The Wind Singer. William Nicholson

separate building set aside for Special Teaching was inside the old palace compound, on one side of a small deserted square. It was a solid stone structure, much like any other in this grandest of the city’s districts, with a high handsome door at the top of three steps. This door was opened from the inside, as the warden approached with Kestrel in his arms. It was closed after them, by a doorman dressed in grey.

      ‘Referred by the Chief Examiner,’ said the warden.

      The doorman nodded, and opened an inner door. Kestrel was pushed through into a long narrow room, and left there without a word. The door closed with a click behind her.

      She was alone.

      She realised for the first time that she was shaking violently, out of a combination of fear, rage and exhaustion. She took several deep breaths to steady herself, and looked round the room. It was empty and windowless.

      She turned her attention to the door, hoping to find a way of opening it. The door had no handle. She felt all over it, and round its edges, but it was close-fitting, and there seemed to be no way to open it from the inside. So she turned back to examining the room.

      All along one wall hung a plain grey floor-length curtain. She drew the curtain back, and found there was a window behind it, looking through to a much larger inner room. Cautiously, she drew the curtain all the way back, and stared at the strange scene beyond. It was a classroom. Sitting at the rows of desks, with their backs to her, were a large number of children, perhaps as many as a hundred. They were all bent studiously over their books, working away in silence; or so she supposed, for no sound of any kind came through the glass. There was a teacher’s desk at the far end, and a blackboard, but no teacher.

      The children at the back of the class were quite close to the window. Perhaps they would help her. She tapped on the glass softly, just in case a teacher was nearby. The children didn’t move. She tapped more loudly, and then as loudly as she could, but they seemed to hear nothing. It began to strike her that there was something strange about them. They kept their heads so low to their books that she couldn’t see their faces, but their hands were unusually wrinkly. And their hair was grey, or white, or – she saw it now – some of them were bald. Now that she looked properly, she asked herself why she had thought they were children at all. And yet, they were the size of children, and the shape of children. And surely –

      The door opened behind her. Kestrel turned round, her heart hammering. A scarlet-robed examiner entered, a middle-aged lady, and closed the door behind her. She held a file open in her hands, and she looked from the papers in it to Kestrel and back again. She had a friendly face.

      ‘Kestrel Hath?’ she said.

      ‘Yes,’ said Kestrel. ‘Ma’am.’

      She spoke quietly, clasping her hands before her and lowering her gaze to the floor. She had decided, on the spur of the moment, to be a good girl.

      The examiner looked at her in some perplexity.

      ‘What have you done, child?’

      ‘I was frightened,’ said Kestrel in a tiny voice. ‘I think I must have panicked.’

      ‘The Chief Examiner has referred you for Special Teaching.’ As she spoke, she glanced through the window at the silent class working in the room beyond, and shook her head. ‘It does seem a little extreme.’

      Kestrel said nothing, but tried very hard to look sad and good.

      ‘Special Teaching, you know,’ said the lady examiner, ‘is for the most disruptive children. The ones that are entirely out of control. And it is so very, well, permanent.’

      Kestrel went up to the lady examiner, and took her hand and held it trustingly, gazing up at her with big innocent eyes.

      ‘Do you have a little girl of your own, ma’am?’ she asked.

      ‘Yes, child. Yes, I do.’

      ‘Then I know you’ll do what’s best for me, ma’am. Just as you would for your own little girl.’

      The lady examiner looked down at Kestrel, and gave a little sigh, and patted her hand.

      ‘Well, well,’ she said. ‘I think we should go and see the Chief Examiner, don’t you? Maybe there’s been a mistake.’

      She turned to the handleless door and called,

      ‘Open, please!’

      The door was opened by a warden on the far side, and the lady examiner and Kestrel, hand in hand, went out into the square.

      Now that she wasn’t being carried, Kestrel could see that one side of the square was formed by the back wall of the Great Tower, which was the building at the centre of the Imperial Palace. This tower, the highest building in Aramanth, could be seen even from Orange District. This close, it seemed immensely tall, reaching up and up even higher than the city’s encircling walls.

      As they crossed the square, a small door at the foot of the tower opened, and two white-robed men came sweeping out. Seeing the lady examiner holding Kestrel’s hand, the older of the two frowned and called out to them.

      ‘What is a child from Orange District doing here?’

      The lady examiner explained. The man in white studied the file.

      ‘So the Chief Examiner ordered Special Teaching for the girl,’ he said sharply. ‘And you have taken it upon yourself to question his judgment.’

      ‘I think there may have been a mistake.’

      ‘Do you know anything about this case?’

      ‘Well, no,’ said the lady examiner, going rather pink. ‘It’s more a kind of feeling, really.’

      ‘A kind of feeling?’ The man’s voice was cutting with contempt. ‘You propose to make a decision that affects the rest of this child’s life on a kind of feeling?’

      The rest of this child’s life! A chill ran through Kestrel. She looked round for a way of escape. Behind her stood the Special Teaching building from which they had come. Ahead, the men in white.

      ‘I meant only to speak to the Chief Examiner, to make sure I understood his wishes.’

      ‘His wishes are written here. They are perfectly clear, are they not?’

      ‘Yes.’

      Kestrel saw that the door into the tower had not closed all the way.

      ‘Do you suggest that when he made this order, and signed it, he didn’t know what he was doing?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Then why do you not carry it out?’

      ‘Yes, of course. I’m sorry.’

      Kestrel knew then that she had lost her one source of protection. The lady examiner turned distressed eyes on her, and said once again, this time to Kestrel,

      ‘I’m sorry.’

      ‘That’s all right,’ said Kestrel, and gave the lady’s hand a little squeeze. ‘Thank you for trying.’

      Then she released the hand, and she ran.

      She was through the tower door and pushing it shut behind her before they realised what was happening. There was a bolt on the inside, which she drew shut. Only then, heart beating fast, did she look to see where she was.

      She was in a small lobby, with two doors, and a narrow curving flight of stairs. Both doors were locked. She heard voices shouting outside, and the outer door rattling as they tried to open it. Then she heard louder bangs, as they tried to break the bolt. Then she heard a voice call out,

      ‘You stay here. I’ll go round the other way.’

      She had no choice: so she set off up the stairs.

      Up and up she climbed, and the stairwell grew darker and darker. She thought she could hear doors opening and closing