Lexicon

current students going about their lessons. They are under instruction not to speak to you, so please don’t interpret this as rudeness.” She smiled.
    “Okay,” she said.
    “I must ask that you observe two rules for the duration of the examinations. You are not to leave the grounds, nor use the phones. These rules are quite important. Do you find them acceptable?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good!” She patted her lap, like she wanted a cat to sit there. “Well, then. For the rest of the day, you may simply settle in. Meet your fellow applicants, enjoy the facilities. The examinations will begin in the morning.”
    “I do have a question,” Emily said. “What’s the catch?”
    Charlotte’s eyebrows rose. She had good eyebrows. Like whips. “I beg your pardon?”
    “Well . . .” She gestured at the room. “This is kind of unbelievably good. I mean, I appreciate it, but if you’re going to ask me to shave my head or take my clothes off or something, I’d like to know.”
    Charlotte suppressed a smile. “We’re not a cult, I promise. We’re a school. We bring the best and the brightest here to help them reach their potential.”
    “Right,” Emily said.
    “You seem unconvinced.”
    “It doesn’t look like a school.”
    “Actually, it looks very much like a school. You may think otherwise because your experience has been limited to government-run child farms.” She leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “To me, those do not look very much like schools.” Emily wasn’t sure how to respond. Charlotte rose to her feet. “Well! Let me show you your room.”
    She picked up her bag. “I still think there’s a catch.”
    Charlotte pursed her lips. “If there must be a catch, we do only admit those who pass the examinations. Which are difficult.”
    “I’ll pass.”
    Charlotte smiled. “Well, then,” she said. “There’s no catch.”
    • • •
    She followed Charlotte through wood-paneled corridors and halls with far-off ceilings. She had never seen so many arches. Charlotte tapped a door with her fingernail. “My office.” A copper nameplate was engraved C. BRONTË . “Come to me with any questions or concerns, day or night.” There were more corridors. Through tall, slitted windows, she glimpsed kids in dark blue uniforms with hats and blazers. Maybe it did look like a school.
    Charlotte stopped outside a heavy wooden door. “Your room.”
    There was a small bed. A high, arched window. One old desk with a high-backed chair. The walls were stone, patches worn smooth by the palms of restless nuns.
    “A few of the others are about,” said Charlotte. “But I’ll let you find them in your own time.” She smiled, one hand draped on the door handle. “Dinner will be called at six.” The door closed.
    Emily let her bag drop. She went to the window and studied the mechanism until she figured out how to swing open the glass in two panels. She leaned out. A breeze tugged her hair.
Woods
was right. The trees were like pillars. You could get lost in there. Find a gingerbread house. Meet a witch.
    She needed the bathroom. She would have to find some of the other kids, check out the competition. But she stood awhile and watched the trees, because even if this whole deal turned out to be a scam, this moment here was really nice.
    • • •
    She peed and washed her hands and studied herself in the mirror. Her hair was like straw. She was wearing an outfit that looked worse the fancier her environment became and didn’t smell terrific, either. But aside from this, she did not seem completely out of place. She could possibly believe she was a person who regularly peed in bathrooms with twenty-foot ceilings. And then went out on her horse. “Relax,” she told the mirror, because her eyes were tense.
    She followed sounds of a television to a small room with sofas and cushions and a boy spread across them. He sat up as she entered. His hair was very curly. His clothes were new and bright and his collar was turned up. If they had something in common, she couldn’t see it.
    His eyes moved over her. He was probably thinking the same thing. “Hey,” he said.
    “Hi. Who are you?”
    “A guy. On a sofa.” He smiled. She hated him already. “You’re here for the tests?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Just arrived?”
    “Yeah.”
    “From where?”
    “San Francisco.”
    “Right,” he said. “And, uh, where in San Francisco?” He smiled again. That upturned collar, what was that?
    “Street.” He