Judit turned over, pulling the duvet more tightly around her face.

Knock.

There it was again. She scrunched her eyes closed and ignored it.

Knock knock.

"Judit. Judit."

Ugh. Who was that? Judit's heart sank as her sleepy consciousness unfurled and brought with it memories of the previous day. It was all actually skitting real.

"Judit! It's me, Rama. Time to get up, Judit."

Judit pulled the covers completely over her head. She heard a click as the door opened.

"Judit. You've slept in. Class has started. You must have slept through the alarm."

Judit continued to ignore him, curling herself up in her duvet-burrow. She hadn't slept through the alarm. She'd ignored the alarm. She had no intention of following the rules here. Why should she? They said they wouldn't send her home, and there was no threat of methy.

"Judit? I'm coming in."

She felt a slight pressure on her shoulder through the duvet. Rama's voice was closer now, and softer too.

"Sorry leman, it's time to get up. I've brought you a tea."

Judit peeled the duvet back, just enough to show one eye, and scowled at him, even though he couldn't see her lips.

"Hooray! Good morning."

He smiled, and lifted the cup of tea into her one-eye line.

She sat up, sighing huffily for his benefit.

"Okay, okay. I'm awake. You can leave me alone now."

"Great! I'll leave you to get ready. The rest of the students are in classroom 1B. If you go to the social room I showed you last night, you'll see it. You can pick up some breakfast there and just take it with you."

He placed the tea carefully on her desk and went out, shutting the door behind him. Judit sat up in the bed. She wasn't going to rush anywhere.

After a leisurely shower, in which she endeavoured not to get her blue hair wet, Judit dressed in a pair of jogging bottoms and a black top, pulling the plimsoles straight onto her damp feet. She sat at her desk for 30 seconds just to demonstrate to herself that she wasn't rushing, then left her room and headed for the social area.

It was sunny and bright in there. Remnants of others' breakfasts were scattered over the low tables, and a buffet was set up along the long white table.

Judit had previously decided she wasn't going to eat anything, but she had to admit that the food looked good—way better than at school—and that she was starving. She took a chunky slice of bread and spread it thickly with butter and fruit jam, then stood, eating and staring out of the window.

She could see the orange-head freak-brigade in a classroom across the way, beyond the grass square with its stone pile. They were sitting at rows of desks, facing a large screen mounted on the wall. The screen had pictures of grass or something on it, and an old crone with frizzy hair was gesticulating in front of it.

Judit finished her bread and poured herself a tea, purposefully not rushing to join them. After her second cup, she was starting to get bored alone in the quiet social room, and moved toward the classroom. She went all the way around the corridors, rather than through the quad. There was no way she was going to walk across the grass while they all gaped at her through the window.

She took a deep breath, her hand on the door handle, before she went in. Despite the fact that she definitely did not care at all what any of these nyaffs thought of her, her heart was still hammering.

Barely anyone looked up at her. They all had their backs to her, facing the screen and frizzy-haired woman. Judit saw Merle, in the middle of the room, her hoodie on an empty chair beside her.

She didn't like the idea that Merle presumed they were friends now or something, and looked around for somewhere else to sit. She noticed that the super-sleek girl with the coiling plait was sitting by an empty seat in the back right-hand corner of the room, and quickly moved over there, dropping herself down silently.

Frizzy-hair was pointing at a big picture of some grass on the screen, and the others were frantically making notes. They were writing on paper, instead of screens, like it was the olden days or something. Weird. She hadn't pen-written since primary school, she wasn't even sure if she could remember how to do it now.

Coiled-plait looked up at her and gave a small smile, pushing a pen and paper towards her. Judit chin-nodded and pulled the paper in front of her, but didn't pick up the pen. Instead, she leaned back in her chair, arms folded, and surveyed what she could see of her classmates.

The kinky-haired sleek guy was sitting on the other side of coiled-plait, then the guy with the gross long hair. He had it plaited today, two ropes long down his back, which was probably the most ridiculous thing Judit had ever seen. She could see fat Jaddy in the front row, and Merle in front of gross-hair, but she didn't really pick out anyone else.

She let out an audible sigh to express her boredom and picked up the pen so she could chew on its end. Coiled plait glanced at her and then back to her paper.

"Ok, time to stop for a break," the frizzy-haired crone said, and the class exhaled collectively, their bodies loosening.

Chatter began. Judit saw Merle turn, and tried to look inconspicuous, which wasn't easy with blue hair. She leaned in to coiled-plait to try and avoid Merle's gaze.

"Hi," Judit said.

"Hey." coiled-plait smiled, wrinkling her nose. "I'm Lintie."

"Judit." Judit nodded in return.

"I know," Lintie said. "There's only a couple of people here I didn't grow up with. Which means we,"—she gestured to the group–"tend to notice them."

"Yeah, Merle said that," Judit replied. "So you're from the reservation?"

"Yuh-huh." Lentie nodded. "This is my friend Hegri."

She shifted her body round and touched kinky boy's arm. Her voice was tender when she spoke about him, Judit noted. He turned to face them and smiled at Judit, without saying anything. Even though he was sleek, he wasn't Judit's type. He looked like he might write you poetry or something. She liked her guys wild.

"And that's Gaen. Gaen!" She repeated his name louder to get his attention.
Gross-hair turned.

"Gaen, say hello to Judit."

He didn't say hello, just gave Judit an adversarial chin-nod and turned immediately away. Well skit you, Judit thought. As if I give a crank about what you think anyway.

"Hey guys!"

Merle had come over to the front of their table, and crouched down to sitting level.

"Botany is sooo boring, eh? Don't worry Judit, some of the other stuff is better. We're starting hunting soon."

She lifted her arms as if she were holding a bow, then launched an imaginary arrow violently at Gaen's back. Judit snorted.

"Yeah, and mythology," Hegri said, smiling at Judit.

She blushed and turned away.

"Are you Hirtan, then?" Hegri asked.

Judit shook her head. "No. I mean, I'm not even Native, really. Just like my grandparents or something. But Rama said something about the east, I think. Like the east coast."

"Sharp!" Hegri said, as if he really thought it was sharp. "I wonder if your myths are different from ours, then? Do you know what variations your Selkie stories usually take?"

Lintie laughed, resting her hand gently on his arm.

"Hegri is our resident myth-man. He's been crazy on all that stuff since we were kids."

Judit nodded. "I don't know anything, to be honest. I didn't even know I was Native—a bit Native, I mean—until I got here. Before that, all I knew about Natives was the attacking savages and all that Great Conquest stuff we do in History."

"Attacking savages?" Out of nowhere Gaen had spun round, and was addressing Judit directly, his voice loud. "We Natives lived in peace in Albia for thousands of years, then our families were brutally and systematically murdered and our villages razed by the invading Generics, and you call us savages?"

"Zen it, Gaen," Lintie said, her pretty nose wrinkling again. "It was hundreds of years ago, it's not like she did it. You were hardly there, getting personally murdered and razed."

"No, but me, and practically everyone else in this room, lives with the legacy," Gaen spat. "We have to deal with depression, joblessness and alcoholism on the reservation. Being treated like second-class citizens. Forcibly cut off from our traditional culture, oppressed by the Generic hegemony."

"God, give it a rest will you Gaen?" Merle huffed. "Enough with your hegemony, no one cares."

"You don't care, because you're a brainwashed idiot," Gaen spat back. "You wouldn't know the meaning of culture if it head-butted you."

"Whatever," Merle rolled her eyes.

"They're brother and sister," Lintie whispered to Judit.

Judit nodded. They kind of reminded her of herself and Sannah. She remembered what Rama had said about most of these kids being cousins.

"So the east coast?" Hegri was trying to get the conversation back to its previous path.

"Something like that," Judit affirmed.

"I wonder how the legends differ," he mused, not seeming entirely in the room.

"More importantly, I wonder who they're gonna pair her with!" Merle said, slapping the table with both palms excitedly.

The others all turned to look at Judit, like this was a significant question. Judit noted Lintie giving Hegri's arm, where her hand still rested, a slight squeeze.

"What do you mean?" Judit said, looking at Merle suspiciously.

"The pairings. For when we get out in the forest," Lintie said, nodding. "It's like the only bit of the project anyone can talk about. Except Hegri and his mythology, of course."

Judit shrugged, uneasily.

"Oh my dag! She doesn't know!" Merle screeched. "You're gonna die when you find out. None of us can sleep for worrying about it. The thing is as well, there's nothing to go on with you. I reckon I've guessed nearly everyone else's based on who's most related to who, but you're new blood, so..."

The others exchanged significant looks.

"What are you talking about?" Judit said, a note of alarm finding its way into her voice.

"They're concerned about the size of the Native gene-pool," Hegri said, nodding, "and considering the circumstances, they want to reduce the chance of there being genetic malformation in the tribe..."

"Yeah," Merle cut in, "like back on the reservation, there's loads of kids who–"

"Merle!" Gaen said sharply, and she stopped short, looking sheepish.

"...so they've performed special tests to see who is, and who isn't, likely to create genetic problems, and they've paired us all up based on that," Hegri finished. He frowned.

Lintie nodded. "We think they've known since the beginning, but no-one has told us yet who our pair is. It's when we move from the field station to the forest village. That's when we find out. They house us in pairs. Like couples."

"So it's like... an arranged marriage or something?" Judit said, incredulous.

The others all nodded.

"And you have to live, alone in a house, with the person they pair you with?"

Nods again.

"Like boy-girl roommates?"

"Yup," Merle said. "All the girls are crossing their fingers and dreaming to get Hegri—don't look at me like that, you know it's true. I even heard Cuddy saying the other night that she hoped she'd get you. Like she's got a chance in hell, her dad is your grandad Gled's nephew, the nyaff."

"Aren't they worried if they room boys and girls together, alone, they'll..." Judit opened her eyes wider and pursed her lips to communicate her meaning.

"That's kinda what they want." Lintie looked at her like she was stupid. "They want us to do that."

"Why do you think we're all teenagers?" Merle cut in, gesturing around the room. "Old enough to have sex, but not old enough to have a family or whatever back home. Nothing to tie us down."

Hegri and Lintie shared a look.

"You're skitting kidding me." Judit wrapped her hands round her elbows, suddenly desperately uncomfortable. "You're seriously suggesting they want us to rub?"

Lintie nodded. "Yep. Just with the right person."

"Propinquity," Hegri added.

"What's propinquity?" Judit asked. This place just got worse and worse.

"You're more likely to fall in love with someone you spend a lot of time with," Hegri said. "So they put us together, hoping propinquity and our teenage hormones will do the rest." He blinked, and Lintie squeezed his arm again.

"Dag that." Judit shook her head in disgust. "They're not doing that to me."

"Well, you're not related to anyone," Merle said, "so who knows who you'll get? Though you probably won't get fat Jaddy, you lucky bitch. They won't waste two new-bloods by putting them together."

"Merle! That's mean!" Lintie said.

"Whatever, you know we're all thinking it," Merle shot back.

Just then their conference was cut short by the return of Frizzy-hair, calling their attention back to the grasses on the screen.

Judit sat, feeling dazed, as the others made notes around her. Propinquity. It made her feel sick. She couldn't handle this freak show at all.