When The Snow Falls

Was it a coincidence that he had met Raven in the library or had the prefect been keeping a close eye on him? Raven had to have been observing him to have known when to take the cats and bring them back without being caught.

The mention of keeping his door unlocked had also allowed Daniel to realise that Raven had predicted his future actions. Whilst it did make things easier for him, it did suggest that the other prefects could be thinking along the same lines.

What he really needed to do was overhear another top-secret conversation, however he was lucky the last time for two reasons. One, that they were actually talking about something useful and two, he didn't get caught.

He couldn't risk it a second time.

Daniel put that matter aside sat down at a table with the books. He started with the books about the school's history as he only knew basic facts about the school. The oldest one smelt extremely mouldy and was falling apart and he didn't get much from it. The Pudding Club was mentioned and the description wasn't different from what Alvin had told him. He moved onto the one that had been published in the sixties. It had a mention of the traditionally poor treatment of scholarship students being related to 'ingrained snob mentality'. Daniel raised his eyebrows, that was one way of putting it. The third book had what he was looking for.

'There are two secret societies, both unsupervised by teachers. Both take care of areas of life that the teachers would be unwilling to acknowledge. Instead the secret societies are presided over by the four prefects. If any of the prefects are unhappy with the secret societies they have no choice in the matter as tradition dictates that they must carry out their duties or lose the highly d.e.s.i.r.ed position.'

It was as he had guessed. Raven had no choice, but to go along with it or stop being a prefect. Daniel read the next paragraph and realised that there was another layer to the secret society.

'To ensure tradition is preserved, the highest-ranking pupil who is not a prefect is to be a member of both clubs and watch over the prefects in case one or all of them rebel.'

It made sense. The secret society could be brought down if all the prefects were against it and took the information to the Police. If the tradition of having a supervisory member was still going, he had another nemesis. He was willing to bet that it still was.

He needed to find out who the highest-ranking pupil was. That either meant the highest title or best connected. The current prime minister didn't have any children so that avenue was out.

With that in mind Daniel moved onto the drug book. He could ask other people who the highest-ranking pupil was, it wasn't something he could find out in the library. He opened the book up and found the borrowing sheet on the title page. It was fortunate that Kingston Royal Academy hadn't updated to a computerised system and still used a list of stamped dates and handwritten names.

It was quite a well borrowed book. There was a stack of several double sided sheets stapled onto the page. Daniel checked the names for the last three months of 2018 as that would have been when the prefects changed and new people were added to the society. The first names were a familiar set of names.

The four prefects had borrowed the book first, then it was Wilfred Anning, Hugo Barnes, Robert May, Clarey Holmes and some other names. Jack had also borrowed the book a while later and the last name was Felix Albury.

It appeared that he had a list of secret society members with the exception of Felix. The other names had been mentioned as members of the Pudding Club before. Some of the names were familiar. He'd encountered some at a few social events the Earl had taken him to. Wilfred Anning was a bitchy brunette as far as he remembered and Robert May was vain about his looks whilst Hugo Barnes was always bragging about how rich his parents were. Clarey Holmes had just been boring and forgettable.

He closed the book and looked over at the computer area. The next thing to do was some internet research, but he was aware from the information he had been given before arriving that internet access was heavily restricted. All of the computers were in use and he didn't want to be seen researching deaths at Kingston Royal Academy in any case so he put all the books back and left the library.

The computer area would probably empty out when everyone went to dinner so he hurried over to the canteen to eat first. The canteen was mostly free of pupils and Ben was refilling the tea bag box instead of being behind the counter. He looked around to see if there was anyone he could talk to and spotted Alvin sitting by himself in the corner.

"Beef stew or vegetable lasagne?" Ben asked him when he approached him.

"Beef stew," Daniel said and picked out his dessert whilst he waited for the chain smoker to ladle out the stew.

He carried his tray carefully over to Alvin, Ben had been very generous with the serving. He didn't know if that was a sign of the chef warming up to him or being annoying. Alvin beamed at him when he noticed someone standing by him.

"Daniel! I've missed you."

It would have been polite to say that he missed him in return, but Daniel didn't quite feel the same way. Alvin's unwillingness to see the truth and idolisation of the prefects had been off putting. Kingston Royal Academy clearly had problems even if Alvin was unaware of the drug ring, cat mutilation and attempted murder.

"Really?" he said and sat down next to him. "I've joined the Pudding Club- I thought you might want to know."

Alvin smiled widely at him.

"I'm so glad. It's so fun. I don't know what's going to happen with the pudding though because Felix isn't here. How is he by the way?"

"He's woken up," Daniel answered. "On the negative side, he has amnesia."

Alvin's face fell and then he immediately cheered up.

"He should get his memory back soon. I know he will."

Personally Daniel wanted him to get his memory of the day he fell off the roof back as well, but he was less optimistic. He decided to change the subject before he could get any more annoyed with Alvin's naivety.

"Who has the highest title here?"

"Well, Christopher Entwhistle is the son of a Marquis," Alvin began.

Daniel smiled. Clearly Alvin hadn't noticed the fact that they had the same surname.

"He's my cousin. Is there anyone else?"

"You don't look alike," he said doubtfully. "Anyway, Robert May is the son of a duke who is distantly related to the queen, Hugo Barnes' uncle works for the home office in a high position, Wilfred Anning is the illegitimate child of a duchess with foreign royalty connections. What are you?"

"Son of an Earl," Daniel said absently.

Those three pupils had borrowed the drugs book and were members of the Pudding Club. Technically the most powerful one should be the one with the government connections; however royal connections weren't to be sniffed at, especially considering how stuck in the past Kingston Royal Academy was and the fact that the school had 'royal' in its name. He needed to know more about each of them before he could positively identity who had been assigned the observer role.

"Aren't those three members of the Pudding Club?" he asked.

Alvin perked up.

"They are. They're all amazing like the prefects."

That comment cemented the idea that one of them was the most dangerous person at Kingston Royal Academy. If Alvin thought the prefects that mutilated cats and supplied drugs were amazing he was going to get a sharp wake up call when the whole affair was over.

"In what way?"

"Hugo Barnes is in our house so you'll meet him soon enough. He's really clever and manages to always attend all the clubs he's in and keep up with schoolwork. Wilfred Anning is in the Golden Lion house and he's really kind hearted. When we used to have to bake things ourselves, his were always the best," Alvin paused to get his breath back. "Robert May is also in the same house and is good at everything. He's wonderful at Sports- Felix is the only one that can beat him and he's academically talented as well. He's also really nice."

The observer could be any of those three. He realised with a pang that the best place to meet them and investigate them was the Pudding Club and he had a strong d.e.s.i.r.e to solve the mystery before the Pudding Club had their first meeting of the term. He g.r.o.a.n.e.d quietly.

Was he going to be able to solve it? It was too risky to hope that the observer tradition had been dropped and he could resolve everything by finding the other three parts of the secret society paperwork.

"Are you all right?" Alvin asked in concern. "Is the stress of exams getting to you?"

Exams felt very insignificant to Daniel now. They had never really weighed on his mind due to his ease at passing exams thanks to his past life. Now, courtesy of a dark mystery, they felt even further away.

"I'm going back to the library to revise after this," he said with a shrug.

***

As he had predicted the computer area had emptied out when he returned half an hour later. He sat down on the computer in the corner away from the few students that were left, logged in with the credentials he'd been given when he'd arrived and opened up the internet. Frustration came quickly when he realised how heavily filtered the internet was. Whilst all schools had a form of internet filters, this one was on a different level.

He downloaded a proxy that was similar to the ones he'd used in his past life and started again. Nothing came up for 'Kingston Royal Academy murder' which was relieving and disappointing at the same time. Daniel moved onto 'Kingston Royal Academy death' and came with one article from a local newspaper mentioning Jack's accident. Nothing else relevant turned up.

Was Jack the only death in the history of the school?

It seemed strange that no one else had died considering general dark atmosphere of Kingston Royal Academy and its history of not treating scholarship pupils kindly.

Another strange thing was that there was only one article about Jack's death and it was from a local news site. It hadn't piqued the internet of any wider media which was unusual. It was the kind of thing than the tabloids would love. The school had done an excellent job keeping it out of mainstream news.

Now it made sense that he hadn't known about it until Christopher had told him and the Earl hadn't mentioned it at all. The Earl probably didn't even know about it.

His next search was 'Kingston Royal Academy expulsion' and again nothing relevant came up. Mr Collings had been right after all about no one ever being expelled.

He closed down the internet and looked around on the desktop. There was a database of newspapers produced by the newspaper club that had been around since the start of Kingston Royal Academy. Daniel's sour mood lifted slightly when he realised that there could be something in those articles. His past life had taught him that there was usually something to be found in old news articles.

Half an hour later he was back to square one. He had picked up some information here and there so if hadn't been completely wasted. He knew what his three suspects looked like now and what Felix looked like in the school PE kit.

There had also been an article in the fifties about needles and joints being found in the grass outside the domestic science block which had probably been from the secret society. The follow up article mentioned a stern speech in assembly, but no one had confessed to anything and the curfew had been narrowed to 8 in the evening. The next issue was about the lack of a culprit. It suggested that the teachers genuinely had no idea about the secret society and it was really all run by the prefects. Assumedly, the prefects that left at the end of the year left the necessary information behind for the new prefects.

He might be able to find that information. The most likely place it would be in was the prefects' sitting room or their pavilion.

Daniel twiddled his thumbs whilst he added up everything. In order to solve the mystery, he was going to have to take a few risks no matter what method he tried. Some of those methods also involved breaking a lot of school rules and probably a few laws.

***

His chosen method was what led him to set light to a handful of paper underneath the smoke and heat detector by the stairs leading to the Violet Rose dorm.

The one sure way to empty out the building was to cause an evacuation.

When the sound of the fire alarm began to peal through the previously silent night, he grabbed the paper and extinguished it with a bottle of water, concealed it in his pocket and ran up the stairs to his floor. When he reached his bedroom door, he started to see half asleep pupils open their doors and look out.

A pyjama clad Liam came running down the corridor instructing everyone to leave and gather at the fire assembly point which was the car park. Daniel made sure he was seen by Liam before he used the commotion on the stairs to go back.

It was time to do some breaking and entering.