I woke up to the sound of the running shower. I lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. I felt very well rested, but was reluctant to try to interpret what my dream meant or didn't mean. I glanced out the window, and my eyes widened. I had forgotten for a second that now I was a fledgling and I would be awake at night. The clock read seven pm.

The shower turned off and Brooke came out wearing a pink tee shirt and blue jeans. Her long hair lay damp down her back and she grinned at me. I sat up, my hair falling around to my waist and she gasped. "Oh, Goddess!" she said, her eyes wide. "Your hair! What did you do?"

"My—what—Brooke—huh?" I couldn't formulate a sentence. 'What is she talking about?' I wondered. Finally, I managed to choke out, "What do you mean?"

"Your hair is white," Brooke said. "Look in the mirror! I'm going to go get Egypt." Brooke ran out of the room, and I, totally lost, wandered into the bathroom, saw my reflection, and gasped like she had done before.

My hair was a pure white, shining silver. It was to my waist and perfectly straight. I touched it, and it was as soft and beautiful as velvet. I recalled the dream, with Nyx stroking my hair, and I made fists, my hands still buried in it.

"Ivory? Can I come in?" Egypt's low, clear voice called through the door. "Brooke said that I should come to meet you as soon as I could." She knocked on the door, three sharp raps. "Are you in there, Ivory?"

"Yeah," I replied, still touching my hair. "I'm in here. Come on in."

Egypt walked in, her dark hair waving around her shoulders. I was struck by how beautiful she was again. When she caught sight of my hair, she gasped. She just stared for a second, and then she recovered her manners and said, "Merry meet, Ivory."

Smiling because I knew what she was talking about, I answered courteously, "Merry meet, Egypt." I touched my hair again, and Egypt reached out and lightly touched it as well, caressing the locks. She whispered, "Blessed by Nyx. You are blessed by Nyx, girl. Do you have any idea what caused this?"

I remembered the dream—vision? —I had about Nyx. Quickly I explained it to Egypt, and when I got to, "she said she blessed me with spirit and was making me powerful," Egypt's eyes widened. She let me finish and then told me "We must see Isis now."

"Isis?" I asked her. "Who's Isis?"

"Isis is the High Priestess at this House of Night." Egypt took me by the arm, nodded to Brooke, and led me out and downstairs. "If Nyx has truly gifted you with Spirit—well, then you are truly an extraordinary fledgling."

We got to the temple, and I gasped. It was a beautiful place. There was a statue made of black marble of Nyx, and the temple was made of the same smooth material, just with silver flecks in it. Pillars lined the front. Egypt bowed her head before the Nyx statue for a second. I did the same, remembering that the goddess had given me powers.

"Merry meet, Isis," Egypt said. A woman was standing outside, and at first I hadn't noticed her because she had fit in so well with the rest of the temple. She had caramel skin and curly brown hair. She wore a black dress. "Merry meet, Ivory Labastria."

"Merry meet, Priestess," I said respectfully. I somehow knew what to call her and that this woman was connected to Nyx and deserved respect.

"You are indeed gifted by Nyx," Isis said, her dark eyes searching me. "Tell me about the dream you had, Ivory."

"How did you know?" I sputtered. "I only told Egypt about my dream with Nyx this morning! Do vampyres know telepathy or something?"

Isis laughed. "No, but most vampyres have a kind of psychic power, and mine is pretty good. I can't read your mind, but because both you and Egypt are thinking about the dream, I can tell that it was a dream or vision and that it's about Nyx."

I quickly summarized my dream. Isis seemed puzzled, but she said, "This means Nyx has gifted you and expects great things of you. You must not neglect your religious duties to her and do not let the goddess down."

I shook my head. "No, of course not. She has gifted me—obviously—and I will fulfill whatever duties the goddess wishes of me."

"Very good." Isis surveyed me, her eyes resting on my hair and finally on my mark. "I'm glad that you will serve Nyx well. In fact, I think you might be qualified to join the Dark Daughters. Would you care to become a member?"

"The—the Dark Daughters?"

"The Dark Daughters is an organization here. Only the most gifted fledglings may join. I believe that because Nyx has obviously chosen you, you belong here," Isis explained, looking pointedly at my mark.

"Oh," I said. "I'd love to join. Really."

Isis smiled serenely. "That's amazing. I'll tell Zara to contact you. Zara is the leader of the Dark Daughters. That also means that she is in training to be High Priestess after me. Do you have a phone number she can contact you at?"

I blinked. "Um, yeah." I rattled off the numbers and she smiled. "Don't you need to write that down?" I wondered aloud.

Isis smiled at me. "No, in addition to being very intuitive and able to read feelings and body language easily, I have a very good memory."

"Oh. So, do you think I'll meet Zara soon?" I asked. It felt kind of awkward to join an exclusive club through text message.

Egypt smiled at me. "Probably. She's a friend of Brooke's, so you'll likely talk to her in the near future. You're both fourth formers, so you'll probably have some classes with her."

"But I just got here!" I protested. "I should be a first former!"

Egypt and Isis laughed (seriously, what was up with the Egyptian names?) and Egypt explained, "The youngest are third formers here. Then you go to sixth formers. Throughout that time you'll turn from fledgling to vampyre. But since Nyx blesses you, you are advanced and have been moved into the fourth former year. Brooke is also a fourth former."

I blinked, trying to digest all of the info. "Alright…" Egypt turned and looked at Isis, a question in her gaze. Isis shook her head and said, "No, you won't go to classes yet. If you don't mind, I think you should pray to Nyx and thank her for her gifts. I will do the same, but Egypt has a class."

I nodded. "No problem." There was a small statue of Nyx, about knee height, resting on a small oak table. The statue was carved from a birch-like wood and something about it spoke to me. I picked up a silver silk prayer cushion and placed it before the alter.

"Would you like to light incense to her?" Isis asked. When I nodded, she led me to a table with vases full of different kinds of incense. I took one that was a whitish grey, lit it from a burning white candle and, bowing before the alter, placed it in the glass bowl full of dark, moist soil as Isis looked on with approval.

I knelt on the mat and closed my eyes. I could smell the smoke from the incense (which I would later find out was also used as a smudge stick) wafting into my nose and I inhaled deeply as I began my prayer (mentally).

"Thank you, Goddess, for the gift you have given me. I only wish you would tell me what to do with it, but I am glad that you trust me to find my own way. I just want to make sure that I don't fail you. Thank you for my beautiful mark, but I don't get why it's filled in and not, like, hollow like the other fledglings'. I don't really understand how to use Spirit, but I guess that in time I will learn to control my power."

Suddenly I felt like I was falling through a tunnel of smoke. My eyes were open, and the smoke drifted into them and stung. I closed them to avoid the burn, and suddenly I was solidly sitting on the prayer cushion again. I opened them cautiously and found that I was in a different room.

This room had bare walls and was empty of furnishings. Before me, instead of the statue of Nyx I had been praying in front of, was the real Nyx. I bowed my head again and said, "Merry meet, Goddess." Nyx smiled and motioned for me to rise.

"Merry meet, Ivory." As I became more and more conscious the room furnished itself. On the walls paintings appeared. They were of the elements, a wall with a painting of a wave, a wall with a painting of a bonfire, a wall with a painting of a forest clearing, and a wall with a painting of leaves being whipped about in the wind.

"You forgot Spirit," I said softly. Nyx smiled at me, not unkindly. "I have no need of a painting of true Spirit, Ivory," she said to me, her calm voice washing over me like a wave. "I have Spirit, TRUE Spirit, right in front of me. You are the representation of all it is, Ivory."

"I don't think I can live up to your expectations," I murmured. "I think I'll fail you."

Nyx shook her head at me. "I have gifted you, Ivory. I believe in you. I believe in your power. You have to learn to control it. But you can do so many things with it—both good and evil. I believe you will choose good over evil. But, remember, all that is light is not good, and all that is dark is not evil. A great evil is coming, and you must defeat it."

"Me?" I asked, incredulously. "Me? How can I do that? All I have is white hair and a weird mark! Nyx, there's no way I could defeat evil alone."

"Alone," Nyx said quietly. "But you won't have to defeat it alone. There are more like you. Not with your white hair—that is a gift I have given you, and you alone. That is Spirit, and you are the only fledgling with power over it to that extent. You will BE the only fledgling, ever, who will have power over Spirit to that extent."

"But what if I DO fail?" I couldn't help but ask.

"You won't," Nyx said simply. "Merry meet and merry part and merry meet again, Ivory." The goddess disappeared, and I was left alone in the room with the paintings.

I contemplated Nyx's words for a while. Then, I could feel myself being dragged back to earth. I coughed, my eyes opening. The bark had burned out, finally, taking me away from my dream/vision place. Isis stood next to me.

"You've been out for four hours, Ivory. Nyx told me to replace the incense to give you two longer to talk, but not to replace it a second time."

"I think—I think I had some kind of vision," I said uncertainly. "I was talking to Nyx, in this room, and she was talking about Spirit and stuff. I don't know what she meant, though."

Isis looked at me, interested. "She was talking about your affinity for Spirit?" she asked. "Come, Ivory. We better do some research. You have a half hour until lunch." Isis led me into her office, and I sat in a chair, closing my eyes to remember the vision better.

I told her everything Nyx had told me, and she nodded along. "Here is your schedule for today," Isis said, handing me a paper. "I might send you to some advanced classes, but this should work out for now."

I glanced at the paper as I headed to the Dining Hall. After lunch I had Intro to Equestrian Sciences. Good. I had always liked horses. Inside the Dining Hall, I glanced around nervously. I didn't have any friends, and it felt awkward to sit by myself or ask people. As I grabbed a plate full of spaghetti with salt, no sauce, Brooke slid beside me, grabbing a bottle of water and a plate of salad.

"Merry meet, Iv," she said. "Come on. Sit with us." I followed Brooke to a table with a girl with curly dark hair and tan skin.

The girl smiled warmly at me. "Merry meet. I'm Zara Way."

I smiled back, panicking. 'Good impression, good impression. Make a good impression.' I hoped my face didn't show my panic. "Merry meet, Zara. I am Ivory Labastria."

"You're the one Egypt told me about in art, right? You have an affinity for Spirit." I nodded, suddenly aware that everybody was watching us. Great, I was the freaky girl with the white hair and the gold mark that had an affinity for an element nobody had ever had an affinity for before. Just great.

"Cool. Your mark is neat, too," she said. I smiled and choked out a thank you as a girl with thick blond hair sat next to Zara. "Merry meet. Ivory, this is Summer, Summer, this is Ivory." Summer and I exchanged "merry meets" and we set about eating.

A few more people joined us at the table: Leila Fox, a sixth former with long dark hair; Joan Gloss, a fifth former with curly red hair who seemed pretty talkative; Anna Fall, a quiet, dark skinned fifth former; Opal Lee, an Asian fourth former; Alissa Star, a Mexican fifth former who was chatting with; Ari Sun, a blond sixth former who seemed pretty into Alissa; Derek Night, a tan fifth former who threw his arm around Summer the second he got to the table; and Leo Black, a sixth former who said nothing but, "Merry meet" the whole time.

Our table was pretty crowded with the twelve of us, and it was a little claustrophobic. It was loud, too. Ari and Alissa flirted, somewhat shyly, Derek flirted outrageously with Summer and Leila, Joan and Opal chatted loudly about something I couldn't figure out, Zara and Anna talked quietly about Dark Daughters, and Brooke sat next to me and told me all about the school.

"It's a little overwhelming, isn't it?" I asked her in almost a shout.

"Yeah, I can afford emeralds!" Brooke shouted back. I shook my head at her and repeated the question and she nodded. "Yeah, but you get used to it eventually."

"I just wish it was a LITTLE quieter!" I complained. I closed my eyes for a second and it seemed like everything went quiet. My eyes flew open and I saw that it really had gotten quiet. Everybody was staring at me and talking, but nobody was making sounds. I shook my head. "No," I said. "No, I didn't—it wasn't—I have to go…now…" I ran out of the dining hall, everybody staring after me, bewildered.

I was sitting with my back to the stonewall that surrounded the school. I shuddered at what I'd done. Yes, the noise was very annoying, but that didn't mean I had the right to take away everybody's voices. "Did YOU do that?" a voice asked, seemingly coming from nowhere.

My eyes flew open and I saw Leo in front of me. "Oh," I said. "It's you. I thought…do you know if I'll get in trouble?"

Leo grinned. "For stealing everybody's voices? Nah." I winced at the way he phrased what I had done, but couldn't help grinning back.

"Cool. I just—it was too loud—it was like—" I stammered, trying to sound cool. Something about Leo was making me nervous.

"Nah, I don't care. I actually was thinking of thanking you," Leo said seriously. "I really hate how loud the cafeteria gets. It seems like nobody knows how to shut up sometimes."

"Sometimes?"

"You're right: they NEVER know how to shut up. I think they have never closed their mouths their entire lives."

I giggled. "I know what you mean. It's like, at my old school, everybody there was just talking and talking. I just wished I could shut them up."

"Like you did in there?" Leo asked, gesturing at the dining hall. I stopped laughing, remembering what I had done.

"Yeah, I guess. I never imagined I would feel so awful if I did, though." Leo didn't say anything, so I just plunged on. "I mean, I, like, violated their minds in there. What gives me the right to do that?"

I shook my head and closed my eyes, leaning into the wall, laughing without humor. I didn't notice when Leo slipped away. I opened my eyes again, and I was alone. I saw Summer and waved. She waved at me and headed towards me, her thick blond hair waving about in the wind.

"Weird what you did in there," she said. "Everybody just got their voices back. They're all talking about you."

"I don't want to talk about it," I said. If Summer had come for gossip on my powers, she'd have to go elsewhere. "Not exactly in the mood."

Summer shrugged. "Fine by me. So you lived in New York?"

"Yeah," I responded, finding the question a little weird. "Didn't you?"

Summer shook her head, laughing. "Nope. I lived in California. I got Marked two years ago, and went to the California House of Night, but they kicked me out last year. Isis 'specially requested I come here. No idea why, I was a real troublemaker there."

"Do you miss it?" I asked.

"All the time," Summer said wistfully. "I loved it in California. It's so RAINY here. It was sunny, like, all the time there. But my parents visit every other month and stuff so—" Summer broke off as I doubled over. "Iv? Iv? Oh, Goddess, are you going through the change? Hang on, Iv, I'll get Isis."

I wasn't going through the change. I was having a vision.

There was a girl walking down a street, oblivious to the Tracker that was following her. She had curly brown hair and light skin. Suddenly she sensed him and turned, and he said, "Melissa Benit! Night has chosen thee; thy death will be thy birth. Night calls to thee; hearken to Her sweet voice. Your destiny awaits you at the House of Night!" She freaked. "No! I'm not a vampyre, I can't be! No!"

The blue mark on her forehead appeared and the Tracker disappeared. She went home, and a dark haired lady snapped at her without looking at her, "Mel, don't shriek walking down the street. What will the neighbors think?"

"Stephanie, I've been Marked!" the girl (Mel) said. "And DON'T call me MEL!"

"Ohmygod!" Stephanie exclaimed. "No! Get out, get out, get out!" Mel blinked and said, "But—Stephanie—"

"GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!" screamed Stephanie. A man walked in, and from his resemblance to 'Mel' I assumed he was her dad. "Steph, what's going on?"

"Mel has been Marked! Get out, girl!"

"Dad—" Mel stammered.

"Is it true? You've been Marked? How could you, Mel?"

"It wasn't my fault!" Mel protested. "I never asked for this!"

"Get out, get out, get out!" Stephanie continued her shrieks. "Get OUT, you stupid vampyre girl! Get out of my house!"

"No," Mel said through tears. "It's Dad's house."

"Get out." Mel's dad's voice, concerned before, was cold and uncaring. "Go to the House of Night. I don't care. Get out. Never come near our family again."

"Dad!" Mel pleaded. "Please, Dad. Would you disown your daughter, would you ban her from going home, from ever seeing her father again?"

"You are no daughter of mine." With her father's cruel words and Mel's cries in my mind, I faded into a dream of Nyx. Sigh.

"What's wrong with her parents?" I demanded. It was clear to me that Nyx had sent me the vision, and I was upset that there was nothing I could do to help the girl.

"They hate vampyres," Nyx said gently. "They are upset."

"But she's their daughter! They'll get over it and forgive her, won't they? I mean, it isn't her fault that she was Marked!"

Nyx shook her head sadly. "They will never forgive her, although this is not her fault. I'm sorry you're so upset about this. I had to show you, though, because that girl will be a part of your future. She will be your friend and your ally. You will soon learn to control who you can see visions about, and you want to keep an eye on her."

"Yes, Goddess," I said earnestly. "I just feel bad for that girl."

Nyx gave me a considering look. "Don't feel sorry for her. She, like you, is gifted by me. She is a special fledgling. She is the second golden fledgling."