Dawn Rising

By A. F. E. Smith

Alyssia Gale is a daydreamer. A liar. An attention seeker. Everyone she's ever known has found a label to stick on her, but one thing's for sure: she can't be telling the truth. The flashes she sees of the dark and difficult lives of four other people, living in a world that's not her own ... they can't be real. Alyssia understands that as well as anyone, even if she does keep catching herself thinking of the people she sees as friends.
Then she's pulled into that other world by blood and dark magic, and realises that everyone she's ever known was wrong.
To start with, her focus is on surviving until she can find a way home. Yet it doesn't take long for her to figure out that where before she was merely a spectator, now she can change things. And with one of her friends being forced into an abusive marriage, and another trapped in the cruellest of prisons, there's plenty that needs changing. She just needs to survive long enough to do it.
What she doesn't know is that something connects her to these four people. Something she never could have imagined. And it's not long before she isn't just fighting to find her place between the worlds – she's fighting to protect her closest friends from a narrative that wants them dead.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IronWright Books
• Release date: Nov 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9781838223717

A. F. E. Smith

A.F.E. Smith is an editor of academic texts by day and a fantasy writer by night. So far, she hasn't mixed up the two. She lives with her husband and their two young children in a house that someone built to be as creaky as possible. Her successful series The Darkhaven Novels, including the novels Goldenfire (2016) and Darkhaven (2015), will continue in 2017 with Windsinger.

Book preview

So I wasn’t dreaming, after all, she said to herself, unless – unless we’re all part of the same dream.

Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

Part I: Reflection

One

Sometimes it is better to take a man’s life than to let his sickness spread.

Oriana stands at the top of the tower, shivering in the chill breeze. Something twists inside her, sick and fearful; she takes one long breath, then another, trying to stop her hands shaking. The hilt of her mother’s jewelled dagger digs into her palm, but she does not dare loosen her grip. This is her last chance.

Sometimes it is better to take a man’s life than to let his sickness spread.

It was written by a healer. Like her mother. Like she herself once wanted to be. The subject of the book was the containment and treatment of plague. Not strictly relevant to her situation – but then, maybe cruelty can be a plague in itself.

One thing is certain: if she does not kill Ifor Darklight, she will forever be infected by his sickness. And, sooner or later, he will kill her.

Sometimes it is better …

The windows of the Citadel wink up at her, a hundred empty eyes. Behind them are the myriad stairways and passages of her home, the hidden ways and unexpected openings in which she delighted as a child. Bathed in the blue glow of the rain barrier, the stone walls seem lit by moonlight. Only when the Guardians decide the land is in need of water will the barrier fade, to reveal the true sky in shades of grey. Such is the gift bestowed by the Sapphire, her birthright, her inheritance. It is the Sapphire that prevents the rain from ruining crops and herdbeasts in the Citadel’s farms, that keeps defences intact and walls upright.

It was the Sapphire that brought Ifor to the Citadel, and to her.

Oriana does not want to remember how lucky she felt, when she first met him and realised that the old friend her father had talked about for so long was a young man with hair the colour of sunlight and a beautiful smile. How happy she was when they exchanged their betrothal rings; how willingly she gave herself to him even though they were not yet married. Those memories are like insects drowned in amber: preserved forever, yet lifeless. They hardly seem to belong to her at all.

And in between then and now lies the single jagged moment when the man she loved told her, in clear and precise detail, exactly how he killed her mother.

Sometimes it is better to take a man’s life than to let his sickness spread.

Turning her back on the blank stare of the windows, she crosses to the opposite parapet. Around her the night is gathering, with all the force of the west wind at its back. The wind of the dead, the Citadel people call it: carrying souls to the Void to await rebirth. For a moment, it leaves her breathless – but she shakes off the encroaching dizziness, glancing down at the dagger in her hand for reassurance. Just a bit longer, and then it will be over. He said he would be here before dark.

A horn blares, loud and long. Head swimming, I look up, to find a man gesticulating at me from behind the wheel of his rusty old car. I’m standing in the middle of the road.

But –

Wasn’t I just –

Alyssia Gale. I’m Alyssia Gale.

I’m not her.

I’m not Oriana.

I’m Alyssia Gale.

Part of me is still elsewhere, but I manage to return the driver’s rude gesture before stumbling to the pavement. The car accelerates past me, engine snarling, and dirty water sloshes against my heels. Great. One more for the Gale fan club.

Heart still racing, I close my eyes and take a deep breath through my nose. Smells often do what logic can’t. The places I conjure up in my head have a hundred different scents. Perfume and beeswax in the Citadel. Wet bark and rotting leaves in Luthan’s forest. Blood … Real life, on the other hand, smells mainly of exhaust fumes, bad cooking and body spray. Maybe that says more about the limited number of places I get to visit than it does about the world, but I’ll take it. I need some way to tell the difference between seeing and reality.

Just your overactive imagination, my first foster mother said. A head full of daydreams and nonsense, according to my second. My third said I was lying to get attention, but I think only half of that was true. I may be a liar, but I’ve never wanted anyone to notice me.

A bus pulls up to my stop, doors opening with a hiss and a clunk. Head down, I follow the other waiting passengers on, then find a place to sit as far away from them as possible. I dump my bag on the seat next to me, before jamming my earphones in place. The scar on my left palm is stinging again; I curl my fingers against it, rubbing the pain away. It was the only visible mark left on me by the accident that obliterated my parents. A thin white line that follows, almost exactly, what a palm reader would call my fateline.

As the bus rumbles into motion, I lean my head against the window. A row of grey-stuccoed houses slides past, one or two with windows illuminated against the dusk. The night is gathering. A man in a hooded waterproof coat is walking his curly-haired dog. The pavement is spattered with old gum and a few warning drops of rain. He said he would be here before dark. I’ve been down this road a hundred times before. I’ve lived in this town my whole life – or at least, the four years I can remember. Yet I can’t quite place where I am.

A sense of unreality crawls up my spine. Briefly I see other shapes, taller buildings, different stone – but I blink them away. Stop it, Alyssia. Not again.

Digging in my pocket, I turn up my music until it’s loud enough to hurt. This can’t happen. Not so soon after the last one. I have to stay in my own head.

Yet part of me wants to see …

My stomach twists. I duck my head and close my eyes, trying to focus on the here and now. The sore patch where one of my new school shoes has rubbed my heel. The scratch of fabric against my skin. The lurch of the bus as it halts at a stop, letting in more people and a rush of cold, damp air. The lyrics of the song in my ears. But it’s no use. Because Oriana is frightened. Oriana is in pain. And Oriana –

Oriana.

The voice sets her heart beating in rapid stabs. She turns, concealing the dagger in the ragged folds of her skirt. Ifor is standing at the top of the steps, smiling.

My lord. She hears the tremor in her words and breathes deeply, trying to suppress it. Sometimes she is so full of hatred, she can hardly stand it. For him. For the deference he has beaten into her. Most of all, for her own weakness. Because her hatred may be strong, but her terror is stronger.

It will end, she tells herself. As soon as the dagger cuts through his flesh, this shame will end.

You wanted to see me? she asks faintly.

Yes, little one. I wanted to ask you a question. He steps closer, one knuckle forcing her chin up until she meets his gaze. Do you think me entirely oblivious?

A cold shiver ripples through her. N-no.

And yet, you tried to talk to your father again today.

Oriana flinches. She knew it was a bad idea. Every time, she knows it. But even though her father’s absent gaze never fails to skate over her bruises – even though he replies to her most desperate pleading as if he is in another conversation entirely – she cannot help but try. Somehow she always hopes that this time, unlike all the others, he will perceive what is there in front of him, not merely what should be. If he could see her, really see her, for just a single moment –

But only Ifor’s death can lift that veil.

Now, she tells herself. Do it now. Their wedding is set for her sixteenth nameday, in nine days’ time; wait much longer and it will be too late. Her fingers tighten on the hidden dagger, and Ifor’s gaze flickers in that direction.

I would reconsider, if I were you, he says calmly. You have earned enough punishment for one day.

He knows. Of course he knows. So she does the only thing left to her, and drives the dagger towards him.

As soon as the tip of the blade touches the fabric of his shirt, her muscles seize up. She grits her teeth, willing all her strength into her right arm, but it is no use. The weapon will not move by even a hair’s breadth. She looks up, to find him watching her with amused contempt.

Yet you did it anyway. Effortlessly, he plucks the dagger from her grasp. Stupid, although no more than I would have expected. Because I know you, Oriana. I have always known you.

He has said those words before. He said them soon after their first meeting, gazing at her as if he saw and accepted every last dark corner she kept hidden from the world. She has learned better since then, but still there is something in them. A weight she struggles to understand.

She swings at him, wildly, with her left hand. He catches her wrist, fingers digging into her flesh, and her stomach plunges. Why did she ever think she could defeat him? He killed her mother without the slightest remorse and made it look like an accident, and in the end, he will do the same to her. The aberrant power he wields, a thing out of ancient myth, is stronger than any weapons she possesses.

Just remember, he says. You brought this on yourself.

Grip as cold and hard as steel, he wrenches her arm down. The dagger slashes across her palm, forcing a cry of pain from her lips.

You are g-getting what you want, she manages. You are getting the Sapphire. Why – 

"What I want? What I want is for you to make amends, Oriana."

For what?

His gaze meets hers. Everything.

The old bronze bell in the Great Hall tolls one deep, warning note; above them, the translucent blue arc of the rain barrier fades into transparency. As the first drops begin to fall, Ifor raises her wounded hand, tracing the line of welling blood with his fingertip. He smiles, but there is a darkness behind his eyes. Anger. Sorrow.

He expects something from her. She has never understood what.

Get up, he says. Softly, like the whisper of a blade being drawn. Onto the parapet.

I cannot –  she begins, but he lifts a finger and the world dissolves in a red wash of agony. She doubles over, gasping and choking, only to be wrenched back upright.

Do not argue with me. Get up there before I really hurt you.

No words are left to her, and certainly no defences. As soon as the pain subsides, she scrambles onto the low wall, feet slipping on the stones. The day is dead now. All that remains is a sliver of grey on the horizon. She can no longer see the ground below.

I will not let you die, little one. Not yet. It is a murmur, part of the wind and the rain and the night. But I cannot say, in all honesty, that I care what happens to you beyond that.

You will not b-break me, she stammers, though she cannot tell through the ringing in her ears whether she is making any sound. No matter what you – 

With a single, violent shove, he pushes her off the tower.

I jolt back in my seat. Shaking all over. My fingers digging into the ugly brown-and-orange fabric to stop myself falling –

But I’m still on the bus. Of course I am. It still smells the same, muddy shoes and damp raincoats. And I …

I’ve missed my stop. Again.

The woman across the aisle is giving me a look. No wonder. I can feel the sudden sweat on my forehead. And I’m panting loud enough that she can probably hear me, even over the snore of the engine.

Alyssia Gale. I’m Alyssia Gale.

It’s darker outside, now. The day is dead. The rain is coming down harder. The wind and the rain and the night. I turn back towards the window, lurching, off balance, and stare into a girl’s wild, reflected eyes. Right. That’s me. Alyssia Gale. At least I know my own face.

The raindrops on the glass shine briefly, caught by the headlights of a car coming in the other direction. Beyond the window, the orange halo of each street lamp illuminates its own little patch of wet pavement. Light spills from the shop fronts, their signs proclaiming Sale and 50% Off and Final Reductions.

Real shops. Real rain. Real people walking home through the dark of a January evening with their umbrellas and gloves. No Citadel. No rain barrier. Just me, Alyssia Gale, riding the bus back from school to Woodleigh House, the only place I’ve stayed for longer than six months in the past four years.

Heart still pounding, I take deep breaths. One by one, I force my fingers to release their grip on the seat. It’s fine. It’s over. Nothing happened.

I hope Oriana is all right. The thought drops into my head from nowhere. Yet I mustn’t fall into that trap again. Even if I miss her happiness, even if part of me is clenched with guilt that I can’t do anything to help her … I have to focus on the real world. Letting myself feel emotion towards a figment of my own imagination isn’t healthy. I should know that by now.

Grabbing my bag, I ring the bell for the next stop. It’s going to be a long walk home.

Two

Sitting in the café across the street from school, I warm my hands on my half-full coffee cup and stare at the suspiciously oily plastic surface in front of me. They wipe the tables after every customer; I’ve seen them do it. But with grease on the tabletop, and grease on the cloth, and the smell of old, cooked grease in the air, the result isn’t clean so much as smeared.

Best coffee in town. I almost hear it: the enthusiasm, the cheerful elongation of the vowels, the genuine sigh of appreciation to round it all off. Peter Lampforth and sarcasm were always strangers to each other. My head lifts automatically, the start of a smile forming on my lips, but the chair on the other side of the table is empty. I just wish –

Forget it.

I unzip the inner pocket of my bag and fish out the piece of paper I came here to think about. It doesn’t look like much, but it contains a whole universe. Because I wrote it down. As much as I could remember of what I saw through Oriana’s eyes, yesterday evening.

It occurred to me last night, lying sleepless on my lumpy mattress – clinging to it with fingers and toes, an insufficient anchor to the real world – that perhaps I could record them. The visions. What I see. Maybe then I’d start to recognise the difference between reality and fantasy. Setting the words on paper, detaching myself from the experience, would surely relegate the whole thing to the realm of fiction.

Yet now, scanning through what I scribbled down at some point in the early hours of this morning, it isn’t just caffeine making my heart race and my gaze skitter around the room. There’s a reason I didn’t do this before. Because if anyone ever found it …

Slowly, I turn my head to stare out of the window at the building opposite. Lakeview Secondary School. Not that there’s a lake in sight. Lumped together from sullen shades of grey, it’s a dirty concrete box that would be indistinguishable from a prison, were it not for the lack of bars on the windows; one of those dull, shabby buildings that feels worn out almost as soon as it’s made. It’s separated from the road by iron railings, which are meant to look fancy but miss the mark by half a ton of rust, and an expanse of tarmac where the younger kids play ball after lunch. The sign on the gate reads Lakeview Secondary School: Educating Future Adults. Peter and I once spent a whole hour coming up with possible endings for it. Educating future adults in how to … smoke without getting caught. Write a half-assed essay the night before it’s due. Identify repulsive canteen food by smell alone.

I was sent here three and a half years ago, once I’d adjusted to life after the accident. As it turned out, I hadn’t adjusted well enough. I didn’t have full control. There are lots of people in my class who remember me sitting there trembling and staring at the wall, whispering I’m Alyssia Gale, I’m Alyssia Gale over and over again. With the frankness of utter naivety, I even told some of them about my imaginary friends.

Really, it’s no surprise they think I’m a weirdo.

I look back down at my handwritten scrawl. I should get rid of it. Throw it away. Burn it. At the very least, I should have left it locked in my drawer back at Woodleigh instead of bringing it with me. Yet something about it …

Carefully, I trace Oriana’s name with my fingertip. Pinned down by my words, her pain has become more manageable. More contained. Writing, after all, is the art of reducing the infinite vastness of an experience to something that will fit on a page. Yet it also bestows truth. It gives this particular flight of fantasy, even more than any other, the status of an event that really happened. And that feels dangerous.

I’m just not sure that’s a bad thing.

A bell sounds, distantly, from the direction of Lakeview – one of the many benefits of choosing a café right outside school – and I check the time on my phone. Warning bell. Ten minutes until classes start. If I don’t leave now, I’m going to be late.

I swallow the last tepid dregs of my coffee. I stand up. One final time, I look at the piece of paper on the table. Then I fold it into eighths and tuck it back into the secure pocket of my bag. I can’t throw it away. Not yet.

At my locker, I swap yesterday’s unfinished History homework for the first of this morning’s ring binders. English. For someone who didn’t or couldn’t talk for weeks, after the accident, I’m doing all right at it. Not brilliant, but not terrible – same as every other subject I study here. Which is fine. I have enough going on in my head already. And besides, it isn’t as if anyone expects anything better from me.

The bell rings again. I’m really going to be late. As I hurry down the rapidly emptying corridor, I keep my gaze fixed on the floor. I count my steps, listening to the squeak of my shoes against the hard-wearing brown vinyl. I breathe in the smell of heated dust from the radiators. And I don’t look up.

You drift around school like a ghost, Peter’s voice accuses me. From near the end, when it all fell apart. You never speak to anyone.

But I spoke to him.

By the time I reach the classroom, there’s only one vacant desk: at the back, right next to Colin Bones. That makes no sense. He’s always surrounded by his sycophants. Unless –

Unless he kept it for me on purpose.

My pulse accelerates, but I force my expression to remain impassive. I dump my bag, hook the chair out with my foot, and sit down. Then I prop one elbow on the desk and lean my chin on my hand, letting my hair fall to hide my face. Maybe if I can’t see him, I won’t have to listen to him either.

Hey, Lissy!

Don’t reply. Don’t –

Read any good books lately?

I shoot him a quick glance through the curtain of my hair. I don’t even get why the question is funny, but a bunch of his friends are laughing all the same. Only Peter is silent. He’s a sci-fi nerd himself. At least, that’s what he used to tell me.

Oh, but I forgot, Colin says. You don’t need books, do you? You have the voices in your head to entertain you.

I grope for the right reply, but that’s just it. There isn’t one. Whatever I say will be mocked and twisted back on me. Saying nothing is unsatisfying, but at least it doesn’t give him anything to grab onto.

What’s the matter? Sharper now. Forgotten English again? Someone better call the mental hospital and have you readmitted.

Right … so saying nothing isn’t going to be much help either. I bite the inside of my cheek: a habit left over from my first months here. The sting of it helps to drive away the prickling feeling behind my eyes, replacing it with welcome anger. Straightening up, I turn to face him.

You know what, Colin? Screw you.

Grinning, he grabs his own crotch. Sorry, darling. I’ve got far too much of this for your taste.

I look away, and my gaze falls on Peter. A scarlet tide is creeping up his face, beneath the freckles, but he doesn’t lift his head.

Look at me, I tell him silently. You knew what Colin thought of me. You knew about all those times I came back to myself to find he’d drawn obscene pictures on my work, taken my stuff, put glue in my hair. Yet you still told him something I told you in confidence. You sold me out. At least have the decency to own it. Look at me!

Ugh, stop staring at him, Colin says. Stalker.

I swing back to face him. So which is it? Do I hate men, or am I a stalker? At least get your story straight.

Face darkening, he opens his mouth – but then the classroom door swings open to admit Mr Sorensen, running behind as usual, and everyone falls silent. Turning away from Colin, I prop my chin on my hand again. Old Sorry starts talking, but the words are no more than a distant murmur. Anger still simmers in my veins, made all the stronger by the fact that it has nowhere to go.

I could scream. I could break things. I could tell them, honestly, how much these small everyday wounds hurt; how they build on each other until just stepping through the front door of this building feels like removing another layer of my red-raw skin. But where would that get me? My feelings mean nothing to them. That’s the whole point.

… childhood. Even through my fog of frustration, the word hits me with enough force to set my heart racing. I shift in my seat, refocusing on Old Sorry’s voice.

That’s why I want each of you to write about your earliest memory, he says. In as much sensory detail as possible.

Heat washes over me. I don’t know where to look; I bow my head lower, staring at the initials scratched into the desk in front of me. Surely he must realise – surely he doesn’t expect me to –

Oh, come on! one of Colin’s friends mutters. That’s the kind of thing we used to do when we were kids.

Waste of time, Peter agrees. I glance up sharply. Is he trying to help me? He, out of all of them, must know what I’m feeling right now … but it doesn’t matter, because Old Sorry is shaking his head.

This is about bringing a scene to life. Engaging the reader. Any incident, however trivial, can become compelling if you …

I tune him out. The heat of panic has receded now, to be replaced by an invisible but persistent shiver that makes it impossible to concentrate on anything else. A cold lump sits in my stomach like a stone. I can’t write about this. I just can’t.

Around me, there’s a general rustle as the others find a clean sheet of paper, uncap their pens, and start writing. But I gaze blindly at the blank page, and that stone continues to drag at me.

Your earliest memory.

Except I don’t have one, do I? Not in the way he means. No, I have fear and fire and blood.

Give him that, the angry voice inside me says. Give him the truth.

I pull my binder towards me and begin to write.

Shadows, edged with orange light. A sharp, choking smell. Heat like a fist at my back, urging me forward. My left hand was throbbing; I looked down, saw my palm slick with dark blood. My head was filled with the roar and hiss of fire. I couldn’t remember. I couldn’t remember anything.

I stumbled past shattered glass and burning oil to the cool air beyond. When I could breathe again, I turned. The flames were fierce, hazing the shapes of the two bodies at their heart. A soft breath of sound and the wreck buckled, sending sparks flying into the night sky. Their brightness made my eyes water. Yet I felt nothing. I knew nothing. My thoughts were bubbles that burst as soon as I tried to grasp them, leaving no more than a faint stain. Desperate, I flung questions into the void.

Where am I? What’s happened? Who am I?

And like an echo the answer came back: Alyssia.

I waited, but there was no more. A single word was all I had.

My pen wavers, then races on across the page in an urgent sprawl.

Sitting with Mama on the windowsill, listening to one of her stories. Her arm was around me, and her long hair brushed my cheek as she leaned to whisper in my ear.

A long, long time ago, when the world was new … That is how it would have started. Mama’s stories always started that way. The day I remember, she was telling me the tale of Rithima and her dragon-forged blade. I listened half-drowsy, lulled by her voice as it ebbed and flowed like the sea outside the window, and so I cannot bring it all to mind, only the ending. As long as she bore it, she never needed to use it; for her life had been blessed, and no evil could touch her.

After Mama said those words, she drew the jewelled dagger from the slender sheath at her own waist and held it out to me. I gazed at it wide-eyed.

"Is that really –?"

She smiled. Maybe so. After all, I have been granted sufficient blessings for a lifetime. And you, my dawnchild –  she dropped a kiss on my brow – are first among them.

Now, years after her death, she is only fragments to me: the colour of light on the sea, a snatch of an old tune, the scent of purpleleaf. But I remember the weight of her arm around my shoulders, and how safe I felt.

More. There’s more. I turn the page and keep going, my world tightening to a blur of ink and paper.

Someone had dropped a knife in the dirt. It lay there glinting at me in the afternoon light. I knew the right thing to do with a weapon was to wave it and look fierce – I’d seen the King’s Guard on the practice ground – and so I picked it up.

It was heavier than I’d expected. I held it in two fat fists and swung it about. It slipped from my grasp, back onto the ground. I picked it up again, only this time I went for the shiny end.

One confused moment of pain later, I sat down and howled. It wasn’t long before someone picked me up and examined my cut fingers.

"You’re not old enough for that yet, son, he told me. Knives are dangerous."

Well, sure. I’d made that connection already.

It didn’t stop me, though.

The words pour out of my pen as if they’re flowing straight from my veins –

I remember … sunshine. Striking sparks from Catéda’s hair. And waves, I think, and the contentment of sand underfoot …

But it fades. All beauty fades here, in the end; like the sun, it leaves only shadows behind. Every time I wake, it is to something a little greyer, as though the blood is being drained from my memories, leaving only the stark bones. Eventually there will be nothing to cling to: no emotion, no life, no hope.

I strive to remember light, but the darkness always returns.

– as if they come not from my brain but from some hidden knowledge that swims in my blood –

The earliest memory I can be sure of is learning to read. Most children start with a sand tray and a stick; Isidor used our copy of the holy book, the Kyantil. It weighed too much for my knees, so he would prop it on the table and I would kneel on a chair in front of it, chin in hand, turning the pages. I don’t recall how he taught me. I just recall that one day, the apparently disconnected arcs and lines resolved themselves into words. Just as the random shapes of clouds may change in an instant to form castles and faces and ships, suddenly there was meaning where before there had been none.

There is meaning in everything, if you only look hard enough.

The pen falls from my hand, trailing a smear of ink across the page. My eyes feel scratchy and unfocused; I blink until my words jump into view. A lot of words. More words than I was expecting –

The stone drops another foot or so inside me. I’ve done it again. I’ve let my imagination overcome reality. One of these five things is not like the others …

Get rid of them. I fumble with the ring binder, before giving up and ripping the pages straight out of it – my own memory along with the rest. I’ll just have to write it out again. Or not. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that I get rid of them –

Thanks, Lissy! With the inevitability of a nightmare, the crumpled bits of paper are snatched out of my hand, and I look up to find Colin grinning across the gap between our desks. Shit. I was afraid he’d find one piece of evidence to use against me, and instead I’ve handed him five. Maybe this is my fault. Maybe by writing what I saw through Oriana’s eyes, last night, I’ve opened the floodgates.

Give that back, I mutter.

Old Sorry said we had to swap with a partner. Give each other feedback.

What? I didn’t hear that bit. But then, I didn’t hear much of anything. I was too busy panicking. And true enough, a hum of conversation now fills the room.

Smirking, Colin sits back in his chair. With slow deliberation, he smooths my pages out in front of him, shooting little glances at me all the while. You should take more care, Lissy. You’ve torn your work.

I make a grab for the papers, but he tweaks them out of my reach. Then he angles his body away from me and begins to read.

"Give them back!" This time my voice comes out with surprising force, carrying me to my feet.

Alyssia! Mr Sorensen snaps from the front of the classroom. Sit down!

But I – 

Sit. Down.

What now? Wrestle Colin for possession of my memories? Yell at him and get myself kicked out of class? Why is it that I never have any decent options?

We create our own options, someone says in my head. I’m pretty sure it isn’t anyone I’ve ever really met. If you find yourself short, then the fault lies within.

Shut up, I tell it. Shut up shut up shut up –

Wow. Colin turns back round to face me, and there’s something new in his smile. Something gleeful. You really are crazy.

I punch him.

As punches go, it’s hopelessly unscientific, but I have the advantage of surprise. Even as I make an ungainly landing half on and half off his desk, my flailing fist catches Colin’s face a glancing blow. Swearing, he jerks away from me. A single drop of blood falls from his nose to stain the papers containing five people’s memories.

Stunned silence.

Then the world erupts in noise. Old Sorry storms across the floor towards us, saying something, but he’s drowned out by a slow handclap from some of the boys nearer the front of the classroom. Colin prods his nose gingerly with a finger, muttering profanities. Beyond him, Peter looks oddly as if he wants to laugh, though whether at Colin or at me it’s hard to tell.

You made the move, says the same voice in my head. If it is a false memory, it’s certainly an annoying one. Now you have to take the consequences.

I grit my teeth. Thanks for your input, imaginary wise old mentor. But on balance, I’d rather not. I’ve had enough of school for one day.

As I straighten from the desk, I seize the opportunity to twitch my handwritten pages out of Colin’s loosened grasp. He glares a silent promise of retribution, but I don’t care. Peter opens his mouth to say something, then