A day in the school was nothing like I imagined it must have been before the first and second apocalypse. I had read many books and they always seemed to have lengthy classes on things that now remained a mystery. Algebra, Chemistry, English and other such subjects that I could only guess the purpose of in the context of old novels.

We, however, first practiced with scripture study after being divided into two groups, the younger ones who were fresh from the nursery up until twelve.

At twelve you're considered old enough to go over the more advanced part of the scripture including fighting of the angels against the devils and how both magi and vampires came to be.

The tome's of Pandora's box are pretty graphic and disturbing for younger children and even us older ones. Either way, though it was important to read the words of Angels so that we could grasp our situation and really understand how important our mission was on the planet.

Ignorance was bliss . I believed everything they had taught me back then and it always gave me a centered calm. The false calm , the eye of a storm to come.

There was of course only thirty girls at the school in total at that time so this made up for a group of about ten older girls including myself, Violet and the girls I had scolded at breakfast. Magi blood girls were rare , but I heard once that alot of us were born in other villiages to be brought up for the cause and escaped lives that might have been much more difficult.

Matron Mary was usually the one in charge of the older scripture studies but once a week one of the priests was the one in charge visiting from the temple and he would share his sage wisdom and blessings with us.

And if we behaved sometimes ...and only sometimes if it was Priest Jacob, we would get to watch him use magic.

Of course, he would wink and make us promise not to tell anyone which we would agree to wholeheartedly since the only people we would want to tell were each other. Who else was there but the younger ones?

There were days he would create rings of fire, or make a small storm in a tiny covered glass. These tricks were amazing and I always found myself wishing I had been born a boy later so I could study and perform magic like they did. On the other hand Violet with the capability to conjour fire? Let us not explore that possibility.

That day, of course, we were stuck with Matron Mary with her droning scornful voice...

"It was then that the angel converged with the mortal woman and she bore him a son, the first magi Xavier and he slew countless children of the devils who sought to rule the planet in chaos. "

She did get passionate at the part where the Magi priests killed vampires though so I had to give her credit there for never making those parts boring. If anything I think she might have added to the gore and violence of the scenes.

Afterward, we would study together in a large room that had once been three rooms for patients. The walls between them had been torn out as well as could be managed and it had an assortment of fraying carpets of different verities covering the meticulously swept linoleum tiles that had mostly peeled back and developed deep scratches on their surface.

The most ugly parts of the torn wall were decorated and covered in old hospital curtains , their white plastic long ago plastered with paint from the girls before us forming colorful drawn flowers and various colored images.

This was the study room where all the girls gathered sitting on pillows with makeshift crate boxes or actual desks that had been found and gathered with chairs.

I think at one time they planned on furnishing it more, but everyone enjoyed lounging on the carpet on pillows with the soft glow of daylight from the windows so instead the classroom looked less like a classroom at all and more like a lounge of some sort.

I sketched out the room one in my notepad I had made myself with recycled paper with thick cardboard covers I had found still in good condition. Down in the city scavangers often came back with the remains of books and magazines and mash them in water , making new paper by drying it out on screens. We even got to try doing it ourselves before when we were younger , the youngest always looked forward to it.

Every piece of paper recycled from the pulp of old documents and workbooks, was a soft and precious resource so I spent a long time on the picture even coloring it in with the watercolors the city craftsman made aswell from berrys and an assortmant of things I would never know.
It was a particularly peaceful painting full of the warm colors that I could make and the girls in their white dresses lounging around in a sleepy dreamy daze. I was far from a great painter so it looked more like squares and blobs of colors but I felt like I was able to get the feeling down at least. I think they called that abstract once.

Because we were thirty girls of different ages we were usually given different assignment books that would be handed down in as the years progressed.I, in particular, was very close in age to Violet so we actually got to study together one of the things that had made our bond so close from the beginning since it made going through our workbooks and assignments much faster.

The youngest girls usually played outside in the courtyard after scripture so they could run around and burn off excess energy before sitting down and studying which made mornings wonderfully quiet in comparison to the giggling and shuffling we would hear later.

In many of the books I had read ,particularly the romance novels, class and good grades were really important, but it wasn't like that at all anymore. So long as you were keeping your mind occupied and obedient to the rules, to the priests and matrons you were mostly just left alone.

We didn't have a college or career to study for, the only thing we mandatorily had to learn was sewing, proper cleaning and sanitation "purification" and how to cook properly which was what household economics was all about.

Childcare was part of being an older sister in the school, but sometimes the priests would bring a baby from the nursery and we would be taught how to handle and care for them.

Little Rose had once been one of these babies when I was barely out of the nursery myself and I remember not wanting to have anything to do with her while the older girls all fussed and cooed over her. Girls that were now wives with children of their own.

Motherhood is the most important job the settlement could have.

In reality, though, women with magic blood were just the most prized possession.

At twelve in the afternoon on that day, lounging on a long pillow and propping myself up with my elbows I was engrossed with the book I had been reading the door burst open.

A Priest I had not seen before entered. He had straight brown hair that hung to his shoulders combed back in a neat and orderly fashion and a rigid and tight walk that made him look uncomfortable. He wore a purple sash at his hips over nearly pressed black pants and a well fitted black tunic. He was of the magi ...he was ...

I closed my book and sat up wide-eyed and looked at Violet who looked at me without the excitement I had felt. She had on a stony face that I knew well masked an expression of fear.

But why?

I felt my own excitement die away replaced with tension and confusion.

Did Violet sense something I hadn't? Maybe this was an emergency of some sort.

Had the ghouls finally made it to this territory? Maybe a river basilisk?

"I would like to request a meeting of all Matrons in the temple immediately its a strange kind of day, I apologize for interrupting in your daily routine and hope this has not thrown your day in disarray." He held hands in the prayer triangle and bowed, taking the chance to look around at the room curiously. Since he didn't appear very much older then us I could imagine he had never seen the inside of the school and the crimson wave that came across his face when he glanced in my direction confirmed it.

I suddenly became very aware of my breasts and how thin the worn white cotton had become over the constant washing.

He quickly walked away rushing to the door he had entered and I let out a breath I wasn't aware I had been holding.

The Matron's lips pursed and her arms were folded in themselves as she took a breath in her eyes glazed over lost in thought before she looked back at her students who sat there watching back.

"I will be leading you to the quiet rooms where you will stay the remainder of the day."

I stood up and glanced quickly at violet who shrugged with a worried expression.

I couldn't fault her for that.

Didn't the priest tell her to meet with the others immediately? Why lead us to the crumbling part of the building first? Why not just leave us here? It wasn't like we had anywhere to go.

We usually slept six to a comfier large room. The quiet rooms were on the second wing and were as tiny as closets with no windows and locks on the outsides of the door. That particular hall was blocked off with the exception of the dark and creepy stairwell and the only time we ever went into the quiet rooms was when we were being punished or when we prayed for the week of fasting.

Still though if anyone knew anything at all Violet with her sharp ears would have heard about it, and she wouldn't have shrugged just now.

We exited to the dark hallway in single file the younger girls whispering to each other before the Matron hushed them into silence.

The stairway was even darker without the vast amount of windows the rest of the building had, smelling more of mildew and mold more than the other places that were constantly sanitized by us. No one ever volunteered to clean the stairwell because of its creepy aura, but now burying my face in my dress collar I wished we had.

"Its a strange kind of day." The phrase that the young magi had used was bothering me for some reason. Maybe because the way he put emphasis on it didn't seem to fit with the rest of what he was saying. A code maybe?

Were we being told to hide?

What if that was the real reason?

The quiet rooms were in a very strange and difficult to reach location in the chaos of the crumbling parts of the building. It would be an ideal way to keep us safe, wouldn't it?

Then I heard a shrill sound that I couldn't place in the distance followed by a large and thundering crack of sound.

Some of the girls jumped including me, but after the initial gasp and shock,we all became very quiet an very still.

I looked at the Matron in the dark narrow passage and somehow in the very small amount of sun breaking through, she looked more clear than in daylight. My vision was much sharper and I saw sweat on her brow and the thin line of her lips concealing where she bit her lips. The Magicians ring around her iris glowed in the darkness a bright ring of yellow around dark iris that were hazel and full of pain, experience, and fear.

"Quickly girls, you had your orders from the priest."

It was looking at her shaking hands grasping for the worn down guardrail that I realized that we might be in danger.

If only I had any idea how much.