The White Tower

by Cathryn Constable

  ‘Just so that you know,’ Celia was saying, ‘Temple assembly is really boring. Dr Smythe will just rattle on, but don’t fidget or you’ll get one of her death stares and wind up in one of her weird detentions where you have to clean out all the dirty flasks from the chemistry lab.’

  A riot of bells broke out over Livy’s head.

  ‘Oh, and put your phone on silent,’ Celia hissed.

  Livy did it but knew no one would be likely to message her: she currently had no friends.

  The bells changed to a single, repeated chime. There was a surge of bodies from behind and a man’s voice intoned, ‘All Templars will be seated.’

  Celia pushed her into a row of chairs near the back and Livy looked up into the crystal petals of a chandelier which hung from the high vaulted stone ceiling.

  A boy with ragged blond hair, so thin that the collar on his shirt was too big, appeared on the end of the row. ‘Can you move along, please?’ he said, to Livy. ‘The teachers are about to come in.’

  ‘No, Alex.’ Amy leant forward and made a shooing gesture with her hand. ‘No room for you here.’

  ‘Amy!’ The boy pleaded and then he looked at Livy. ‘Can’t you move up?’

  At that moment, teachers began to file in from a side entrance, all wearing long academic gowns. The boy said something under his breath and darted off to find another seat.

  ‘Good riddance,’ Amy said, smiling at Livy. ‘We can’t have him hanging around.’

  But Livy felt sorry for the boy. She should have forced the others to move along for him.

  As the teachers took their place in the Temple, it felt to Livy as if she was watching a play. No teacher at her last school had worn a black gown, there had been no processions and certainly no ancient bells ringing out overhead. She had a strange sense of being not only in the wrong place, but in the wrong time, as well. Surely no one behaved like this in the modern world?

  There was a scraping of chairs and coughing as all the pupils stood up; Livy quickly followed suit. At the end of the procession of teachers, Livy saw Dr Smythe, her shoulder-length hair falling in solid golden waves. The general background noise of voices immediately dropped away as the woman walked past on her way to the raised platform at the front of the Temple. The rest of the teachers remained standing until Dr Smythe had taken her place on a large carved wooden chair.

  ‘Budge up!’ she heard a boy’s voice say. ‘Quick, otherwise I’ll have to sit on the floor!’

  Livy looked up, then felt a sharp tug on her arm and turned to see Celia, her cheeks flaming.

  ‘It’s Joe Molyns!’ she whispered, pulling Livy along one chair so that the boy could sit down. Martha and Amy started whispering together, excitedly.

  The boy seemed oblivious to the girls’ twittering and Livy staring.

  ‘That was close,’ he said. ‘Mr Bowen nearly caught me running into the Temple.’ He frowned as he looked at Livy. ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?”

  ‘No, you haven’t –’ Celia seemed to be having trouble talking – ‘she’s new . . .’

  But Livy recognized the boy. He had handed back her travelcard when she dropped it on the bus, had spoken to the kind book man in the park . . .

  Livy copied Celia as she dropped her head and stared at her shoes. But she could feel the boy looking at her from underneath his brown curly fringe.

  ‘I’ll remember in a minute,’ he whispered. ‘Because I know I’ve seen you before.’

  Dr Smythe had started speaking, but Livy, in her embarrassment, took a few seconds to realize that she had no idea what the woman was saying.

  ‘Templar Latin,’ Celia whispered.

  Livy felt relieved that she didn’t have to listen: she clearly wasn’t going to miss very much. Still keeping her eyes on her feet and her head lowered, she glanced up at the boy called Joe Molyns.

  He was staring up at the large stained-glass window set into the side of the Temple. Livy, too, looked up and found herself staring into the pools of coloured light. The luminous image was, she thought, beautiful but troubling. There was a tower that looked very like the white tower in the corner of the Court of Sentinels, except that in this painted version, red and white roses wound up and around the pale stones to the grey roof. Around the image were symbols – inverted triangles, crescent moons, circles with arrows through them, more roses that looked as if they had been painted in thick, dark blood . . . And at the top of the tower, instead of a carved stone Sentinel with a broken wing, there was a boy with dark hair stepping across from the tower on to a cloud.

  He was looking straight ahead – his hand was outstretched and his fingers almost touched a painted sun and moon as if he was unaware of where he was. Livy squinted to read the letters beneath the boy’s foot: Tempus Fugit – the same words that she had read on Master Burgess’s portrait. But it was the boy’s smile that frightened Livy so much her pulse quickened. How could he look so calm? Did he not realize how close he was to the edge of the tower? Did he really think the cloud just beneath his outstretched naked foot would bear his weight?

  A black shadow darted behind the boy in the window, then another, and in the next second, the glass exploded as a bird tumbled through the glass.

  For a second, it was as if the window tried to hold itself together: the boy was still there on top of the tower, about to step into the sky, except it was now the real sky that Livy could see through the hole in the glass. But then the boy, too, splintered and fell, the breaking glass sounding like an audience laughing. Livy saw the bird’s wing catch on the jagged glass and a feather floated lightly down after the heavy glass.

  Someone screamed.

  Dr Smythe dropped her book of Templar Latin to the floor with a great thud, her hand flying to her mouth. She seemed too shocked to be able to do anything.

  Mr Bowen leapt up. ‘Stay calm, everyone!’ he shouted. ‘There is nothing to see!’

  But clearly no one agreed with him as they craned their necks and leant forward to get a better view of the bird desperately trying to fly but managing no more than a sickening falling and swooping movement accompanied by the frantic flapping of wings. It hurled itself at the bottom part of the window, which was still in one piece, then fell, heavy as a stone, to the ground.

  ‘It’s dead!’ someone shouted.

  ‘Thank you, Nicholas,’ Mr Bowen called out. ‘Helpful as ever.’

  A few braver pupils laughed. Mr Bowen frowned and clapped his hands to restore order.

  ‘Quiet, please. We will exit the Temple calmly, starting with the rows nearest the door. Keep moving and keep your eyes straight ahead! There is nothing to see!’

  ‘Except an enormous window in pieces on the floor,’ Joe whispered.

  Livy concentrated on the shattered glass. The sky filled the empty window now, all clouds and lead grey. There was a streak of red – pigeon’s blood – on the jagged glass of the window.

  That was what she could see now. But she had seen more, hadn’t she? There had been two shadows behind the glass, as if something bigger had been chasing the bird into the window . . .

  As Livy turned to go, the other pupils still murmuring and straining to look at where the poor bird had fallen, she looked up again at the teachers. Dr Smythe was staring fixedly at the broken window and the cloud-strewn sky behind. Her face was white with shock. Or anger.

  ‘Quite a dramatic first morning for you, Livy,’ Amy said as they left the Temple.

  ‘Let’s hope it’s not an omen,’ Martha added sweetly.

  ‘Wow!’

  ‘Awesome!’

  ‘Did you see it when it smashed into that pillar?’

  ‘Boof! I thought it would explode!’

  ‘It looked frightened!’

  ‘Nah, stunned.’

  They were outside, and the voices swirled around.

  Livy saw Joe Molyns – now standing a few feet away from her – laughing with a group of his friends.

  ‘I was so late,’ he was sayin
g. ‘Bowen nearly got me!’

  ‘There he is!’ Amy had grabbed Celia’s arm and was pulling excitedly on her blazer. ‘Oh Celia. You are just made for each other!’

  ‘I’ve got more pictures,’ Martha had her phone discreetly angled towards the boy.

  Celia was looking at him from underneath her lashes. But the boy, oblivious, took no notice.

  ‘Why didn’t you say anything to him, Celia?’ Amy asked.

  Livy saw that although the question seemed innocent, Amy had exchanged a look with Martha.

  ‘Struck dumb,’ Celia mumbled. Then she sighed. ‘He’s just too beautiful!’

  Dr Smythe now swept past, a group of stern-faced teachers following her.

  ‘Over four hundred years old.’ Livy heard one of them say.

  ‘Priceless,’ added another.

  ‘Given to the school by Master Burgess himself!’

  ‘You can’t restore something like that.’

  Livy and the others picked up their bags from the locker room by Mr Bowen’s office and crossed the Court of Sentinels to the science labs.

  Livy wanted to talk about what she had seen before the bird flew into the window, but Amy and Martha were talking to Celia and handing their phones round. More pictures of Joe Molyns, no doubt.

  Pupils swarmed in and out of doorways but there was one doorway that no one entered: the one studded with nails and set into the flint and white stone tower on which the Sentinel with the broken wing stood guard. The Sentinel that she had stared and stared at ever since they had moved into the house on Leaden Lane and yet had never again seen the feathers move as they had on the day of her interview.

  As they drew level with the door, Livy shivered. There were words carved into the stone lintel.

  ‘What does tempus fugit mean?’ she asked.

  She thought of the dark portrait of Master Burgess when Dr Smythe had told her about his mad ideas about that strange ‘mortal force’, the heaviness in the blood that had brought gravity into the world. And the boy in the stained-glass window, now destroyed, who had stuck out his foot as if he could walk over the words. And now above the door to this tower. What connected them?

  ‘Didn’t you learn Latin at your last school?’ Martha said.

  Celia frowned at Martha and Martha pulled an ‘I’m sorry’ face.

  ‘It means “time flies”,’ Celia explained. ‘Although whoever it was who carved it on the White Tower had never sat through double maths at Temple College!’

  ‘But you’re so good at maths, Celia,’ Amy said. ‘You came top in the last test.’

  ‘Joint top,’ Celia corrected her. ‘With Alex.’

  ‘Alex is sooooo boring.’ Amy frowned. ‘He’s always staring at me.’ She sniffed. ‘As if!’

  They pushed past pupils coming down a broad oak staircase in some part of the school that Livy had already forgotten how they had got to. Painted faces looked down on her from portraits in heavy gilt frames and every one of those faces seemed to sneer at her. Perhaps those long-dead scholars were right, Livy felt, dropping her eyes. What right had she to be here? Everyone who walked past her seemed so assured, so confident. Livy felt lost and out of place.

  As they found their seats in the classroom, Amy said to Celia, ‘Pleeeeease sit next to me. You know I’m going to need your help.’

  ‘But what about Livy?’ Celia said.

  ‘She can sit next to Martha,’ Amy said, pulling Celia into the seat next to her.

  ‘Do you mind?’ Celia looked concerned.

  Livy shook her head and moved into the seat behind Celia and Amy.

  Martha didn’t immediately sit down. Livy could see her scanning the classroom. ‘Actually, I’d better sit next to Francesca,’ she muttered and slipped into another seat, leaving Livy on her own.

  Livy felt her cheeks turn red. She took out her bashed pencil case and laid it on the desk in front of her.

  ‘Can I sit here?’ The thin, pale boy with ragged blond hair whom Amy had been so rude to in the Temple stood next to the empty seat.

  ‘Sure,’ Livy said.

  ‘Who are you?’ The boy stuck his bag under the desk. Livy couldn’t place his accent.

  Amy turned round. ‘She’s called Livy Burgess.’

  ‘Burgess?’ The boy looked surprised.

  ‘She’s new, Alex. Don’t get any ideas.’

  Livy saw the boy’s cheeks redden and she felt sorry for him. He got his textbook out of his bag.

  ‘He’s from Moscow.’ Amy smirked. ‘He came top in the entrance exam.’ She turned back to Celia and whispered, ‘Not that it makes up for anything else!’

  Celia elbowed Amy in the ribs.

  The boy ignored Livy, working furiously on the equations that the teacher wrote on the board. Livy copied them into the book she had been given, but had no clue how to attempt them.

  Alex’s pen suddenly hovered over her page. ‘You have to work out what is inside brackets first,’ he mumbled.

  When the bell went to signal the end of the lesson, the boy hurriedly put all his things into his bag, then hesitated. ‘Are you a real Burgess?’ he asked.

  Livy shrugged. ‘I might be.’

  The boy looked troubled and left the room, quickly.

  ‘Did I say something to upset him?’ Livy said.

  ‘Don’t take it personally: he’s quite a loner,’ Celia explained.

  Amy put her large, expensive and very definitely designer bag on her shoulder. ‘Quite a loser,’ she said.

  The day’s lessons went past in a blur of endless corridors and classrooms; Livy had no idea where she was and made sure that she stuck close to Celia at each lesson change.

  Still, she had done it, she thought as the final bell rang out. She had survived a whole day. And nothing too awful had happened. She would have to watch out for Martha and Amy, but Celia looked as if she could handle them. Or ignore them. Which was the same thing.

  On the way back to the locker room, Mr Bowen asked Livy to step into his office.

  ‘Did you find your way around?’ he asked kindly. ‘It’s quite easy to get lost in Temple College.’

  Livy nodded.

  ‘Has Celia been looking after you?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ replied Livy, addressing him in the Temple College manner.

  ‘Temple College is a little different from most schools: we have our own way of doing things. But I am sure you will fit in quite nicely.’ He smiled at her. ‘Celia will take care of you. Just don’t take too much nonsense from the other two.’

  As Livy entered the locker room, she could hear Amy talking. ‘Do we have to ask her, Celia?’

  ‘But she’s new, Amy. Imagine what you would feel like if you started at a strange school and didn’t know anyone. I think it would be kind if we invited her. And she seems very nice.’

  ‘But we’ve been dragging her round all day,’ Martha added. ‘Please don’t let’s take her for a frozen yoghurt! She’s going to make us look seriously uncool. Have you seen her phone? It’s out of the Dark Ages!’

  ‘Shhh!’ Amy had looked up to see Livy.

  Celia blushed at the awkwardness, but smiled broadly at her. ‘We’re going for frozen yoghurt. Do you want to come?’

  Livy looked at Martha and Amy, who were standing behind Celia. They weren’t smiling.

  ‘I . . . I’ll go home, if you don’t mind,’ Livy said.

  Martha nodded her approval. Amy’s mouth squeezed into a tight smile of triumph.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Celia said.

  ‘See you tomorrow,’ Martha said, loudly, turning her back on Livy to put a book in her locker.

  ‘Yeah.’ Livy shrugged her rucksack on to her shoulder.

  As she left the locker room, she heard Martha say, ‘I thought she would never leave!’

  And then worse, Celia’s reply: ‘I feel sorry for her. She seems a bit lost.’

  Livy put her key in the door.

  ‘There’s a bun on the kitchen table . . .’ Her mother’s
voice floated down from upstairs. ‘Can you pick up Tom from nursery for me in ten minutes? I’m hanging curtains! I’ll call them to say that you are coming . . .’

  The bun was a large sugary doughnut that made her teeth itch just looking at it. She couldn’t face eating anything after her day at school.

  ‘How was it?’ her mother called down again. ‘Did you make friends?’

  As if she could make friends in a day! It had taken her almost her entire life to be friends with Mahalia.

  ‘I don’t know how many times I have to say this,’ Livy muttered to herself, cringing at the memory of Celia, Martha and Amy talking about her in the locker room, ‘I don’t need friends.’

  Livy shut the front door behind her and ran towards the end of the street. Tom’s new nursery was not far; she had to go to the church on the other side of the roundabout and knock on the green door.

  ‘A bit lost.’ That’s what they thought of her. And she was going to have to go into school and do it all again tomorrow! But it was true. She was lost. Or rather, she was . . . between places. She couldn’t go back to her old school and yet this new one did not seem to have space for her. Or the right kind of space, anyway.

  Livy found the nursery: the door had been covered with children’s paintings, handprints and cut-out paper shapes. A large piece of paper had been fixed to the middle of the riot of colour and shapes: We Play Here. Underneath were several attempts at handwriting. Some were just strange circles or crosses with dots and squiggles. Tom had written his very neatly, although it was upside down.

  ‘I got a ballooooon!’ Tom yelled as he ran at Livy’s knees.

  The nursery assistant smiled at him and ruffled his hair. ‘You’re Tom’s sister?’ she asked. ‘That’s nice. He’s a lovely boy.’ She knelt down so that she was at the same height as Tom. ‘So here’s your balloon for being such a very good boy on your first day. Remember what I said about holding the string very tight?’