want to mess with me, I will happily boil you.” The fruit in front of her began to steam and shrivel in demonstration.

Having found that her other neighbor was far more terrifying than the bubble of energy, Alice scooted as far away from Viola as she possibly could. Next in line was Kalyani Chandra, then Alec Lapein, Nicholas Esposito, Rohan Jahani, and Eleanor Mahid. Around the time they got to Elsinor Vanderheiden, who was not thrilled to be named after a castle, the moose brought around a chilled apple stew, which garnered a chorus of groans, a couple strange faces, and one squeal from Elena.

“Jesper makes the best stew,” she explained and dug in without qualms.

The thoroughly strange meal ended with apple cinnamon tea and apple biscuits as the students quieted down and began drifting toward their rooms. The new students looked at each other, unsure of what they were meant to do now. Elena was unhelpful. She just shrugged and vaguely said, “Somebody has your room assignments.” Then she yawned and rested her head on Lior’s shoulder.

Eventually, Lior spotted a familiar figure approaching their table. “Ms. E told me to give you your room assignments. Here you go.” Diana dropped the list on the table and left.

“Well that was helpful,” Alec muttered.

“Just read it,” Viola snapped, swiping the list. She quickly scanned it then frowned. “Well, Chesterton, we’re roomies. Anyone know which building is Whimsy Hall?”

Lior nudged Elena awake. “You going to show everyone where all the dorms are?” She asked, knowing that would wake her right up.

“Ooh yes!” Elena responded, jerking upright. “Whimsy is for the girls, Chimera is for the boys, and Mirage is for everyone else. Got it? Let’s go!”

Lior grabbed Elena’s arm to keep her from running off while she scanned for her name on the list, until she saw her name beside Whimsy Hall, room 303. Just below that was Elsinore’s name with the same assignment. “Okay, now we can go,” she told Elena. Elena gleefully dragged her off to the dorms.

After the long day she’d had, Lior was quite happy to find her luggage already placed inside her room, Elsinore’s right beside it. “I don’t know who Kaena is, but I guess I need to thank her,” Lior murmured. Louder, she added, “I’m glad today’s over.”

“Me too. I was on and off planes for three hours.” Elsinore held up the sheets that were folded neatly and placed on the bed. “Almost over,” she sighed.

Lior groaned and glared at an identical stack on her own bed. “So, floor sleepover?”

“Definitely.”

The two girls spread the sheets out on the floor along with whatever spare blankets, jackets, and soft things they had, before collapsing into their impromptu nest for some much needed sleep.