Verbena Academy

ℭ𝔥𝔞𝔭𝔱𝔢𝔯 𝔗𝔥𝔯𝔢𝔢

(So, I am super aware of the missing chapter 2. Some of the ideas I had down got jumbled up and the chapter names got crazy, so just keep reading and I promise I'll fix it!!)

(Picture is Verbena Academy)

ℭ𝔥𝔞𝔭𝔱𝔢𝔯 𝔗𝔥𝔯𝔢𝔢- 𝔅𝔲𝔯𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔤 ℜ𝔬𝔰𝔢

As we drove down my long driveway, I watch the cedar saplings and the age-old oak trees through the window of the limousine as they blur past. An old church in the pasture beyond reminds me of my old palace in Venice. Huge stained glass windows, thousands of old bricks, white and faded. My favorite memory is if me running through the ball room and being picked up by a man, his face faded from my memory. Being twirled in the air, a brief view of the motif on the ceiling. A deep, smooth laughter came from a forgotten man echos through the grateful hall. My thoughts of my old life were suddenly interrupted by a piece of hair falling from my raven-haired bun into my eyes. Pinning it back, I look through the window, put my sunglasses on, and get lost in my thoughts once again.

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About twenty minutes later, the driver rolls down the partition separating the cab from the rest of the vehicle.

"Hello miss, I'm Phil. You you like to stop anywhere before we start heading toward the academy?" He asks in an accent I can't recognize. After thinking for a moment, I answer him.

"Yes, County General hospital please."

"Of course. Visiting family?" he questions. I hesitate, millions of miles of excuses run through my head. After numerous unworthy options passed, I go with the easiest choice.

"My aunt is sick, and I want to visit her before I go."

"I see, I see. We will be there in about ten minutes, miss." He says while punching in the address to his GPS. He rolls up the partition not before picking up a radio from the dash. He speaks in a foreign language he thinks I don't speak.

"Rose de ardere în tranzit, În drum spre spital" he speaks in Romanian. (Burning Rose in Transit, en route to hospital)

'Great' I think to myself, I even have a code name. I open my phone to see 3 messages from Roxie.

Rox: Hey, did u get killed yet?

Rox: r u ded?

Rox: have u eaten? You know how u get...

I give a small chuckle before texting her back.

Me: Ya, i'm fine, and already dead, and no, I haven't eaten, going to hospital now.

I immediately get a text back.

Rox: Oh thank god u r alive! Be good, text me when u get there

Me: I will. Kisses ^_^

Rox: Kisses <3

Her final text sending a warm feeling through my bones. Roxie has been my best friend since I moved to my home in Virginia. She pretty much lives with me, her parents died in a car accident a few years ago. Before me, she lived with her Aunt Marsha and Uncle Harry. They abused her so much, she still has panic attacks in certain scenarios.

She came to my house the first time when she had run away from her Aunt's house. The fight that night had been particularly bad. A week earlier, her Uncle took her door off to make sure she wasn't doing anything 'unsavory'. The fight was about getting her door back on so her creepy cousins couldn't watch her, which they often did. She ran out of the house after her Aunt had threatened her with one of the kitchen knives. At that time, I was just first moving into my house, boxes were still everywhere. I first bought the home when I was four hundred. Up until now, an old friend was looking after the house. He died of a werewolf bite a year ago, so no one has been looking after the place. It was in shambles. People had broken in, graffiti on the walls, trash all over the place, there was even a fire pit dug into the floor of my front parlor.