The bell is ringing, the first morning call. Laura's eyes remain closed, as if they are impossible to open, so she lays there listening. Her long blonde hair is a mess across her pillow and face, no doubt full of knots to brush out. She can hear doors opening and feet shuffling to the bathrooms, people attempting to beat the morning shower lines. Mumbling voices, sleepy hello's, this is a typical morning at Greenstern. Finally, Laura pulls herself out of bed. Sleepily her eyes start to open, and she lets out a heavy breath. Getting up she walks over to her wardrobe and changes into a fresh uniform, after falling asleep in the one she wore yesterday. The Greenstern uniforms aren't particularly special, a pastel green button up shirt with a forest green cardigan over the top with the school's crest, a glowing tree being orbited by the moon, sits embroidered onto the top left pocket. And of course, a pleated dark green skirt with long white stockings and their black mushroom leather lace up boots. After combing the knots out of her hair, and brushing her teeth, Laura grabs her backpack and heads out to the food hall across the courtyard along with the other students.

"Hey Laura! Wait up!" a voice calls. Turning around, she sees that it's Violet. Violet is one of Laura's closest friends at Greenstern, despite the fact that she's a year younger than herself. Violet had clearly been rushing again, her bleach blond hair was tied up into a very messy and knotted bun on the top of her head. Her shirt wasn't tucked in, her buttons done up wrong and her laces untied. She was frantically shoving textbooks into her backpack as she ran, catching up to Laura.

"Morning Vi," Laura smiles, "sleep well?"

"Oh well, you know, I sorta stayed up late trying to balance my crystals out the window to charge them but I kept dropping them and had to sneak out to get them again." Laura snorted a laugh, "what about you?"

"Nah not really, I went to the library to finish my Botany essay."

"Again?" squeaked Violet, "You're going to get caught." Laura scoffed a little. Violet is always concerned about Laura's rule breaking antics despite she does it herself. It's probably more to do with the frequency and boldness of her actions that worry her the most.

"It's fine, I've done it since I was fourteen," Laura said rolling her eyes, "besides, you'll never guess what I saw". Violet looked at her with wide eyes, waiting to hear the gossip.

"Aaina Arya and Maggie Williams met up in the library, and Maggie gave her some kind of package. It must have been something important or they would have just done it at the dorms. Then, Mrs. Miller showed up and chased them away. Didn't see what happened after that 'cause I made a break for it."

"Oh weird," Violet said with a frown, "I wonder what it was... Oh my god you don't think they were going to try and practice something forbidden do you?" Laura shrugged, they could have also been smuggling drugs but Laura thought she might let Violet keep a little more of her innocence a bit longer. They had made their way to the food hall entrance, Laura could already feel her stomach beginning to grumble.

"Maybe just keep an ear out today for any gossip?" Laura suggested half heartedly, knowing that they may never find out anything. Gossip was one of the few interesting things that happened at school, every student and most definitely teachers all kept an ear out for a bit of entertainment. Violet nodded in agreement.

"I wonder if they got caught?" Violet pondered.

"Probably not, Mrs. Miller isn't exactly an Olympian."

"Ha, you can say that again." Violet said sarcastically. Mrs. Miller was incharge of the Physical Education classes, nobody knows how she even got the job, you'd be lucky to see her doing a fast walk let alone run after students.

They stepped into the food hall, which was still reasonably empty as most students hadn't finished getting ready yet. But Laura and Violet were always here that extra bit early to get the best food in the mornings. Everyday had the same basics: cereal, toast, tea and coffee. But if you get here early enough before it runs out, there are crispy hash browns, baked beans, fried tofu, fried mushrooms and tomatoes in garlic and the cherry on top, blueberry muffins. They both load their plates up, grabbing a pot of coffee to share before making their way to their favourite table by the window which overlooks the view onto the lake.

The Greenstern School was built in the 1400s as a safe place for the young women across The Wide Country to gather, to practice what their ancestors had passed down to them. And it was only when Laura sat, looking out at the view of the lake, that she truly felt thankful for what they had done. They had climbed up into the mountains and found Lake Greenstern, named after its deep green hue, and started what would change the lives of witches everywhere. Many people travel Greenstern from far away as very young children, to have the safety of its walls to practice. Witches aren't accepted in the regular world, only in select places like small rural towns. Laura glances over at Violet, who was slightly leaning over her food while she ate.

"You know your roots need doing again, right?" Laura said, Violet groans.

"Again? For all that's crepid it is relentless." she grumbled. Even though it looked really cool, Laura could never understand why Violet went through the many tedious hours of bleaching her dark black hair.

"Do you have anymore? We could sneak into my room at midnight and do it if you want?"

"Yeah I have one whole box left. Sounds good, I'll meet you then." She said with her typical sweet smile. They both finished off their breakfast and lazily wandered out to their lockers, which were kept outside next to the Main Building. As they were putting yesterday's books away and sorting through todays, Laura heard voices arguing.

"God, you know it was completely your fault, right?" a voice snapped.

"Was not! There was a chance she was there when I arrived." another replied whiningly. Laura stopped what she was doing and followed the sound of the bickering girls and peeked her head around the back of the lockers to the other side. Of course it was them, Aaina and Maggie.

"Well whether it was chance or not, we still haven't done it." Aaina barked back, "we'll have to try again tonight."

"Oh I don't know if we sh-" Aaina gave Maggie a silencing glare, for someone extremely beautiful, she was incredibly nasty. Maggie shut her wide open mouth with a snap.

"Same plan as last time, meet me at the Library at a quarter to one, and we'll head off to the graveyard." Laura's heart jumped, it was something she had felt before, every witch has at some point in time. When something is going wrong, twisted or vile, your heart does a jump in your chest telling you that it should stop. It was a natural witches instinct to keep yourself out of danger. Laura felt all this in half a second. She retreated, walking backwards until she was fully round the corner again. She looked over at Violet who had been oblivious to the whole affair, walked up to her and grabbed her wrist so that she turned and looked at her in the eyes and whispered to her.

"New plan. Tonight, we will go to the graveyard".