‘Don’t fret, Vivi.’
The whisper drifted into her ear so lightly she almost wrote it off. Almost. And then she suddenly came to a standstill in the middle of the garden. It was early in the morning, too early for most people to be awake.
But she was up at the crack of dawn. She’d slept restlessly, with the castle groaning at night, and woken up with a hot flash she hadn’t had in many years. Sweating, she had run to the common showers that had been empty, turned the cold faucet, and cleansed herself as thoroughly as possible. Then, ready for the day, she had taken a packet of dried nuts and gone down to the gardens to take in some fresh air. And the whisper had come.
Mo. But why was he so light in her head?
She didn’t know whose voice it was, or if it was even real. With her history, it was entirely possible that it was simply in her head and she was imagining it. But this voice was a man’s. It had always been a man’s. She’d liked to imagine when she’d been younger that it had been her father’s. She didn’t know much about him, only that he had killed himself, leaving behind the cottage and the little land to her mother.
A crow flew overhead. The first one she’d seen in all the weeks she’d been there.
‘Follow the bird.’
Should she? She usually always did whatever Mo told her to without question.
Corvina looked up at the bird, following it with her eyes as it went down around the castle to the woods beyond. She’d not ventured into them here but she knew woods. Her sense of direction was fantastic, so she wasn’t worried about getting lost.
Determination zinging through her, she wrapped the burgundy shawl around her frame and headed down the incline to the same spot the bird had flown over. The fog swirled around her skirt early in the morning, her breath misting in front of her face as she stepped into the woods, waiting for the sounds of the bird to guide her.
When she’d been a little girl, her mother had taught her to follow the caws of the crows into the woods to feed them at a certain spot. That way, the birds knew exactly what area to expect their food in.
Wearing the fog around her like a cloak, fearless of anything that hid inside it, Corvina followed the sound as it came. The woods thickened with her steps, the castle disappearing behind her from the sight in the foliage. Tall trees stood like sentinels against the battle of the time, their barks thick, their leaves dewy, the scent of crisp forest permeating the air.
Walking into the woods, she could see how someone could easily venture into the forest and lose their way, disappearing without any chance of getting help. Only these trees knew the truth of everything that had happened here, and sometimes, she wished there was a way for her to listen to their stories.
After a few minutes of walking, the trees branched out. The sound of water had her curiosity piqued. Was there a river running through the mountain? Quickening her pace, she emerged after a few paces into a clearing that led to a giant, beautiful, dark lake.
A still lake.
Where had the sound of water come from?
Corvina looked around and found the crow sitting on a rock beside the lake. Without wasting any time, she quickly ripped open the pack of nuts and shook some out on her palm, placing the offering on the rock a few feet away from the watching bird.
She quickly stepped back and turned to the lake.
“It’s beautiful here, isn’t it?” she spoke to the crow. For the longest time after her mother was gone, Corvina had taken to talking to the birds she fed just to not forget the sound of her voice. Though she talked daily these days, there was a certain comfort in such an old habit.
“This lake is a surprise though,” she continued, watching the utterly still water. It was murky and something not entirely pure. She didn’t know what it was, but something was off about it.
The sound of a beak pecking on the rock came from the side. Her offering had been accepted. Corvina smiled. “You must know so many secrets about this place. I wish you could tell me.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” the masculine response from her back made her gasp and turn around. The bird cawed and flapped its wings before settling back, pecking at his treat.
Corvina looked, her heart pounding, as the silver-eyed devil watched her from the edge of the clearing, leaning against a tree, his hands in his pockets. She wrapped the shawl around her tighter, realizing she was all alone with this man of questionable history, and no one knew where she was. She swallowed.
“Are you scared?” Mr. Deverell asked, not moving from his spot at all.
“Should I be?” she asked, raising her eyebrows slightly even as a part of her wanted to break the eye contact and blush furiously at the singular masculine attention from a very masculine male.
“Yes,” he answered succinctly. “The woods are dangerous, especially for someone who doesn’t know them.”
Corvina shrugged, the intensity of his eyes making her nerves flutter. Turning around to face the lake, she gave him her back and sensed him step forward.
“Worse, I could have been anyone,” he continued, his voice sounding a few feet behind her, rolling over her. “I could have done anything to you and left you here. No one would have known.”
She almost smiled at that. “If you’re trying to scare me, it’s not working.”
“And why is that?” Closer.
“He knows you,” Corvina tilted her head to the side, indicating the bird eating the last of the nuts. “He recognized you, gave you a greeting, and continued to eat his food. Had you been a threat, he would have run with the food or attacked you. He did neither, which means he recognizes you enough to eat in your presence.”
“Or maybe it means he’s just an idiot bird with no sense of self-preservation,” he spoke beside her, his own gaze on the lake. Corvina looked to the side and realized for the first time how immensely tall he was in contrast to her. The top of her head barely reached his shoulder.
Unsure as to why it made something warm inside her unfurl, she stood in silence for a moment. The wind blew tendrils of her hair across her face, her eyes closing as his scent drifted to her for the first time. He smelled like burning wood and heady brandy, the kind her mama had made her sip on cold winters. He smelled of dangerous adventures and coming home, of heartache and nostalgia.
She saw him bring out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from his pockets, watched his long, surprisingly beautiful fingers take one out, put it to his slightly moist lips, and set it alight. He took a deep drag in, the smell of burning nicotine mixing with his own scent, adding a layer of rogue into the concoction.
He exhaled and she watched the smoke suspend itself in the air, before dispersing into molecules unseen. Some of those molecules must have touched her lips because she felt her mouth tingle. She wondered what they would feel like pressed into his, just for a moment. It was lust but it was so novel for her.
“Your bird’s gone,” he pointed out without even glancing at the rock once.
Corvina turned to check and realized with surprise that he was right.
“I hope he comes back with a few friends next time,” she muttered without thinking and felt the searing mercury eyes come to her. She looked up, their gazes locking, and this time she didn’t break it, instead taking the chance to observe him up close. The grey streak in his hair seemed more prominent so close, in utter contrast to his unlined but grave face.
Something in the moment must have muddled her head because the next words out of her mouth were, “Are any of the rumors about you true, Mr. Deverell?”
She saw his eyes flare slightly before he looked back out at the lake, taking another drag of the cigarette. “You’re very unusual, Miss Clemm. Almost enough to interest me,” he turned his eyes back to her. “And let’s just say that’s not good thing.”
He threw the half-smoked cigarette to the ground, crushing it under his shoe before turning back to the woods. “Stay out of the woods, little crow. Your feathery friends can’t help you if you’re dead.”
Well, that wasn’t cryptic at all.
She watched him disappear into the thicket and shook her head, turning away from the lake towards the woods entirely when, for the first time in ages, another voice came to her on a whisper.
‘Help me.’
It was light, almost gentle, and definitely feminine.
“What the hell,” she muttered to herself as a chill made its way down her spine. Something ugly left its residue on her tongue as she thought of the voice, something wet and slimy and terrible. Corvina stilled for a long moment, letting her eyes rove over the entire view – a placid dark lake, woods on the other side, grey skies, and a thin mist coating the water.
‘Help me, please.’
The residue thickened.
She’d heard a few voices throughout her life, Mo’s being the most prominent of them. They had never left that coating on her tongue. Whereas his voice had left her the scent of sandalwood, this one scented of decay and rotten flesh. She didn’t understand why.
Keeping her head down, she hurried back to the woods and jogged through the trees, heading in the direction of the castle, her senses jarred because of the alien voice. Was it her subconscious? Was she imagining it? And if so why? Was it because of the spooky tales of the castle?
Questions revolved in her mind as she left the thicket behind and climbed the incline up to the tower to get ready for her classes.
The same group of guys she’d seen sitting on the stairs with Troy on her first day were sitting there as she walked up, laughing about something. She recognized one of the boys from her class amongst them, Jax.
“Little romp in the woods?” Troy asked good-naturedly, wiggling his eyebrows. Still a bit shaken from the voice, Corvina tipped her lips up in a smile for the boy who’d only been nice to her.
“What do you mean?” she asked, trying to distract herself and ignore all the boys looking at her all at once. Her natural shyness, when faced with so many gazes, made her want to run off.
“Well,” Troy grinned. “Mr. Deverell came out of the woods, which isn’t anything unnatural. But you came out a few minutes later all flustered. So, one plus one?”
It took Corvina a second to realize what he was implying. Her face grew warm, the tips of her ears burning at the idea that she and the man she was most definitely feeling lust for had done something so forbidden in the woods.
Troy chuckled good-naturedly. “Relax, Purple. I’m just messin’ with you.”
Jade was right. He was an asshole.
Rolling her eyes at him, she simply walked around the group to the tower to the sound of his laughter. She would’ve said something had he been alone, but she was a bit rattled, and all the boys together in one place only made her more nervous.
The tower that housed her room was beautiful as everything else in Verenmore. It was one of the three tall towers that housed the girls, one less than the four where the boys resided. The interior of her tower was all dark, different kinds of woods – some polished and classic, some unpolished and raw. The foyer had nothing but a reception area with a small table, a chair that was always empty, and a huge painting of the lake she had just seen with a bridge on the wall. There was also a little box with a few folded papers. Jade told her that was where any issues with the housing were left in writing and someone from the Admin Wing collected it every week. There was a small chandelier fitted with electric lights on the high ceiling, and the staircase leading up to the right.
Corvina headed to the stairs and climbed up to her level. The corridor was busier now than it had been when she’d left, girls preparing for their morning, some chattering, some quieter, going to and fro from the common bathrooms at the opposite end of the hall.
“Hey, freaky eyes?” a voice called out from the stairs.
Corvina paused in the corridor, not turning, knowing exactly who it was. Roy Kingston, the beautiful senior from the third level who exuded more confidence from her pinky than Corvina did from her entire body. From what Jade had told her, Roy had come from a really shitty foster home where she had been sexually assaulted. It had hardened her and made her a bitch to anyone who didn’t fit in with her. Corvina was on that list.
“Did I just spy you coming out of the woods with a teacher?”
A few girls in the corridor stopped, looking at Corvina with surprised glances. Corvina took in a deep breath and turned to face the blonde beauty.
“I don’t know what you saw, Roy,” she told her loudly, knowing girls were listening for the slightest hint of something wrong.
“You didn’t come out of the woods with Mr. Deverell then?” Roy asked, folding her hands over her ample bosom, still in her pajamas.
Corvina blinked. “Not that it’s any of your business, but no.”
Roy tilted her head to the side, considering Corvina with light eyes. “You probably missed it because you’re new, so I’ll give you the courtesy of telling you. Student-teacher relationships are not allowed at Verenmore. One hint, and you’ll be thrown out. That’s the way things work on this campus.”
Corvina stayed silent, slightly annoyed at the other girl and her tone but keeping it quiet.
“If I were you, I’d watch myself,” Roy parted with that, going back upstairs.
“She’s not wrong, you know?” one of the lingering girls in the hallway told Corvina, wincing slightly. Corvina gave her a small smile and went to her room, mulling about Roy’s motivation in warning her off. Was she a rule-thumper looking out for her or was there something more nefarious about it?
Jade was still asleep, snoring slightly, her leg thrown out of her blanket. God, the girl slept like the dead. But Corvina knew she’d be up and running around the moment her alarm went off, so she let her be, and went to her desk. Her fingers trembling slightly from both her interaction with the voice and with Roy, Corvina opened her journal and quickly wrote down everything she’d felt when she heard the voice. Dr. Detta had told her to note down any unnatural occurrences and hearing a new voice was definitely unnatural.
Her eyes caught on a shimmery stone under her bed, stuck between the floorboards. Corvina shut her journal and put it away, leaning down to the thing and pulling it out, on instantly it wasn’t one of hers. A dark green jade crystal glinted off the light, set in an antique metal ring. Was it Jade’s? She hadn’t mentioned losing a ring.
The sudden blare of an alarm startled her slightly. Calming her rapid heartbeat, Corvina huffed at herself, and stood up, putting the ring away in their shared drawer.
“Why do mornings come?” Jade groaned from her bed, slapping the alarm shut.
“Would you prefer it be night all the time?” Corvina asked curiously, crossing one leg over the other.
“Hey,” Jade yawned. “Gimme a hot guy and pots of money and I’d be a night girl my whole life. Mornings are the devil’s work.”
A laugh bubbled out of Corvina as she looked at her friend. “Many cultures around the world would beg to differ.”
“Please don’t make sense at this ungodly hour,” Jade groaned, finally pushing herself off the bed and gathering her things to take to the bathroom. “Wait, why are you already dressed?”
Corvina looked up to see her friend looking at her black skirt, shoes, and the shawl around her shoulders. She shrugged. “I went for a walk.”
Jade’s eyes widened. “In the woods?”
“Yes.”
“Please tell me you weren’t alone.”
Corvina hesitated. “I wasn’t alone.” Well, she hadn’t been for half the time, and it was entirely possible the news of her being spotted leaving with Mr. Deverell would reach Jade’s ears by lunch.
Her roommate exhaled and rushed out of the room, muttering under her breath.
Corvina stood and went to the arched window, looking out at the dark green forest from above. She watched the students milling around, unaware of what lay in the woods. She wasn’t entirely aware either, but she sensed something.
Her eyes went to a darkly dressed figure striding across the campus at a brisk pace. The silver-eyed devil. Perhaps he knew more about what lay in those woods. Because she couldn’t ignore the fact that the first time she heard a foreign voice was immediately after her interaction with him.
It could be a coincidence, but she didn’t believe in them. Unless the voice she’d heard there wasn’t real. Her response to the ugliness it brought with her had been very, very real though. And if it wasn’t real, that meant she’d imagined it.
That wasn’t good, especially not for her.
She’d been tested. Mo’s voice that she’d heard her whole life, the doctors had written off as her subconscious’ way of filling in for an absent father figure. But the voice she heard in that forest wasn’t her subconscious. It couldn’t be. Or could it? Because if it was truly in her head, Verenmore posed bigger problems than mysterious woods and mysterious men. It meant her descent into madness had begun.
**
Dr. Kari was one of her scariest professors in the semester. He had down tilted dark eyes and a fierce white beard, and he was strict. One time a girl got late to the class and he made her stand outside in the corridor in full view until she had gone red in the face from humiliation. Students were scared to ask him a question. But it didn’t end there. He also seemed to enjoy looking at young girls too much in the class, all eighteen-year-old first-years except an older Corvina.
He taught the elective Psychology class, the one class she had without Jade, one she had wanted to take because she was curious about understanding the mind. But as she sat at the back trying to keep herself as small as possible, she wondered if Dr. Kari was worth the bother.
“According to Jung, sexuality can express deep levels of the psyche’s symbolic, archetypal and mythic elements,” he walked around with his thickset frame, his eyes passing over the class, lingering on the girls for an extra split second that gave Corvina the creeps as she took notes.
“Jung’s perspective on the nature of libido was different from Freud’s and not only sexual,” Dr. Kari went on. “He believed libido was desire or impulse unchecked by any kind of authority. To quote him, it is ‘appetite in its natural state’.”
A movement at the door brought her eyes to find Mr. Deverell leaning against the threshold, dressed in black, hands in his pockets, watching her with those eyes. Appetite in its natural state. Oh yeah, she could see what Jung was talking about. And she wanted the utmost to sate that appetite, to satiate her own. A part of her, one that didn’t care for rules, wanted to follow this newfound lust and see where it led.
“Would you tell the class what has you so fascinated, Miss Clemm?” Dr. Kari’s hard voice jolted her attention back to his lecherous eyes, her own lust extinguishing.
It was such an odd moment for her to mull over, two men watching her with desire in their eyes, one giving her the creeps and the other giving her the butterflies.
“I’m afraid I distracted her, Dr. Kari,” the deep, gravel voice from the doorway made her stomach flip.
Dr. Kari looked at the man half his age with an odd look of apprehension. It was a look Corvina didn’t understand the reason for.
“Mr. Deverell?” Dr. Kari swallowed.
“Can I have a quick word with you?” Mr. Deverell didn’t wait for his reply, simply gave Corvina another intense look that made her stomach tighten, and walked out.
Dr. Kari followed and the two men stood in the hallway, speaking for a quick second, their body language alone telling Corvina who had the upper hand in whatever conversation they were having – Dr. Kari was agitated, defensive; Mr. Deverell was relaxed, authoritative.
Dr. Kari came back to the room, looking angry.
But he didn’t look at Corvina all through the class again.
And she wondered, in a dark recess of her mind, if it had something to do with the silver-eyed devil.
