Classes resumed and hope for normalcy seemed justified.
The professors never treated her any different, and none of the students looked at her more than usual during class. Chester, Keinan, and Mortem all walked with her between classes, with Mortem always disappearing around meal times.
Now aware of Viola's feelings, though, Rose was acutely more conscious of her actions. She noticed that Viola still stared at Chester a lot and looked away whenever he walked by her. Rose wondered why she hadn't noticed it sooner, because it was painfully obvious once pointed out.
Rose simultaneously felt guilty for being so terrifying for the girl and immensely irritated. Rose hadn't done anything to warrant such a reaction, and it bothered her greatly that they treated her like a monster. Sure, she could understand if she had acted rudely or been mean towards them, then they would be perfectly justified in their fear for her.
Rose was a good girl. She didn't raise her voice. She didn't use her fists.
Mother Mara raised Rose to be a good girl. Not a monster… and being treated like one made the whole situation unfair.
Rose kept reminding herself, though, that things would go back to normal. They'll lose interest in her after a while, and once the nasty touch of the Dark Vigil left everyone's minds, everything would be better. She could go back to focusing on her studies and learning about what it meant to be a dragon. Once she was done with that, she'd work on figuring out who her parents were, and maybe even meeting an actual dragon.
Yes, that was her plan. It seemed like a good plan, too.
All she had to do was keep her head down and wait it out. She could do that.
She would do that.
And for the first few days of January, it seemed like it was working. There were no more obvious moves made against her, and she got to work on practicing her magic. Things were looking up again…
But that semblance of optimism didn't last long.
The fifth day after classes started up, Rose pulled her hair up into a ponytail as she was exiting her kingdom's dormitory. She was a little tired since she stayed up later than usual reading some fantastical mystery novel Havi lent her. She hadn't realized it was nearly two in the morning when she finally reached a good stopping point.
The young dragon couldn't resist giving a big yawn, closing her eyes as she did so and stretching her arms up. Opening them again, she had only a second to realize something was flying towards her face. The girl reflexively threw herself out of the way of the impeding ball of white fire, which hurtled past, hitting the cold wall behind her with a blazing crackle.
Her eyes widened in horror when she recognized what exactly was thrown at her: spirit fire.
The white fire that had given her atrocious burns had harmlessly slammed against the wall behind her, disappearing into the air shortly afterwards. Rose frantically looked around for the source but saw no one.
With shaky legs, Rose stood back up and wondered if she should get a teacher.
The fire's gone, though, Rose thought, and I didn't see anyone.
Rose tentatively looked back towards her dorm. Should I ask Lanna to come with me? Spirit fire can hurt dragons… and that very nearly hit my face.
Then Rose remembered the red paint incident. Spirit fire would hurt her, too, she thought with a sudden jolt of fear. I don't want her to get caught up in this.
The girl shook her head, mustering what little bravery she had and marching on towards the cafeteria. Her stomach was knotted so tightly she didn't think she could eat, but she didn't want to bother her friends.
I just have to get through this. Things will go back to normal, Rose told herself. Everything will be okay. I can do this.
But things did not get easier.
After classes that day when Rose was on her way back to the dormitory, her backpack ripped open again. Her notebooks and homework tumbled out of it with gusto, and Rose frantically looked around the hallway. She saw a group of older girls—a mix of Hero and Aisling—giggling at her.
Rose's cheeks flushed as she hurriedly picked up her things and carried her thoroughly ruined backpack back to her room. While she wasn't surprised to find the word 'monster' scrawled on her things, she was no less hurt by it.
The next day, she decided to just bring a single notebook she hadn't used and all her homework. She was sure she could share textbooks with one of her friends, but she couldn't carry everything and keep an eye on it.
Plus, her backpack was thoroughly destroyed. Duct tape could only go so far.
Unfortunately, between breakfast and her first class, her homework mysteriously disappeared and was replaced with blank papers. When Professor Laye came around to collect their rough drafts, Rose could only stare in disbelief at the empty pages.
"Did you forget?" Mortem asked her.
Rose's bottom lip quivered and she shook her head. "It was here, I swear…"
Chester looked over her shoulder. "What the—I saw you had it at breakfast!!"
"Did you l-leave it in the cafeteria, M-Miss Rose?" Professor Laye inquired.
"I—I guess. I'm sorry, Professor."
"It's quite alright," Professor Laye reassured her. "If y-you'll bring i-it to me later today, I'll c-count it as full credit."
Rose thanked him, still feeling sick. She flipped through her notebook, looking for her other homework assignments. To her horror, all of them were blank.
Rose's breathing hitched, and her shoulders tensed. All the color drained from her face and her grip tightened on the blank papers she held. Anger and worry gnawed at her, and the desire to confront someone grew immensely. As Professor Laye continued to collect the homework, Rose took a deep, shaky breath.
"Okay, class," Professor Laye said, "dismissed."
Rose quickly got up from her desk, intent on searching for her missing homework. She moved with all the speed she could to get out the door, and as soon as her footsteps crossed the threshold, she was abruptly stopped by Mortem grabbing her hand.
She felt that familiar zing of his magic race across her—she had realized by that point that that was what she was feeling: him poking her with his magic—and she stopped. Mortem pulled her aside as Chester and Keinan left the class as well.
The rest of the students paid the quartet no heed, marching on to the next class. Rose pulled her hand out of Mortem's, holding her notebook closer to her chest.
"What?"
"We'll help you look," Keinan told her firmly.
"It's not like it's disappeared from existence. They probably just stashed it somewhere," Chester said, trying to sound consoling and optimistic.
Rose's chest tightened, and she struggled not to show how touched she was by the gesture. She had come to think of them as friends over the past months, but having never had real friends, she didn't know what to expect from them. She'd never had people help her for the sake of her before coming to this school.
She tried on a wobbly smile and said, "Th-thank you."
She wanted to smile for real, but nerves and anxiety kept her from doing so.
"We should split up," Mortem suggested, "but someone should stay with Rose in case they try anything else."
"I'll stay with her," Keinan volunteered. "Rose, why don't we start in the cafeteria?"
...🌹...
Chester nodded, folding his arms over his chest. "Let's be sure to check the trash, too. They might have thrown it out after they swapped it. I'll check by her dorms."
"We don't have a lot of time before the next class. Let's hurry," Mortem muttered, turning and walking away.
Chester wished the two of them good luck before breaking out into a brief jog towards Rose's dorm. Keinan gave Rose a big sunny smile and the two headed off to where they had last seen the homework: the cafeteria.
Nerves unintentionally drew out Rose's draconic tail and horns as she followed closely behind Keinan to the cafeteria. The Aisling arachoa glanced back on occasion with a furrowed brow, concern plain on his face, but he didn't speak. The two arrived at the cafeteria soon enough and began looking on opposite ends.
They only had a solid five minutes to search—everyone had fifteen minutes to get in between classes—before they had to run over to Professor Nigel's Black Magic class. Rose thought Professor Nigel would be understanding if they were a smidgeon late, but certainly not if they were more than a few minutes past the gentle chimes.
Rose searched with near frantic energy, anxiety clutching at her heart. She couldn't pinpoint what unnerved her the most: the violation of having all her belongings consistently stolen or vandalized, or the fact that it was now interfering with her classwork. Rose was never one to disappoint the adults in her life, because she understood being less than a good, obedient girl meant that no family would ever want her.
The bad boys and girls were left friendless, family-less, and shuffled around like a vile disease. Good children were taken away to better places, Mother Mara told her so. If Rose ever wanted to have friends or parents, she had to be a good girl.
What if she was kicked out of the school? What if she had to go back to that town and her magic acted out, but this time, they all had their shotguns ready?
No, no. She couldn't—she can't—no, no. She wouldn't allow that to happen. She would give them no reason to throw her out of the school and put her back there. She would be the ideal student and behave like a good girl. She would learn to control her magic and then maybe one day—
"They're not here," Rose whispered, her voice cracking. She was blinking rapidly, trying to fight off the bubbling turmoil inside of her. "W-we sh-should go to class now. We shouldn't be late."
Keinan frowned, his brow creasing. "Rose, we'll find them, don't worry."
Rose swallowed back her disbelieving retort and turned to leave, her tail whipping about behind her like an irritated cat. Distressed, Rose headed out of the cafeteria. As she began the reluctant trip to Professor Nigel's class, she wrung her hands together. Her claws caught on her skin more than once, but never drew blood. Keinan caught up with her and walked beside her, seemingly at a loss for what to say.
"You know, I haven't turned in like five assignments this year," Keinan tried out. "Professor Laye only gave me a detention on the fifth one and made me do them all there."
Rose turned her head, hope curdling inside of her. "R-really?"
"Yeah. I can show you the letter my pa wrote when he found out," Keinan offered. "If I miss another one, I'm grounded, but this is like the first one you've ever missed this year, right?"
"Y-yes."
"Yeah, so you're totally fine," Keinan said confidently. "Besides, Professor Laye likes you, you're always answering questions in class."
Her insides were still knotted tighter than a disfigured pretzel, but she stopped messing with her hands. "I-I guess I can always redo it during dinner, since he s-said he'd be okay if I gave it to him at the end of the day."
"Chester and I will help you," Keinan reassured her. "If it happens again, we'll talk to the teachers. They might be able to give you a backpack that resists magic or something."
"There's—?"
Rose's question died down when she saw Mortem rounding the corner and holding a bundle of papers.
Mortem approached Rose, holding out his prize. Rose's face lit up and she rushed over towards him, gladly accepting the papers. She rapidly flipped through them, her smile stretching wider and wider and an immeasurable amount of relief washed away her anxiety.
"Yes! They're all here. Where did you find them?"
"Here and there," came his response.
Keinan and Chester joined the two, both smiling in relief. Chester had apparently come around from behind and sped up to catch up to them. Chester then frowned. "Emotional or not, they really shouldn't do that. You could have gotten in trouble with the professors."
Rose nodded in agreement, her grip tightening as she recalled the spirit fire thrown at her earlier that day. She bit her bottom lip as she thought about what she could do.
Things are supposed to get better though, right? A wriggling sense of doubt about that dug itself in the back of her head.
"Have you talked to the teachers, yet?" Mortem asked Rose. "They may not be able to punish those morons since there's no definite proof about who's doing it, but they can at least make sure your homework is safe."
"Can they?" Rose asked hesitantly.
"Easily. Professor Rina is an enchanter, so she can place protective and repelling seals on your backpack. Those should be strong enough to deal with students," Mortem explained. "Talk to Professor Nigel after class tonight, I'm sure he'll take care of it."
"Meantime, we can try to find proper evidence against those jerks," Keinan declared.
"And how exactly do you plan on doing that?" Chester inquired with a raised eyebrow. "Did you suddenly become an observer?"
"No, but I bet we can figure something out," Keinan said with a shrug. "We can't let them get away with this, that's for sure."
"If we retaliate, we could get in trouble," Chester argued. "Not to mention if Rose retaliates, she'd be giving them more gasoline to their ignorant fire. We have to resolve this peacefully and within the rules or it'll only get worse."
"So she's supposed to simply accept what they're doing?" Keinan argued, scornfully shaking his head. "If she teaches 'em a lesson, they won't bother her again."
"Or they'll use it as a rallying cry and make whoever she defends herself against a martyr. This isn't one of your video games where you can beat your opponent to near death and make them realize the error of their ways," Chester scoffed.
"U-um, we should probably get to class," Rose interrupted hesitantly, flustered by their argument over her problem.
Her heart swelled with a foreign warmth from the idea that her friends were so concerned for her they would try to help. Especially since they could get caught up in the bullying simply being associated with her.
Mortem cleared his throat. "She's right. Let's go, we can discuss this later."
The wood elf and arachoa exchanged looks of annoyance but nodded in agreement. The quartet headed off to the Black Magic classroom where they were still a few minutes late. This wasn't acknowledged by Professor Nigel with anything more than a slight tilt of his head. Everyone took their seats and Professor Nigel began the class like any other class.
Rose always enjoyed Black Magic, so the class went by in what felt like only ten minutes. At the end—with the encouragement of her friends—Rose lingered behind to talk to Professor Nigel. Chester, Keinan, and Mortem stood a little way behind her in a show of support.
Professor Nigel greeted her with gentle warmth like he always did. "How may I help you, Miss Rose?"
With a shaky voice, Rose admitted to what had been happening. Professor Nigel listened to her story quietly, speaking only to prompt her to continue when she fell silent.
"I am terribly sorry this has been happening," he said softly. "I will discuss this with the other teachers, so we may be more watchful of this behavior. I will also talk with Professor Rina about getting you a better bag, and I will personally bring you new school supplies. If you have any idea who is behind these incidents—"
"I never see who does it," Rose admitted. "I-I get the most… looks… from the Hero Kingdom, though, if that helps."
"I will talk with Professor Mamta about his kingdom, then," Professor Nigel said. "If anything like this happens again, come see me immediately. We will do what we can, I promise."
The tall, gentlemanly professor reached over and gave Rose a brief pat on the shoulder. "I may be bound by the rules, but if you ever need someone to talk to, I've been told I'm a good listener."
"Thank you, Professor," Rose said, her voice barely audible.
"Mn. Now, why don't you head down to dinner? I'll have your backpack ready by morning tomorrow."
Rose nodded slowly, turning away and walking over to her friends.
"C'mon, Rose. There's a steak with our name on it," Keinan told her.
"Ugh," Chester said disdainfully.
"Don't worry, I'm sure there's some nice rabbit food for you," Keinan consoled his best friend.