Author's Note: This chapter contains a few small jabs at the general 2nd generation writerbase. Please, please don't kill me.

Chapter Seven: Brightly

School had been out for hours when she was called to the office, that was how she knew she was in some really deep trouble.

Claire sighed, rose out of her bed, and changed from her red flannel pajamas into a royal purple baby doll dress that was one of the few things she had in her closet that Rei thought was Cloud Tower appropriate. She slipped on her black flats and headed out to meet Headmistress Griffin in her office.

She was worried about getting lost, but apparently since she was in trouble, the school contorted itself in such a way that getting from her dungeon-level dorm to the main office took about a minute. Claire sighed. Why couldn't they put magic that powerful and, okay, cool to use doing something like building prisons? The Omega Dimension was supposed to be all creepy and evil, but hello! There had been seven breakouts in this century alone!

The door opened as she lifted her well-manicured hand to knock, and Griffin looked down at her. "Why hello," she said. "Come in."

Claire did, even when she wanted to curl up into a little ball. "Sit down," Griffin encouraged, then paused before adding, "And for Dragon's sake will you stop looking that nervous?"

"I'm… sorry." Claire looked down meekly and brushed the dark red waves out of her face.

Griffin rolled her eyes. "I can see I was right to call you in here. I'm going to venture and say that Cloud Tower wasn't your first choice. What was it- parental pressure? Darker forces working in your life? The price tag?"

"A boy," she whispered.

"The classic." The headmistress stood. "Claire, when I reviewed your application, I flagged you as a potential 'pressure entrant.' However… have you seen the scores of your magic preexamination?"

"No."

She handed Claire a piece of heavy cardstock paper. "An important part in the difference between fairy magic and witch magic is how you channel it. Your power, your personality, your… hair… they all scream fairy in a way that makes me want to label you a disappointment and send you to the bottom classes. However, you channel like a real witch- and your power is at the top of the charts. Almost off of it."

Her nearly-clawed hand slammed onto the desk. "Claire, we want you here at the Cloud Tower School. And I believe I have an idea that will satisfy both of us."

"What?" Claire asked, mainly because she was probably expected to. She was having a little trouble keeping up with the headmistress. Because there was no way she could be powerful enough for Griffin to be practically begging her to remain at the school.

But Griffin didn't see that. "Earth witchcraft. Not something I'd normally teach… but it may be the right fit for you. Frilly as fairy magic, but it's a lot more practical. And it doesn't involve any wings." She shuddered. "Whatever happened to good, old fashioned levitation, I'll never know."

Claire shuffled her feet. "What's that mean for me?"

"Private lessons, Miss Claire. Instead of going to your scheduled classes, you will report to the office next to this one. We will start tomorrow."

"Do I get to cancel out on my roommate, too?" the suddenly happier witch-in-training asked eagerly.

"No," Griffin replied.

Grace was in tears by the time they met up with Story and Lara at the restaurant. "I don't have a sister! I can't! It's not possible!" She took a deep, shaky breath. "My name is Grace of Zenith. My Earth name is Grace Ramona Smith, but I only go by that during summers- which I've spent without fail on Earth with Morgan and the rest of her family while my parents, Tecna and Riven of Zenith, do humanitarian work on less fortunate planets."

Lara looked confused. "Is Grace having a meltdown? Cause I don't remember that being in the friendship contract."

"We met someone who looked almost exactly like her," Morgan summarized… leaving out the kissing bits. "Her name is Rainier of Melody, she goes to Cloud Tower, and- get this- she claims that Grace is her younger sister."

Grace was still going on. "I am sixteen years old, I am a commoner. I am the next guardian fairy of Zenith. I am in love with Morgan Nebula Day."

Morgan gaped. Lara gaped. Story said, "I knew it!"

Morgan turned to her roomie. "How did you know…?"

"Oh, it's pretty much the way you look at each other, talk about each other, the way you have your arm around her right now. Don't worry. I'm really observant, I'm a writer, I sort of have to be. I don't think anyone else noticed it."

"I didn't," Lara offered.

"Don't worry, Morgan. We won't tell until you're ready to let it out."

Morgan smiled a teeny bit. "You may be waiting a while. You're both totally cool with this? For sure?"

"Well, this is just the Wicca Wannabe speaking," Lara said jokingly, "but I think it's completely and utterly romantic. Now, let's focus on that later. For now, what do we do about Grace?"

"Let's get some food into her. From there… maybe we could find some information about this girl?" Story frowned. "Really, I have no clue."

Morgan kissed Grace.

When she pulled back, Grace was still a little hyper, but for a different reason. "Wow," she said. "In front of people we know and everything. You really do care about me."

Morgan frowned. "Was that in question, because you never told me it was?"

"No… it's just… never mind. What do we do about this Rainier girl?"

The fairy of communications wiped the last of the tears from her eyes. "Leave it to me. Anyone have a cell phone?"

Story dug a small, circular pod out of her pocket. She touched the center, and a holigram expanded like a map unfolding. "What do you need it for?" she asked curiously.

"I can hack into the network from it and access the Cloud Tower archives, now that they've went digital with them. It's really all a matter of finding out who accessed them last and what password they used and all that. Your phone connects to the witch wide web, right, Story?"

Lara whistled. "Never pegged Gracie as a geek?"

"It's in my blood," the girl smiled. "My power goes more into the social aspect of technology, though. I interned at Fairybook last year, you know."

"Do you roleplay?" Lara asked.

Grace blushed. "Only with Morgan."

"I didn't mean that sort of roleplay," Lara snickered, biting her lower lip to keep from laughing.

Morgan sighed. "She didn't either. She's kind of self-conscious about her writing. I'm really the only one allowed to see it." Grace nodded agreement, still red as a tomato.

Then, she turned to the phone, and got to work. Within five minutes, she had connected, and the group had gathered around the small device. A little bit too dramatically, Morgan typed in "Rainier of Melody." The search results came quickly and a little bit overwhelmingly.

Magic name: Rainier of Melody

Earth name: Rainier Cadence Malison

Age: 17

Occupation: Student witch.

"Okay," Lara commented. "I'm sure we've learned some stuff, but this isn't a baseball card."

Story laughed. Morgan looked at her like she was crazy. "What's so funny?"

"Malison is another word for curse," Story giggled. "It just seems, I dunno, ironic that a witch would have that as her Earth name. It's not exactly a word you use in everyday conversation or anything. It's olde. With an 'e' and everything."

"And we have two geeks in the club," Lara said, rolling her eyes.

Grace was busy tapping something out on the phone's holographic keyboard. "What do we want to know? GPA? Childhood traumas? Criminal record?"

"Let's see if she's really related to you before we do anything else," Morgan advised.

"Okay… but… maybe you should look. I don't know if I can do it."

Morgan took the phone and scrolled through the information. A long moment passed. Then, "Grace… don't freak… but can I have permission to murder your sister?"

Grace drew in a sharp breath, and Story gave her a quick hug. "Don't worry. We'll figure this out."

"I don't get it," Grace said. "I mean, you'd think I'd know I had a sister… and, no offense, or anything, but why do you and Lara care? We just met you today…"

"Story and I met yesterday," Morgan inputted.

"And we're already almost like best friends. It's so… improbable."

Lara sighed. "There goes beauty-is-a-geek again. And while I don't exactly know the answer to your question or anything, it just sort of feels right, you know? Maybe we're, like, part of a prophecy or something."

"I second that," Story said. "This feels right. Weird, cause I assume you don't normally bear your soul and bawl your eyes out to people you've known for eight hours only, but… yeah, it feels like it's meant to be."

"It's the Winx Club all over again," Morgan grinned.

"The Winx Daughters," Grace corrected.

Morgan shook her head. "Anya and Dafne coined that phrase. And while I love them… in a special, angry way… I don't think we'll be really spending that much time with them outside the dorm. We need a new name. A new group. A new beginning."

"It's a renaissance," Story said. "Now, let's think on this later. Right now, we've got an expedition to plan."

"What expedition?" Lara asked.

"A top secret one, one that puts us in the footsteps of the Winx and could possibly get us suspended. We're going to break into Cloud Tower School, because, online archives or not, that's the place that's going to hold all the answers… or, at least, most of them."

Story raised her water glass. "To the yet unnamed group of friends!"

And three other fairies followed suit.