'Tom!?' Maddy was so confused by his reaction, it was not at all what she had expected. Whilst getting ready this morning, Maddy had played out Tom and Shannon's seeing Rhydian again in her mind in several different ways, but she had not thought of this. Joking? What was there to joke about? Maddy had thought that Tom and Shannon would welcome him back with hugs and question him about his time as a wild wolfblood; but this was not the case. Nobody was smiling. Rhydian's face had dropped as Tom marched intently towards him, closing the gap between them. He was now looking as though he was squaring up to Rhydian (surely Tom wasn't actually thinking about starting a fight which he clearly has no chance of winning? Was he really that stupid?) Tom was right in his face.

'What are you doing here? Come back to cause more trouble? Come back to hurt Maddy some more?' Tom's tone was angry and sarcastic, two things that he rarely was.

Rhydian was struck by Tom's directness, but he wasn't going to let shock stop his reply.

'What… No! I've not come back to cause trouble, I've never meant to cause trouble at all! And I've definitely never meant to deliberately hurt Maddy! That's the last thing I'd ever want to do! I've come back because-'

'Because what? Because you missed her? Because you care about her? Because you couldn't live without her?' Tom was hitting a nerve here; the blood in Rhydian's veins was beginning to flow black. 'Aw. It's all very touching. But you want to know what I think? I think it's because you'd had enough of the wild-life, and knew that she'd have you back in a heartbeat.'

Tom's words had been calm yet they showed his distaste at Rhydian's homecoming, but although the audience could see how he felt, they didn't understand exactly what he meant. What did he mean? Had Rhydian been sleeping rough? Why would Maddy be so forgiving? What even was there to forgive? The minds of the watching school-children were racing.

At Tom's last sentence Rhydian almost snapped and pounced: but he didn't. Maddy had been watching Rhydian's reaction and saw that Tom was getting to him. At the exact moment that he would have changed, Maddy grabbed Rhydian's arm. At Maddy's touch, his head snapped around to face her. Maddy gave Rhydian a stern but understanding look, causing Rhydian to force himself to take a deep breath and calm down before his eyes began to yellow.

Shannon had stayed silent at Tom's side the entire time, observing the situation.

'I don't really think that we should do this here, too many prying eyes,' Shannon declared, slightly raising her voice towards the end so that the spectators could hear, causing her fellow students to act as though they weren't listening. 'Darkroom?' suggested Shannon.

'Of course.' replied Rhydian.

'Why not?' agreed Tom.

Both boys held each other's gaze for a moment then began to lead off to the darkroom. Maddy and Shannon followed close behind.

'What the hell is wrong with you Mads?!' Tom turned on Maddy as soon as Shannon bolted shut the door.

'What?'

'What do you mean 'what'? You know what. He left you Mads. He didn't even say goodbye, he just left without a thought for you, so how could you let him back into your life so easily? Can I remind you of how hurt you were when he left? How damaged you were still only a few days ago? Maddy you shut down! He left and we had to pick up the pieces!'

Tom had reduced Maddy to steady, silent, tears now, it was reminiscent of how she had spent the last few months past; in tears over Rhydian's departure. Her wet eyes were focused on a point in the distance; she was back in her world of pain at the reminder of her destruction.

'Tom-'

'What?' He bitterly replied to Rhydian with a look of deep disgust on his face, like he smelt something bad.

Rhydian took a deep breath and begun, 'I'm sorry about leaving, truly I am. It's the biggest mistake that I've ever made and if I could take it back I would. But I can't. As soon as I left I wanted to come straight back. B-'

'Then why didn't you then!?'Tom was not only angry, but irritated now too. He wanted answers.

'Because of Ceri! I knew that if I came back she'd never give up trying to bring me back home! But then, one day, she went one step further and threatened Maddy, she went off on a massive tirade about the things that she'd love to do to her if she ever saw her again!' Rhydian's eyes had merged from blue to yellow now; yellow with anger, yellow with fear, yellow at the threat he felt posed towards Maddy. 'I… I had to stay away-'

'Then what's changed! How come you're back now?!'

'I didn't mean to come back! I only meant to check-up! I just wanted to make sure that everything was ok, then leave, but Mads saw me…' His eyes had calmed at the thought of Maddy. His face darted to hers, and then to the place which her scars were hidden. His face held an expression that resembled that of somebody being tortured. 'And…' Rhydian trailed off, he was no longer really aware of the fact that he was mid-conversation; his mind had been submerged in a flashback of Ceri's attack.

'And…?' Questioned Tom, just as the form bell began to chime, bringing Rhydian back to reality.

'We'd better get to form.' Maddy was glad of the excuse to end the discussion there, she didn't want anyone to know about her scars, even Shannon and Tom; her best friends. She and Rhydian dashed their way out of the darkroom and joined the rest of their form in Jeffries room, where they were of course greeted with many stares and questions about Rhydian's sudden reappearance.