Starr Academy: Year Two

Starr Academy: Year Two- Chapter 14

Fourteen

    Everyone talked animately as we all walked into the great hall for lunch. Everyone including me. I just wasn’t agreeing that my actions in the first stage was anything extraordinary. Of course everyone argued against me.

    But I didn’t sit down with my friends when we got inside. I excused myself from Marek and my friends to go up to Headmistress Alexi who smiled at me. “You did wonderfully out of the field Hope.”

    I blushed as I looked to each of the professors who nodded in agreement. “Thank you.” Biting my lower lip lightly, I looked back to Headmistress Alexi. “May I talk with you privately?”

    She nodded excusing herself from the table just as everyone else’s place misted with their lunch. Her place was left untouched with food or mist. I knew that she would have known I would want to talk before lunch. That she had planned on it.

    Headmistress Alexi placed her hand on my upper back and we walked out to the balcony off the great hall. We went over to one of the few stone benches out here over to the side and sat down. My stomach a bit tight with nerves.

    Alexi smiled down at me placing a hand over my fiddling ones. “What is it you wish to speak with me about?”

    I took a deep breathe and let it out before I looked at her. “I don’t think I should continue in the competition.” I shocked myself at how confident my voice was. It didn’t waver or shake in the slightest.

    She gave me a thoughtful look. “But you’ve only been through one stage of the competition. Wouldn’t you want to see how the other ones are?”

    I shook my head looking out over the garden. “It’s too easy for me. I don’t think it’s fair to the other students.”

    “But is it fair to you not to experience the full length of competition?” She asked with that motherly tone of hers.

    I smiled at her. “I don’t care about me, but the others.”

    She matched my smile. “My husband was very right. You sound exactly like Melerick.”

    I blushed and looked out over the garden again. “Maybe it’s all the time I spend reading his journals and seeing him at night in my dreams.” A sigh of longing. “I sometimes wish he was here.”

    Her fingers touched my chin lightly turning back to her. Headmistress Alexi looked at me thoughtfully. “He is here with you.” She placed her hand on my heart. “Always right here in your heart. Your love for him keeps him close to you.”

    I sighed, but this time in defeat. “During the summer I had wished he was there to just hug me when I was at my family’s house for the short time I was there.”

    “And if he was here, he’d encourage you to continue on with the competition. To not take yourself out when it’s too easy.”

    I frowned at her. “He’d trust my judgement because he’d know that I hate besting everyone as if it weren’t my first time.”

    She smiled and nodded. “Then I will trust that you wish to step aside from the competition.”

    Headmistress Alexi started to stand up, but I touched her arm. “But I want someone to take my place.” I smiled. “Franklin. He should be given a chance to see how far he can go in the competition.” I shrugged. “He seemed gloomy that his team had been the ones against mine.”

    She chuckled lightly. “That I believe is a very nice idea. He is a strong young man and deserves to see how he’ll do.” She rose and offered me a hand up. “Shall I announce it now?”