Read Fairies and Felicitations (Scholars and Sorcery) for Free Online Page B

to show any distress at parting with their family, at least in front of the others.
      When I see just how many girls have arrived, there’s a panicked moment in which I rethink my scheme and almost turn back to take Ember toward Briar Stables again, like a good girl. It passes. Ember is already circling lower, and the figures in the courtyard are starting to look up, point, and bring each other's attention to me. I'm in for it, now. Might as well try to carry it off with style.
    Why did I ever think this was a good idea? Me, who hates being the centre of attention. And when I've kept my record clean at school for nearly two years now, to break the rules on my first day in the Sixth in a way the mistresses can't possibly pretend not to notice, in front of a crowd of girls and parents. I don't ever think anything through properly, that's my problem. Like my brothers are fond of telling me, I don't have the horse-sense of a newly born unicorn.
    Ember rears backwards, pacing the air, his head high. I lean forward, burying my head in his neck, his wings beating the air, unworried about taking a tumble. Ember would never let me fall. We understand each other too well for that, and not just as steed and mistress.  
    I have the ability to reach out to fabled beasts and feel their hearts and souls, and communicate what I want. It's my sole magical talent. It's more than just my magical gift connecting me to Ember, though. It's not simply that I can reach into his heart, more that we share the same one. I was present at his birth, and I felt it the moment he slid, wet and pathetic looking, from his dam's body. We belonged to each other right then.
    When I feel Ember's rear hooves strike the ground, I relax and let myself sit back as he brings his front hooves down as well, landing in a canter that slows to a trot as the beating of his wings gradually subsides and his strong legs take over. He wheels in a circle, drops to a walk, and folds his wings along his back. A perfectly executed landing, and I barely had to nudge him with my mind. I can hear his smugness in his whinny. I ignore it, given over to my own anxiousness and embarrassment.
    I give my audience a somewhat desultory wave and slide from my seat. The girls who had scattered at my approach are reforming into groups and heading to me as if Ember's beautiful wings exert some magnetic attraction. There's altogether too much fuss already for my tastes, too much giggling and shouting, but then, I suppose I was asking for it. It's a relief when Cecily and Esther come to the forefront. Those two won't make a silly fuss.  
    The other girls, mostly younger, hang back a bit as they come forward, not so much in awe of me, I suspect, as of Cecily. Of course, being a sixth former now, I suppose I too might be an important person in the eyes of the kids. I may not cover myself in glory in either scholastics or magic, but I'm not a bad fast bowler, good enough to hold my own in the first Eleven, in any case, and I've been in the first hockey team since last year. Still, I'm not nearly as impressive a figure as Cecily, Head of the Fifth last year, Senior Prefect and, far more importantly in the eyes of the school, Games Captain. Esther, too, is the best batsman Fernleigh Manor ever produced, as well as being possibly the prettiest girl in the school and a source of deliberate awe and terror to the little ones for more reasons than that.  
    The crush disperses a little at the sight of my grand company, although I'm still uncomfortably aware that there are a lot of eyes on me—or, at least, on my pegasus.
    "Oh, really, Charley, fancy flying him right down to the school courtyard like that!" My friend Cecily has a peculiarly welcoming smile, all straight white teeth, and a an agreeable Colonial accent. She doesn't remind me that it's strictly against the rules to bring magical creatures into the school grounds; she knows very well that I know, and she wouldn’t knock me in front of the