He carries me back to the school in the early hours of the morning. I am drowsy and languid, and he kisses me softly as he places me back on my bed. Ann shifts in her sleep and we hold our breath for a moment, terrified as to what would happen if she were to wake. But she does not.

He kisses me once more and then is gone, and I roll over, facing the wall, and think about the events of the night. I remember Benedek, and how my sister loved him. I remember the vile man who tried to touch me and make me his own. But most of all I remember the warm hands and soft lips and breathy moans of Kartik.

I still have my virtue. He blankly refused to 'flaw' me in that manner, and I am grateful for it, even though, at the time, I was passionate and irresponsible and drunk with desire.

Kartik is a far more powerful spirit than rum could ever be.

We kissed each other and we touched each other and we held each until we slumbered, and then I woke as he carried me softly back through the forest. I remember vaguely seeing the pink blush of dawn slant through the trees, remember the feeling of fresh new warmth on my skin.

I remember Kartik.

Felicity immediately notices something different when Ann and I meet her and Pippa for breakfast. Pippa is wearing a diamond on her finger, and looks broken hearted and hollow. The other girls notice the ring and crowd round her until she dully announces her engagement. Mrs Nightwing, of course, knew all about it, and smiles proudly as she calls for congratulations. Pippa tries to smile, but her true feelings are clear on her face.

"Who is he? Is he handsome? Pippa, why on earth are you crying? Are you really so spoilt that you are angry because the diamond isn't big enough?" Cecily smirks, and I feel a new rush of hate towards her. Felicity notices the barbed comment too, and accidentally steps on the hem of her dress, causing her to sprawl inelegantly over the marble floor of the great hall. Cecily is chided for her carelessness, and Felicity is now the one to smirk.

I am thinking throughout the day about what my sister said about Kartik. Shut him out. Treat him professionally. I do not think that my behaviour last night was all that professional. It certainly wasn't respectable. Not what proper English girls do in the depths of the nighttime. Proper English girls sleep dreamlessly, with a peg on their nose to stop the snores escaping.

Is Fee a proper English girl? Technically, yes. She is pretty, clever, witty, and, academically, achieves a great deal. But yet she is wild and rude and poisonous too. She kissed me passionately, and meets with many men, and is so different form anyone that I have ever known that I do not know how to compare her to anyone. Or anything.

Pippa is different. Pippa is spoilt and selfish and vain, but she is also caring and romantic and sweet. She is longing for her Prince Charming, for the knight that will come and sweep her off her feet, with his chiselled good looks and gallant behaviour. From my experience, such a man does not exist.

Ann, on the other hands, desires what we all already have. She wants to be wealthy, and respected, and to have opportunities in life beyond caring for other people's children. She wants to be one of us, and, try as we might, we cannot alter the fact that she is not.

Life can be so cruel.

Kartik is in my room that night. Ann enters a few seconds before me and I can see the panic flash across her face, like a child caught stealing from a wealthy man's pocket. She glances from me to him, and then squeaks something about how she forgot her book, and races from the room.

"Gemma!" Kartik calls to me, and I race after her and grab her arm just before she begins down the stairs.

"Ann, please, don't tell anyone. Please, don't tell Mrs Nightwing!"

Her eyes widen, and she smiles awkwardly before shifting in my grasp and uttering the words, "Gemma, don't be ridiculous. I just ... wanted to leave you alone. I was getting in the way."

It is true, but I do not want to agree with her. She still believes we only put up with her because we are sympathetic, and I know that she still hates herself. She doesn't think she belongs anywhere.

"Ann, you needn't have left, he was quite alright ... you were the one that wasn't."

A thousand different expressions flit across her face as she realises this. But then she smiles wickedly, reminding me so much of Felicity that I am quite shaken, and whispers slickly, "Yes, but Gemma, if I haven't seen anything then there is nothing I can tell Mrs Nightwing. I think it is better this way." And she walks off.

I stand staring at her for a few seconds, and then remember why she ran off so suddenly, and hurry back to Kartik. He finds the key to the door and locks it, flicking the metal in such a way as to be completely silent. I sit on the bed nervously, not quite sure where to look.

"Have you news?" I ask, at a loss for anything else to say.

"Not quite," he says, with a chuckle, that fires up my cheeks. "No, not quite. I merely came to check that you were ... quite well."

"Thank you for your kindness. I am, as you put it, quite well." I try to remain formal, but his put-on pious face is hilarious.

"Wonderful, Miss Doyle. Spiffing, in fact. I shall take your leave now, unless you wish for me to be detained so that we can discuss matters such as Ascot, or fashionable hats?"

I giggle, and he moves towards me. "I wish to detain you, unfortunately, my dear Mr Kartik. Though not to discuss fashionable hats."

"Good, because I don't know of any." He sits next to me, places his hand on my knee and slides it silkily up my thigh, crumpling the skirt of my dress. His other hand finds my waist, and I forget everything my sister told me, everything she advised me, everything that I know for myself, and sink into to the kiss.

It is long, slow and delicious. He smiles lazily as we break away, and then his fingertips graze part of my thigh and I shudder and moan involuntarily.

"Goodness, Miss Doyle, if Mrs Nightwing were to see you now." I remember these words from before, murmured from Felicity's lips, and I think of her for a second. I wonder what she would do. I wonder what she has already done. And I relax and smile and whisper back to him.

"Please, Kartik ... please."

"If you are referring to what I think you are referring to, then the answer is 'no', I am afraid."

"Why?"

"I couldn't do it. Not to you. Never to you. It would destroy you in a way that you could never comprehend until all men refuse to marry you and your family disown you and you are left alone and regretful."

"I could never regret you. Felicity does not regret it."

He sits back for a moment, a curious expression in his eyes. "Really? Miss Worthington? I cannot say I am surprised. But, Gemma, darling, this is not a competition. Is it, now?"

In my head, it is. Fee is always testing us, daring us, wordlessly mocking us. I feel I have to prove myself to her somehow. So I press into him and stroke his chest, his back, his face. He smiles, presses my fingers to his lips, and sinks down onto me, pushing me into the soft blankets that cover my bed. I remember the first time I saw him, how scared and panicked and furious I felt. How guilty.

Do I feel guilt anymore?

I think the answer is no.

I am moaning and whimpering and gently breathing, entangled in his hair and arms and legs and eyes. The blankets are growing warm and crumpled, our bodies get closer to each other, desperately trying to fulfil this gnawing hunger inside of us that we know, deep down, will only be satisfied with one thing. He takes my earlobe gently in his mouth and bites it softly. I giggle, melt into his hands on my back and on my hair and on my legs. His mouth leaves my ear and trails sweet seductive kisses down my neck, past my collarbone, until he reaches the barrier of my neckline. He glances up, a question in his eyes, and I nod soundlessly. His hands fumble at my dress, pulling it down over my body, tugging at the laces of my corset. I feel a great pressure relieved from my ribs as it falls to the floor, and as I look down, I can see the garment that I so despise being creased and wrinkled by his body. His lifts me gently, in my chemise, and places me on the bed tenderly, before laying on top of me and pushing my thighs apart with his knee. I wrap my legs around him, murmuring and moaning sweet empty words into the spirals of his ear, and he shudders violently and pulls my hips closer. I simply melt.

But he does not. He will not. I always knew it. With a regretful and reluctant sigh, he climbs off of me, shaking the wild and passionate thoughts from his head. I wonder if he looks at me in the same way that I look at him, or whether he really does speak the truth when he says that he does not care for me personally.

I wonder how he can kiss me like that if it is the truth.

I wonder how he can kiss me at all.

We enter the realms again that night. To my surprise, Evelyn is not waiting for me by the tree. I call out her name half heartedly, praying inwardly that she will not appear, and that I will be left to dance and play and hope and dream and fail with my friends. After a few silent minutes, I give up. She will know where to find me.

We are to play blind mans bluff. I am blindfolded, albeit reluctantly, with a handkerchief conjured from a rose petal. The silk is a lustrous ruby red, and feels soft next to my skin as it is tied around my eyes by Felicity. I bite my lip as I remember the silky, petal soft lips of my gypsy boy, and I know that I am blushing. I can sense Felicity's smirk through the fabric, and she leans close and whispers seductively into my ear, "Now, Miss Doyle, what is the blushing for? Surely you have nothing to fear?" I feel her mouth on mine, hear the muted gasps of Pippa and Ann in the background, and taste the sweetness of her tongue. I don't know why she kisses me, and that is the beauty of it all.

We simply do not know anything.

She spins me 16 times, the number of years I have been on this earth, and then I hear her and the other girls scamper away through the undulating grass and gemtly swaying trees. I think of the hanging vines, what were to happen if I fell through them unknowingly, so I call out to them all to make sure that I do not approach them. Fee calls back, teasingly, "Buff!" but Pippa and Ann assure me that they will not. I follow the sounds of their voices, Pippa's sweet and melodic, Ann's motherly and sensible, Felicity's savage and jagged. I hear them retreating backwards, giggling merrily, all engagements and future employment forgotten as they enjoy being children again.

Enjoy being young, my dears; enjoy being young and carefree and foolish and happy and wild.

Oh, so wild.

I stumble upon something, something soft and smooth against my bare feet. It is warm and breathing, and I crouch instantly and run my hands along the silk of the dress, trying to work out which girl it is.

"Fee?"

"Pippa?"

"Ann?"

There is no reply. I call out to the other girls and hear three distinct shouts of "Buff!"

My heart is cold.

I rip the blindfold off, and find Evelyn, lying cold and dead and broken next to me. She is still breathing, yes, but her face is grey and her mouth is parted slightly. The green has faded from her eyes, leaving them dull and empty and soulless.

"Oh God, oh, Evelyn." I shake her slightly, harder now, even harder. Please, Oh God, please wake u,p please, if only to make me feel a fool for worrying so.

"Felicity! Ann! Pippa! Please!"

"Buff!"

"No, the game is over, I have found Evelyn, oh my, oh please, please help me. I don't know what is wrong with her!"

They stumble over to me, their faces draining as they catch sight of her face down in the grass. Pippa recoils, as if my sister is diseased, and I am furious.

"Pippa! Grow up and help me! Please!"

But I know that there is nothing they can do.

I think of the one person who could possibly help me now, the one person who could not use this to destroy me, and I know that I must find him.

I must go after Kartik.