It will be just like changing schools, he said.
We needed to go home, like our place of origin, he said. It would be good for me to know where I am from.
I just decided that my father is suffering from a lot of things but I should add one more to the list, Memory issues.
There is absolutely nothing alike between the human school I was attending before I was shipped to this glorified prison yard with a lot of criminals. Just that in here, that is the Faery, an alternate realm, no longer earth, it was deemed as a very good way to best your opponent. It makes children strong.
Welcome to Arcanes Training Institute, ATI for short. The best school that exists in Faery and does not discriminate among the top five species that live here. It did not matter that I am crossbred between two of them because a lot of halflings come here too. Oh sorry, Half and half. Halflings referred to children who kind of have one human parent, this happens when their fae parent go to the human world and somehow create an unintended baby, my dad explains although I wonder how someone could create a new life unintendedly.
I hated this and I have a very strong dislike for my father right now. I mean why, just why would he uproot the last fifteen years of our lives where he teaches fairytales and folklores in one of the universities in the city I grew up in just to come back to this realm and help a woman who abandoned us when I was two.
His explanation about me being the heir of her throne and I was not ready to rule came to mind but I brushed it off. I needed to be angry at him, it will take my mind off this clusterfuck situation which I find myself in.
Which happens to be, the new kid in the final year, with no idea of how their version of school is here. Don’t get me wrong, my father did his best to fill me in on this world of ours but high school regardless of the world it exists in always changes.
“Don’t worry Iristendale, you will fit in, in no time.” My father said beside me as we sat at the principal office, we had to come in through a back entrance because apparently, there was some test I needed to perform on the school stairs but no one would tell me what it was.
“You are not allowed to talk to me, I am still very pissed off at you.” I replied my dad, ignoring him as much as I could. This was looking something like how I imagined a fiction headmaster office was which was insane since this was my life and certainly not fiction.
When someone sucked in their breathe, I remembered that we were outside and I was supposed to be respectful to my father, not just because he gave birth to me but also because he happens to be one of the rulers to the prominent five species.
My mother was the leader to her own sector too and although the Dad and mom’s part of the family usually don’t relate in that way, I was a product of my father’s one night loneliness and my mother’s power hungry schemes. Something which I have always knew no matter how much my father tried to hide it from me but what does it say when your mother abandon you at the age two but before then, your father was the go to parent for any injury or issue.
“Ignore my daughter words, I have raised her to freely express herself, a quality which I believe the Folks need in their next leader.” My father answered smoothly, covering my faux pas.
“But Your Majesty, she was being downright disrespectful, Heir or not, she should be disciplined.” The man said.
I was supposed to be on my best behavior, I mean, I really was going to try but his words rubbed me the wrong way. I scoffed. “I would like to see you try.” And I meant it. All through my years in school, my father never once allowed someone else to me, every slight I did was taken care of by him and although sometimes I push the bag too much. I got to suffer heavily for it.
My father shot me a glare and I pinned my mouth, aware that I was heading towards dangerous territory, I did not want to offend this man more. “Speaking of disciplining, my daughter is not to be disciplined by anybody other than me, not even her mother.”
The man nodded. “Of course, as it is with the case of every high ranking heir that we have schooling here. All reports goes to you and you tell us the acceptable behavior that you are grooming in your heir so we do not cut short your efforts.” He stated and my father nodded.
“Good.” My father replied before turning to me. “Iris why don’t you get started on school.”
I opened my mouth to argue but his brows went down, the universal sign that I have pushed too much today and I should not even think of it again. I hugged him tightly, knowing this will be the longest time I will spend away from me.
“You will visit right?” I asked.
“Every chance that I get and when it is safe, we will see if you can continue attending from home.” He replied before he kissed my hair and let me up.
Tears gathered in my eyes but he shook his head at me. That would not be a good example, I was a future queen, I should not be going about crying at the separation from the only face that I knew after being spirited to another realm. I sucked the tears in and turned to the principal.
“Where should I take and what should I do?” I asked him.
“Take the tunnel back, you will come out before a huge building and you might not see a lot of people on the stairs but people milling around it or sitting on the lowest ones if they are brave, I want you to take the stairs… you will eventually get tired before you reach the top but when you do get tired, I want you to come down and someone will be waiting for you at the bottom.” He explained.
“If I am not going to finish climbing the stairs why do I need to try at all?” I asked, when no reply came, I sighed. “That is the test somehow isn’t it?” I asked, two nods came my way, I stood up and waved bye to my father, knowing that if this was some sort of test, he was right behind me to see how I would do even if I will not see him.
