“Goooooooood morning!”

Zyn poked her head out of her room, throwing her arms out on either side of her. She was dressed in a bright blue robe with dark blue birds scattered across its smooth surface. Underneath the robe, she wore a green-and-blue striped shirt and black pants with green stripes down the back.

“It’s the first day of school!” Zyn called, her voice echoing off the stone walls of the tower. “Wake up and get ready for a great day!”

“Why can’t you let us sleep?” Sarala’s annoyed voice screamed down to her. “It’s the crack of dawn!”

“It’s only 7!” Zyn replied loudly. “Or—almost 7!”

“I don’t care what time it is!” Sarala growled in return.

“Now, kids, stop your howling!” came a gruff voice one level down—it was Ren pretending to be Ak-tu. “Let people sleep if they want to.”

Zyn snorted in laughter. “Oh, come on, Ren! Let me have some fun! It’s not like Dad’s here to actually scold me, after all.”

Ren bounded up the stairs, appearing around the turn with a grin on her face and dressed in a simple pink robe. “Yeah, I know, Zyn! But I just couldn’t resist!” she teased. “Not that Dad sounds like that anyway.”

“Yeah, if anything, he’d get in on the joke!” Zyn looked at the stairs spiraling up towards Sarala’s room and yowled as loudly as she could, “COME ON, SLEEPYHEAD!”

“UGH!” 

Zyn and Ren walked down the steps to the first floor. Ren went to sit on the rug in front of the empty fireplace, while Zyn jumped onto the couch behind her. 

“I can’t wait for class!” Zyn said, fidgeting excitedly.

“I can see that,” Ren chuckled, closing her eyes. “Do you mind keeping it down, though? I want to meditate for at least five minutes!”

Zyn shrugged quietly in response and hopped off the couch again, placing one hand on her hip as she scanned the tower room in a bored fashion. Sniffing the air, she could detect a trace of something fruity; it seemed Ak-tu had eaten breakfast in the tower that morning. 

A bit later, Sarala came dragging her feet down the stairs. She was dressed in a new yellow robe, one that Ren had seldom worn before. She would have appeared nice in the new outfit if it wasn’t for the annoyed look on her face and the dark marks under her golden eyes. 

Maybe I shouldn’t have woken her up… Eh, what am I thinking? Of course I had to wake her up, otherwise she’d miss breakfast! The bell will sound any minute now anyway.

“What’s the first class again?” Sarala grumbled.

Zyn put her pointer finger to her lips, then pointed at Ren over the couch with her other hand. Sarala scowled and crossed her arms, leaning against the entranceway to the stairs.

“Why can’t she just do that in her room?” Sarala whispered.

“Because she wants to do it near the fireplace,” Zyn mouthed to her.

“Why?” Sarala hissed.

Zyn thought about that for a moment. Why is she doing it by the fireplace? “I don’t know!” she whispered back honestly.

“You two are ridiculous,” Sarala muttered loudly.

“I heard that!” Ren said, opening one eye and looking back at Sarala. She smiled playfully at the other girl, then hopped to her feet. “Well, that’ll have to do! I lost concentration when you two had your hissing match. Let’s see what’s for breakfast!”

The three therefore left the tower, Zyn digging around in her pockets for the tower key (she’d keep spare keys in most of her robes). Once finding it, she locked the door and hurried after Ren and Sarala, as the two walked on without her.

They crossed the Tai Chi Studio and Courtyard until they reached the Eating Hall. There weren’t too many students at breakfast yet, as the bell had just rung. The three made their way through the many wooden tables to reach the food counter near the Kitchen door. The usual aromas of savory and sweet filled the air, but this time, the smells didn’t bother Zyn. 

The cooks always made a variety of good food. There were blueberry muffins, cinnamon rolls, plain and chocolate chip pancakes, peanut spread toast, fruit bowls, cereal, teas and blends of multiple flavors, hot cocoa, and plain water.

“Do you ever wonder how the cooks have time to make all this food?” Zyn asked Ren, grabbing three bamboo trays from the clean stack on one side of the counter.

Ren took a tray from Zyn and replied, “Well, there are six of them.”

She led the way, sliding her tray down the scratched-up counter and reaching for some pancakes.

“Do you think they use magic to make it go by faster?” Zyn wondered.

“I would, if I knew how,” Sarala commented.

Zyn collected food unconsciously, thinking back to a time that she and Ren had been cooking with their father. The family had been traveling (as was usual in the good ol’ days), and they were low on food supplies. They only had flour, a few spices, some mangoes, and a handful of blueberries. Instead of eating the fruit by itself, the twins voted on making a mango blueberry bread. Ak-tu had used his air magic to make the bread rise, and Zyn recalled how she had wanted to do magical cooking for at least a month afterwards. 

Smiling at the memory, Zyn trailed Ren and Sarala to a nearby table and sat down to eat. But it tasted nowhere near as savory or sweet as the mango blueberry bread she’d made with her family. 

As they ate, more people trickled in, until the Eating Hall was completely full. Chatter filled the air again, pulling Zyn from different memories of the places the Caihong family had traveled to before the school’s creation. She scowled at the annoying people, then realized that she had finished eating while she’d been reminiscing. Standing up, she placed her pointed shoe on the bench.

“Hey, Ren, do you think we’ll ever travel again?”

“Of course we will,” Ren said, raising an eyebrow in question and appearing much like their father. “We go on vacations every summer.”

“Yeah, but…I mean traveling like we used to do, just going around the world and never being tied down, or only staying at the little house for a few months before traveling again!” Zyn explained, tripping over her words as she spoke rapidly. 

“Oh. Well, it’s hard to do that when Dad owns a school,” pointed out Ren.

Zyn’s shoulders slumped. “Yeah, I guess that’s true… How much time do we have left anyway?” 

“Umm…school just started, so it’ll be another year before we can go anywh—”

“I meant until class starts,” Zyn interrupted.

Ren pulled out the squarish family mirror and said, “It’s 7:35! What should we do to kill time?”

“I would have slept, if given the choice,” Sarala muttered, glaring up at Zyn.

Zyn raised an eyebrow at her. “Sleep is for the weak,” she finally said in an uninterested voice.

In the end, Zyn pulled out a deck of YAT cards from her robe. She played with Ren, until Sarala was done eating and surprisingly joined in too. The card game was fun, especially when Zyn constantly made Sarala pick up cards. They were so invested in their game, that the chatter faded around them and they almost missed the ringing bell.

“Ah! That’s the minute-bell!” Ren cried. “We better go!”

“I don’t have my wand though,” Sarala said, her voice slightly panicked.

“Hurry up!” Zyn yowled.

The three raced out of the Eating Hall, each of them heading for the western building containing their tower. 

“I’ll get our wands!” Ren shouted over her shoulder. “You get to class, okay?” 

Zyn nodded and changed directions, heading for the Magic Studies classroom instead. Sarala followed her, as Ren vanished into the Tai Chi Studio. 

Zyn and Sarala sat down at the front of the class, saving a seat for Ren. Khurshid stood at the large desk, waiting for the students to gather. The final bell rang and Ren appeared soon after, panting heavily. She sunk into the seat beside Zyn, passing Zyn and Sarala their wands and a stack of notebooks.

“Welcome, class!” Khurshid began. “You will be in this classroom for the next two hours, for Magic Studies and Magic Channeling. Next week, Magic Channeling will be in the room over. You will report to the Greenhouse for Plants, and then to the Potions classroom. In the afternoon, you’ll go to the Kung Fu Studio for Kung Fu, and those of you who are taking Tai Chi will go to the Tai Chi Studio.

“I’m going to have my mirror call out your names for attendance, to make sure we’ve got everyone here for the first day. Please say ‘here’ when you hear your name.”

He pulled out his mirror and ordered it to read out the attendance. It called out their names in a bland voice, its surface lighting up each time it spoke. Everyone was there, so he put the mirror away to start class.

“In Magic Studies, we will be going over the types of magic and how to determine a person’s magic. In Magic Channeling, we will be going over common uses for magic and why we use objects for channeling. We won’t be doing any actual channeling until next week.

“Now, I am blind, but that doesn’t mean you can’t ask questions. Just knock on the desk to get my attention. If I seemed not to have noticed, you may interrupt—but only if your question is important, please. Any questions so far?”

Nobody moved, as if afraid that any small movement or sound would catch Khurshid’s attention.

“Very well. Let’s begin. If you’d like to take notes, you can do so. I don’t mind if you use your mirror or your notebooks, just so long as you’re paying attention.”

Khurshid paced slowly at the front of the class as he lectured them about the different types of magic. There was elemental magic (which everyone knew of), natural magic, enchantment magic, and spirit magic. 

Elemental magic was what every living animal had in them, and was said to be the source of life itself. The elements consisted of earth, water, fire, and air. People typically channeled their magic through an object (like a wand, as only plants could channel magic), but could also use actions (like martial arts or dancing) to control it. 

Natural magic was found in nature, specifically plants and crystals. This magic could be used to help a person’s own magic be more powerful (especially when added to potions), heal body or mind, and more.

Khurshid didn’t spend much time on enchantment or spirit magics, saying they’d learn more about those types of magics at the higher levels. Enchantment magic made objects do certain things, while spirit magic was said to be that of imagination. 

Zyn wished Khurshid would go into the magic types more, as Ak-tu didn’t even tell his children much about them, despite using advanced magic often.

The rest of the class was spent looking up astrological birth charts in textbooks. After all, the placement of the sun and moon in somebody’s chart determined their type of magic. If someone was born during the day, their sun sign would determine their magic; if born at night, it would be their moon sign. If a person was born at dawn or dusk, it could swing either way.

Studying birth charts took a lot of concentration, that the class was quickly over before the students realized it. Khurshid assigned them homework to figure out their personal birth charts, which would be due the following week. Zyn groaned at the idea of receiving homework already, but at least Khurshid told them they were allowed to use the air-net for pointers.

In Magic Channeling, Khurshid briefly explained that objects helped a person channel their magic. People used plant magic through wands to help their own magic come out and be stronger than if they were trying to channel on their own. Zyn hoped that this would mean she’d be able to summon her magic when it came to using a wand, but Khurshid strictly told each student not to try practicing any magic until the following week—so Zyn would still have to wait.

Once a person mastered using their wand (or other wooden object, like a staff or stick), they moved onto using their entire bodies to summon their magic. The most advanced wielders got away with using only their hands. 

C3 asked so many questions in this class, that they had little time to go over how magic could be used on a day-to-day basis. As a result, they were assigned homework of how to use each element in two daily tasks.

After Magic Channeling, the first-years hurried to the opposite side of the Courtyard where the Greenhouse was located, glad to be out of the stuffy room and stretching their legs. They had to walk through the thick garden to reach the glass doors concealed behind it, shoving poky branches and slick leaves aside. 

The Greenhouse wasn’t connected to the western building, due to being made entirely of thick-paneled glass instead of stone. It stood four floors high to house the many plants comfortably; this meant that there were less student rooms in the western building than the northern and eastern buildings, due to the Greenhouse taking up a large chunk of space.

The glass building was more cluttered than the gardens. There were all sorts of plants, from trees and shrubs to pulsing bushes and dancing vines. There was even a large pile of sticky pink-and-green goo. The glass windows at the top of the Greenhouse were open, allowing birds and many insects inside. Between the birds, bugs, and bushes making a racket, it was difficult to hear the teacher, Fern Oakley.

Fern was a tall woman with a bushy green afro. Her right eye was purple and her left eye was red, but it was the green vine-like tattoos covering her body that caught everyone’s attention. She wore a spiral necklace over her plaid shirt; Zyn never saw her without it. Her face always looked chiseled to be a stern expression. 

Most of the class was spent studying a few of the most common plants and what magical properties they had. Fern had them taking extensive notes. The students not only had to write down how to detect the plant by their four or five senses, but also sketch them to the best of their abilities. The class once again flew by with the notes and sketching. Soon enough, they were leaving the humid Greenhouse and crossing the Courtyard to return to the eastern building, where the Potions classroom lay.

Fern was teaching this class too, and she spent most of the time lecturing them on potion safety. Many of the students had fallen asleep, worn out after getting so much information in one morning. After C3 asked plenty of questions, Fern let the class go early for lunch, thankfully not assigning any homework.

“FINALLY!” Zyn yowled, as she raced across the Courtyard. 

Ren snorted in amusement. “I thought you couldn’t wait for classes?”

“Yeah, and it was fun until Potions, and now I’m hungry,” Zyn huffed.

“It wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be,” Sarala said, coming up behind them. “But, then again, I haven’t been in school since the fourth grade…I think.”

Zyn and Ren stared at her.

Sarala blushed and pushed past them, reaching the Eating Hall first. The room was packed when they got inside. Sarala had paused in the doorway, clearly taken aback by how full the room was when she didn’t get there early. She muttered that she’d save a spot for her, Zyn, and Ren as long as they brought her food. Zyn and Ren therefore went to the long line at the counter.