Corvina had never heard of the University of Verenmore. But then again, she hadn’t heard of most normal things, not with her upbringing. However, nobody else had heard of it either.
Holding the letter that she got weeks ago in her hands – a letter written in ink on browned, thick paper that smelled as old, beloved books did – she perused the words again.
Dear Miss Clemm,
The University of Verenmore is pleased to extend our offer of admission to you. For over a century, we have enlisted students who come from special backgrounds to attend our esteemed institution. Your name was referred to us by the Morning Star Psychiatric Institute.
We would like to offer you a full scholarship to our associate undergraduate course at Verenmore. This degree will give you access to some exclusive circles going forward, and open many doors for you in the world. We believe with your academic records and personal history, you would be a good fit for our institution.
While we understand that this must be a difficult time for you, a decision must be made. Kindly revert to this letter at the attached address for further information. If we do not receive any response from you within 60 days, we will regretfully rescind the offer.
We hope to hear from you.
Regards,
Kaylin Cross,
Recruitment Specialist,
University of Verenmore
Corvina had never received a letter, much less one as bizarre as this.
And it was very bizarre.
She was a twenty-one-year-old girl who’d been home-schooled and secluded her whole life by her mother. Why would a university want an undergraduate student way past the normal age, one who didn’t have anything close to conventional schooling? And who even sent hand-written letters anymore?
Weird thing was, no one knew about the university. She’d tried to find something about it – asking the chief doctor at the facility, using her town library’s computer, and no one knew anything. Verenmore didn’t exist anywhere except on the map, a tiny blip, a small town by the same name in the valley of Mount Verenmore. That was all.
The school existed somewhere on the mountain that civilians weren’t usually allowed on. And she knew this because her taxi driver – a very kind man called Larry – had just told her so as he drove them up the mountain.
“Not a lot of folks ‘round here who go up to that castle ‘nymore,” Larry continued his barrage of information, winding the small private black car up the slightly inclined road. Corvina had found him right outside the train station when she’d come out. It had taken her two trains – one from Ashburn and the next from Tenebrae – and over twelve hours to get to Verenmore. Larry had been surprised when she’d given him her destination on the mountain, to the point he’d prayed before starting the car.
“And why is that?” Corvina asked, watching the little town get smaller in the distance as lush green swallowed her vision. She wasn’t used to conversation but needed to know as much as she could about the school she had agreed to go to. Not that she’d had anything better to do.
Living in the tiny cottage she’d grown up in, making jewelry and candles and doing readings to earn had become monotonous – especially when nobody in town except the old librarian had ever treated her with anything but suspicion. The letter of acceptance had come as a sign from the universe, and her mama had always told her never to ignore those. Corvina had always wanted to experience a school for the social nuances, study with other humans around her, and learn more about people who knew nothing about her. A clean slate to write whatever she wanted on it, however she wanted it. It was contradictory since she was a loner, but she was an observer. Whenever she got the chance, she enjoyed people-watching.
“Dunno,” the driver shrugged his slight shoulders under a thin beige jacket. “Tales ‘bout the place, I reckon. Say the castle’s haunted.”
Corvina snorted. She doubted that. Old places and things, in her experience, had a tendency to get labeled as haunted over time. But she also wanted to keep her mind open.
“And is it? Haunted, I mean?” she asked, still curious to know more about the mysterious university.
The driver glanced back at her in the rear-view mirror before focusing on the road again. “You stayin’ at the castle or visitin’, miss?”
“Staying,” she told him, glancing down at the letter in her hand and stuffing it in the brown leather bag that had belonged to her grandmother. It had been the only thing she had gotten from anyone besides her mother.
“I’d say keep your wits ‘bout you,” the driver concentrated as the incline got steeper. “Dunno if the place’s haunted but somethin’s not right with it.”
Silence reigned after that for a few minutes. Corvina rolled her window down slightly, looking out at the natural, incredible beauty of the mountain. The sight was unlike anything she had ever seen before. Where she came from, the woods had been more yellow and the air more humid.
As the cold, dry air whipped through the dark strands that had escaped her fishtail braid, Corvina let herself take in the abundance of deep, dark verdant that expanded below her, the little town a small clearing in the middle of the thicket. The scent of flora unknown filtered in through the open window, the sky a cloudy pale imitation of itself.
The music that had been on low through the ride crackled as they went higher. Corvina looked at the dashboard as the driver sighed. “Happens every time,” he told her. “Signal gets worse up there.”
Corvina felt herself frown. “Then how does the school communicate?”
The driver shrugged. “They got a boy they send down to town generally. To send letters, use the internet, such.”
“And this is the only road up and down the mountain?” She was quieter usually, although she didn’t know if that was a natural tendency or a lack of someone to talk to. Living alone at the edge of her small town, Skarsdale, as an outcast, she had sometimes gone days without even hearing the sound of her own voice.
“Yeah,” the driver nodded, steering through a bend. Corvina grabbed the handle on the side to keep from falling. The first time she had gotten inside a car, claustrophobia had assaulted her. Her mother and she had always gone to town on foot. She had seen cars but she’d never been inside one, not until the day they came for her and put her in one. She’d thankfully found the claustrophobia manageable as long as she kept the air circulating inside.
“Anything else I should know about the castle?” she asked once they were over the curve in the mountain, the fog thickening in front of the windshield, air getting fresher, lighter as they ascended.
The driver hesitated, his eyes flickering to her odd, violet ones – she’d inherited them from her mama – in the mirror briefly. “There’s some rumors, miss. Dunno how much truth they got.”
Another curve.
Corvina looked out the window, breathing in the crisp, cool air, realizing the view she had admired moments ago had disappeared under the thick white fog. It might have scared some people but Corvina had always found comfort in the oddities.
A slight smile on her lips, she waited until the driver navigated the curve safely before prompting him. “What rumors?”
“Strange thin’s,” the driver supplied, his accent heavier. “People killin’ themselves, goin’ missin’, as such. Now, we dunno how much truth it got. Townsfolk only get to castle for temp jobs. Cleanin’ or deliverin’ somethin’. But that’s what my mama told me, and her mama before her. Folks at the castle go mad.”
That was very oddly specific for a rumor. Although she didn’t know if it had any grain of truth in it at all. People in town could simply have made it up for amusement and to give themselves a reason to stay away from the strange place. It could be an old wives’ tale. Or maybe it wasn’t. She was going to go with an open mind. She knew better than most how false rumors affected lives. Before Corvina could go down the memory lane, they went over another bend, and suddenly, a looming silhouette of a huge iron gate broke through the fog.
Heartbeats quickening, Corvina leaned forward and squinted, trying to see the shape better.
Tall.
The gates were tall, on one side walled by the mountain and on the other side plunging into the valley below. There was no way for anyone to breach it, not without falling to their own deaths. The tight security sent a shiver down her spine. Or maybe it was the chill in the grey sky.
The driver came to a stop and rolled his window down as a guard clad in a brown uniform came from the guard’s room on the side with a clipboard.
“Your name?” he asked Corvina, his tone completely no-nonsense.
“Corvina Clemm,” she answered quietly, taking the man in. He was light-haired and had a wicked-looking mustache curved at the ends and surprisingly kind brown eyes for a man with his tone. He looked tough but she sensed he was a naturally good person. She didn’t know how she always knew it about the people she met – strong instincts, her mother had always called it – but seeing that her first point of contact at the university was a good man made her feel better.
She watched as he perused through the list and came to a halt. “And who will you be meeting, Miss Clemm?”
“Kaylin Cross at the Administration Office,” Corvina said. After she had sent her letter of interest, Kaylin Cross had given her the instructions on how to get to the university and everything she’d need to bring with her. Corvina knew she’d be sharing her room with another girl from her class, she knew she’d be getting all her books delivered by the end of the week, and she knew this was a new beginning, in a place where nobody knew her and her past. It was a chance to make something better of her life, maybe even make a good friend, and perhaps, if the universe was kind, even meet a boy like in the novels.
The mustached guard nodded, breaking her out of her musings, and raised a hand to someone on the other side of the guard room. The giant gates opened slowly, the noise like a monster groaning awake.
“Welcome to Verenmore, Miss Clemm,” he said to her before looking at the driver. “Five minutes, Larry.”
“You got it, Oak,” the driver nodded before starting the car again.
Corvina looked up at the tall, wrought-iron gates as they passed, and officially entered the university premises. The flutter in her belly became a quake as she put her head out the window to peer up, and finally saw the castle perched on top of the mountain. The closer they got, the larger it became. Calling it a castle was an understatement. It was a monstrosity, a beautiful, stunningly constructed monstrosity.
The vehicle came to stop before tall wooden doors and Larry jumped out of the car to help get her luggage. Corvina grasped her bag and hurried out as well, taking out some cash for the kind man as Larry put her one suitcase and one carry-on out on the cobblestoned entryway.
“Far as I can go, miss,” Larry told her, pocketing the cash she handed him.
“Thank you,” she nodded and he gave her a little smile, jumping back in the car quickly, and reversed. Corvina watched as the man hurried and disappeared around the bend that would take him to the main gates.
“They think we’ll eat them or something,” a wry feminine voice from behind her made Corvina turn. A beautiful green-eyed girl with a shock of super-short white hair stood grinning, a bright pink suitcase by her side.
“Damn girl, your eyes are freaky,” she whistled, drawing Corvina’s gaze to a metal piercing through her eyebrow. “And I didn’t mean that offensively. Sorry. Hi, I’m Jade.”
Corvina liked her immediately.
“Corvina,” she introduced herself, her voice sounding raspy in contrast to Jade’s feminine lilt.
“Cool name. First-year?” Jade asked, plopping down on her suitcase, her short, pale legs exposed in jeans shorts. Corvina wondered if she felt cold at all.
“Yes. You?” she asked, fiddling with her bracelet, the one she never took off. She knew what the other girl was seeing. A short, slight girl of questionable heritage, with slanted violet eyes, sun-kissed skin even though she rarely spent much time in the sun anymore, a nose ring, long, black hair in a fishtail braid that reached her waist, dressed in loose black pants and a thin purple sweater.
Jade chuckled. “Possibly. I mean I was a first-year last year and then I ran away but then I got some sense knocked into me so I’m back. But I think I’ll probably have to repeat the year. These guys don’t have a lot of rules but the ones they do? Strict doesn’t even cover it.”
Corvina felt herself smile slightly. The girl talked more in one minute than Corvina did in an entire year.
“This castle is so crazy. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it. You should see inside, it’s even bigger than it looks from out here. You don’t talk much, do you?” Jade asked, squinting at Corvina.
Corvina shook her head, enjoying the chatter from the other, definitely younger girl. She doubted she’d be able to get a word in anyway.
“Cool,” Jade nodded. “Wanna room with me? I am a little nosey but mostly I’m nice. And I can give you all the juicy info here.”
God, this girl was amazing. Corvina had never met anyone who treated her so… normally. She smiled. “I think I’d like that.”
“Damn, you got a killer smile, Corvina,” Jade grinned. “Can I call you Cor? You don’t mind, right?”
Corvina shrugged. She didn’t know how she felt about that. She’d always been Corvina to others. But this was a new chapter. Maybe she could be someone else too, someone more carefree, someone more badass. “I don’t mind.”
Just then the doors opened and a woman almost her mother’s age with short red hair walked out, wearing a nice formal beige dress.
“Ah, Jade,” she greeted her new friend. “Good, you’re here. Corvina,” she turned in the same beat, “I’m Kaylin Cross,” she came forward, her hand extended. Corvina shook her hand, an unpleasant sort of tingle flickering in her palm at the contact.
Kaylin removed her hand and continued without a pause. “Please call me Kaylin. I’m the recruitment specialist here at Verenmore. I’m also your point of contact going forward. If you have any problems, my office is in the Administration Wing.” She indicated a huge building she’d just exited. “You can find me there from 9 to 3 every day. Jade,” she gave the other girl a severe look. “Don’t run off this time. You two are rooming together. Grab your luggage. Let’s walk and talk.”
Kaylin was fast. Her quick words and quick steps left little time for Corvina to do anything but grab the handle of her roll-on suitcase. She saw Jade do the same, and they followed the older woman inside the campus. Jade was right. It was vast.
Well-manicured gardens littered small sections between different wings of the castle, people milling about in a few of those. High burettes graced different towers that Corvina could see. The stone walls were spaced with arched windows and climbing vines, some blooming with roses at the bottom. Gargoyles stuck out high on the walls, masking the water gutters in a grotesque display. The top of each tower was covered with some kind of deep blue stone that contrasted with the light brown of the rest of the buildings.
It was breathtaking.
Corvina had never seen anything like it in her entire life. The books she’d read with castles had usually been historical romances that never had pictures. She’d only imagined and this reality far outweighed her imagination.
“We’re a fairly small university,” Kaylin began, leading them around the side towards the right as Jade and Corvina dragged their luggage behind them on the cobblestoned path, the wheels making a loud sound against the stones.
A group of boys sitting on the steps outside a tower to their left came into view, their conversation stopping as all eyes fell on the group of females.
Corvina felt her face get warm at all the masculine gaze on herself.
A natural shyness overcame her.
She’d never really interacted with men – not unless one counted the doctors – although she loved reading about them. She’d started sneaking in romance books from the library years ago to read them at night after her mother went to bed. Her mother, even while awake, had barely spoken to Corvina outside of teaching her. Books had become her refuge, especially books with men – humans, shapeshifters, or aliens – who fell in love hard and claimed their women body and soul were her favorite.
Corvina wanted that. She wanted to belong, to be loved, to be absolutely adored, no matter what happened, despite her past. She craved it so badly in her bones, some days she thought she would die from the sheer hunger of it. There was a gnawing ache in her soul and she desired so, so deeply. But she knew the books she read were fictional, and chances of her, of all people, finding anything remotely similar were slim.
Yet, she firmed her lips, shook off her thoughts, and gave a semblance of a smile to the boys who’d checked them out.
New beginnings, newer her.
“Verenmore has about two thousand students, give or take a few hundred,” Kaylin informed them, bringing her attention back, in a voice that told Corvina she’d given this exact spiel countless times before.
“We’ve been around for more than a hundred and fifty years. The university was established to educate and uplift bright students who could otherwise not afford a conventional college education for many reasons. Every student here has come from odd circumstances. We fund as much of it as possible. Luckily, the Board has some of the most influential members of the society so thankfully our funding has always been covered. Some are alumni themselves. Some choose to give back by becoming professors here. We aren’t elite, but we’re very exclusive. You are a part of that exclusivity now.”
While Kaylin had been talking, Corvina had counted four tall towers that they had crossed. They came to a halt at the fifth tower, one at the back, and Kaylin turned to them. “Since Jade here already knows the room, I’ll let her guide you. There’s a welcome packet for you with a map, your schedule, and the professors you’ll have this semester. Anything else, please find me. Welcome to Verenmore.”
With that, she turned and left the way they had come.
“Looking good, Jade,” a blonde, blue-eyed handsome boy sitting with the group on the other tower’s steps called out. “Didn’t think I’d see you here again after the way you ran off.”
Corvina saw Jade grit her teeth, show the boy a middle finger with bright pink polish.
“Asshole,” Jade muttered. “Let’s just go, yeah?”
Corvina nodded. She didn’t know why this girl had run away but she’d been kind to her so far and she’d become her first friend. Corvina didn’t like the idea of her feeling uncomfortable.
“Hey, Purple,” the same boy called out just as Corvina stepped forward, obviously referring to either her rather distinctive eyes or her sweater. She hesitated on the threshold, wondering if she should turn, especially since there was nothing else even remotely close to purple around them.
Probably not a good idea to ignore people on the first day, Corvina.
She sighed, turning her neck to see the boy giving her a smirk. “Be careful with that one,” he pointed to Jade.
Corvina raised her eyebrows, clearly missing out on some history between the two. She moved to step in just as his voice rang out again, his words cutting through the dry air, giving her pause.
“Her last roommate threw herself off the tower roof. So, watch yourself with her.”
