THE VAMPIRE I WAS NEVER MEANT TO LOVE

Grief didn't feel like crying all day long. For Liora Hale, it felt like being empty inside. It was like someone had opened her up, taken everything out, and closed her again. She could still walk. She could still make tea. But there was nothing in the middle of her anymore. It had been four days since the funeral. Only six people had come. Mrs. Dabrowski from the laundromat. Two nurses from the hospice. A man from the diner who left a casserole and ran away before anyone could thank him. They all said the same thing to Liora, in the same soft voice. She's at peace now. Liora had nodded each time. She had said thank you. She had not said that her mother was never at peace, not once in the eighteen years Liora had known her. Elena Hale checked the locks twice every night. She picked apartments with two exits. She picked cities where nobody knew them. They had moved eleven times, always before the sun came up, and her mother always said the same thing. It's better this way, Liora. Trust me. And Liora did trust her. There was no one else to trust. Now there was no one else at all. --- The apartment still smelled like lemon cleaner and sickness. The neighbors had scrubbed everything while Liora was at the funeral home. It was kind of them. But the last six months were still in the walls. The pill bottles. The long afternoons. Her mother's hands, getting thinner and thinner, until Liora could see every bone. The doctors never found a reason. That was the part Liora could not forgive. They did blood tests. They did scans. They sent her mother to three different cities. *It's unusual,* they said. *It doesn't match any one illness.* Her mother just got weaker. A little more each day. Like a color left out in the sun. Liora sat down at the kitchen table. A mountain of papers waited for her. Hospice bills. A phone plan to cancel. A letter from the landlord saying the lease was only good for three more weeks. She sorted them into piles and then sorted the piles again. She did not cry. She was afraid that if she started, she would never stop. Eighteen years old, she thought. And four hundred and twelve dollars. That was all the money left. It was in a coffee can on the shelf. She had applied to community college in the spring. Then she had put it off, without telling her mother. That was the month the doctors stopped saying *when she gets better.* Now she found the letter about it in the pile. She read it and put it down. There was a job at the diner if she wanted it. Mrs. Dabrowski had a spare room over the laundromat. It wasn't a terrible future. It was just a small one. A life shaped exactly like her mother's, only without the running. Liora touched the pendant under her sweater. It was a small, plain disk on a thin silver chain, worn smooth from years of wear. Her mother had put it around her neck the night before she died. Her hands had shaken the whole time. *Never take it off,* she had whispered. *Promise me.* Liora had promised. She would have promised anything. She reached for the next envelope in the pile. That was when she saw the one underneath. It was thick and cream-colored. The paper felt like cloth. Her name was written on the front in black ink, in a curly, old-fashioned hand. "Miss Liora Hale." There was no return address. In the corner there was a crest, pressed into the paper. It showed a tree with its roots showing above the ground, and a ring of thorns around it. The wax seal on the back was already broken. One of the neighbors must have opened it by mistake while sorting the mail. Liora pulled out the pages. *Dear Miss Hale,* *We are happy to tell you that you have been given the Founders' Scholarship to Everhart Academy. It covers your tuition, your room, and all your costs for the year. It is given because of your great promise.* Liora read it twice. Then she laughed. It was a short, tired laugh, and it sounded strange in the quiet kitchen. She had never heard of Everhart Academy. She had never applied. Nobody gave scholarships like this to girls with four hundred and twelve dollars. It had to be a scam. Or a mistake. Or one of those letters sent to thousands of people, hoping someone sad enough would call the number. She almost threw it away. But the letter kept going. *Your application has been reviewed and your place is confirmed. Please come to the Academy gates by the first of September. A car will meet you at Ashford train station. You do not need to bring anything but yourself.* *Your application.* There was a second page clipped behind the first. Liora unfolded it, and a cold feeling crept down her neck. It was a copy of an application form. It was filled out neatly. Her full name. Her birthday. Her grades. Her address. The names of her last three schools. There was even a short essay about herself, written in a voice that sounded almost like hers. She had never written it. At the bottom of the page, above the line that said *Signature of Parent or Guardian,* there was a signature. Liora would have known it anywhere. *Elena Hale.* It was her mother's handwriting. The slanted E. The little hook on the last *a*. The way she always pressed down too hard, so the pen left a groove in the paper. Liora ran her thumb over it and felt the line. Then she looked at the date. *August 9th.* Two weeks before her mother died. Liora forgot to breathe. Two weeks before the end, her mother could barely lift a cup. She slept most of the day. She had not left the apartment in months. But someone had put a pen in that shaking hand and made her sign her name. For a school Liora had never heard of. For a gift Liora had never asked for. *Why?* She sat very still and listened to the rain on the window. A memory she had been hiding from slowly came up. It was the last night. The hospice nurse had stepped out. The lamp was turned low. Her mother was so weak that Liora had to lean close to hear her. Then her mother's thin, cold hand grabbed Liora's wrist. It held on with a strength that should have been impossible. *Lia. Listen to me.* *I'm listening, Mom.* *If anyone comes for you,* her mother said. Her eyes were bright and scared, and she was looking at something far behind Liora's shoulder. *If anyone offers you a place to stay. A school. A new name. Anything. Don't trust them.* *Who, Mom? Who would come?* Her mother's lips moved. At first Liora thought she had heard wrong. It was not a name she knew. *The Vespers,* Elena whispered. *Don't trust the Vespers.* Then she closed her eyes. Her hand went loose around Liora's wrist. And she never really spoke again. Liora had told herself it was the fever talking. It was the medicine. It was the confusion of someone dying. She had put the memory in a drawer in her mind and shut it tight, the way she had shut so many drawers before. Now she looked down at the cream-colored letter. Her mother's name. The date. The groove in the paper. Her mother had warned her about strangers offering a school. And her mother had signed the form herself. *It doesn't make sense,* Liora thought. *None of it makes sense.* Her hand moved to her neck without her asking it to. She pulled the chain out from under her sweater and held the pendant up to the lamp. It felt warm in her fingers. Warmer than it should have been. For eighteen years, she had thought the pattern on it was only scratches. Old marks, worn down by time. She had never really looked. She looked now. The lamplight slid across the little disk, and the scratches turned into lines. The lines turned into a shape. Thin and delicate, but clear as day. A tree. Its roots were above the ground, reaching up into the air. And around it, curling tight, was a ring of thorns. Liora's eyes dropped to the crest in the corner of the letter. Then back to the pendant. Then to the letter again. They were the same. Exactly the same. Her mother had worn this school's crest around her neck her whole life. She had made Liora promise never to take it off. And in eighteen years, she had never once said the name Everhart. The kitchen was very quiet. Rain tapped the window. Liora's heart began to beat very hard. She had been so sure this was a trick. Now she wasn't sure of anything. But she knew one thing, deep in her bones. The answers to every question her mother had ever refused to answer were waiting behind the gates of that school. And someone there had been waiting a very long time for her to come. ---