by Ruby Vincent
Marked
An Evergreen Academy Novel
Ruby Vincent
Published by Ruby Vincent, 2019.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Broken
Mailing List
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Prologue
Wide, terrified eyes gazed at me in the glint of the steel until they disappeared in the gush of the liquid. It flowed down the metal—hot and thick and seeking my fingers.
Someone was screaming. Horrible, piercing shrieks that made it impossible to concentrate. Impossible to understand what was going on.
Why wouldn’t they stop? Why wouldn’t they—
Oh, wait...
I put my hand to my raw, aching throat and smeared it with blood.
The person screaming was me.
Chapter One
“Ugh. Size zero.” Olivia picked up my uniform with two fingers and tossed it over her shoulder. “I used to be a size zero too, little show-off. Before you wreaked havoc on my hips.”
My reflection rolled her eyes. “How many times should I apologize for being born?”
“Until I get my figure back!”
I burst into laughter, and after a second, Mom did too. Our giggles filled the room until a soft whine cut through our mirth.
I closed my lips with a snap and looked at Adam in the mirror. Please don’t wake up. Please don’t wake up!
The baby stirred from the comfort of my bed, scrunching up his little face, while I held my breath. After a few tense seconds, his face smoothed out and he settled back into sleep.
I relaxed and reached for my brush. Adam had fought his nap all morning, screaming and wailing so loud the neighbors must have thought we were murdering someone in here. It took so long to get him down that I was in serious danger of being late on my first day to Evergreen Academy.
“That was a close one,” said Olivia. She reached over and pulled the blanket up to the baby’s chin. She settled back onto the comforter, propping herself up on one arm, and watched me in the mirror.
Olivia, as she insisted I call her whenever we were in public, still looked amazing for her thirty-five years, despite how she complained about me ruining her figure. Mom’s chestnut hair fell in soft waves to her shoulders, framing a heart-shaped face, Greek nose, and piercing green eyes with flecks of gold.
That face was my face. We looked so much alike people asked if she was my older sister and that pleased Mom to no end. Gray had yet to touch her brown locks and wrinkles dare not grace her skin. She was still young and in the prime of her life. Just ask her.
“You sure about this, kid?” The hand brushing my hair stilled as I pulled myself out of my musings. I met Olivia’s look in the glass. “This fancy new school,” she clarified. “Things have been different for you at Joe Young High. You’ve made friends.”
“I’ll make new friends,” I insisted. I smiled at my reflection, drawing my lips across my teeth and grinning widely. The smile trembled as if the muscles had forgotten how to do this. It began to look like a grimace and I dropped it.
It’s alright. Things will be different from now on. Soon... all of my smiles will be real.
“This is a great opportunity, Mom,” I continued. “This is the opportunity. Of course I’m sure about Evergreen.”
Olivia sighed. “I just don’t want you to think you have to go because of—”
My grip tightened on the brush. “Mom.”
“—everything that happened—”
“Mom!”
Adam shifted at my shout, but I didn’t pay it any mind as I spun on Mom. She met my glare without flinching. This was Serious Olivia. This side of Mom and I were barely acquainted.
“Don’t give me that look,” she said calmly. “I only want to make sure you know that you’re in control. If you don’t want to go, then you don’t have to.”
The tension leaked out of my shoulders. “I know. I’m sorry.” I took a breath and released it. “But I do want this, Mom. Kids from all over the world fight to get into this place. Having a school like Evergreen Academy on your application pretty much guarantees automatic admission to any university in the country. I’ll go, graduate, get into a good school, get an even better job, and then”—my eyes swept my room—“I’ll get us out of this place.”
Olivia studied me for a moment, then she offered me a smile. “Glad to hear it, kid. You get your mom a big house and deck her out in diamonds and pearls. It’s the least you can do.”
I snorted. “Let me guess, it’s the least I can do after messing with your figure?”
She tapped her nose and winked. “Exactly.”
I shook my head and took the five steps to the other side of the bed to pick my uniform off the floor. My room was just that small.
I gazed around the space with the royal blue monogrammed fabric dangling from my fingertips. My old life and my new.
The cracks in the plaster greeted my eyes. I had tried to cover the worst with posters, especially the hole made when one of Mom’s ex-boyfriends put his fist through the wall, but there was no covering the hideous puke green the landlord refused to let us paint over.
There was no disguising the brown stains dotting the ceiling due to the leaky roof. There was no hiding how cramped the space was, made even smaller from Adam’s crib pushed into the corner that used to have my desk. That desk was in the living/kitchen/dining room now. We had been eating off of it since Mom’s last boyfriend broke our former dining table and we couldn’t afford to get a new one.
This tiny two-bedroom apartment in the poorest part of Wakefield had been my house for the last twelve years. Living in government housing is as glorious as one would expect, but as I often reminded myself, it was better than moving from one friend’s couch to the other after Mom’s parents closed the door in their pregnant, college dropout, twenty-year-old daughter’s face. And it was certainly better than the street corner we lived on for a time when I was two.
This has been all I’ve ever known... but now my life was going to change in every way.
I pulled open the door of my wardrobe and ducked behind it. It shielded me as I stripped out of my PJs and into my new uniform.
The top of the dress clung to my curves while the skirt flared at the waist. It was solid blue except for the stiff white collar wrapped around my neck. There was a definite Wednesday Addams vibe coming off this outfit but it was still quite stylish for a school uniform.
“In that case,” Mom spoke up while I tugged my long, brown hair out of the dress. “Since you’re skipping about going to this place, there’s no reason for me not to go out with Marcy and Jeanine tonight. They invited me out to celebrate my kid getting into the best school in the country.”
“Um, there is a reason.” I poked my head out to give her a look. “Who is going to watch Adam?”
She waved that away. “That’s what babysitters are for. There’s this new club that opened on Fourth Street. I’ve been dying to check it out, and if they’re buying, I’m all for it.”
I shoved the wardrobe closed and hurried back to the vanity to finish my hair. I needed to hurry up. I
couldn’t be late on my first day.
“Okay, but who are you going to get?” I asked as I pulled my hair back and wrangled it into a scrunchie. “Not Monica. The last time she spent the whole time running up our cable bill and didn’t change his diaper all night. And not Dorcas, she—”
Mom heaved herself off my bed. “Relax, relax. Mrs. Potter on the fifth floor is going to watch him. You don’t have to worry, Val.” She came up behind me and flicked the back of my head.
“Hey!”
“This isn’t my first kid. I know what I’m doing.”
“That’s debatable,” I mumbled under my breath, but not low enough.
“What was that?” Mom grabbed me from behind. I shrieked as she wrestled me to the floor. “You watch that sass mouth of yours,” she cried as she peppered my face with kisses. “I’m the gold standard of moms. It doesn’t get better than me.”
I was laughing too hard to answer back. It had been a while since we messed around like this... and even longer since I laughed.
A wail shattered our fun.
“Look what you did now.” Mom got to her feet and picked up a crying Adam. “I’ll get this one a bottle while you finish getting ready.”
She took him out and I scrambled to do as she said. In no time, I was standing at the door of the apartment with my suitcases at my feet. This was it.
There was a sense of finality in the rickety elevator ride down. I knew I would be back at the close of the semester, but still, I couldn’t fight the feeling that everything would change.
Good. I want everything to change. I gave a smile another try. Evergreen Academy is going to be the best thing that ever happened to me.
Chapter Two
Mom turned on to the final street and made a face. “Evergreen Lane?” she scoffed. “To go along with Evergreen Manors, and Evergreen Mall, and Evergreen Bowling Alley. Is there anything in this neighborhood that isn’t named after the school?”
I answered without turning away from the window. The street she was mocking was surrounded by thick, lush trees reaching so high they blocked the rays of the morning sun. Their fallen leaves dotted the single stretch of pavement that cut through nature and we sent them flying into the air as we drove—a riot of reds and golds swirling in our wake.
“The Evergreens are an old family, Mom. They moved in over a hundred years ago, bought up the entire town, and built this school.”
She hummed and then flipped on the radio. That was the end of the history lesson.
Sinking back into my seat, I sighed. Two hours and now all that separated me from my new school was a two-minute drive up a tree-lined lane.
I rubbed my hands down my thighs, smoothing out my dress. I wasn’t nervous exactly, I was excited to be here, but I did wonder how a poor girl from the projects would fit in at a school the whole town was named after.
Mom crested the hill and there it was. I shot forward in my seat.
Evergreen unfolded before me, even more amazing than I pictured and I had been pouring over the school catalogue since I received my letter of acceptance.
Sitting on one hundred and fifty acres of land was a structure of gray sandstone, turrets, and arches. It was like something out of a movie, or maybe something from a country we have never been able to visit.
Mom whistled. “Nice digs.”
“Yep,” I breathed.
As our car rumbled closer to the wrought-iron gates, I noticed three figures standing just past the entrance. Mom pulled the car up to the curb and killed the engine.
I stepped out just as one of the people peeled herself out of the pack. A girl about my age slipped through the gap in the fence and raced up to me.
“Hello, I’m Val—oompf!”
Squealing, the stranger threw her arms around me and squeezed me hard enough to burst me like a jelly donut. “You must be Valentina! It’s so cool you’re here.” She lurched back and grabbed my hands. “My name is Sofia Richards. I’ll be your student guide.” She punctuated that with an eyeroll, but the smile didn’t leave her face.
“Nice to—” The words lodged in my throat as I took her in. There was stunning and then there was Sofia Richards. Her auburn hair caught the wind and it flew around her in a silken halo. It was almost as gorgeous as the dancing brown eyes and the full, pink lips stretched into a grin. There wasn’t a single blemish or pimple touching her fair skin.
I wasn’t ugly by anyone’s definition, but next to her, I might as well have been a toad. You wouldn’t have thought we belonged to the same species if it wasn’t for the identical blue uniform dress that she wore. Blue for freshman. We weren’t only the same species; we were also in the same class.
“—meet you,” I finally stuttered. “Sorry we’re late. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”
She flapped a hand. “Don’t worry about it. I love you so much right now. You got me out of a whole day of classes. I’m going to give you the official tour and then”—she put her hand to her mouth, lowering her voice—“the unofficial one. By the end of the day, you’ll know everything you need to about this place.”
“Great, I’ll just get my stuff.”
I moved away but a hand on my arm stopped me. “No, they got it.” She turned around and called to the two men waiting behind the gate. A closer look showed they were wearing uniforms of a different kind marking them as school staff. The two men sprang into action and crossed to the car, pulling out my suitcases when Mom popped the trunk.
“They’ll take it up to your dorm room,” she explained, “while I show you around.”
“Looks like you’re all set, kid.” I twisted around and looked at Mom over the roof of the car. “I’m going to head out, but call me later. Not too late though, I’ll be out with the girls.”
“Alright, bye, M—” She narrowed her eyes. “Bye, Olivia,” I corrected. “I’ll see you on Parents’ Day.”
She shrugged. “If I come. Who’s got time to be doing this two-hour drive every other day?”
“Love you too,” I deadpanned.
She cackled, threw me a kiss, and slid back into the driver’s seat. I shook my head as I pulled open the back door and leaned over Adam. The five-month-old watched me with huge, solemn eyes while I planted a kiss on his forehead.
“Bye, Adam. I’ll miss you. I love you. See you soon.”
“Aww,” Sofia cried when I stepped out. “Who is this little cutie?”
“My baby brother, Adam,” I said while she hooked her arm through mine. “They don’t make them any cuter than him.”
She laughed and we waved goodbye when Mom honked and pulled away from the curb.
“Was that your mom or your sister?” Sofia asked, keeping up the questioning while she led me through the gates and I took my first steps onto Evergreen campus.
“My mom,” I said absentmindedly as I took in everything around me. It was a good thing eyes couldn’t truly fall out of your head or mine would be rolling down the cobblestone path.
An ocean of green surrounded us only broken by a magnificent bubbling fountain, gardens, and benches scattered throughout.
“Olivia is one of a kind,” I continued.
Sofia chuckled. “I bet she’s got nothing on my parents. On my move-in day, Mom was so into texting that she walked into a wall. The great Madeline Richards had to go around with a massive bruise on her forehead.”
“Wait, not the Madeline Richards. Owner of—”
“Honey Hair Care,” she finished. “Yep, that’s her.”
Her tone said this was no big deal, my gaping mouth said otherwise. “She’s your mom?” I cried. “But I’m obsessed with her stuff. One of my suitcases—the big one—is filled to the brim with Honey products. Her shampoo has you smelling like a wood nymph with gardenias in your hair and sunshine coming out of your ass. No wonder you’re sporting that auburn halo of loveliness.”
Sofia threw her head back laughing. “Auburn halo of loveliness? Wood nymphs? Do you always say exactly what’s on your m
ind?”
“Yep.” I put a little pop on the “p.”
Sofia squeezed my arm. “Good. Then you and I are going to get along just fine.”
My lips twitched in the beginnings of a smile. I had a feeling I had made my first friend.
The two of us passed under a single stone arch and something caught my eye. I pointed at the top of the arch. “The inscription. What does it mean?”
Sofia followed my eyes. “Quae sequenda traditio. It means ‘tradition is everything.’”
I nodded and turned my attention back to the academy looming before us. My head went all the way back as I took it in.
“This is the main building,” Sofia spoke up. “The dorms, swimming pool, courts, track, and greenhouse are in the back, but since you’ll be spending most of the next four years of your life here, this is where we’ll start.”
“Cool with me.”
Twelve-foot heavy oak doors stood open before us. As we stepped inside, I saw an E and A emblazoned in the wood. “It’s like a medieval fortress,” I marveled. “Seems like we stepped back in time.”
“Back in time is right,” she said under her breath. “You’ll soon figure out how stuck in the past Evergreen is. These uniforms for one. Girls have to wear dresses and skirts while the boys have pants and polos. They refuse to change it or the class colors. Just wait until next year when we have to wear yellow.” She shuddered. “No one looks good in yellow.”
I had a sneaking suspicion that there wasn’t a single thing that Sofia didn’t look good in, but I focused on the courtyard we stepped into instead of arguing with her.
The trees were shedding their leaves in here as well and they crunched under my feet. It was a satisfying sound to go along with the birds hopping along the ground, chirping as they plucked goodies only they could see from the cobblestones.
Gray columns lined the open space, supporting the second, third, and fourth floors of the academy and I could see the heads of my new classmates through the spotless window panes. A smaller version of the fountain rested in the middle of the courtyard and clear, cool water shot from beneath the feet of a stone man in long robes.
