Evermore Academy (Evermore Academy #3) - Audrey Grey Page 0,116

behind his back. I don’t cry when my mother takes me, dazed and unable to speak, to her Manhattan apartment for the rest of the break.

When that break stretches past the return to school date, I don’t say a word.

I let her tell me when to sleep. When to wake. Let the brownies bathe me and bring me food I won’t eat. If I allow myself to think about anything, the sobs trapped inside my chest will burst free and I’m afraid they’ll never stop.

So I stay numb. Focus on simple tasks like combing my hair or brushing my teeth. I wake up late, take long naps, and go to bed as early as possible. I pretend to listen to my mother as she discusses wedding details, nodding my head to everything.

On days that I feel up to it, I do my schoolwork at a desk by the window. Days go by where I don’t remember anything.

And I don’t break. Not until I finally gather the courage to open my phone and, hand shaking, dial the one number that could piece me back together.

My bruised heart leaps as I hear the voice pick up, but it isn’t Zinnia. Vi is quiet on the other end as I manage to keep my tone calm while asking for the woman who has always been there for me. Who always has an endless supply of affection, hugs, and humor when I need it most.

When Aunt Vi finally speaks, her words reverberate through my chest like shrapnel, shattering my wounded heart into a thousand pieces.

“I’m sorry, Summer—” Her sharp, hard-as-nails voice breaks. “We think it’s best for both parties if you don’t call here for a while.”

I don’t respond; I can’t. It doesn’t feel real. None of it does.

I hang up the phone, fall to my knees, and weep. I weep for my friends. For all the terrible things we’ve endured over the last three years. All the heartbreaks and injustices, all the cruelty. I sob for Valerian and what he gave up so that I could live. For our stolen future. For the bond shriveling inside me every second we’re apart and the agony I feel pulsing from the other side. The torment and pain he will have to endure watching me marry someone else. And then, once Hellebore has made sure Valerian knows I’m chained forever, he will execute my mate.

This can’t be real.

But it is.

I can’t catch my breath. Can’t seem to find a way out of this nightmare. My heart twists in my chest as if trying to escape the truth. As if making itself smaller and smaller will somehow make it hurt less.

I sob and sob, wrenched with an agony that threatens to split me in half. I’ve never given up on anything in my life, but I do now.

Hellebore won. I thought I could best him, but he’s had thousands of years to play this game and I’m just a foolish, arrogant mortal.

A mortal who, in a few short months, will be the world’s downfall.

The academy ends up making an exception for my mother, and I’m allowed to take my courses remotely until the wedding. I don’t know how many weeks it’s been since the Nocturus. Every day I wake up, do my schoolwork, and try not to look at the faded markings on my arm, nearly overtaken by Hellebore’s Bloodstar flowers. Valerian is still alive—that much I do know. Hellebore is waiting until after our wedding to execute him.

After lunch, I might sit on the balcony despite the cold late winter air and stare at the busy world below.

A world slated for destruction.

My mother comes home from work on occasion and tries to connect with me. I can see that, in her own way, she wants to provide comfort, but she doesn’t understand my pain. According to her, Valerian and I would have never worked out anyway. Seelie and Unseelie cannot marry.

Being forced into marriage with the Spring Court Heir, on the other hand, is completely legal and accepted. Now that there’s no way to prevent it, I am supposed to forget Valerian, embrace the wedding, put on a good show, and regroup.

Mack’s dads visit me a few times, their faces revealing just how bad I must look. They feed me carefully curated snippets of Mack’s life and ask safe questions about the wedding. As if talking about which color of tulip will be used at the reception can make us all overlook the fact that I’m