Fowler had almost become an expert at sneaking out of his dorm. A note had been left on his study desk while he was in class, and while at first he'd ignored it, the mysterious lack of information had intrigued him until he had all but packed a bag for travel. He waited until two hours before curfew to head off for the library; seeing the small boy there at late hours was a common occurance, so no questions were asked. Fowler found a dark corner where he wouldn't be noticed and waited until fifteen minutes before midnight to leave.

---------------

"Psst! Fowler!"

Fowler's head jerked to the side. Out of the shadows of a nearby building, another smallish form had materialized.

"C-c-cecil! Is th-that y-y-you?"

"Yeah, it's me. What are you doing out here?" The other first year asked as he approached. "Did you get a note too?"

"Y-yes. It w-w-was on my d-d-desk." Fowler pulled the slightly crumpled piece of paper out of his pocket for the other boy to see.

"Mine was under my pillow. What are we doing here?"

Fowler shook his head. "I d-d-don't kn-know. Th-there's n-n-nothing else in th-the m-m-message."

The two boys stood there quietly in the dark, looking around for anyone else who might also be joining them.

Ruhi Ha was not the type of girl to put overmuch stock in rules. So when she'd found the note pinned to her pillow, there was absolutely no hesitation in her decision: she would be there.

She'd brought nothing with her, as she had no way of forming any expectations for what was going to happen. Of course, she had thought to do away with her uniform-- heavy, dark-colored trousers tucked into sturdy boots and a high-collared coat to keep out the chill of the Loshis rain were much more practical. No reason to assume something require running or jumping or climbing wasn't going to happen. She wanted to be prepared, just in case.

It was in fact a few minutes after midnight when she arrived behind the shed, so she wasn't entirely surprised not to be the first one there. She was surprised that the ones to come before her were two small boys, certainly no older than second or third years at best.

"Do either of you have any ideas as to just what is going on?" she asked, her voice quiet as she came up behind the two boys.

The tall, lean silhouette of Horace Aquila stalked across the grounds of the science sector, a place he was unfamiliar with. The astronomy tower towered over the boy, like he towered over his fellow students. It was uncommon to see Horace out on the grounds later than twenty eight o'clock. He had usually retreated to his dorm before that, he liked to get a good nights rest during the week, the nines and tens were completely different.

Horace was puzzled by the note he found on his desk. He didn't want to come alone, he was going to stop by Laur's dorm and ask her to come with him. Then he thought about it, What if Laur was the person who sent the note? He wasn't one to anger her, he liked her too much.

Walking towards the shed, he kept ducking his head. He kept thinking he saw a professor trailing him, but he decided it was just his imagination, his odd imagination. Approaching the shed, he heard voices. They sounded younger, like first forms. He popped his head around the corner, his suspicions were right. They all looked young, It obviously wasn't orchestrated by Laur.

He stalked up to the younger kids, keeping his footprints quiet. "You know, first forms aren't allowed out this late." A small smirk formed on his face. He liked the perks of being a sixth form, no curfew.

It had been such a funny morning. Eden had found a most curious letter in his trunk, neatly pinned to one in the profusion of underpants his mother insisted on packing him every semester. While someone more sensible might have been wondering why a mysterious stranger was leaving him notes strewn amongst his underthings, Eden thought the whole business reeked of adventure.

30 o’clock, though! Bell and chimes! Never in all his little days did he ever think he’d be going out this late.

But it would surely be fun, all this shadowy sneaking about! It was all he could do not to squeak with delight every time it crossed his mind through out the day. He wasn’t much of a master planner, not at all. So he had simply lingered in the West Garden as he often did on damp Loshis nights, hiding away in the boughs of a tree once the great clock struck curfew. He fell asleep there, to be honest, and would have slept through the whole exciting clandestine business had his father’s pocket watch not started whirring and chirping to mark the stroke of midnight.

So he’d tumbled out of the tree and into mud puddles innumerable. He loped off through the rain, honeyed curls covered by a stone grey riding cloak. When he sloshed his way across the grounds and came upon the others gathered in the eaves of the shed, he spoke the words that were surely on everybody else’s mind.

“Bells and chimes! What is going o—I mean...” he lowered his voice quite dramatically, affecting a still rather loud stage whisper. “What is going on?”

The two boys jumped as Ruhi spoke behind them, and watched as other students appeared out of the darkness.

Fowler shook his head. "W-w-we d-don't kn-kn-know," he whispered. "D-d-did you all g-get n-n-notes t-too?"

Cecil narrowed his eyes in the direction from which Horace's voice came. "Yeah? Well, we may be firstyears, but we've been here long enough to know that when you get a secret note telling you to go somewhere, you clocking well better be there when it tells you." He looked at Fowler, who shook his head in agreement.

"I sh-sh-sure w-would l-l-like to kn-kn-know wh-what w-we're s-s-supp-p-posed to b-be d-doing out here, th-though."

--------

Lawrence Phabian stood in the shaddows of the trees surrounding the storage shed, watching the small group of students slowly congregating in the yard. The tenth year student smiled grimly at the unsuspecting group, thinking of what lay in store for them. The others would be arriving any moment, and then the real fun could begin.

Ruhi snorted when she heard the boy's admonishment. Did he think they were stupid? Or that she was a first form? Surely at standing just over five and a half feet tall she didn't look like a first form student. Then again... Ruhi looked him up and down. He was some sort of awkward-looking giant himself. It was not an endearing quality.

The Hessean, she completely ignored. She hadn't forgotten him at the library. She was not a forgiving girl.

"I am not entirely certain what we're doing here either," she said, her voice low though not as obnoxiously quiet-but-not as Eden's.

Horace shot Cecil a look. A look that told Cecil not to talk to him like that. Horace believed he deserved respect from anyone younger than him and it in turn, he would respect almost anybody older than him.

"Yes, I received a note. I thought one of my friends sent it to me, now I see I was wrong." Horace was quite confused. Why was he sent to meet with a bunch of underclassmen? He was a sixth form, he finally had no curfew. There were only a few underclassmen he like to be around, the ones with potential. "I am guessing none of you sent the notes than." He said, in regards to Fowler's comment. Who he thought looked a bit like a smaller, younger version of himself, with glasses.

To a late night passer-by, this group could have looked like a motley crew. There was a lanky redhead, A mug girl, two first forms, and an odd speaking Hessean. Quite a motley crew.

"This is a bit odd. I wonder why someone would want us all to meet?"

“Nobody knows?”

A little squeak, cracked in two on adolescent vocal cords. Running around clandestine in the rain under a shroud of darkness! Oh, Eden was so excited! He rocked back on his heels and clapped his in delight. Mother wouldn’t be happy he’d gotten mud all over his spats – they were new and white and Mother was so wrapped up in keeping things nice and pale. Something about symbols of purity. Whatever.

The fact he’d been sleeping only minutes before was obvious. His uniform jacket was all unbottoned, his shirt tail peeped out of the back of his pants, and when he shook back his hood, his wooly nimbus of hair was frizzed out to proportions most epic. There was good reason Hesse was dry grassland, if this is what humidity did.

“This is so exciting!” he chirruped, arms fluttering out to his sides to spin little minuets in the rain. Everybody was looking so tense. He couldn’t contain himself – didn’t anybody else like adventure?

Chimes, but it was dark. Laur was unaccustomed to being out so late at night, even as a final-former. She'd received a strange invitation that had turned out to be telling her to come out and mess with the younger kids. For some reason, it required a cloak. Her hair wouldn't go up after she'd taken it out for the night, and she'd left it that way, blackness falling into her eyes and catching the light of the few lanterns left lit on the more main paths.
She went around to the trees where the only person her age was standing, shaded in her dark, enveloping cloak.
"Are we still waiting?" Her voice was a low whisper, barely audible. This was quite the mission, she supposed. Secretive as clock according to the invitation.

Lawrence didn't turn to greet the newcomer; he'd felt her field approaching from behind. "We are," he whispered in return. "There are a few others join us this evening. Once they do, it'll be time to teach these children what being a student at Brunnhold is really about." He barely moved his head, just enough to look in her direction. "Good, you brought your cloak. The hair is a nice touch. Makes you look far more frightening, I think. This should be an entertaining venture."

--------

Cecil eyed Eden strangely. "Downright frightening is more like it," he harrumphed, crossing his arms. "Out here in the dead of night, standing around in the rain and trees? Who knows what's out there, waiting for us to stop paying attention so it can jump in for a snack!" The boy shivered and inched closer to the other students. "I do hope whoever told us to come out here has a good reason."

"And I h-h-hope th-they g-g-get h-here s-soon!" Fowler added, his voice barely rising above a whisper. Images of giant animals hiding behind the bushes and crawling through the trees loomed in his imagination, only serving to make the situation far more tense than it was.

The younger boys were anxious, and though Ruhi would never admit it, their tenseness was catching. She felt jittery and too aware. Even a girl like Ruhi didn't feel entirely at ease standing around behind a rarely-used shed in the middle of the night. She did her best not to let any of this show on her face, though her too-stiff posture might have given her away to the keenly observant.

"Stop spinning about like that!" Ruhi hissed at Eden. It was quite possible the boy had some sort of mental affliction that prevented him from shutting up and standing still like a normal person. The giant ginger boy was right-- this was very odd. Ruhi didn't like odd.

Horace leaned on the sheds wall and folded his arms, he looked like he was spewing composure out his ears. Being outside on the grounds was nothing new to him. He was a bit worried though, he didn't know anyone that would leave him a note, let alone meet him at midnight. The midnight rain patted his head with ease. His rose coat did a good enough job of protecting Horace's body from the rain, but his head was cold.

He heard something in the bushes, it was very quiet. He thought it was just a frog hopping around or a turtle stepping on a branch. Sadly, he didn't want to start looking through the bushes to see if it actually was a some person, he was too scared.

The younger students had started bickering, the mug was telling the Hessean to close his head and Cecil had started to get on Horace's nerves, if he didn't want to be out at midnight, he shouldn't have come. The worst of all, though, was the stuttering, the constant stuttering. Horace stuttered when he was nerves or afraid, but not constantly. He was heading towards the breaking point, why in the clocking hell did he come anyway?

"BEGADS, will you all close your clocking poxy heads! Gods, you underclassmen are so annoying! Someone wanted us all here, now let's just sit here and wait! None of you make a sound!" He shot all of them a dirty look and than looked back at the bushes.

What the hell is going on?

"Sooooo, what's this clocking about anyway?" Came a sardonic, quiet purr from behind Laureline, "I'm not used to everyone else not giving a tock about class tomorrow besides myself."

To say that Nauleth had been invited would have been a slight overstatement of the truth. He'd actually overheard, found the idea entertaining, and decided that if he couldn't spend the evening with his fiancé, he might as well do something interesting. Then again, by the cling of smoke and must on his cloak and the color across his pale, aquiline features, the dark-eyed boy now grinning with lopsided, wolfish sarcasm at the other two older students wasn't quite sober, either.

While he wasn't guttered, he certainly was toasty, slightly disheveled out of uniform, and amused. Sliding his hands into his pockets with a smirk from under his hood, Naul added, "You know, professors get paid to teach that kind of rot. What kind of bill are we footing?"

"Oh, yes, I just couldn't put it up for some reason tonight. It's--" Her whisper cut off at the sound of that very familiar voice.

"Siordanti." Two narrowed yellow eyes were turned in his direction for a moment, then returned to their post of looking at nothing. "You'd think this would only be the first years. Is this the first time you've decided to have a bit of fun with the underclassmen?"

((whoop, sfsr))

"A bit of fun for the underclassmen, my lovely Laureline." Angus admonished, appearing from out of nowhere (a bush) wearing an old black cloak and holding up a long length of chain.

The chemical shed would never miss it.

"Hello Nauleth." Angus said, his voice slightly frostier than it usually was.

He was still feeling altogether wounded by Naul's lack of regard for his welfare. Nauleth was probably aware that Angus could keep his pique up all night and probably would.

"Should be good, I always liked getting scared a bit as a kid." Angus pulled a caramel from his pocket and began to chew on it. He felt like the sugar would help his motivation.

Lawrence sniffed in Nauleth's general direction. "Ah. Been at the bottle already tonight. Well. That should make for a far more interesting time than I had originally planned. Especially considering how you weren't exactly on the guest list, Siordanti. Still, I suppose you'll add to the fun."

"Well said, Worthing, well said. And excellent work bringing that bit of chain along."

Lawrence surveyed the group of younger students standing before the storage shed, and nodded. "Now that we're all here, we can get started. Pull your cloak hoods up, keep your faces hidden. It's time these children proved their worth!"

--------

"Yes, by all means, none of you make a sound," Lawrence purred as he slinked out of the darkness of the trees. "It will only make you all that much easier to find, and the last thing you want is to be found by the creature living in these woods." He spread his arms, waving for the older students to begin forming a circle around the younger ones.

"You have all been summoned here in order to prove your worth as true Students of Brunnhold. Tonight will determine if you are as strong as you hope..." the older boy lowered his head towards the group. "...or as weak as you seem."

Eden had stumbled to a stop much faster than he should have, and teetered to and fro like a spinny top. A warm flush rose in his cheeks. Some people at Brunnhold just hated having fun or anything that didn’t involve yelling at him. No matter. If there was one thing Eden had, it was endless enthusiasm.

“Isn’t this delightful fun, though? It’s like in a storybook I –“

An interruption, by way of the woods. He whipped around to the strange voice, a soft murmur of surprise bubbling up.

“Oh dear, oh my!”

Ominous voices from the trees, cloaked societies? He smiled, a big and lopsided grin, but tried to hide it behind his hands. Smiling would ruin the feel of it. Eden guessed they must be at the bad part of the story. But he also knew, as these stories often go, that the sweet little hero would escape from the bad fellows without a scratch. He wasn’t afraid, because that’s just how things worked, wasn’t it? Yes, he insisted, even though his hands were trembling just a bit.

Wasn’t it?

Ruhi's stance had just shifted into something distinctly menacing-- she didn't take kindly to such words from anybody, let alone this great gangly thing who saw fit to lord over them just because he was a little bit older. He was obviously young enough to be included in this particular event so where did he--

Then she heard the voice from the trees and quite suddenly, they were surrounded.

The dark girl bristled at the suggestion of weakness. Older students or not, she didn't take that well. Her posture remained threatening, though she was now more focused on the ring of students surrounding them. "Prove their worth"? She didn't need to prove her worth to anybody, let alone this group of cloaked and hooded figures.

"And who might you be to determine this of us?"

Horace saw that coming. Who else would leave him a note, of course it would be hooded figures? He knew there were stories of hazing, a tradition among the legacies of Brunnhold. The students in the later forms would find young students they thought either had potential or would cry and pee their trousers.

Horace sighed, he didn't know if he was a student with potential or one they wanted to pee his pants. Either way, he wasn't going to fight it, well not until he felt like his life was in danger.

"Alright," he said, looking around at the hooded figures. "Let's just get this over with." He was taller than all of them, but they were probably stronger. If they felt threatened they could always use a Living spell on him, but using the mona for hazing practices was probably not a good idea, considering everything they were taught at the university.

Lawrence held up a hand to stop the girl from speaking further. "That is none of your conscern. Tonight, your conscern is that of your own safety, or the safety of those around you, and most certainly your future. Each of you has been chosen with good reason, and since tonight could very well be the last you'll ever spend alive, I suggest you stop asking questions and listen carefully."

Lawrence began to walk, slowly, in a circle around the group of students, and he ushered the other cloaked figures to do the same. It would seem to the younger galdori as if they were standing within a slowly spinning tunnel, or sinking into the ground. The older boy quietly began to tell a story.

"Many years ago, a 10th year student named Reginald Thews was preparing for his graduation from Brunnhold and had been accepted as an aprentice by one of the professors in the Experimental Magic department. Everything was going quite well for the young galdor, until an unfortunate accident occured in one of the labs. Reginald was changed, not into anything normal but into a beast more fearsome, more loathsome, and far more deadly than even a hatcher. His thirst for blood forced the faculty of this school to hide what had happened to him, lest their reputation for fine education be ruined by the monster they had created." Lawrence continued walking, and waited for the next student to tell their part of the tale.

--------

Fowler huddled closer to Cecil, shivering slightly. The young galdor was usually long asleep by this time of night, and being outside in the cold and dark, surrounded by moving hooded figures had began to take its toll.

"C-c-cecil," he whispered. "I'm sc-sc-scared."
"Me too," the other boy whispered back.

Laur walked in the circle after Lawrence, her hair in her eyes, shadowing her face. She couldn't see any of the younger students in front of her, but this story would be rather chilling, especially to the little ones.
Recalling her memory of the story that had been sent to her, she spoke.

"A professor forged a letter to his parents, telling them he would be travelling overseas for quite some time and not to worry if they didn't hear from him for a while. Reginald was hidden away here..." Laur paused, for dramatic effect, "in the very same storage shed you see before you. The students were warned to keep away, that the structure was weak and could fall at any moment, but in reality it was the need to keep Reginald's imprisonment an utmost secret. He was fed on rodents and small wild animals, kept chained to the floors and walls, and never allowed outside. One night, during the monthly cleaning of the shed, he attacked his guards, violently ripping them apart--and escaped into the woods!"

Her turn was over, but who would speak now?

Angus didn't feel like speaking. He'd heard the story, all the older students had but he knew that if he had to say any of it in a serious, spooky voice he would start laughing. Loudly and exuberantly and not at all appropriately.

So he rattled his chain, slowly, loudly and chuckled ominously, as though an escaped madman was his kind of schadenfreude.

Nauleth, unfortunately slightly out of the loop, felt compelled to add something worthwhile to whatever was going on. His voice was less quiet as much as it was hoarse, warm in a way that wasn't soothing at all given the alcohol in his system and the perceived, disappointing distance between himself and Angus, "The real problem with the wrongfully dead is just how much trouble they have making it to the Antelife. Confusion sometimes has been known to lead to misdirection upon death, leaving the spirits of the dead unable to find their places in the Phasmonia. That's when you get clocking hungry, angry ghosts, starving for living flesh to inhabit while wandering in search of a way to move on."

Indeed.

There was a hint of something distant in his tone, if only because describing the unliving brought back memories of his own rather up-close and personal encounter with one only a handful of months ago.

"So, you know, as if raving monsters weren't enough on this campus, there's always the undead who're just as eager for the living." The sharp-featured, dark-eyed boy grinned lopsidedly, though it was hardly an expression full of humor. It was wolfish, ruddied by drunkenness but threatening none-the-less.

He still enjoyed scaring the young, though he certainly had been out of the habit for quite some time.

Ruhi snorted her disbelief. It was a wild story, too wild to possibly be true. And yet... The girl shivered, just a little bit, trying to pass it off as a result of the all-pervasive Loshis chill. Her posture took on a fearful edge, her face a bit too stiff and fearless for believability.

More than the thought of possibly fictional madmen or the undead, however, Ruhi was admittedly a little scared of these upperclassmen. Coming out here with their hooded cloaks and their scary stories-- she had trouble believing they were here for anything harmless. Oh she would scrap with any of them, all of them, if it came down to it, but her heart still hammered in her chest.

"Hush now," she hissed to Cecil and Fowler. "Be brave!" It was as much directed at herself as the boys.

Whether the older students could see his face or not, Lawrence didn't know, but his own wolfish grin could be felt splayed across his features. This was turning out far better than he had thought it would. The two smaller students already looked scared out of their wits, which was exactly what Lawrence had hoped. They deserve a good fright every now and again. Angus' menacing laugh and chain only helped add to the experience.

Lawrence raised an eyebrow to Nauleth's addition. He'd heard rumors of something involving the boy and a few others, but they were only rumors, and had been exaggerated to the point where the story just seemed absurd. Still, it was as frightening as anything else he could have told, which only added to the terror slowly filling the air.

"Yes, indeed. The number of things eager to consume the young and naive on this campus grow steadily with each passing moment. And the school tries ever so hard to keep it all hidden and quiet so that no one will know, just as they did with Reginald."

Lawrence continued walking the circle as he finished the tale.

"Despite any and all best efforts, the teachers couldn't find the boy-turned-beast, and decided he had left the school and the city. Reginald Thews, and the horrid creature he had become, were never seen or heard of again." Lawrence paused, allowing the clink of the chains and the deep silence of the night to steep the story. "They say a beast still haunts these woods, and in the deepest, darkest of nights, his cries for blood can still be heard. Some think he's merely celebrating his freedom, but in reality he is waiting. Waiting for his captors to return to the place they held him prisoner--waiting for revenge!"

Lawrence stopped his walking, motioning for the other students to do the same.

"Your task tonight is simple." He motioned to Laureline to open the door to the shed. "To prove you are the galdori you claim to be, you must stay overnight in the very shed where Reginald Thews was held captive those many years ago. The door will be barred behind you until morning, to prevent anyone getting out--or in."

Lawrence produced a single candle from beneath his cloak and whispered the spell for Ignite, lighting the flame and handing it to the student closest to him, who just happened to be Eden.

"You will have this candle to light your surroundings, but be warned--you are not to use magic tonight, no matter what may happen. This will be a test of wills and a sign of strength. When it is all over, we shall know those who are the true galdori among us."

The older student raised his arm and pointed toward the open door. "It is time for you to meet your fates."