The bell rang to signal the end of second period, and the girls of the Upper Fifth were streaming out of the classroom, impatient to enjoy the fifteen-minutes intermission outside in the park or at the school cafeteria.

I was heading for the latter place at a brisk pace when Mallory fell in beside me.

"So, as a bonus, I managed to obtain some additional information about you, Hart. Which gets me ever closer to uncovering all your secrets," she told me.

I stopped in my tracks.

"Ah, and what would that additional information be, Carmichael?" I inquired, though judging from her tone of voice I figured she might merely be teasing me.

"Well, let's recall all the things I have learned about you already, Hart." She started to count them off on her fingers. "You're reliable but not always altogether truthful. You can be very funny when you want to be.  You are kissable, very much so. You are excitable too, also very much so." She grinned. "Now it turns out that you are also extremely spankable."

"Hush, Carmichael." I glanced around to make sure nobody had been listening in on our conversation. "Anyway, in order to figure that out it would have been sufficient to ask my tutor, Alison Thomas."

"Yes, but where would have been the fun in that, Hart?"

I made as if to kick her. Mallory jumped aside, laughing.

"Well, at least those two seem to be in a great mood," Natty remarked as she and Nancy and Erin Morgan approached us.

"Meaning that the three of you are not?"

"I am fine, myself. Which, sadly,  is more than can be said about Nancy and Erin here," Natty retorted.

"Why? What's wrong?" I asked them, more than a bit concerned.

"Nancy's got an appointment with Marcia Evans, during lunch break," my roommate explained.

I groaned. "With the prefect? What is it, this time?"

Nancy made a face. "Running in the hall."

"Running in the hall?" Erin Morgan asked, incredulously.

"But that's not even a proper transgression. Nobody ever walks in the hall," Mallory Carmichael objected.

"It is, if you go by the rules," Nancy told her. "In any case, Ms Hammond reported me to the prefect on duty. Who happens to be Marcia Evans."

"Of course. Hammond again, who else?" I commented

Mallory raised an eyebrow at that. "So Hammond's got it in for you, Kerrington? Is that the way it is?"

"That's one way to put it," Nancy replied. "But yes, that sounds about right."

"Granted, that woman's a bitch," Mallory agreed. "But what's she got against you specifically, Kerrington?"

"There's bad blood between her family and mine, about something that happened ages ago," Nancy explained.

With Natty's and my assistance, Nancy told Mallory and Erin the story as Ms Hammond had related it to us: how her great-grandmother, Rosalind McKearney had served as a personal maid for Nancy's great-great-grandmother, how she been falsely accused of stealing a necklace, how, after a flogging had been administered she had been sent away in disgrace, and how, even after it was discovered that Rose had been falsely accused, her name had never officially been cleared and no recompense had been made, ever.

"Well, that's pretty tragic and all, but none of this is your fault, Kerrington," Erin observed. "However justified her grievances may be, you can't let Ms Hammond take it out on you."

"I completely agree with Morgan here. You can't allow that woman to keep harassing you, Kerrington," Mallory declared. "You have to bring this up with your parents, as soon you get the chance."

"But I did talk to my parents already," Nancy replied. "Like you, my father thinks that that woman is harassing me. He says if that keeps up he will take me off this school. But I do not want to leave St. Albert's, so I have been very careful about telling my parents anything at all ever since he mentioned that possibility." She sighed. "Anyhow, what have you guys been up to?"

"As for me, I was on my way to the school cafeteria," I told her.

"Yeah, Morgan and I were planning to sit down there to have a coffee or something and discuss that odd letter she received from her grandma," Natty added. "We thought you might like to participate in that discussion, Cathy."

"Sure, I'd love to."  I glanced at Mallory and Nancy. "How about you guys?"

Both girls decided to join us, so we all walked over to the cafeteria, got ourselves some coffee and took our seats at a corner table near the window.

A few weeks ago, the five of us – Nancy, Erin, Mallory, Natty and I – together with Nancy's little sister Liz, had visited Erin's grandmother, Granny Morgan, in Wales over the weekend. Only to find that the old woman's cottage had been broken into and Granny Morgan herself had disappeared without a trace, but not without leaving behind a rather cryptic note addressed to her granddaughter, promising that she would attempt to contact Erin at some unspecified later time.

Though the police apparently had classified the case as a simple burglary, we had feared that something awful might have happened to Granny Morgan, especially as there had been hints of that sort in the note she had left for Erin.

Thus, at first Erin had felt relieved when she had received another letter mailed to her by her grandmother a few days ago, but upon reading the contents of that letter, she had started to strongly fear for the old lady's sanity, as she herself put it.

Erin took a sheet of paper out of her English Lit textbook.

"Here, let me read parts of it to you," she proposed. She raised her voice and proceeded to quote from that latter.

"Unexpectedly I managed to escape largely unharmed. I still believe that they will not connect you to our family, which means that you might be safe for the moment. Eventually, this is going to change, or so I fear."

"I blame myself for not having completed your training. One might say that actually I have not even properly started teaching you, to the extent where you will not even know what I am talking about when you read these words. My only excuse is that I thought there would be plenty of time for that in the future, and that I wanted to spare you from having to shoulder that burden, until you will come of age."

"However, things have turned out otherwise, and I, like so many of our kin, am on the run now. This means that you will be largely on your own when you have to do deal with what lies ahead."

"There are two things I ask you to do. Firstly, you must go to our old hidey-hole in the mountains and pick up an amulet that I have left for you there. There are only a few of those left, but it has been decided that you can use this one. It will help protect you, to a certain degree. I would have preferred to hand it over to you in person, but I cannot afford to risk being seen, and worse, to cause them to associate you with me. Secondly, I want you to stay with your friends, to stay alive and keep them alive, at any cost. I repeat, at any cost. I cannot emphasize strongly enough how important this is."

"The rest is kind of personal." Erin folded up the letter again. "But what do you make of it? I love Granny dearly, but this sounds like she has lost her marbles, doesn't it?"

"I believe the technically correct term would be paranoia," Mallory observed.

"Yes, that's what it sounds like, doesn't it?" Erin sighed. "So, what am I to do with this? I thought about handing over this letter to the authorities, and be done with it."

"The authorities?" Natty asked. "What do you mean? Which authorities?

"You know. Inform the police, and possibly Granny's doctor, if she has got one. Or medical services."

"I am not sure if that would be such a good idea," Nancy cautioned. "Your grandma seems to be okay if not completely happy. The authorities would probably lock her away in some mental institution, and I doubt if the old lady would be much happier there."

"Mind you, I am not sure at all that we are really dealing with a case of paranoia here," Mallory added. "Remember, people did actually break into your grandma's cottage, Morgan. Your grandma did not make up that part. Also, she seems to be talking not just about herself but about a group of people in that letter. A group of people who are on the run now, as she puts it. And she says that it was decided that you should have that amulet. The way I read it, several people were involved in that decision."

Erin frowned. "What exactly are you trying to say here, Carmichael?"

"Isn't it obvious, Morgan? I am talking about the witches, or a group of witches, who may be on the run now."

"But who would they be running from?"

Mallory shrugged. "We don't know. But as I said last time we talked about this: there could be self-styled witch hunters, people who not only believe that witches exist but who also consider it their duty to hunt those whom they regard as witches."

"Maybe so, Carmichael." I turned towards the Welsh girl. "But about that hidey-hole she mentioned in that letter, do you know what she is referring to, Erin?"

Erin smiled. "Of course I do. It is near the entrance of a cave, high up in the mountains. Granny and I used to take walks there when I was little."

"Sounds like yet another trip to Wales is called for," Nancy chimed in. "How about next Saturday? I can ask my parents if I can invite you guys to stay at our place over the weekend."

"Can I come along too?" Mallory Carmichael asked, with unwonted enthusiasm.

"Sure, you even have too," Nancy told her. The prospect of continuing with our investigation appeared to have cheered her up immensely. "You were with us last time, Carmichael, so you'll be eager to see how this brilliant adventure continues."

"You bet I am," Mallory said.

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A / N : As always, thank you reading this chapter. I love getting your feedback, so please consider adding your comments or voting.