Thyla - Kate Gordon [39]
‘What is amusing?’ I asked.
‘Nothing!’ he said, shaking his head, his lips twitching. ‘Just that … well, you’ve got that look,’ he said. The little bit of anger had now turned into a very big bit. How did this stranger know about my looks? How presumptuous of him! ‘That “I’m mad with Perrin” look,’ he added. ‘It’s cute but definitely not funny.’
Despite his words, his lips were now twitching uncontrollably.
‘No, you’re right. It’s not funny,’ I snapped.
‘Just a little bit?’ he asked.
‘You know, it is the height of impoliteness to make fun of a lady in this manner!’ I retorted. It felt like a phrase I had been instructed to say. Or perhaps I read it in a book. I enjoyed saying it. I felt as if I had been longing to use those words.
My pleasure gave way as the twitch in Perrin’s lips escalated into a wide and unashamed grin. ‘A lady?’ he said. ‘Right. Lady Tessa. Is that what you think you are?’
I was furious now. What did he know? I might have been a lady.
‘Cad!’ I growled.
‘Fiery,’ he whispered. ‘Good to see you fiery.’
‘What?’ I asked. ‘What are you talking about? I don’t even know you!’
A shadow passed over Perrin’s face.
‘You don’t … look, forget it, okay? Forget I said anything.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Hey, I don’t think we got the chance to shake hands properly before, because my rude little sister got in the way.’ He was smiling again now.
‘I don’t want to shake hands with you,’ I said, but a voice in my head said, Yes you do. You want to hold his hand. You want to hold him. To shoo away the unruly, unbidden thought, I focused on being angry. ‘I think you’re very rude,’ I said. ‘To laugh at me like that. And to presume things about me.’
Perrin shrugged. ‘Maybe you just need to remember how to harden up, little girl,’ he said, winking. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I really do need to scram. School awaits, worst luck. I hope I’ll see you again, though.’
‘If you’re lucky,’ I bit back.
I turned on my heel and began marching away. It took me a few moments to realise I was marching in completely the wrong direction.
Feeling my stomach churning and the heat blazing in my face again, I stopped and turned around.
Head down, I marched back past Perrin, who was standing, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised. His lips were doing that twitching thing again. Most ungentlemanly.
‘Missed me already?’ he asked.
‘No, Perrin,’ I growled as I walked past. ‘I just wanted to make sure I remembered your face, so I could run the other way next time I saw it.’
I knew it sounded spiteful and unladylike, but I also knew that I should not put up with his rudeness. He should know better than that. He needed to be reprimanded.
‘That’s it, little girl. That’s what I mean by hardening up. Go, Tessa!’
My face flamed. I hid it and kept walking. ‘Goodbye Perrin,’ I muttered.
What sort of a name was ‘Perrin’, anyway? It sounded like a kind of baby bird, not a name for a strapping youth.
It was only when I was had walked a hundred steps away from Perrin, into the hallway that led to Mr Beagle’s history classroom, that I remembered what Rhiannah had said the night before.
‘Now, you know it’s going to be difficult tonight,’ she said. ‘Perrin told me. They’ve upped their night-time patrols of the grounds. Obviously they think the same as Perrin does. They must think it’s important to increase their forces. There are Thylas everywhere tonight.’
Perrin told her.
That’s what she said.
Perrin was involved in the same strangeness that Rhiannah and her friends had talked of and created last night in the moonlight. Yet again, the image of Rhiannah with claws and fangs burst into my mind. But it had been a dream. Just a dream. There were no strange creatures. Perrin wasn’t one of them.
You’re just tired, I told myself, as I slid into my usual seat, ignoring the words written in blood-red ink on the lip of my desk. ‘Tessa is a freak’ they said. ‘You’re probably right,’ I whispered at the desk. Certainly, nobody normal would have such queer imaginings.