A/N: Wow. I am absolutelt overpowered by the response this fanfic has gotten, so many favourites and reviews every day. I can't even comprehend it! Anyway, here is the next chapter, and if you haven't, please check out my other Miss Peregrine stories: 'Wish that you were here' and 'The fire between us'.

I am also writing more Olive x Enoch for anyone intrested.

Olive Abrolhos Elephanta

"Primitive, rude, normal humans! Peculiars are definitely a hole lot more polite…" Alma muttered angrily, feeling another person 'accidentally' hitting her over shoulders as they tried to push their way past her in the crowd. The market place was far too crowded, far too noise and far too big for Alma's taste, and she hated all of it.

Yet she wasn't here for her own enjoyment. She had come here because her charges had figured out that it was Christmas season again, and started begging her for seasonal food, sweets and gifts. Even though there was no diffrence to the weather or conditions in ther loop, her charges still insisted on celebrating the holidays as best they could, and Alma found herself too weak- hearted to say no.

Therefore, though she made a point never to leave her charges nore the loop alone, she had made an exception to the rule and left Cairnholm for the day so that she could go to the mainland and buy all they needed for their Christmas celebration of sort.

It had taken all of her willpower not to turn around as soon as she sat foot on the mainland, though, but now that she was finally here, she was determined to see it through and make sure she didn't have to return to this god-forsaken place for another year yet. Alma really, really hated being on the mainland.

"I should have just said no to them." She grumbled angrily, knowing all too well that she couldn't do that to them. The pleading eyes of the youngest ones would always reminded her of her little brother, Bertram, and make her broken old heart ache with longing for something she no longer had. At that point she would be ready to promise almost anything to remove that look from their faces, christmas gifts included, and therefore it was easier to just say yes from the very beginning.

She was looking at some black and blue mittens to give to Bronwyn and Victor, knowing very well that they wouldn't get much use for them in the loop, but also knowing that they would prefer something practical over meaningless toys, when something highly peculiar happened.

"Oh! I looove mint-chocolate!" A childish voice squealed near her leg, and Alma saw a tiny hand reaching into her basket and trying to steal the mint-chocolate crisps she bought for Enoch. It was a well-thought out gift that she for once hoped would put the boy in a good mood, and she was certainly not about to let some unmannered child steal it from her.

Alma swatted the tiny hand moving around in her basket hard, and as it retreated she tried to grab onto it's owner, wanting to give them a piece of her mind, only to end up empty handed as the little thief avoided her hand and slipped away. Not having actually seen the child who tried to steal from her, she realised that it would be impossible to catch her again, and she just sight and prepared to move on.

"Ouch, it hurt! I'm not even wearing my mittens. Not to myself: wear mittens." A little voice spoke up close to Alma, and as she recognised it as that of the thief, she quickly looked around to try and locate who might have said it. Her eyes fell on a small blonde-haired girl in a grey coat who was standing a few paces away and examining one of her tiny hands. Obviously, the girl hadn't understood she had been properly caught, as she then would have left the scene, but only though that Alma saw a hand moving around in her basket and swatted it away. Alma wasn't slow to react.

"Hey! Wait there, you little thief!" She exclaimed, quickly running up to the girl and grabbing her by the shoulders so she could pull her aside and away from the crowds. "Don't think I'll let you get away with stealing my children's gifts you…"

Alma lost the rest of the sentence as she finally pulled the girl out of the crowd and noticed that she was, in fact, hovering about a meter above the ground. Her pockets on the thick winter coat was bulging, and when Alma reached into them she found that they were filled with pebbles.

"Please don't remove the stones, they keep me grounded! I don't want to fly off into the sky! I won't steal no more I promise!" The blue-eyed girl begged, bending down to the ground to get another pebble and placing it in her pocket, immediately bringing herself a few centimeters closer to the ground.

"You are floating." Alma mumbled, vaguely aware that she was pointing out the obvious but far too shocked to come up with something else to say. "You're a floating girl."

"Yep" The girl answered. grinning. "I was born like that. Would have flown right out the window if it hadn't been for the umbilical cord. Creepy right?"

Alma shock her head, trying to bring herself out of her stupor and regain her bearing. A floating peculiare was hardly the most peculiar thing she had seen in her days, it shouldn't be that surprising. Besides, an Ymbryne's number one rule was to always keep a stoic impression in the face of a peculiare, no matter how shocking it's peculiarity might be to the Ymbryne.

"No, natural." Alma smirked at the girl, once the shock wore off easily settling into her normal character. "A floating syndrigast is as natural as anything else."

The girl looked at her in confusion, carefully tipping her head to the side in a way that reminded Alma of a confused puppy when it's owner was trying to give it a command,

"A syndri what? I think I'm peculiare. That's what mom said before she made me sleep in the dog house. Only normal children sleep in the real house." The girl explained, uncertain, before righting her head and smiling again. "I'm Olive by the way! Olive Abrolhos Elephanta, like a hurricane whirlwind thing-y, because I fly!"

Alma laughed. It was a light and unfamiliar sound that slipped out of her mouth, and she barely had time to reveal in the realisation of how much happiness this little child brought her so very easily when they were interrupted by someone screaming.

"OLIVE! I TOLD you to stay on the ground! You'll scare people away with your horrible, horrible ways!" A short, blonde woman in her forties came running towards them, ignoring Alma completely as she went on to scold Olive, who Alma assumed must be her daughter. "What would your mother say if she saw you!? This is exactly why she wouldn't keep you!"

Alma felt herself go cold inside at the words. Never in her life had she experienced such terrible treatment of a peculiare, and a child at that, in public. It horrified Alma, and she been a normal person she would have reported the woman to the CPS. But she wasn't a normal woman, and instead, Alma promised herself to help the girl through doing what she was meant to: take care of her. She was not going to leave until she convinced the woman to let her care for the child instead.

"Excuse me, but there is nothing horrible about this child!" Alma interrupted the woman, who still hadn't acknowledged her existence, and adding just a little bit of an edge to her voice as she continued. "If you do not to wish to take care of this girl, as I sense you don't, I actually happen to own an establishment for children like her, and would be more than happy to take care of her instead."

The woman immediately became quiet, after Alma finished staring at her if she had two heads. She understood the woman probably thought she was crazy and she couldn't really blame her for her. She had been extremely untactical about the whole deal, she knew that, but the horrific treatment of the child that she witnessed had put her off so to the point that she didn't care about being tactical. The only thing she wanted was to get the child away from her despicable caretaker no matter the cost.

"You want to have her? You offer me to not have to get to deal with all this" The woman asked in disbelief, pointing intendedly at the child she was holding by the wrist. The little girl looked decidedly unhappy and was trying to free her hand. "For free?!"

"Yes, I believe that's what I said. And she will be in good company, too, for I got several other peculiar children living there as well. Not that they can all fly, mind you, but they can certainly do spectacular and peculiar things." Alma smiled politely, happy that things was going her way. Normally people were rather vary of abandoning their children, and even more so peculiare ones, but this time it seemed as though all the woman saw was an opportunity to get out of a responsibility.

"When do you have the time to take her? I'll get her to where the establishment is located, don't worry. Just give me a time and a place." The woman rushed, her eyes wide and a dangerous glint caught in them. Alma saw it immediately, like a warning telling her not to leave this child alone with the woman.

She had to take her with her immediately.

"I can take her with me now, if you want to. I'm merely out shopping and I'll be returning to my house and my other charges in just a few hours." She suggested, desperately hoping that the offer would be accepted.

"Take her! She's all yours! As long as I never have to see her ever again!" And with that, the woman let go of Olive, as Alma suddenly remembered the girl called herself, and disappeared. She didn't bother looking where the woman went, instead focusing on the girl and quickly wrapping her arms around her small waist and lifting her up. She wasn't normally a very affectionate woman, but little Olive was throwing everything she usually was out the door and forming her into someone completely new.

"A-are you going to take care of me now?" Olive asked, confused. She had understood the woman holding her and her aunt had reached some sort of agreement, but she didn't quite know what that meant for her.

"Yes. My name is Alma LeFay Peregrine, and you're coming back home with me. You are going to get to meet lots of other peculiare children, and noone is going to call you different or wrong anymore. It's all going to be okay, I promise." Alma had never had a charge so quickly handed over to her. While it made her both happy and sad to see, she was mostly concerned about the little Olive. It was probably very confusing for her and she was afraid that she would scare her. She wanted Olive to feel safe and loved, and even if she had to go out of her comfort-zone and be unusually loving and affectionate, then so be it.

Olive tentatively wrapped her arms around Miss Peregrine's neck, hugging her back. Despite being told all of her life that she wasn't supposed to be this way, she had never been able to feel bad for it, and now that she was going to live with this woman and her weird children, she wouldn't have to."Thank you" She whispered, feeling the woman squeezing her tiny body in response. It's okay, you're safe, she seemed to tell her.

That Christmas, though Enoch loved his mint crisps, and Victor and Bronwyn both adored the colours of their new mittens, it was Miss peregrine who got the best christmas gift of them all: A new charge to take care of in her home for peculiar children.