My alarm song – Heat of the Moment – sounded throughout my room. I groaned and turned it off. I got about four and a half hours of broken sleep last night. I forced myself out of bed and into the shower, putting it on a colder temperature, which woke me right up. I worried if my hair would look alright today, instead of its usual mess. I opened the door to the shower and went back into my room. I pressed play on my iPod and the song Mamma Mia started to play. I sang along as I laid out my – a white shirt, plaid skirt, tights and a dark purple blazer with a purple and red tie – uniform and dried my hair. Luckily, my hair didn't look too bad today, so I straightened it – I even managed to get my side fringe sitting right! My hair reached my shoulders and once I was happy with it, I started on my make-up. I only wore moisturizer, foundation and powder, so it didn't take me long. I went downstairs to have some toast to find my parents had left me a good luck note. I smiled as I read it, it's a shame they had to work so much and couldn't see me off on the first day of my new school, but I didn't mind. I would see them at the weekend. After my toast I brushed my teeth and got dressed, double checking myself to see if I had left any tags on.

Once I was satisfied I grabbed my pre-packed bag and left. I walked past other paranormals going about their day – taking the bins out, getting ready for work. They all avoided my gaze. The paranormal killing group popped into my head. Thank goodness I lived in a paranormal area. I think if I shared a neighbourhood with humans, I'd be even more terrified. On the walk to school – it took about forty minutes – I discovered that lots of kids from there lived near me, but they just looked at me as I walked past, not even bothering to return my smile. I felt nervous again and that's when I saw the school.

The gates were black and pointed at the top and they ran round the entire school. The bricks were darkened from all the years they had been there. Across the buildings, ivy climbed high, some of it creeping over the rooftops. The windows were stained different colours, blood red, dark purple and glistering yellow were the ones that I could see. The first building was tall and broad, with towers at both ends and the second was built high and daunting and looked as if it was crumbling away. There was a third building, but it was overshadowed by the first. Grass grew everywhere, through the cracks in the pavement, underneath the thick gnarled oak tree in the field.

Through the archway of the first building there was a large open area where students were loitering in groups of fairies, genies, ghosts, vampires and werewolves. Some in larger groups than others. The genies carried around detailed oil lamps – the source of the majority of their power – with large curved handles and a blue energy resonating inside it. Ghosts walked through other people, floating slightly above the ground. Werewolves had a yellow tint to their eyes whilst vampire's eyes were red around the edges and their pupils carried a hint of silver. Other fairies were around, fluttering their wings slightly. Most of the people looked at me menacingly, which was worrying to say the least.

"Hi, I'm Joanna. Avery, right?" Out of nowhere a pale blonde hair girl with sparkling green eyes and yellow wings bounced up to me. She was wearing the same uniform as me and I was relieved to see I was in the right school.

'Urm... Hi Joanna. How do you know my name?' I asked hesitantly.

"Are you kidding? We all know you! You're Avery Winchester, second to her name, princess of the Fae!" She walked alongside me. "Do you want me to show you around?"

"Sure. How do you know me?" I questioned apprehensively.

"All the fairies! How could we not know the royal family?" She teased falling into pace beside me. She seemed easy to talk to. "I mean, your wings are huge, so that's a dead giveaway." I looked at her wings. They were half the size of mine. So much for fitting in.

"Ok, you've got me." I grinned. "How come you're so happy to talk to me whereas all the other fairies look so... apprehensive?" I quizzed her as I caught a fairy's eye; he quickly averted his gaze and looked at the floor.

"I dunno. They're intimidated by you, I guess. I don't get intimidated easily." She boasted.

"Yeah, I can tell." I told her.

"Here's the office. Want me to wait for you? I can show you to your form room." She offered.

"Yes. Please." I reminded watched my manners. I was still a so called 'princess' after all. 'Thanks Joanna!' I pushed the door open to the office and was confronted by one purple and three blue walls with the school crest of Marton mounted on the purple wall opposite the door. A woman with bright blonde hair sat at the desk to my right. I turned to her and she silently handed me my schedule and homework planner and pointed to the door behind me with the plague reading 'Headmaster' written on it.

The Headmaster stood up as I entered. "Avery, please take a seat." He gestured to a blue chair on the other side of the desk and I sat facing him. The office was white with blue chairs and a black desk and even the filing cabinets behind the Headmaster were white! Overall, the office looked bland and uninteresting. How could you spend all day in here?

"I'm Mr Baros, welcome to my school!" He was a tall man in his mid-thirties with collar-length brown hair, which matched his suit. His accent was Spanish, I think. His eyes flashed yellow as he welcomed me. Werewolf.

"We're honoured to have you here, Avery. We do have a few other royal children here and they are treated like everybody else." He paused to make sure I was listening, so I nodded.

"Now, I'm sure your parents have made you aware of the rules here, but I'll run through them anyway. No powers of any kind to be used within school grounds, no shape shifting, no talking to plants, no granting wishes or walking through walls or anything of the sort. Got it?" I nodded again.

"Good. No bullying or any illegal activity; whilst you are in uniform you are representing the school. Understand?" I nodded for the third time.

"Great! Onto your schedule." He pulled a piece of paper out of the draw on his right and scanned it. "I see you have chosen geography, history, gardening – which of course, is reserved for fairies only – and maths for your GCSEs; is this correct?" I nodded in confirmation and he beamed at me.

"Fantastic! Do you need someone to show you around?"

"No, thank you, Sir. I have Joanna waiting for me outside." I responded.

"Then that concludes this meeting." He rose at the same time as me and showed me out of the office.

I pulled the door to walk into the corridor and walked straight into someone.

"Whoops. Sorry." I apologized.

"Watch where you're going!" Someone hissed at me.

I looked up and saw a tall boy around my age with bright blue grey eyes and brown hair glare down at me.

"Hey, it was your fault too!" I told him.

"No, it wasn't. I knew you were there. Stupid fairy." He snarled.

"Take that back!" My wings fluttered and took me up a few inches, to his height.

"No." He bared his fangs at me. I had never seen a vampire's fangs before. They were like a second set of teeth that appeared in front of his other teeth. They were long and sharp and look like they could tear me apart. But I wasn't scared. Ok, that was a lie. Maybe I was slightly intimidated, but I wasn't going to show it. Not on my first day.

'Stop.' The headmaster stood behind us, glaring at the pair of us. The guy put his fangs back – wherever the hell they went – and I lowered myself to the ground. "Get to class." The headmaster snapped. I wasn't that scared of him either, but he was my head teacher.

I turned back around. "Excuse me." I muttered politely to the guy. He stepped out of my way and I exited to find Joanna leaning against the wall, raising her eyebrows at me.

"Wow. You know how to piss people off." She told me.

"It wasn't my fault!" I immediately protested.

"I didn't say it was." She grinned. "Come on, give me your schedule and I'll show you to your class."

First up was english, then science, after comparing out schedules, we discovered we had the same lessons together. Joanna said it wasn't that unusual for the different species to be kept apart from one another, apart from at break times, where we were supposed to mix with each other.

Fortunately, this meant that I didn't have to see that vampire again. Unfortunately, this meant I was mostly with fairies none of whom seemed willing to actually speak to me. They weren't allowed to bow either, thank goodness. I hated people bowing to me. At break time, Joanna introduced me to her friends. Sachi was a petite Chinese girl with brown hair and eyes and blue wings, Briony was really tall with blonde hair, blue eyes and pink wings and Iris had blonde hair too, but slightly darker than Briony's and Iris' eyes were brown and she had orange wings.

After break it was geography and maths and the teachers seemed okay. At lunch, I sat with Joanna and her friends.

"So, Avery." Iris leaned forward and eyed my wings. "What's it like being royal?"

I smiled. "It's alright, I guess."

"You guess?" Briony raised her eyebrows. "If I was one of the strongest of the fairies, I'd be ecstatic! Do you know how strong you really are?"

"We're not supposed to use them for personal gain." I pointed out, shuffling in my seat.

"Yeah, but you can." Sachi told me.

Joanna rolled her eyes. "Guys, leave her alone!"

"We're just asking questions!" Sachi's eyes widened in innocence.

"What's it like at home? Are your parents really strict?" Iris raised an eyebrow at me.

"Urm... I don't think so. They're just normal parents."

"I bet they spoil you. According to ParaNews, you're an only child." Briony grinned.

"You can't trust ParaNews!" Iris scolded.

Briony shrugged. "Yes you can!"

"They're fabricate so many things about us, they make the humans afraid of us!" Iris argued.

"Humans shouldn't have access to it!" Briony shot back.

"Guy. Calm down." Joanna held a hand in each of their faces when they tried to protest. "Seriously. I'm sick of you arguing about humans." She turned to me and whispered. "Iris had a human best friend as a kid."

My eyes widened. We weren't supposed to mix with humans. "Really? Do you still see them now?"

Iris shook her head. "No. She disappeared when I was almost eleven." She replied, sadly.

I frowned. "What do you mean disappeared?"

She shrugged. "I stayed late at her house once. Went home, slept, went back to hers and everything was gone."

"Maybe she moved." I suggested.

"No. Everything was gone. The whole house had wooden floor put down and painted white, like the slate was wiped clean." Her voice dropped lower. "I think she was killed by the government."

I blinked. "Why?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"Did she live down the same road as you?"

She shook her head again. "Different neighbourhood."

"Oh."

The bell rang and we left the playground. Joanna took me to my history class and the teacher had us start to write essays on the royal families, everyone spent the whole lesson glancing at me.