I cannot remember the first time I met Robin. Sometimes I think it was the first day I found myself in the cold world that everyone knew as Kensington Academy for Proper Young Ladies. Other times I wonder if we had known each other since a time before we were even born.

It was a complicated relationship, speckled with moments of spite and anger but never distrust. I could always trust her and she could always trust me. At least, I thought she trusted me, perhaps she simply wanted to protect me sometimes.

But then I'm getting ahead of myself. For a story to make sense you must, of course, start at the beginning and the beginning would be somewhere around the spring 1884…

Robin sat with her back to me, a book spread open on her lap. She was humming a tune, a lullaby she sometimes sung out in the dark of our room after the Headmistress locked us in for the night. I tried to hum along with her as I braided strands of her long, black hair. But I never had a musically inclined voice and it fell flat beside of hers.

We sat in the courtyard, a pretty little place though it seemed something like a cage. The brick walls of the school itself surrounded the small garden on all sides, offering no views of the outside world. Yet the sunlight flowed freely over the sloping roofs to where we sat and the flowers smelled just as beautiful here as they did anywhere else. Robin broke into song while the echo of her humming still floated around, creating an eery overlay of the same voice.

"A little cock sparrow sat on a green tree, And he chirrup'd and chirrup'd, so merry was he…"

The sound of the courtyard door opening with a weary creak of hinges caused me to turn my attention to the old cook stepping outside. Agathe was her name, I still remember that clearly, she was a dear old soul.

Agathe stood with her hands pressed against the small of her back, stretching. She smiled sweetly at me when she noticed us, the lines in her face conforming to the look.

"But a naughty boy came with a small bow and arrow, Determined to shoot this little cock sparrow…"

I turned back to braiding robin's hair, passing the time until our next class.

There were other girls, some young and some older, running about in the yard. Robin and I sat like the eye of a tornado made up of skirts and ringlets, lace and petticoats.

" 'This little cock sparrow shall make me a stew,' Said this naughty boy, 'Yes, and a little pie, too.'…"

I began humming along quietly, more so in my head than aloud, so as not to disrupt the tune. One of the younger girls, Molly I believe she was called, came to sit down beside me. She clutched a tatty, stuffed rabbit to her chest and played with the loose stitching in his ear almost as a habbit.

Molly was always nearby, I suppose she looked up to Robin. Then again we all looked up to Robin, for all the trouble she tended to get into and get us into. There was something in Robin that seemed to mother some of us and we all needed it here.

" 'Oh, no,' said the sparrow, 'I won't make a stew,' So he fluttered his wings and away he flew."

As Robin's song ended it seemed the noise in the yard picked up even more. I heard a shriek of laughter somewhere close by, one that was entirely unpleasant in sound.

With a blur of bouncing, red curls a smaller girl ran past. Avoiding what was approaching, which I cannot say was unwise. Robin turned around slowly as I dropped the strands of her hair I had been holding onto. Her narrow face was calm, though her dark eyes danced with mischief. She stared, as did I and Molly, at the girl approaching us. A girl older by two years who wore her plain brown hair in a loose bun of style high on her head. She was petty enough, with a rounded face and large eyes.

Yes, I would say that if one did not know her, she could be called lovely. Yet her personality did wonders for that opinion and changed her into little more than a creature a bit like an overgrown slug. Something she proved daily, over time I began to wonder if she took pride in the fact.

"What, don't you have any more silly little songs to sing us, Birdie?" She spoke to Robin though her eyes seemed fixed on Molly. The smaller girl pulled at my pinafore, attempting to hide behind me and avoid the girl's look.

"Oh Ruth! I didn't know you enjoyed my singing so much." A smile twitched on the corners of Robin's mouth as she spoke. Yet Ruth found nothing amusing in the words, she scrunched her nose in an unbecoming way as her eyes flicked to Robin. She stood with her arms crossed against her chest, her back held stiffly straight from the years of instructions.

Robin got to her feet, her thin limbs seeming to unfold from the folds of her white pinafore and darker tunic. She was the same height as I and thus was a good foot shorter than Ruth, but she stared up at the girl with defiance in her eyes none the less. Ruth glared back at her, what seemed to be a snarl curling her top lip.

It was no secret the past and the relationship between those two girls. When Robin first arrived to the school, it seemed Ruth had attempted to steal a hair ribbon as Robin unpacked. It is needless to say that Ruth had refused to show her face until the bruising had faded. They had never gotten on well and many of their meetings ended with one or the other getting a good caning.

"Oh yes, I enjoy as much as I enjoy Bettsie dragging her nails down the balckbaord." Said Ruth is a particularly low voice. "It's something one grows to love."

There was a peculiar emphasis on the word 'love', one that I have not quite figured out to this day.

"I imagine that would normally pass as music for you, Ogres tend to have an odd taste in sweetness." Robin said playfully. She was edging Ruth on, her favorite game when she was bored.

I tired not to seem edgy, holding tightly to Molly's hand and doing by best to stand calmly beside Robin. But I was not at all one for the conflict and strife, I preferred to stay out of trouble's way when possible. However, being friends with Robin, that was rarely ever possible.

"You little witch!" Ruth's hand shot out nearly as quickly as she spoke, grabbing a fist-full of Robin's hair, "You need more manner lessons with Monsieur Anton." She pulled Robin's hair sharply, causing her to stand on the tip of her toes or gain a bald patch.

Molly let out a wail and began crying, gasping for breath as her voice carried around the yard. It was enough to draw Agathe's attention to us all once again. The old woman came for us at a run, her plump figure causing her to waddle slightly and her movements not to be so swift as she might have liked. That being, it didn't take her long to reach us and the Headmistress had chosen the perfect moment to step outside now she was close behind Agathe.

Ruth, unfortunately for her own safety, did not see the women until it was too late. She let go of Robin's hair hastily, a few strands still tangled in her fingers.

"What is going on here?!" Headmistress Devitt barked, her slight frame shaking with the effort of projecting the sentence.

She was an older woman, though not quite as old as Agathe, and she seemed a little more hardened to the world than someone who had lived in the cruelest of situations.

When none of the girls answered her question, Devitt turned to Molly. It was a known fact that Molly could scarcely keep a secret from herself and was the best person to ask if you needed to know something.

Molly shrunk in size it seemed, enough to hide behind the rabbit she held so tightly. However, it seemed Molly would be spared this time as one of the other girls spoke up first.

"They were fighting again, Headmistress! Well mainly Ruth was fighting..."

The words earned the mousey girl a look from Ruth that could possibly curdled milk. I felt sorry for her, sorry for what Ruth would do to her later on when they were out of the sight of Devitt.

Devitt did not seem entirely convinced though, she gave both Robin and Ruth a stern look, surveying them. "You are saying our Little Robin is innocent this time around?"

It was said with such a tone of mockery I was forced to speak for the first time.

"She didn't do anything! We were just sitting here when Ruth decided to play the bully!" My voice faltered slightly, but I was proud that the sentence sounded strong at least towards the end.

Divitt gave me a look that was not completely approving, but she seemed satisfied enough.

"Very well, Miss Ruth come with me!" She took Ruth roughly by the arm, not giving the girl a chanced to follow of her own accord. I felt oddly satisfied to know she would get a thrashing about the legs with a birch cane before long. The satisfied feeling vanished quickly, however, when I remembered the welts on Robin's legs after one such beating. I despised Ruth, yet I could help a small amount of pity for the girl.

The girl that followed Ruth everywhere, Rebecca I think her name was, looked a bit like a lost puppy wondering around the yard without Ruth there. I would have offered her company, but that seemed far to likely to cause another argument from Ruth when she found out. So I left Rebecca there and followed Robin back inside, still holding to Molly's hand.