David went in to see Ms. Scott right after Cary came out. While Cary was very hungry, starving almost, she was still too scared of the new school to go out there alone. Instead, she stayed in the headmaster's office, waiting for David to come out. Waiting for them both to head over together. As the evening lagged on, Cary started pacing. She was too anxious to just sit there, and far too scared to leave on her own.

Whenever she passed by the door to the main entry hall, her eyes would lock on the window in it. Every time, she expected to see someone out there. Someone waiting on her to leave the relative safety of that room. Waiting to pounce on her and eat her alive. It seemed like the kind of thing that witches would do, whether or not there really were witches at that school.

"Ready?" David asked, as he finally came out of the back hall. Cary jumped at his voice, her hand going to her heart to stay it. "Sorry," David said. But despite his apology, his smile spread wide.

"Can we go home now?" Cary asked.

"I don't think that's an option," David said. "Would you settle for getting some food? I think we're supposed to head to the mead hall." He looked down at the slip of paper in his hands, an echo of the one she had gotten.

"Right," Cary said, nodding. But she just stood there, waiting for David to lead the way.

It was darker outside than Cary had been expecting. Darker than it should have been at just after six in September. But there were more of those weird torches hanging all over the grounds, lighting the way between the buildings. Except that the torches were literally hanging there, floating in midair in most cases, covering the space of the campus and lighting it up as brightly as the building behind them had been. As brightly as the hallways of their old school had been by the fluorescent lights inside.

The two of them stood there for a moment, just taking in the campus, looking between each of the buildings as they started to get their bearings. The coach that had brought them there was long gone, having departed the moment that they stepped into the main building. It gave them a much wider view of the campus, the two dorms on their right and the three buildings on their left. From the map, it looked like those buildings were the two school buildings, with the mead hall between them.

Once they figured out where they were going, the two of them headed off towards that building. David took Cary's schedule, putting the two of them next to each other to compare. But Cary's eyes were constantly searching around her, looking for danger. Looking for the witches that she knew would come for her. For witches always went for the innocent.

"Well, we almost have all the same classes," David said. "But I have math when you have history, and vice versa. At least we're in the same dorm room."

Cary paused in her walk when he said that. For some reason, she thought that odd. That the two of them would be sharing a room in the dorm. She wasn't sure why it felt odd to her, or how she felt about it at all. But when she realized that, if she wasn't bunking with David, she probably would have ended up with a roommate that she didn't know, she figured it was the better option. If she had to be in a room with another boy, it might as well be David.

As they came up in front of the mead hall, Cary looked at the building, comparing it to the cafeteria at their school back home. While the cafeteria had been part of the main school building, she thought that the mead hall was about the same size. But as they approached the front door, the noise that was coming through it made her think that the place was packed to overflowing. There were more people talking inside than could ever fit in their cafeteria.

David pulled open the door to the mead hall, quickly slipping around it to lead the way inside. The doors opened right into the main room, which seemed to take up the entire building. And then some. The room spread out to either side, far wider than the building seemed to show from the outside. Cary just paused there for a moment, staring on in complete confusion.

"You need to start just going with this stuff," David said. He was standing just a few steps inside the building, looking back at Cary with a knowing smile. "It's magic. Whenever you see something that doesn't make sense, just tell yourself that. It'll make you feel more comfortable here."

"I somehow doubt that," Cary said. She shook her head, trying to dislodge the fear that gripped her at every new twist. But it refused to leave her. Refused to let her get past the unexpected. "Magic had never sat well with me."

"That's because you come at it from your book," David said. He pointed towards her backpack, still slung over her shoulder, and the bible that he knew was still in there. "I come from mine."

The one thing that David and Cary never agreed upon was reading material. While Cary stuck with the more traditional fiction, and more often non-fiction, like the bible, David always loved his fantasy. When Cary remembered that, she realized that he really was living his dream.

David came back those few steps, reaching out to take Cary's hand and lead her into the room. As she came inside, Cary looked around the place, searching for where they should sit. And more importantly, where they shouldn't sit. There were several rows of tables, all stretching into the distance. On her right, the first row of tables was elevated above the rest, on a balcony overlooking the rest of the room. This table was largely empty, but it was lit up by more of those strange torches. There was a banner hanging down over the railing in front of it, with a wizard's hat and wand on a blue background. Whatever that was meant to signify, Cary wanted nothing to do with it.

Next to that one, on the same level as all the other tables, was a line of tables marked with two crossed arms on a red background. The kids sitting at that table all looked like older kids, most of them with thick arms showing beneath their t-shirts. Most of them were focused on the food in front of them, but two groups were facing off against each other near the middle of the space, throwing balls of water at each other. When Cary noticed that the balls of water weren't coming from anything, that they were somehow conjuring them themselves, she shied away from that table. Only there were plenty of other students throughout the space showing off similar spells among their own groups. None seemed dangerous enough to draw the attention of the few adults that were in the room, most of whom were sitting at the tables on the balcony.

"I'm just disappointed that people aren't wearing robes," David said, as they looked around the room. "It's all the same clothes people wore back home."

"Not all the same," said one of the kids sitting at the next table over. This one was marked with an eye, on a white background. The kid that spoke was wearing a green tunic, which looked like nothing that Cary had ever seen before. His short cut hair did little to hide his pointed ears as he glared over at the two of them. "New kids are over there," he said, pointing towards their left. "Far table under the five."

Cary looked in the direction he was pointing. Sure enough, the last three tables on the left were marked with 5, 6, and 7. There were other characters with each of the numbers, but none of them looked familiar. Instead of an 8, though, the next one over showed a toad, on a green background. The last table, right in front of them, was marked with a mouth, with the tongue hanging out, on an orange background.

"Thanks," David said, waving his hand towards the boy, before heading in the direction that he pointed.

While most of the tables in the middle were full, the far table was half empty. As they approached it, Cary looked up and down the table, searching for where the food was. There were several spaces that were wide open, but Cary wasn't sure if that was because of how late it was getting, or if there really were that few fifth graders there. Given that Cary and David were coming in weeks after the start of the school year, she figured the latter was the truth.

"I wonder what magical way they have of getting food to us," David said, as he led the way down, between the fifth and sixth grade tables.

"They're called serving trays, noob," someone called out, which caused quite a lot of laughter throughout the room. David blushed a deep red, but he continued down, seeming unperturbed by the name calling. Cary wasn't sure what a noob was, but from the tone it sounded like an insult.

Halfway down the aisle, Cary could finally make out the far side of the room. Sure enough, there was a line of serving trays over there, in a long buffet line. Unfortunately, the line was letting out on their side of the room, which meant that they had to make their way back over to the right side of the room to join it. There were several options, not all of which looked appetizing to Cary. But the trays were all mixed together, making no sense, as they went along. Cary ended up getting some lasagna, and David opted for a hamburger, with a side of one of those unidentified dishes. Cary wasn't sure if he was just trying to explore the new options or if he really knew what it was that he was eating.

Once they got their dinners, they headed back towards the fifth grade table. By the time they got there, the table had cleared out more, giving them no end to options. As Cary still eyed the room around her, and more pointedly the older students, she let David pick their spot for her. This ended up somewhere in the middle of their line of tables, which was largely vacant of other students.

"Hey," someone said, once they sat down. The boy was sitting alone, just past the break between the tables. As soon as Cary looked his way, the boy slid his tray over, sitting across from them. "You guys new?"

The boy had a noticeable accent, which sounded English or Scottish to Cary, but it wasn't thick enough for her not to be able to understand him. At the time, she thought it a bit weird that someone with any accent other than American would be at her school. She wasn't well versed enough in the power of portals, like the ones she had gone through, to realize that anyone from anywhere could be going to school with her. But considering there was a metal torch hovering over the boy's head, sending sparks all over, she probably should have.

"Yup," David said. "Just got here this afternoon. It's a bit much to take in."

"This one doesn't speak?" he asked, pointing towards Cary. "Is he mute?"

"No, he's a bit scared you're all witches," David said.

"David," Cary scolded, in a low voice.

"No, I get it," the boy said. "You're both from the human realm, then? Me, too. I got here right before school started, and I've been trying to learn as much as I can about everything here. The name's Sam, by the way. You guys are...?"

"I'm David," David said, putting his hand to his chest. "This is Cary."

"Hi," Cary said, in a low voice, just waving her hand before looking to her food.

"So, if you know about all this stuff, why do they call this the mead hall?" David asked.

"Are you kidding? Do you have any idea where you are?" Sam asked.

"Uh... Thornburg Prep?" David said.

"It's Thorbjog Prep."

"Freak," came a voice from behind Cary. Her face went white when she looked over her shoulder to the familiar voice. Greg was just passing by her, purposely bumping into her as he passed her, heading for a spot further up the table. Cary waited until she thought that he was out of earshot before asking the burning question on her mind.

"What on Earth is Greg doing here?"

"That's what I was saying," Sam said. "You're not on Earth anymore. This is the magical realm. Specifically, this is Norumbega, the place where the Norsemen first broke through the barrier between the realms."

"Norsepeople," someone corrected. The girl was sitting back on the table that Sam had been sitting at, but further away. They hadn't seemed to be sitting together, though her accent wasn't too far off his. After correcting him, she went back to her meal, clearly only butting in to correct Sam.

"Anyway," Sam continued. "They named the school after a Norse sorcerer–"

"Sorceress," the girl said.

"Sorceress, Thorbjog. It means Thor protected."

"Cause she was a badass," the girl said.

"And every building is named for Norse buildings. The Mead Hall was the main meeting place in most Norse villages. The dorms are called longhouses. And so on. You get used to it."

"Oh, I hope I never get used to all this," David said. "This is all just so amazing."

"I don't want to get used to it," Cary muttered. "I just want to go home."

"You are home, little dude," Sam said. "At least until they expel you for not having enough magic."

"Or you turn witch," came a voice from the next table over.

Cary shied away from that voice, that word. But then when she realized what they were saying, she was only more confused. "Wait, turn witch?" she asked. "Can that happen?"

"Oh, yeah," Sam said, nodding. "But don't worry. Like Porter said, they kick you out for that. That's how you know that there are no witches here. No real ones, anyway. And the headmaster? Sparks? He's a divinist. He knows everything that happens here, and a lot of what is about to happen. No witch can hide among us."

"But, it also means we can't get away with sneaking off campus," the girl said. "Not that anyone would want to. The world out there is far more dangerous than in here. Trust me; there's nothing to worry about on campus. It's out in the fairy mushroom forest that you need to worry about."

"Why?" Cary asked. With the students' assurances that there were no witches in their midst, Cary was starting to relax. But only just so. "What's out in the fairy mushroom forest?"

"Fairies, obviously," the girl said.

"Don't listen to her," Sam said. "There haven't been reports of fairies in the area for decades. Maybe centuries."

"That doesn't mean they're not still out there somewhere," the girl said.

"If there are, there won't be for long," someone said, as they passed by their spot on the table. The girl was wearing all black, with black lipstick, but she looked young enough to be in their grade. As she sat down two tables further up, she licked her lips as she stared over at Cary. "Fairies are a delicacy where I'm from."

"Don't listen to Rachel," the girl said. "She's not a witch."

"Am so," Rachel said, despite what the students around Cary had been saying.

"If she was a witch, she would have been kicked out," the girl said. "She is, however, unfortunately, my roommate." She shuddered at the thought of that before turning back to her food.