The Dream Sorting Chamber was tightly sealed. There were no windows, only high ceilings carved in pale gray stone. Circular balls of light illuminated in translucent boxes were carefully stacked on top of each other. The cobalt tables with large, magnifying dream analysis equipment had been shoved aside in order to make room for the ensuing brawl. At the far end of the room, was an unusually large Dream Deposit built into the wall.

Laetitia cast her hand in the air, creating a dark purple sparkle that dabbed at the pressure points on her back; she sighed as her tension was released and her eyes gleamed like stars. She coolly rolled her neck with a firm and resounding crack and gazed confidently at Mena.

Mena, on the other hand, was spurred into awkward stretching, lifting her hands above her head and reaching down to her toes, her back making a sickening crack as she did. She rose cautiously and grinned nervously.

“Uhm…Mena,” May said. “I can give you a back rub if you want.”

“Erm…” Mena said, her face still in a grin, but fear now looming in her eyes as May’s shadow fell over her.

Before she knew it, the large girl had gripped her thin shoulder blades with her thick hands and pressed them firmly while rubbing them. A series of cracks and resounding twitches followed and by the time May was finished, Mena’s spine felt like it had split in two.

“My mummy said if you don’t feel anything, you aren’t getting a massage.”

“You don’t say,” Mena said, feeling exasperated already. “Because now I can’t feel my back.”

Mena shook her head and looked towards her opponents. “Well, I guess this is it…”

As she walked towards Laetitia, Janus called after her in a high-carefree voice. “Don’t worry, Mena. You should only be afraid if my dad shows up.”

“Great…” Mena said, as she approached Laetitia.

Surprisingly, some of the other girls in the room cheered for her. Most of them were Groundborns and apparently, they wanted Mena to knock Laetitia off her high horse.

Laetitia left Ashlan and Marie and approached Mena with no fear on her face. “I’m surprised you showed up,” the elf said coldly. “Ashlan thought you were going to squeal to your favorite circus performer.”

“N-n-no!” Mena shouted nervously. “I have a backbone. I can stand up for myself.”

“Very well,” Laetitia sneered. “This beating has been a long time coming.”

Hearing a few cruel words, Mena was overcome with emotion. Though she had never liked the Tessellations much, she figured they could at least tolerate each other.

“Laetitia, Marie,” Mena cried. “I thought you were ok with me.”

“Correction,” Laetitia said, feeling no remorse over Mena’s sadness. “Ashlan was ok with you, but when we ‘eard how bad you were doing on your first day, and how you were consorting with a kumquat and an undead freak, enough was enough.”

May looked away bashfully but Janus pursed her non-existent lips and her high, yet pointed voice broke above the crowd, “If I’m considered a freak by you, Laetitia, then I’m doing everything right.”

Mena nodded in agreement, but a look on her face betrayed her uncertainty.

“It’s nothing personal,” Laetitia said, as if answering her. “Our motha is just very particular about who we hang out with, and some runt from the ground will never reach the rigorous standards of a high class Lunaborn.”

“But…” Mena responded. “That’s why we go to school. To get better at our arts and reach a higher level.”

Laetita pointed her finger at Mena and with a fanged smile, she said, “But you see, peasant,” she chortled and held her hand to her face. “We don’t aim for the moon and the stars. We are the moon and the stars!”

Mena could not take anymore. She pointed her hand to her head and chanted the same duck bill spell. It shot out of her finger with a rainbow sparkle. This time, however, Laetitia was prepared.

“Mirror mirror in front of my face, make sure her attack is displaced!”

A mirror of purple crystal appeared and refracted the spell. It ricocheted towards Ashlan and Marie. Ashlan dived out of the way, but it hit Marie square in the jaw.

When Marie sat up, her mouth had been replaced with a duck bill again.

She quacked angrily.

“Sorry, sis,” Laetitia quipped. “Ok, time to finish this farce.”

Laetitia stepped boldly forward and chanted at Mena. Her eyes glowed pale white and people gasped as a miniature full moon appeared above them.

The silver haired elf summoned power that Mena had never seen before. “Oh, lunar energy within me, drown her mind in the lunar sea!”

Suddenly, Mena did not feel right. Her legs stood up on their own and they started to lift up and down. She swung her arms like she was a marionette hoisted by invisible strings. People gasped and Laetitia burst into high-pitched laugher. “You seem to forget, silly girl that we have power that far out-classes you. You are now succumbing to what I call, moon madness!”

Laetitia walked towards Mena with a sadistic look on her face and moved a fist into her own face. Mena’s arm followed much faster and smacked herself in the face. After recoiling, Mena licked the corner of her mouth and tasted blood. “Ashlan, please help me,” she begged.

At last, Ashlan stood up, a ferocious look on her face. “Laetitia, stop!” she growled with her beastly voice. “That’s enough!”

Mena smiled as she danced. She knew Aslan was truly her friend.

“Oh?” Laetitia asked. Her neatly plucked eyebrows of silver rising. “Ashlan, I thought I told you to stand down.”

“I’m not letting you do this to her,” Ashlan said, her hands on her hips. “She’s my friend. The friend I’ve always wanted since I came to this school.”

“Of course,” Laetitia said in her caustic accented voice. “But do you want us to tell her about you? The dirty leetle gossip we know about you? A teeny tiny thing you’ve confided in us that you’d never want uttered to anyone else?”

It was if Ashlan’s stature shrank 20 feet. Her tanned lioness face paling, becoming as white as the cold pallor of the Tessellations’ faces. “Be a good leetle kitty and stand down. Or zis rainborn will know the truth about you.”

There was a pain in Ashlan’s eyes that she had never seen before, and much to Mena’s surprise, she slumped to her knees in silence. The young witch could not believe it; tears trickled down her face. What secret could be more important than Mena’s friendship and safety? Laetitia’s head turned back to Mena. “Now time for a crazy moon dance, my leetle puppet.”

She raised her hands and Mena’s body jerked up and down, spinning around and stumbling. She teetered across the room, crying hysterically but Laetitia refused to yield.

“I’m getting a teacher,” May screamed, and the door shut.

Mena turned her head just in time to realize she was dangerously close to the room’s Dream Deposit. Mena screamed. She did not want to fall in.

She wobbled back and forth, and it was only when Professor Andromeda appeared in the room with May, that Laetitia jumped, causing Mena’s body to fly backwards into the Dream Deposit.

“Tessellation,” Andromeda exclaimed. “Stop what you’re doing this instant!” But she quickly gasped.

Mena fell headfirst into the Dream Deposit and into the black depths below. All she could hear as she fell was Ashlan crying loudly, but it soon disappeared along with her body.