THREE WEEKS AGO
"Serena! Serena, come downstairs right now and see this!"
Missy's voice rang through the house, bright and breathless with excitement as she gripped the banister at the foot of the stairs. Her joy was so sudden, so sharp, that it sliced clean through the quiet hum of the afternoon.
"Serena, hurry up!" she called again, waving frantically toward the dining table where her laptop sat open, its screen glowing .
Serena groaned softly from the top of the stairs.
"Aunt Missy, whatever it is, can it wait a few minutes?" she asked, folding her arms tightly across her chest. "I just need to finish something first."
"I don't think you'd be saying that if you knew what I'm calling you to see," Missy replied, a knowing smile tugging at her lips as she planted her hands firmly on her hips.
Something in her tone—light but electric—made Serena pause. Curiosity won out over resistance.
She descended the stairs slowly, her bare feet brushing against the cool wood. When she reached the dining area, Missy stepped aside dramatically, gesturing toward the screen.
"Sit. Read."
Serena frowned but obeyed, pulling out the chair and leaning closer to the laptop. Her eyes skimmed the header first, then dropped to the body of the message. She cleared her throat and began to read aloud, her voice steady at first.
"Ms. Serena..."
She stopped.
Her breath hitched as tears welled suddenly in her eyes. But these were not the hollow, burning tears she had grown accustomed to. These were warm. Disbelieving. Alive.
She blinked rapidly and continued.
"Ms. Serena, this is to inform you that you are one of the selected candidates to be awarded the two-year scholarship program at Eldermere University, where you will study History and Modern Literature. You are required to make yourself available on school grounds within the next three weeks. Failure to do so will result in a fine.
Kindly click 'Accept' and review the instructions below for registration requirements.
Congratulations. We hope you enjoy your stay at Eldermere University."
The room fell silent.
Then Serena broke.
"Oh my goodness," she sobbed, rising so quickly the chair scraped loudly against the floor. "Aunt Missy, I got in. I really got in."
She collapsed into Missy's arms, clutching her like she might vanish if Serena let go. Missy laughed through her own tears, hugging her tightly.
"You did it," she murmured. "I knew you would."
It had been a long time since either of them had heard good news.
Too long.
Ever since Serena's parents were declared dead following a car crash years ago, or so she had been told, their lives had existed in a suspended state of quiet survival. Serena had been in the car that night too, a fact everyone reminded her of whenever she asked questions.
But she remembered nothing.
Not the crash.
Not the sound of metal tearing apart.
Not her parents' voices.
Her memories before waking up in a hospital bed were fragmented, blurred at the edges like an old photograph left too long in the sun. Faces dissolved when she tried to hold them. Moments slipped away the harder she chased them.
Missy insisted it was the head injury. Doctors agreed. Everyone moved on.
Everyone except Serena.
She never believed her parents were dead.
After all, no bodies had ever been recovered.
Their personal belongings vanished research papers, journals, photographs, everything erased as if they had never existed. Their finances and properties were sealed away, inaccessible to Serena until her twenty-third birthday. Three more years.
The only thing left to her was her mother's ruby necklace.
Serena wore it every day.
At night, when the house was quiet and sleep refused to come, she clutched the pendant and replayed the same thought over and over again:
They are alive.
That belief drove her obsession.
It was what led her, months ago, to a hidden letter tucked inside an old book her father had loved. The paper was yellowed, the handwriting unmistakably his.
You will find the answers you are looking for in Eldermere.
Nothing more.
No explanation. No warning.
But Serena knew her father. He had always been careful, secretive, deliberate. If he wanted her to go to Eldermere, then Eldermere mattered.
The problem was that Eldermere was unreachable.
The town was isolated, governed by ancestral families who had founded it centuries ago. Outsiders were not welcome. Their wealth, power, and histories were fiercely guarded, their lives conducted behind closed gates.
No one simply wandered into Eldermere.
Desperation drove Serena to research bloodlines, searching for any connection, any ancestor that might tie her to the town. When that failed, she searched for loopholes.
That was when she found the scholarship.
A program offered once every ten years.
A controlled invitation for outsiders.
Only four hundred and fifty candidates were selected, almost always from wealthy, influential backgrounds. People who would not ask questions. People who knew when to keep quiet.
Serena knew her chances were slim.
She was not wealthy.
And her race alone made her an unlikely choice.
Still, she applied.
She had just completed her program at Oxford. She had the grades. The credentials.
And now, against all odds, she had been accepted.
"You have to be there on time, love," Missy said gently, rubbing Serena's shoulders. "I don't even want to imagine how much that fine costs."
Serena laughed softly, hugging her aunt once more before retreating upstairs with the laptop clutched tightly to her chest.
In her room, she sat on the edge of her bed and cried again, this time openly. Happiness felt unfamiliar, fragile, like something that might shatter if she breathed too hard.
She wiped her cheeks, inhaled deeply, and clicked Accept.
The admission portal loaded instantly.
Welcome to Eldermere University.
Her heart pounded as images filled the screen.
Ancient stone structures rose against a perpetually overcast sky. Massive castle-like buildings loomed in gothic silence, their windows dark, their towers sharp against the clouds.
There were no students.
No laughter.
No life.
Only stone.
A chill crawled down Serena's spine.
As she scrolled further, her unease deepened. There were portraits, formal and rigid, of the leaders of the seven founding families who governed both the university and the town.
They all looked… wrong.
Familiar, yet distant.
Her gaze stopped abruptly on the man at the center.
Dark hair. A faint, mischievous smile.
Ruby-red eyes that held no warmth at all.
Something about him made her chest tighten.
Then she saw the mark.
On his wrist.
A butterfly, one wing black, the other white.
Her breath caught.
Slowly, her hand rose to the spot just behind her ear, where her own birthmark lay hidden beneath her hair.
The same symbol.
"This can't be a coincidence," she whispered.
Her eyes darted to the others, scanning for the same mark. She found none.
"Maybe it's hidden," she murmured, heart racing.
Whatever Eldermere was hiding, she knew one thing with absolute certainty.
She was walking straight into it.
"And this time," Serena whispered, closing the laptop, "I will find the truth."