Born at midnight
Chapter 1. The Last Escape
It felt like late evening had enveloped everything around me like a thick cocoon on the other side of the window. And a park alley starting from the large metal gates and going all the way to the porch of this creepy castle with peaked towers; and a fountain with a stone gargoyle, which seemed to mock me, moving subtly as soon as I started to turn away from the window; and rare benches, unoccupied by anyone at this either late or early hour.
But all this simply could not happen!
Exactly twenty minutes ago, in the light of day, my mother and I entered the Ashwool city library, but it was as if we left it in the dead of night. The irritating light of the tall wrought-iron lamps made it possible to see a completely different long street with ancient Victorian houses instead of modern, barely rebuilt townhouses.
These buildings seem to have ended up here by accident. They seemed to come from another era. However, after just a few minutes of walking to the gates of the Midnight Academy, I realized that it was my mother and I who came from another era. Even, probably, from another world. Because in our world, carriages trimmed with carved wood have not been used for their intended purpose for a long time. Yes, I only saw these in photos on the Internet when I was writing another boring history report at school.
The clothes of the passers-by we met were also notable. A kind of nuclear mixture between modernity and the Middle Ages. I, in my denim overalls and white sneakers that matched the color of my T-shirt, looked at least strange against the background of women in baggy floor-length dresses or ladies who chose tight leather pants, high boots, a black corset and a simple raincoat with a deep hood for a late walk.
It seemed to me that I was simply dreaming! But I definitely didn't sleep. She stood in the gloomy darkened corridor of the academy on the second floor. Opposite me was a window, and to the left was one of the massive doors. Behind it was the office of the head of this educational institution.
Trying to isolate something important, she brazenly eavesdropped on her conversation with her mother. I honestly tried to get information in another way, but my mother always avoided uncomfortable questions, and more often she simply remained silent or angry, instantly turning the topic to something pressing: the mess in my room, bad grades at school, or my crappy diet.
Actually, school ended last year. I learned to clean the rooms I lived in myself. And I switched to proper nutrition, with an abundance of vegetables, berries, herbs and fruits. But she still didn’t answer my questions.
More precisely, to the same question.
– Madame Pelisey, I ask you. “Be lenient,” said my mother. It was the first time I heard such a soft tone from her. “I ask you to enroll Sally in the Midnighter Academy.”
“Aletra, are you completely crazy?” It's the middle of the year, where will I enroll her?!
The second voice seemed heavy, strong, stern to me. I had not yet seen what the director of this educational institution looked like, but I already imagined a kind of iron lady with a constant hint of a slap in the head in her gaze. Such people could equally manage either some large university or an entire army corps.
“Madame Pelisey, but you know everything,” stubbornness was now clearly evident in the mother’s voice.
By the way, I inherited it from her, although she most often denied this fact.
Silence reigned in the office. For a moment I even thought that it was my hearing problems that had begun, but in addition to the office of the head of the educational institution, there was also a small secretarial room behind the door. I heard the secretary frantically hammering on the keys, as if she were typing right under my ear.
There was a heavy sigh. It clearly didn't belong to my mother.
“I warned you, Aletra.” I tried to dissuade you in this very office, but you didn’t want to hear me.
– I remember.
Mom’s voice was now barely audible, and I just wanted to rush into them and shout: “What did they warn about? What were you dissuaded from? – but I continued to stand in the same place, practically sticking my back to the wall.
The gaze kept returning to the window. It was semicircular, slightly elongated, with a frame made of ebony. At the very top there was a gloomy stained glass window: the full-sided moon cast an ominous shadow, and in the foreground, with inky wings outstretched, a bat seemed to be hovering in flight.
I caught my reflection in the glass. Dark brown hair, partially pinned at the back of her head, flowed down her shoulders to her chest. The blue eyes seemed unusually frightened, open so wide that the expressive lines of thick eyelashes were visible in the shadows.
She bit her lips nervously, hiding her hands behind her back. Having joined her fingers in a lock, she slightly pushed this structure away from the wall and again joined it, trying to hear something else.
And the conversation in the office continued. My heart sank as soon as my mother’s confession sounded:
– Eighteen years ago it seemed to me that I could cope with anything, with any adversity. But now, having matured, I understand how naive I was then. The older Sally got, the more persistently we were pursued. He…
The heart was beating fast and fast. The pulse was like a drumbeat in my ears. I wanted mom to continue. Finally, I dropped at least a few words about who exactly had been pursuing her all my life; because of whom we had to move twice a year, or even more often, leaving behind almost everything that we were just starting to have.
Your lips are dry, your fingers are clenched into fists…
“I just can’t do it anymore, Madame Pelisay.” “I’m very tired,” my mother complained, and I exhaled in disappointment.
But the next second she pulled herself up again with her whole body.
– Can we speak frankly? – the director of the academy suddenly asked.
I was on the verge of ungracefully placing my ear directly against the massive, heavy door of blackened wood. Still, no one appeared in the corridor – it was empty and quiet, like in a morgue, but I was afraid that the secretary would decide to go out into the corridor on some very important matter, and here I stood, my ears open.
“We can,” the parent answered confidently and suddenly added: “Sally has no abilities.”
– How can he not? Nothing at all? – Madame Pelisey said dumbfounded, as if this fact surprised her much more than our appearance on the threshold of her academy.
“No,” my mother answered clearly.
But Madame didn’t seem to believe her. And that's right actually.
– No sensitive hearing? No sharp vision? No speed? Dexterity? Strength? – she listed, pronouncing each next word louder. – Nothing at all?
– At all.
The director of the Midnighter Academy, judging by her tone, was taken aback:
“Then how do you want your daughter to study here?” What will she learn if she has no even a hint of ability?
There's nothing worse than waiting. During the expressive pause, my heart managed to beat against my chest three times.
“Madame Pelisay, I am not
