The Dance in the Dark. Sophie Cleverly

back. I wanted to tell her that I was afraid something had happened to her again. The things I’d been seeing and hearing around school had only made it worse.

      “Leave it,” she warned, throwing herself on her bed.

      Suddenly, I noticed something strange. “You weren’t wearing your ballet outfit before!”

      Her face was in her pillow, but she tipped it towards me. “I said, it doesn’t matter. I just wanted to do some ballet, alone, all right?”

      “Fine,” I said. “Well, I’m going to tell Ariadne that you’re not sick, and then I’m going to have a bath and brush my teeth, alone.”

      “I don’t need to know every detail of your life,” she grumbled.

      Hmmph. I got up, picked up my things and headed towards Ariadne’s new dorm. It was some way down the corridor, in the section with the larger dorms for first years.

      Unfortunately, I forgot that visiting Ariadne also meant going past Penny’s door.

      I shut my eyes and held my breath as I walked, as if this would somehow protect me. But as soon as I approached, Penny’s door was yanked open. “So is your sister terribly ill, or do I need to tell everyone that she’s just pretending? I don’t know which I’d prefer.”

      “Shut up, Penny,” I said, and kept on walking.

      “So she’s fine?” Penny put on a mock expression of horror. “And she lied to a teacher?” She pulled out her prefect book and waved it at me. “I’ll be writing that one down.”

      I dug my shoes into the threadbare hall carpet. “Mr Bartholomew’s gone. You’re not his stupid prefect any more.”

      “I’m still a prefect, Grey,” she snapped back. “Which means I can do no wrong.” She smiled sweetly, the sweetness of eating too many chocolates that leads to you being sick. “See you soon.” She slammed the door.

      I gritted my teeth. Ignore her, I told myself as I walked on. Count to ten.

      Thankfully, once I got to my tenth step, Ariadne came out of her dorm, carrying her Rookwood regulation towel, toothbrush and soap. Relieved, I hurried over.

      “Ariadne!” I called out. “Scarlet’s fine. She’s in a complete huff, but otherwise unharmed.”

      “Oh, phew,” my friend said, tucking a lock of mousy hair behind her ear. “Where did she go?”

      “No idea,” I said. “Something to do with ballet. She won’t say.”

      Ariadne shrugged, nearly dropping her towel in the process. “Are you coming to the bathrooms too?”

      I nodded. “Let’s go together. I don’t want to run into … anyone. Else.”

      Ariadne looked at me strangely, but she didn’t say anything.

      I stepped out of the chilly little room with the bath in it, shivering in my nightgown. Ariadne came out of the one next door, but she somehow looked a lot better than I did.

      “Aren’t you cold?” I asked. “Those lukewarm baths are awful.”

      “Oh, Daddy used to make me take cold baths for my ‘health’,” she said disdainfully. “I find these much more pleasant.”

      I laughed, and she grinned.

      We headed back to room thirteen. I knocked politely on the door, just in case Scarlet was changing. “Go away,” came the muffled voice from within.

      Hmmph. Well, if we weren’t being polite, so be it. I pushed open the door and went in, Ariadne trailing behind me.

      Scarlet was writing something in her new notebook. As soon as she saw us, she shoved it under her sheets.

      “Oh, come on,” I said. “I’m fed up with all the secrecy.” Hypocrite, my mind said. Yes, well, I told myself. You can’t tell her about Penny, for her own good. “What’s going on? Why are you so cross all of a sudden?”

      Ariadne peered around me. “What’s up, Scarlet?” she asked a bit more diplomatically. “Are you still ill? In your ballet clothes?”

      Scarlet finally seemed to give in. “All right,” she snapped. “But promise you won’t tell anyone? I don’t want Penny the Slug hearing about this.”

      “Promise,” said Ariadne eagerly.

      “Miss Finch was supposed to give me extra ballet lessons, okay?” She looked really embarrassed.

      “Why?” I asked. Scarlet had always been so wonderful at ballet, I didn’t think she needed extra help.

      “Because I didn’t think I was good enough,” she mumbled at the carpet.

      I frowned and sat on my bed. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

      “I didn’t want anyone knowing,” she snapped. “But that’s not the problem.”

      “Then what is?” Ariadne asked, plaiting her damp hair with fumbling fingers. It always made her nervous when Scarlet was angry.

      “After I pretended to be sick – sorry – I went down to the ballet studio. All that effort and Miss Finch wasn’t even there!” She punched her mattress. “I can’t believe she’s let me down. I waited and waited. She obviously doesn’t care.”

      “I’m sure she didn’t mean to let you down,” said Ariadne, trying to be cheerful.

      I agreed. “Something important probably came up. Perhaps she had a meeting or a doctor’s appointment.”

      “Hmmph,” said Scarlet. “She should’ve told me.”

      “It wasn’t a proper lesson, though,” Ariadne pointed out. “And if she came to tell you, wouldn’t that mean everyone would know she was tutoring you?” Ariadne was always the wise one.

      “I suppose,” said Scarlet.

      “Let’s just forget about it and … and … read a nice book or something,” my friend said with a smile. “I’m sure she’ll explain what happened the next time you see her.”

      But something about this wasn’t sitting right with me. I didn’t know if it was the mysterious things I’d been noticing, or the dark dreams, but I had this gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach. “There wasn’t anything … unusual, was there? In the studio, I mean?”

      Scarlet sighed, picking at her bedsheets. “Well, her stool was knocked over. And her stick was on the floor. I thought perhaps she’d hurt herself and gone into the office to sit down, but I knocked and there was no one there.”

      I wrinkled my nose. “Scarlet, she can’t … she can’t get up the stairs without her stick, can she? And if she wasn’t down there …”

      Ariadne’s face paled. “Do you think something’s happened to her?”

      I didn’t want to say what was on my mind. “We need to tell someone, just in case. This doesn’t feel right.”

      “No, said Scarlet. “We can’t, we …”

      “We have to,” said Ariadne, suddenly taking charge. She puffed out her chest. “Let’s find Mrs Knight.”

      Scarlet looked distraught. “I can’t say why I was meeting her! Nobody can know about it!”

      “Scarlet, this isn’t the time to worry about saving your own skin,” I said angrily.

      “Ssh!” said Ariadne, waving a finger at me. “Ssh ssh ssh! No more arguing. If we can’t tell Mrs Knight about Scarlet’s extra lessons, we’ll have to tell her something else. Why don’t we tell her we were all supposed to be meeting Miss Finch, to, um … talk about the ballet? We’ll say we were going to paint the scenery or something.”