CHAPTER XIX

True to Josie's words, he wasn't summoned to the principal's office the next day. He was in class and all went pretty smoothly, no voice over the speaker asking for a certain Hall or anyone. Nothing.

"Ryder." A soft sweet voice, one he was very familiar with called his name ever so gently.

Ryder turned his head to look in her direction, "Elena Frost," he recited.

"Good afternoon," She greeted. She paused a bit, fidgeting with her fingers, as if nervous to say what she wanted to. Ryder raised his head from the backrest, there was a little frown on his face.

"What?" he requested to know what she wanted.

"I just wanted to assure you that what happened yesterday shouldn't affect our personal relationship." She blurted. This was surprising. "I totally understand," she added, "I am not keeping hard feelings," She stretched her hand out for a shake.

Ryder looked at her hand and traced it up to her face, such beauty, yet so stupid. He wanted to facepalm but he restrained himself. Facepalming wasn't the only thing he didn't do with his hand though, he also didn't shake Elena. She was left holding her hand out for about a minute.

"Thanks for forgiving me." Ryder finally opened his mouth and said something. Elena slowly retracted her hand, "But we can't be friends — sorry," he wasn't sorry but had to say it. Courtesy.

"But why?" Elena demanded a reason, she seemed sad, "Is it because of my mother? Did she tell you anything? Threaten you?"

Ryder sighed, not really knowing what to do nor say. He glanced behind her to where Elenor was seated, Elenor was on headphones and seemed not to care what Elena was doing at the moment.

Ryder turned to look back at Elena, "For some reason you seem to like me..." there was a long pause after that, he wasn't sure how to put it. He usually wouldn't care whose feelings he was hurting, but right now he wanted to be mild with his words. He seemed to care how she'd feel about what he wanted to say next.

"Yes." Ryder heard her say, before he could even figure himself out, "Yes, I like you, I have a crush on you," he stared wide eyed at her as she shamelessly admitted her feelings in front of the whole class, she didn't seem to care about the people present. Elenor took off her headphones and turned her body to face them. She was never really using those headphones to begin with, Elena's voice wasn't loud enough to have reached ears behind headphones. Elena opened her mouth to say more but Ryder stopped her.

"I don't like you," he was very blunt about it. Elena's icy eyes melted, as though his words were like the sun to them.

The whole class went dead silent, not as if anybody was talking to begin with. Everybody had stopped whatever they were doing to listen in on Elena's bold confession. As soon as Ryder made clear his feelings about the situation, time seemed to have stopped. It seemed like there was no noise again in the universe.

"Uh..." Elena could only stutter. She staggered back. Elenor pulled herself from her seat and came to Elena's rescue.

"Good afternoon class," A man's voice greeted and everybody had to turn their attention to him, it was the history teacher.

Elena turned abruptly and went to sit at her seat which was in front of Elenor's. Elenor half got up from her chair and leaned forward to whisper something into Elena's ears, Elena angrily shrugged her sister off before she could even say a word. The next minute she turned her head to look at Ryder who had been studying her every move since the moment she left him. She turned to face the board again — she was pissed.

The bells went off. He knew school activities weren't over yet. Tuesdays were for gardening, a certain Berry Brown was their instructor for this. He had never met her before, he wasn't really excited about gardening, but he did think it would be fun.

As usual Fred waited so that they could leave together. Ryder didn't even know if Fred and he were friends or foes. One thing he did know was that; they weren't best buddies but they weren't enemies either.

"For this class there will be no uniform change." Fred explained on their way to the greenhouse. From the little knowledge he had of the school's grounds, from the maps: the greenhouse was by the side of a mansion behind the school building. This mansion, Ryder had never seen before, he was excited to see what it looked like.

He and Fred went out the back of the school and followed a path which led to a fountain. The third of its kind Ryder was seeing around here, it was getting mysterious.

"'Effugium'," Fred said, noticing Ryder's obvious interest in the statue.

"Huh?" Ryder asked for a repeat or an explanation, just anything. His eyes were still fixated on Luna's face.

"The fountain is known as Effugium," Fred repeated, "It features Luna Frost, wife of Lord Fabian Frost with their two children, Brian and..."

"Brandon." Ryder corrected.

Fred looked at Ryder, he was flushed. He was trying to show off his knowledge of the Frosts legacy but ended up being corrected.

"Yes, Brandon Frost." He agreed, he didn't really have other options. They both stood there for a while without saying anything.

"How did you know?" Ryder broke the silence, "Do they teach the family tree around here or what?"

Fred glanced at Ryder to see what his expression was, and it seemed as though Ryder wasn't very impressed about the idea of teaching one's legacy in a school.

"Well, No. They don't," Fred answered, "But there are a couple of books about them in the library," Ryder nodded thoughtfully. "Regina Contessa, that's my favourite." Fred added.

Turning his head to look at Fred, "Who is that?"

"She was one of the heads of house Frost." Fred explained. "She made most of the modifications needed to be made around here," he paused then looked at the fountain, "She had this fountain built too — all the fountains."

"Cool," Ryder remarked. He really was impressed, "How many more of these are there?"

"I don't know how many you might have seen, but there are four in total." Fred answered his question, enthusiasm in his voice.

"Effugium," Ryder repeated thoughtfully, "That's southern for..."

"Escape," he completed horridly, "They say that the fountains are escape routes for the Frosts." Fred added.

"Escape from what?"

Fred shrugged, "I don't know. Maybe it's there for times of need."

"I would like to read about Regina one of these days."

"It's a great read I tell you," Fred urged Ryder, "You should read 'Queen Of House' it's probably the best book I've ever read on her," he suggested.

"I will try that out," Ryder smiled at him, and they were on their way — the mansion stood behind the fountain.

"They look healthy!" Berry beamed. Apparently she had asked the students to plant something of their choosing and cater for it. And on this day she was going round the tables, seeing how much each student had progressed. Presently she was drooling over the patio roses of a red haired girl sitting next to Ryder, the plant was impressive alright, it had unblemished lush green leaves, and big snowy roses — they looked really pretty.

"And what do we have here?" Berry had a displeased look on her face as she left the redhead and stood, facing Ryder. She wasn't a very attractive woman. And one prominent thing Ryder noticed about her was that her boobs were a bit too big for someone of her stature, "You are the new student?"

"You don't frequently get new students around here?" Ryder asked sarcastically and Fred rolled his eyes, Ryder was at it again and he wasn't pleased.

"No", Berry answered, "Not really."

"I see." Ryder nodded thoughtfully to this.

Berry then bent over placing her hands on the table and bringing her face very close to Ryder's, "You would have to get a flower pot and plant something of your choice," Ryder nodded to show his understanding, "I will be giving you a month to bring something in," she said then got to her full length and walked over to Fred who had planted a cactus. His plant was also very impressive. Unlike Yuan's own.

"Ow, look at this poor thing," Berry exclaimed as she got to Yuan, "She's dying," it was looking as though Berry had some emotional connection with the plants, as though she could feel what they felt.

She stretched her hand forward then pressed her index finger on the plant, a drop of her blood ran down its stem. She closed her eyes as if enjoying the pain, then she inhaled deeply. Suddenly the plant began to glow green and it started looking healthier and bigger than it was before. Once she was done she took her hand off the plant and opened her eyes, a big smile broke across her face. The result was Yuan's plant looking better than Fred's: Yuan looked pleased. Fred was amused. Ryder was amazed.

"Take very good care of this Yuan," she cautioned him then proceeded to other students.

"What was that?" Ryder asked immediately after she left.

"She's a plant manipulator Ryder," Yuan answered, he was smiling widely. Ryder didn't have words really.

"Yuan actually made sure his plant withered," Fred added, "He wanted miss Brown to heal his plant with her abilities."

"That's not true!" Yuan defended then chuckled afterwards.

"What should I plant?" Ryder asked for their opinions.

"Do u want to plant a flower?" Yuan asked, "They are beautiful."

"If taken care of." Fred added.

"Hmm." Ryder hummed.

"Or you can plant a cactus, just like us." Yuan suggested waiting for Ryder's opinion.

"Hmm, I think I'd do that." Ryder agreed to Yuan's suggestion and Yuan smiled, he was happy.

"My Cactus would be the best looking." He boasted.

"I won't compete with you at that." Ryder chuckled.

"We can't compete really." Fred pointed out.

While Yuan and Fred continued talking excitedly Ryder zoomed off. His gaze followed the unattractive woman whom he had just encountered, she doesn't look ugly, no. She's just a 'plain Jane' whom Ryder wasn't pleased with for no reasons at all. But now he found her interesting, he didn't notice her abilities before she got to Yuan, but now she seemed to be using them to heal one or two problems with lots of plants, the students would cheer and clap and smile as she did it.

She was with Ben now, Ben was an eyesore to Ryder so he looked away from where they were, then something caught his attention at the far end of the seating spaces present in the greenhouse. There was no way those silver locks won't draw ones attention; it was the other Frost girl. She was seated there, the only one on the table — she looked lonely.

Seated on her table was a pot of well groomed sunflowers — they stood out. The blooms were large, and their showy yellow rays were definitely making a statement. Ryder continued staring at this odd sheep until her icy eyes met his black ones, they held each other's gaze for a while until Ryder broke it by turning to face his front. Her cold eyes seemed dead, she seemed like someone who was suffering. Strange, compared to her sisters who were so lively and seem to be living their best lives. Speaking of which, Ryder turned to look at the Frost twins just to compare, when he looked their way, he met Elena's eyes on him, she seemed angry or something; it felt like she had been watching him. Ryder immediately turned away from her.

Suddenly Berry squealed excitedly and all the students turned in her direction to see what had happened. She was at Elisa's table, and she seemed very impressed with the sunflowers. Berry was gently caressing the blooms while smiling at Elisa who seemed to be managing to keep the fake smile on her face. Elisa nodded, looking up at Berry. Seemed Berry had asked something; now Elisa was talking, answering a question Berry might have asked and on and on it went.

Everyone else had looked away from them leave alone Ryder. His eyes were still fixated on them, Elena noticed this, just like she noticed the initial eye lock and her cold blood boiled, her stomach churned — it made her nauseous.

"Elena." Elenor called her sister, seeing how distracted she was, "What is it?" she asked, concerned.

"Nothing." Elena shook her head, but there was in fact something. Her throat felt salty and her icy eyes felt like they were going to melt, at that moment she didn't want to be there anymore, she wanted to go home.

The class went on for a while though, with Berry teaching them how to care for plants, all the tender care and love bullshit most of them didn't care about.

Elisa had waited for everybody else to leave the greenhouse before she took her leave. She hung her backpack and hugged her flower pot, holding it close to her chest; with her usual slow pace, she slowly made for the exit of the greenhouse.

"Miss. Frost," Elisa heard a voice call from behind her. But she wasn't the only 'Miss Frost' around here. Her hold on her flower pot subconsciously tightened; she doubted that anybody would be talking to her. Was the person behind her mistaking her for Elena? She questioned, then quickened her steps, she thought everyone had left the greenhouse, that she was the last student there. Not having noticed this person's presence when she was inside made her scared.

"Elisa," the person called again and she abruptly stopped walking, clutching her pot even tighter. Elisa didn't want to look back, she just stood, frozen in place. Listening to this person's footsteps as he slowly approached her. He came to stand in front of her then her eyes widened in realization. He was the one looking at her from earlier.

"Ryder," he introduced, stretching his hand forward for a shake. Her eyes traveled from those dark orbs of his and down to his outstretched hand. He kept his nails but groomed them well, his fingers were slender and long and his hand was veiny and looked soft — beautiful.

She didn't shake him, she stood there and continued looking at his hand without taking it. Ryder took a step closer to her, this action made her look up at him. He nodded and smiled reassuringly, it was then that Elisa released her hand from around her pot, and she took his veiny smooth hand in hers.

"You are cold." Ryder observed.

Elisa studied his face and found an expression that seemed to her like 'worry'.

"Oh! Don't worry," she said, "my temperature should be cold." The second half of the sentence came out lower and shakier than the first few words did. All these while, they were still holding hands. As soon as Elisa realized this, she took her hand back and wrapped it around her pot again. "Do you want anything from me?" She innocently asked, lowering her gaze to the ground.

"Me? No! I want nothing." Ryder answered, he was looking at her intensely, trying to know her.

After Ryder's answer Elisa gave him a minute to say something different, something more. But since one didn't seem to be coming, she walked past him Did a small courtesy before passing by his side, without a word.

"You don't seem to have many friends." Ryder called after her, and she halted in her steps, "I don't have many friends either," Ryder confessed. This gained him Elisa's eyes, she turned to look at him, "can we be friends?" Ryder asked. His question was followed by a loud crash.