Second Best | A Rosewood Chronicles FanFiction

Part 2 - Rosewood Hall

Kate stepped out of the car, looking out at the school, aware of her sister waving the chauffeur away as she hurriedly took her own luggage out the car.

"I know you don't want me here, Katy, but we don't even have to see each other, I promise. No one will know we're related." Ellie said, standing next to me outside the car.

"It's not that I don't want you here, and of course I don't want you to completely ignore me! I just..."

She was cut off when she turned to start walking round to collect her own luggage from the chauffeur, and instead bumped into a girl about her age, carrying an insane amount of luggage.

"Oh, sorry!" Kate said, admitting that it was her fault and leaning down to pick up the dropped items. When she stood back up again, she got a good look at the girl. The resemblance was uncanny, and the girl could see it too, for she stared at Kate, before removing her gaze and placing it on Ellie behind her, who she seemed fascinated by.

"Katy!" Said a voice from the opposite direction, and Kate turned around to see a girl, wearing a fir coat and an iced coffee in hand walking towards her. Kate forgot about the girl and smiled at the approaching fashion icon.

"Anastacia!"Kate cried, not having seen her friend for a whole two months. They hugged, and then Lola and Micky came running up, their bags containing a huge stash of sweets and chocolates.

Lola squealed. "The team is back together!" she said, pulling out her phone and taking a selfie of them all, probably making the most of having access to her phone before the term officially started and our devices were locked away.

"Where's Binah?" Anastacia asked, her voice not sounding concerned but more confused.

"She went to help a new student. She's international apparently." Lola said, sounding impressed.

Suddenly realising that Kate had to help Ellie get signed into Ivy, she left them to it and escorted Ellie to the Ivy Dorm, careful not to let anyone see them together.

Once Ellie was signed in, Kate made her way up to her own room and pushed the key into the lock. The room exactly was exactly as she left it. She hated sharing so had requested a single room.

After unpacking and arranging her things how she liked it, she made her way to the Welcoming Ceremony, where her friends, including Raphael, were sat waiting for the Headmaster to make his speech.

"Evening Raphael." She said with a smile, taking her seat.

"Katy." He said, giving her a grin in reply.

"Raphael was just telling us about how he thinks the ten p.m. curfew should be extended for Year Ten students." Anastacia said whilst rolling her eyes. "Well, please be our guest, Raphael, and let us know how it works out for you for the fiftieth time around." she said.

But before Kate could respond, Binah came walking forward, accompanied by the girl Kate had nearly knocked over just a few hours ago.

"Woah, Kate it's your twin!" Raphael joked.

She gave him a weird look in reply. "We don't look that similar."

"Guys this is Lottie Pumpkin!" Binah exclaimed, gesturing for Lottie to take a seat next to her as she sat down.

They all tried to stop themselves smiling at her last name, which Kate realised was a bit insensitive and tried to look away.

"Yeah, we've met." She eventually said.

"Really? When?" But before Kate could recount her embarrassing encounter with Lottie, the Headmaster began his speech.

After the speech spanning the length of about 30 seconds, the fireworks began, sending sparks of purple, red, green, blue, pink and gold into the night sky, making coloured light dance around them.

"Who are they?" Lottie said, gesturing to the people stood behind the students.

"Bodyguards." Binah said. "There's quite a few children of important people here."

"I heard some of them are even Partizans." Lola said, obviously impressed.

"What are Partizans?" Lottie asked.

Everyone turned to stare at her in pure disbelief at not knowing such an obvious question.

"What's a Partizan?" Raphael repeated slowly, obviously trying to make a point.

"Where did you say you were from again?" Anastacia asked, but was interrupted by Binah.

"They're like trained assassins; they're trained from a very young age in many fields such as martial arts and languages." Binah explained with no hesitation. "They're assigned to a single member of a family and will stop at nothing to protect them. There's not much need for them in modern society..."

"Not much need for one for me, you mean." Kate interrupted, crossing her arms and sitting back in her seat.

"Ugh, Katy will you give that up?" Raphael interrupted, "So what if you don't have a Partizan?"

"I just think that if you're going to give my sister a Partizan, why not me? Why aren't I as important?" she continued.

Raphael threw his head back in annoyance, obviously annoyed at the same conversation again and again.

"Because your sister is the heir to the Maravish throne and you're not?" Binah offered.

"Thank you Binah, I've been reminded of that plenty of times thank you." Kate replied curtly.

Kate saw that Lottie's eyes had widened tremendously.

"Your a princess?" she said incredulously. But they were cut off yet again by another speech, this time by Professor Devine, the Ivy House Mother.

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