A/N: Hello! Here is the next chapter...hope that you all enjoy it. A special thanks to Project Team Beta for the help!

Disclaimer: Twilight and its characters do not belong to me. This plot and the characters it presents do belong to me.


"You know, you're awfully dumb." - My Best Girl, 1927

BPOV

Autumn came fast in Maine. The trees were a kaleidoscope of dark greens, reds, oranges, and yellows. Leaves littered the grass, and every so often, a gust of wind would catch a bit of foliage in it's arms and together they would dance in midair. My teacher, Mr. Harris, droned on about something or other in the background. I wasn't paying attention. Instead, I watched the symphony of tree debris swirl lazily, my chin digging deeper into my palm as the minutes ticked loudly from the clock on the back wall.

How long till school let out? Too long. It was only second period, and already, I could tell today was going to be a long day.

I sighed quietly, looking away from the window for a moment to see what the class was doing. Mr. Harris must have told us to get out our book because everyone was digging around their backpacks for them. I did the same and placed mine on the faded and defaced desk.

Pushing his glasses up his long and shiny nose, Mr. Harris instructed us to turn to page 280 and scanned the seating chart for his first victim. My classmates shrunk down in their seats, slouching, and trying to make themselves as small as possible. No one liked reading in class, especially this class. Mr. Harris was a tyrant, armed with a dry erase marker that he threw at students who didn't read loud enough, well enough, fast enough or a combination of the three. He also had the rude habit of over-pronouncing syllables in certain words while the reader read them.

His magnified eyes locked on Susan, a nervous girl by nature, and smiled. "You, read." She looked ready to vomit; her chair creaked as she fidgeted but started reading in a low, quivering voice. Mr. Harris frowned, impatient, and said,"Louder."

Susan's shoulders jerked and she started again, louder this time. "'A small upper bedroom in the home of Reverend Samuel Parris, Salem, Massachusetts, in the spring of the year 1692.'"

I rolled my eyes; The Crucible.

Mr. Harris nodded, satisfied with the volume, and said MASS-A-CHU-SETTS in such a ridiculous way that even Leonard, the class kiss ass, snickered. I ignored them and turned back to my window. Outside, the wind howled, stripping boughs and exposing naked limbs. My mind wandered, and it was no surprise where it wandered to-Shadow Lake, back to summer.

Lately, all my thoughts ended up there, circling around everything Jo told me and that hooded man.

I had been terrified when he grabbed me. I knew that kind of speed, but where their eyes had always been golden and warm, his were red. The color hinted to something darker than I cared to explore at the time but now, I couldn't stop thinking about it. He had been angry, I felt it, but there was something else underneath. Affection? Duty? I couldn't be sure. His thoughts had been fuzzy and scattered, like a flurry of static on a broken television set. The only clear picture was me, or really, my face, but it wasn't really my face. I looked different, older, sad... broken. He warned me that they would come for me. "Watch for the signs,"he had said ,gripping my shoulders. "Wait and trust few."

Blood Moon.

A dying sun.

Dhampir.

Burning veins.

I kept them to myself for as long as could, these signs, wondering who these people were. When I finally told Jo, she said nothing, but her face fell and that day Nanna Cora was at our door. The first full moon after the harvest was often called a Blood Moon, I had read. It was an omen of death among our kind, but I reasoned that it could mean anything; these signs were so vague and obscure. Though, the very idea of burning veins made me cringe. I waited, paid attention and watched all summer, without knowing what I was looking for. Jo believed that I'd know, instinctively, when a sign presented itself. I wasn't so sure. Everything in my life seemed to be written in riddles. Couldn't, just once, something be explained in plain English? Like; Hey, these people are coming for you on the eighth of May. Nice knowing ya.

Things were never that clear.

And it was October. Weren't warnings typically about things a little more imminent?

Isabella.

The voice intruded, putting a stop to the circles I was thinking in, and I sat up straighter. I could hear my name being said angrily, and I wondered if it was that hooded man again. I never did get his name. My eyes flicked to the patch of grass where I had been watching the leaves and found it empty.

Isabella!

It was getting louder.

Something hit the side of my face, and it took me a few minutes to realize that it was a marker.

"Isabella!" Mr. Harris shouted, suddenly standing by my desk, red-faced with his glasses slipping off his nose. I scrunched up mine; his aftershave was noxious, and he always wore too much. "Have you been paying attention? No, you haven't! Don't think of lying to me. If you had been paying attention, you would have heard me call you four times!"

"Sorry." I leaned over and picked up the marker from where it had rolled after its collision with my face.

He hemmed and waddled back to his desk. "We need an Abigail." He smiled. "And I was thinking you'd be PER-FECT for the part, now that you're back from communing with the spirits."

The class laughed, and I glared at my teacher, whose head was swirling with images of me in 17th century puritan grab. His mocking tone was insulting enough but... Abigail? She was an orphan, conniving and wicked down to the bone marrow. She slept with a married man and, fleetingly, he wondered if I would as well.

They're all the same, those women. Devil worshiping whores, every one, he thought loudly.

I was tempted to push back his chair as he sat down but let him sit, unharmed, squeezing the marker to redirect some of my anger. Really, it was of little use being good, behaving and ignoring temptation. Mr. Harris had made up his mind about me long before I ever walked into his classroom, and nothing would change it. He hated us all. Jo insisted it wasn't hate, though it felt a lot like hate to me. I showed restraint because it was what was expected of me, out of all of us. It was never easy, especially living amongst such idiots.

Most of the time the "normal" citizens gave us a wide berth, crossed the street if we happened to be walking in their direction, chose seats in class furthest away, and avoided any contact, but these fall months brought out the worst in them. Soon, a stone would be thrown, a prank pulled on one us, a name called... perhaps several. It was the same, every year.

"Well? Begin, Isabella." He pronounced my name IS-A-BELL-A, slowly, as if I was a dimwitted child eating paste.

Stupid witch bitch.

The voice drew my attention and eyes from the fat, middle-aged man to the first desk in the first row; Leonard Conrad. His expression was cocky, pleased with his "clever" bit of rhyming. Temptation flared again and this time I didn't resist. Leonard yelped loudly. Immediately, his eyes flicked to mine, accusingly, mouth hanging open like a fish out of water, right hand pressed to his reddened cheek.

"You stupid witch bitch!" He lashed out as soon as his shock receded. "She... she slapped me!"

He was right, but I said nothing and stared at him blandly, enjoying the looks of lunacy my accuser was getting.

"Bitch!"

I flinched at the shrillness of his voice; puberty wasn't kind to him. And the word-bitch was such a degrading word.

I frowned and shook my head. "You shouldn't talk about your mom that way, Leonard."

The tips of his ears went white and the class erupted in laughter. Mr. Harris rose from his desk, flustered and shouting ,"SET-TLE down ,class! E-NOUGH. IS-A-BELL-A, principal's office now!"

I gathered my things and took the blue slip from Mr. Harris' meaty hand. Under "reason(s) for being sent to the principal's office,"it read: Disrupting Class, Disrespectful and Witchcraft.

Idiot.On my way out, I smiled sweetly at Leonard, who shrank back in his chair. All the way down the hall, I could hear him complaining about being itchy, so terribly itchy.

When I got to the main office - a depressing beige room filled with all the things high school offices were filled with: mailboxes, flag poles, receptionists and stuffy air- Vi was sitting in one of the lemon yellow chairs. Mrs. Hill gave us both a disapproving look and motioned for me to sit with a sharp jerk of her chin.

Vi looked up at me but didn't say a word. I could feel the anger pouring off her, but knowing my cousin, I didn't ask.

Out of all of us, Viola was the one who rebelled against what she was-what we all were-the most. She wanted to be normal, and I could sympathize with her, most days, but what was normal, really? Where was that definition? She also happened to be the only one of my cousins to dislike me on sight. I could never find the reason, as hard as I tired. The deeper I dug, the deeper she buried it, the tighter she held on. She didn't talk to me for weeks when I first got to Maine and started a rumor at school with her little friends that I was crazy, and had gotten locked up in loony bin for killing some girl. It was accidental, of course, she had assured them, but that didn't change a how people saw me. Needless to say, it was hard to develop a sisterly bond with her after that. Blood, and blood alone kept her tied to me.

"The only history these people," she sneered, "subscribe to is the one they write down. It's the blind leading the blind around here."

"Tell me about it," I responded, sitting next to her. Double glass doors led to the outside world, to freedom, and I considered, for a moment, walking through them. I decided against it in the end, it was too early. Crossing my legs, I traced the crochet pattern of my dress, my red tights contrasting vividly as they popped through the open weave where the underlay and scalloped hem failed to meet.

"Forget ever trying to correct them. No, do that and you're marched to the office like a criminal." Classically over-dramatic, she envisioned herself as a stoic and composed Marie Antoinette, being escorted to the guillotine.

"Using profanity, multiple times, in the classroom seems to be okay though."

She arched a perfectly plucked brow. "Who was it this time?" I told her, and she cursed under her breath, drawing the judgmental eyes of the receptionist.

"The Conrads are such douche bags."

Too bad the Conrads ran the town.

"I hate this place. Can't wait till I can get the hell away from here."

I pulled my sleeves down over my hands and nodded. "Me too."

She held out her hand for my slip, and I handed it over without a thought. "He actually wrote 'witchcraft'. What a tit. Dana was in here earlier for laughing at Coach Carson."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Apparently he tripped and she laughed, which obviously means she made him fall."

"Obviously," I supplied with a shrug.

It was a standing tradition to lay blame on our doorstep whenever some minor or major misfortune befell the good people of Black Tree. No one knew anything for sure, and no one could remember when exactly they began to fear us. One of my great, great, great aunts must have done something scandalous. But after three hundred years, it was easier to follow the previous generations in their prejudices. They suspected, gossiped over white picket fences and told their children to stay away from us, lest they be snatched up and eaten.

Witches made good scapegoats and villains in precautionary tales.

The door separating Principal Richards' office opened then, and out poured the stench of cannabis and unwashed hair. Chris Hardwick stumbled out of the office, his eyes red and glazed. When he caught sight of us, a lazy smile raised two deep dimples in his cheeks and his heart kicked into overtime. In his ganja-induced stupor, he saw the world in vivid hallucinations. The walls were vibrating. The bulletin board, laden with flyers behind us, was a riot of quivering color. Vi and I looked radiant, our eyes shimmering, and around us there was a halo of gold and blue light.

"Wicked, beautiful ladies."

"Not if hell froze over," Vi snapped, glaring at the boy.

The principal addressed us with a wan smile, explaining that he'd be with us in a minute, then began giving instructions to Mrs. Hill on how to get Chris home. He was stoned off his ass and couldn't be trusted to drive. When he finished, he ushered us into his office and shut the door. Before uttering another word, he walked to the windows and propped all four open to let the pungently sweet odor out.

"All I need now is Lila sitting out there to have the complete set," he said, taking his seat. "Hand them over, ladies."

We surrendered our blue slips. He read each slip carefully, his light green eyes growing sharper with each word. A crease formed in between his thick brows; an expression he must have done often because his skin remembered the folds well. His lips silently mouthed the word witchcraft before turning down in a disappointed frown.

"There are always two sides of a story," he said finally, steepling his hands in front of his mouth. "Which one of you would like to go first?"

Mr. Richards was a fair man, had always had been, from what I gathered, and he paid little attention to town gossip or our infamy. He went to school with our mothers, grew up a stone throw's away from our house (in a house that was torn down right before he started high school because of it's proximity to us),so he was familiar with what people said. He believed, much as he did when he was a kid, that we were just like everyone else, albeit a bit strange, but saw no reason why this strangeness was a bad thing.

Vi spoke first, and her explanation was riddled with anger that had yet to cool. Her teacher, an old crone by the name of Mrs. Kraus, had been preaching the many righteous attributes of 16th century witch hunters and their methods. Vi had exploded and I didn't blame her, but her "defense" of our kind was surprising, and frankly, rare. At school, she always detached herself from anything remotely...witchy. I did my best to calm her down, and when she was finished, she shot me a grateful look and a reluctant smile.

It was more than she ever gave me.

"I'm sorry, Viola," Mr. Richards soothed, swallowing hard and picking up the pink pad tossed on his messy desk. "Unfortunately, I have to give you detention for calling Mrs. Kraus a," his eyes flicked down to the blue slip in his hand and quoted, "'Ignorant zealot with shit for brains.' I understand how her remarks could have angered you, however, she is still your teacher, and you need to respect her."

With the rip of the perforated detention slip, he dismissed Vi, and she went sullenly. He turned to me and took a deep breath. In his thoughts, he could not help but note how much I resembled my mother, and somewhat begrudgingly how I had my father's imposing presence. I learned then and there that he had, briefly, been my mother's boyfriend. It had been an adolescent infatuation on both sides broken up by his parents. When my dad moved to Black Tree, my mom forgot about him and his grape soda-flavored kisses.

It was disorienting, seeing the past and the future he vaguely imagined... a little disturbing too.

"I have all of Jo's girls under one roof this year. Time flies," he commented lightly, looking down at my slip. "How do you like high school so far... Bella? You like being called Bella, right?"

I nodded, "It's... ok."

I had been a freshmen for a month, and I hated it. The school work wasn't hard; I liked to learn. I hated everything that came with school. At least no one had written on my locker, yet.

"I've been in this game long enough to know that 'ok' is teenage code for 'I hate it here.' What happened in class today?"

I explained, truthfully, that I hadn't been paying attention, how Mr. Harris had thrown a marker at me and mocked me and implied that I was this town's Abigail Williams. His eyes widened when I told him that Mr. Harris had written up my slip before I had even said a word to Leonard Conrad, who had insulted me twice without any kind of reprimand. I ignored the accusation of witchcraft, because, as far as Mr. Harris knew, I was only guilty of daydreaming and glaring at him.

"What did Leonard Conrad call you, Bella?"

"A bad word."

"Which one?" He looked up from his notepad and fixed his eyes on mine. "What exactly did he call you?"

"A stupid witch bitch," I said without hesitation.

It was unfortunate that those two words rhymed. There was even a little song the kids sang to us.

You're a witch

You're a bitch

Burn the witch

Hang the bitch

Mr. Richards recalled a time when those same hurtful words had been hurled at my mother in grade school and shook his head.

"It would seem to me that Mr. Conrad should be in here and not you. Mr. Harris has complained about you quite a lot. Any idea why?"

I shrugged,and he turned to his computer, clicking and typing away until he found whatever he was looking for. "You're a bright girl. Your grades have always been excellent. You do your work and show up to class, even if you don't join class discussions. No other teachers have complained about you, nor have they raved. Mr. Harris is the only one. Amidst the ridiculous complaints in such a short amount of time, only one stands out to me. Why do you have a such hard time paying attention in his class? Honestly."

I debated on how to phrase my answer. Mr. Harris was condescending and rude, a terrible combination alone, but his intelligence made the man a total nightmare. Teaching freshmen AP Lit wasn't what he had envisioned for himself. When he was my age, he dreamt of Harvard, lecture halls, corncob pipes and corduroy patches on his elbows. Bitter teachers were dangerous ones, and the man gave me the oddest feeling, as if with each shrewd glance he was watching, waiting for the first chance to lash me to a stake and light the match.

I settled with the easiest answer. "I already know what he's going over."

"The work is too easy for you." He typed some more and scanned his screen. Through his eyes, I could see that he had pulled up Mrs. Beevers' class and wondered who she was. "In my experience, when smart students fail to pay attention it means that he or she isn't being challenged enough. Do you agree?" I nodded, and he frowned. "You don't say much do you?"

"Only as much as I have to."

He wasn't sure if what I'd said was a joke or not. When he realized that I was serious, his thoughts and eyes shifted. My school records from Forks were open on his computer. Why he bothered to look at first and second grade reports was beyond me, but when he scanned the notes at the bottom of the document, I understood. Every incident was recorded. My teachers had expressed their concern and recommended a psychosocial evaluation, attributing my silence to an unresolved traumatic experience. Mr. Richards knew what that traumatic experience was.

She was only six. he thought, remembering my father pushing my stroller around town. I cleared my throat, uncomfortable with what he planned to say next. I didn't want to talk to him. He was a decent guy, but there was no need to get any closer.

Sensing my discomfort, he changed his mind and grabbed a white pad and began scribbling as he spoke. "I'm putting you in 10th grade Lit. It's not an AP class but it is a challenging one, and the only lit class this period. I don't want to shift your whole schedule. Mrs. Beevers is a great teacher and... How can I put this..." He conjured an image of her; curly wild head of brown hair, flowy dresses and tribal printed coats that smelled of pine needles and patchouli. "She didn't grow up around here and keeps an open mind."

Just as my cousin had done, I took the slips he offered, both the blue and the white, and gathered my bag. As I was about to leave, Mr. Richards spoke.

"Isabella."

"Yeah?" I turned, my hand still on the door knob, wondering what had prompted the formal use of my name when he knew I preferred Bella.

If you ever need to talk, I'll listen. "Stay out of trouble, ok?"

I watched as his cheeks flushed, and he awkwardly straightened the papers on his desk before nodding.

"Ok."

By lunch, the whole campus was buzzing, Vi's old rumor dusted off and recirculated. News of what I had "done" to Leonard was served up with embellishments and a sizable serving of gelatinous gravy, boxed mashed potatoes and petrified chicken fried steak. Dana and Vi sat at their usual table, but the swarm of boys and girls buzzing around them was visibly thin. From across the cafeteria, Vi was inadvertently apologizing to me, for small things and big ones, stabbing her food with a plastic fork as a boy talked to her about some dance that was coming up. When our eyes met, she looked away and started talking to Dana, who seemed a bit downcast by the lack of attention, from both the male and female population of the student body.

"Heard you were in Richards' office second period," Lila commented, unpacking her lunch. "Did you really give it to Conrad?"

"Yes." She had been there right after me, for arguing with a teacher who hated to be contradicted. "It wasn't an accident either."

"Shit! I wish I could've seen the look on his face. He's a douche, always has been." In her head, she relived the day Leonard Conrad dumped a pail of water on us, hoping we would melt. "Still, Jo won't be happy, what with all of us getting in trouble today. Richards will probably call her."

He already had.

"I'm not looking forward it." A dull ache was starting behind my eyes, and the voices were starting to get in. "I'm going to have to clean out the stillroom. Again."

"What I am going to get?"

"Attic," I answered, quickly. She grimaced; she hated it up there.

And them?

"No boys." Her eyes bugged out; this was new for Jo. "For a week."

"Even Dana? Did she get caught blowing some guy in gym? Come on to Mr. Richards?" Her eyebrows wagged suggestively."You know how much she likes old Principal Richards."

"Dana too, but I don't know why."

"Hmm, how will they survive?" Lila peeked over her shoulder at our cousins, "God, they look so depressed, you'd think someone died." With her fork, she stabbed a chunk of chicken and waved it in front of her like a paint brush. "I think I'll call this painting The Death of Popularity."

"My condolences," I murmured, lifting a carrot stick to my mouth, chewing it thoughtfully.

She was right. The two of them were practically in mourning. Lila was an outcast, artists always were. I, well, I was never going to be anyone's idea of a friend. We were used to rejection, they weren't.

"Any chance I can talk my way into cleaning the stillroom with you?"

Ignoring Dana and Vi, I pinched my fingers together in front of her face. "A small one... if you're really nice about it."

We spent the rest of our lunch like we always did, Lila drawing on my arm while I told her about something I had read the night before, but the whispering and pointing was harder to ignore today. Every eye, it seemed, was on us, watching, judging and gossiping.

"Ever wonder why Jo makes us go to school anyway?" Lila asked, shaking out her left hand, before continuing her design. "Between her and Nik we'd learn more than we ever would here."

"I think it's so we don't miss out on life experiences... or something like that."

"I could do without the experience of high school," she muttered, throwing a filthy look at a group of girls who had been staring far too long.

"I don't think we're the only ones who feel like that."

For once, I was grateful for the bell that ended lunch. At least I was grateful until I saw my locker. Across the thickly painted surface was a word, black and huge:

WITCH