"Be careful... be careful... be careful what you wish for."
Wren's POV.
The trees leaned in like old, whispering sentinels, their branches scraping against the bruised sky. The car hummed beneath me, a mechanical heartbeat in the stillness, as we wound through the lonely road, a path that felt less like a journey and more like a reckoning.
Vermont wasn't supposed to feel like this.
The Vermont I knew had been alive... breathing fire and music and madness.
The last time I was here, the world had been breathing.
I pressed my forehead to the cold glass and let the memory swallow me whole:
The Carnival of the Five-Year Dawn, the Night Carnival.
I could still see it... the flicker of red lanterns floating like embers into the night, thousands floating upward like dying stars, illuminating the masks of revelers below, faces painted gold, lips stained with stolen kisses. The scent of caramelized sugar and charred squid thick in the air. The dancers, their skirts swirling like liquid fire, their bare feet pounding the earth in rhythms older than the town itself. The music had been a living thing, pulsing through the streets, through me, like a second heartbeat.
And the people...
God, the people.
Laughing. Drinking. Masks glinting under the fireworks, their edges too sharp, their smiles too wide.
A dark skinned woman glowing in a feathered headdress had pressed a candied apple into my small hands, her fingernails sharp as claws. "Eat up, little sparrow," she'd crooned. "The night loves sweet things."
"Not everyone here is human, mija, Not all who walks in the carnival are flesh. Some are just... borrowing it." Grandma had whispered, her voice curling like smoke in my ear. "The veil is thin tonight." Her warning slithered through my mind, again.
I had been terrified.
And then Kai's fingers had laced through mine, warm and sure. I'd clung to it so tightly our sweat mingled. His thumb stroked my pulse point... alive, alive, alive... as fire-eaters spat flames into the velvet dark.
"I won't let anything get you," he'd said, like it was a vow.
I had believed him.
"Watch," he'd whispered, pointing to a contortionist folding herself into impossible shapes. "Her bones aren't real."
I'd both dreaded and ached to see the moment her skin would split, revealing whatever monstrous truth writhed beneath.
Now, the Vermont outside my window was a ghost of that memory. The same trees, the same winding roads... but the magic was buried under a silence so heavy it pressed against my lungs.
And yet.
And yet.
There was something else here.
A hum in the air, low and persistent, like a chord struck years ago that never quite faded. The kind of feeling that raises the fine hairs on your arms, not from fear, but from recognition.
You've been here before, it seemed to whisper. In another life. In another skin.
The memory dissolved as the car passed through a police checkpoint. The officer's flashlight raked across my face, and for one dizzying second, his pupils flashed vertical.. then blinked normal.
My breath hitched.
The car flickered past, a brief interruption in the dream. Then the gates of my new prison loomed ahead, iron and imposing, and my Mom's car rolled to a stop.
My mother didn't turn around.
"We're here."
My headphones crackled to life, music flood in, a song I didn't recognize, all weeping violins, some melancholic indie song, all aching chords and lyrics about burning cities. Fitting. And a voice that sang:
"You've been here before, in another skin..."
A shiver crawled down my spine.
Vermont hadn't changed. I had.
A Spotify ad cut in, jarring and too loud.
I almost laughed.
Even now, the universe couldn't resist ruining the moment.
But then the gates creaked open.
Mom's boyfriend parked the car. He looked creeped out. My mother not very much but it was evident with how her fingers twitched before holding mine. I flinched. She didn't seem to notice her hands only tightened. The last time Mom held me was three years ago. Back then my hands were much smaller.
The iron gates groan as they swing shut behind us, their intricate scrollwork casting spiderweb shadows across the cobblestones. The air is thick with the scent of aged parchment, damp earth, and the distant, smoky promise of burning oak from the hearths inside. Above us, the castle looms, its spires clawing at the misty sky, its stained-glass windows glowing like shattered jewels. This is Vermont Academy, a place where time has folded in on itself, where the 18th century lingers in every stone, every whispered secret, every flickering candle.
"Are you seriously going to let your daughter stay in this creepy school?"
The man whispered to my mother, apprehension etched in his tone. For once I agreed with him.
The moment I stepped into the Grand Hall, the air changed... thick with the scent of candle wax, old paper, and the faint metallic tang of ink. The vaulted ceiling loomed above, its arches strung with dust-laden chandeliers, their candles flickering like trapped fireflies.
Our footsteps echoed through the Grand Hall, Portraits of long-dead headmasters watch with eyes that seem to track us. The walls are lined with bookshelves so tall they require rolling ladders, their leather-bound tomes whispering in languages half-forgotten. Somewhere, a piano plays, a melancholic sonata drifting through the halls like a ghost. The very shadows seemed to lean in, as if listening.
And then there were the students.
They moved in a hypnotic current, a sea of wool, leather, and whispered rebellion.
Some of the girls wore high-collared black dresses with sleeves that tapered to tight cuffs, each buttoned with onyx studs. Over them, fitted waistcoats in deep burgundy or hunter green, each of their pockets always slightly bulging with forbidden things... a vial of ink, a lockpick, a folded love letter. Their skirts brushed the tops of knee-high boots, scuffed from what seemed like secret treks into the forest. Others wore high-collared black dresses with silver thread embroidered along the cuffs, tiny, intricate constellations that seemed to shift if stared at too long. Their stockings were sheer as cobwebs, and their shoes, polished oxfords, clicked against the marble like a metronome keeping time with some unseen rhythm.
The boys were in tailored charcoal suits, their jackets lined with silk the color of dried blood. Cravats were knotted loosely, as if they'd been tugged at in frustration. Some wore fingerless gloves, their hands marked with ink stains and faint scars. A few had pocket watches on silver chains, though the time was always wrong. They moved with unnatural grace, their laughter low, their eyes sharp. Some carried rapiers slung casually at their hips, others leather-bound books with pages that rustled on their own. Some were clad in tailored charcoal suits, their waistcoats stitched with crimson sigils that almost looked like ordinary school crests... until the light hit them just right, revealing the faint glow of something older beneath. Their ties were knotted so tightly I wondered if they could breathe at all.
A group of senior students passed by, their gloved hands clutching leather-bound tomes. One... a girl with a single white streak in her raven hair, turned to stare at me. Her eyes were too dark, pupils swallowing the irises whole. She smiled, and for a heartbeat, her teeth looked sharp.
I swallowed hard, wanting to leave immediately. I don't know what the fuck was going on but I wanted to disappear.
Oblivious, my mother gripped her boyfriend's arm, who had the uneasy air of someone who didn't belong. She stopped a passing student, a tall girl with a braid like a rope of midnight, her lips stained dark with something that wasn't quite berry juice.
"Excuse me," Mom said, voice too bright. "Could you point us to the principal's office?"
The girl turned slowly. Her eyes were two different colors, one amber, one storm-gray. She smiled, and it was the kind of smile that made her boyfriend take a step back.
"There is no principal," she said.
A beat of silence.
Then, from behind them, a voice:
"There hasn't been one since 1892."
A boy stood there, his jacket lined with silver thread that shimmered like spiderwebs. His hands were tucked in his pockets, but I could see the edge of a tattoo peeking from his cuff... a snake eating its own tail. Richard, 'the name of my mom's boyfriend I refused to acknowledge' laughed, nervous. "What kind of school doesn't have a principal?"
The students exchanged a glance. The girl tilted her head. "The kind that doesn't need one."
Then, as if on cue, the chandeliers dimmed. The shadows in the hall lengthened, stretching toward the trio like fingers. From somewhere deep in the castle, a clock struck thirteen.
My skin prickled. The students weren't just watching us... they were waiting. For what, I didn't know.
The boy with the silver-threaded jacket leaned in. "You'll want the Head Keeper. Third floor. The door with no handle."
Richard paled. "What the hell kind of place..."
But the students were already melting back into the crowd, their laughter a whisper of bells and blades. Someone collided with Mom, a boy, He flashed an apologetic smile. His uniform was immaculate, his posture perfect, but his voice was wrong... like two people speaking at once, one smooth, the other guttural.
"Don't go there... Go to the Third Corridor. Knock twice. Then once more. He prefers it that way."
My mother blinked, disoriented. Her boyfriend, a man who had tried to seem unshakable, suddenly took a step back, his face paling.
The boy tilted his head, his neck creaking faintly. "You're new," he said to me, ignoring the adults entirely. "You'll learn the rules soon enough."
What rules? I wanted to ask but then like the others he was gone, melting into the crowd of students, his form flickering at the edges like a candle about to snuff out.
My mother exhaled shakily. "Odd boy," she muttered, trying to laugh it off.
I exhaled. The Grand Hall seemed to pulse around me, the portraits on the walls leaning forward, their eyes gleaming with something like hunger.
As we walked down the hall, disoriented I caught a glimpse of a red lantern flickering in an alcove... just like the ones from the Night Carnival.
A shiver tore through me.
Grandma's warning echoed in my skull:
"Not all who walk here are flesh, mija."
I looked back. Something hid in the dark corners. I heard a soft "Ssh.." and a mutter.
Count to ten... everything will be all right Wren you are probably just exaggerating, I thought
I was wrong.