The emptiness of the corridor was the clear mark that most of the students were already enjoying their break. This wasn't entirely the case for the group of friends, that on the Tuesday morning they were near the staircase that led to the second floor.

Valerie was sitting on the stairs, head over one of her hands that was supported by her knees; Jonathan was relying on the wooden railing of the stairs, head over his arms, staring at Valerie; Gabriel was against the wall, and Audrey was pacing back and forth never going further than two steps too far than from the rest were.

"You guys realize how weird this is, don't you?" Gabriel raised his eyebrows earning everyone's attention.

"Of course not" Jonathan rolled his eyes. "Some dodgy bloke telling me I have magical powers and telling Ree that she is basically a princess and that her aunt is a thousand years old witch is consists on a regular Friday for me."

Valerie chuckled, but other than that Audrey and Gabriel limited themselves to glare at the boy. Valerie pulled out her cellphone to check the time, her aunt had finally bought her a new one after the one she used to have broke down. When she had gotten it in her hands, she had given the woman an awkward thank you, and had to give Merlin an explanation on what a cellphone is and how it was supposed to work.

"How are the things with your aunt?" Gabriel questioned, all eyes turned to Valerie, who simply shrugged.

"As good as you could expect, she is trying to live life as we always had, plus adding Merlin into the house," Valerie explained. "At least Jonathan was there yesterday, so I don't have to hear Merlin giving me lessons on etiquette"

"Etiquette?" Audrey tilted her head and furrowed her eyebrows. Valerie took a deep breath.

"Your highness you should not be slouching, the wizard boy should be bowing to you, you need to be more articulated, language! A lady, even less a princess should not be speaking such awful words" Valerie did her best imitation on Merlin's voice, this time, both Gabriel and Audrey chuckled. Audrey then stared at the Gabriel's shoes and lifted her eyes in sudden realization.

"What have you been going to Valerie's house for?" she turned to Jonathan who lifted himself from the railing and scratched the back of his neck. Valerie found herself weirded by the question. It wasn't an oddity for him or for Valerie to go to each other's house.

"Merlin wanted to teach me how to use magic" Jonathan admitted, glancing at the floor, his mouth on a thin, tense line.

"Why?" Gabriel tilted his head, a tone of amusement in his voice.

"I don't know. It might have been the idea of my nightmares crawling out of my dreams and invading my everyday life." he sighed, "He fucking teleported me to the woods to train for like an hour. And in case everyone is curious, his lessons consist on showing me how to blow a dandelion using the wind"

"And how is that going?" Audrey questioned.

"There has been a lot of unpeaceful yelling" Jonathan gave a single nod and the sighed, "He is still trying to teach me the way to properly channel my inner power, whatever the fuck that means, so there's that. How does it feel to know your ancestor was a knight of the round table Audrey?" He turned the attention to the girl.

Audrey's face perked up, "What? Oh, yes. It's nothing memorable, I suppose, it's not like I'll ever meet him anyways"

"If what your aunt said it's true" Gabriel began "Shouldn't we have already seen any sign of it?" He looked for the reactions of his peers, who stared at him confused

"Like what?" Valerie questioned, eyebrows furrowed.

"Kids vanishing, lights flickering, weird weather, who knows" Gabriel shrugged.

Gabriel's words were met with a tense silence from his friends, who exchanged anxious looks amongst themselves. After that, Gabriel changed to topic to a soccer game that had been televised the night before. The conversation lasted for a few minutes before the recess ended and the group returned to their classes.

Valerie and Audrey walked into the classroom with a couple minutes to spare. The calculous teacher walked into the classroom. Miss Charles was a stern woman, with gray hair carefully kept in a bun and a pair of glasses with dark blue frames that seemed to be pulled out of an old fashion magazine.

"Everyone take your homework out!" the woman commanded as soon as she stepped into the classroom. Valerie began rummaging through her stuff, noticing how Audrey froze in her place.

"You did it, right Audrey?" Valerie tried voice soft, noticing how Audrey's eyes prickled with tears.

"I started it" Audrey's voice was raspy. "I opened my notebook to do it, but then I just... forgot about it"

Valerie nodded, noticing how the teacher was looking around the classroom watching the students stand up and leave their homework at the desknext to the teacher's personal bag. The girl raised the hand up in the air, almost jumping in her seat until she caught the teacher's attention.

The teacher sighed as soon as she noted it was Valerie's hands that was raised. "What is it, miss Pendleton?" the teacher's voice was dry.

"I went to Audrey's house yesterday so she could help me with my homework. We ended up filling too many sheets and I think I accidentally left Audrey's at my house and she brought the wrong ones, is it okay if she brings her homework tomorrow?"

"Why was Miss Baker's homework at your home?" The teacher raised an eyebrow, glasses falling to the bridge of her nose.

"Morga... My aunt Moira tells me to give her all the paper I will no longer use instead of throwing it away, so I took the other sheets to give them to her"

"Very well," the woman said "She might bring it tomorrow, but the highest grade she can get is an 85," the teacher sentenced. Valerie opened her mouth, ready to tell her she should give her friend the regular credit the homework should have had.

Instead, she slowly retreated to her seat when Audrey stared at her with wide eyes, aware of what she was going to do. Valerie scoffed crossing her arms above her chest. She took her notebook out when the teacher began writing some problems on the board. Audrey sighed in relief, listening attentive to the lesson the teacher was giving.

Valerie let out a groan of relief when the teacher dismissed them to go home. She retuned all her belongings to her schoolbag, watching how Audrey pursued her lips for a second.

"I forgot to tell you" Audrey spoke turning to her. "I have ballet today, I won't be able to walk home with you."

"Oh, alright. I'll walk with Jonathan."

"I'll go with the two of you on our way out". Audrey assured, putting her schoolbag over her shoulder.

They walked out of the classroom side by side. Outside, Jonathan was leaning against the wall near the gym's door staring at the palm of his hands, eyebrows furrowed. Upon seeing him, Valerie smiled and furrowed her eyebrows, planting herself by his side.

"What are you doing?" Valerie questioned, laying her head against his shoulder, a faint tonality of pink growing in his cheeks.

"I was trying to create a small breeze of wind in my hand like Merlin tried to get me to do," He explained, his eyebrows remained in the same position. He didn't move, nor the pink faded away until Valerie stood straight again.

"And how is that going?" Audrey questioned looking at his palm closely.

"I'm beginning to believe Merlin pointed at the wrong person, powerful wizard my ass" 

"No one was born knowing. You'll do great I'm sure" Valerie smiled putting one hand on his shoulder, the pink in his cheeks returned.

Audrey rolled her eyes as the trio began to walk, Valerie and Jonathan remained side by side as the students walked past them or by their side in the same desperate attempt to get out of class.

Before they realized, Gabriel was rushing to them, hugging Audrey over her shoulder.

The noise of the students around them came to a sudden stop, and in the blink of an eye there was no one else in the hallway. Valerie looked around, noticing how the three of her friends remained there, but other than that there were no signs of the previous bustle the students showed right after being freed from class. The silence was such you could have heard a pin drop.

"Who pulled something this time?" Gabriel questioned raising his voice. Valerie giggled under her breath.

"Jonathan must..."

Before Audrey could continue, the sudden silence and focused stares of her friends stopped her. A figure emerged from the ground, in the middle of the hallway as theyobserved how the shadows shifted until it gave it the shape of a fully armored knight. When it was fully formed, Valerie noticed he was nearly as tall as Jonathan. The knight pulled the sword out of his sheath and looked at the teenagers, stopping for a second longer in Valerie. He said no words as he held his sword high launching at the girl who barely had time to process it before she was pushed out of the way by Jonathan whose hands were raised up.

A.N.
This took me a little longer than what I had initially anticipated it would. However, I hope you like this and if you do, please consider giving it a vote or leaving a comment. Have a lovely day!