Prologue
We stand here, lining up, simply waiting our turn. We’re the new girls and soon no one will even bother to ask us our names. A number will be assigned to us and then we will be given to one of the guys, most are already resigned to their fate. Get through the next three years and everything will be golden. We’ll have enough money to make it through this messed up life, only I don’t want to be here. I would rather be a fly on the wall than another number, I don’t want to give up my name, my identity. Why would I want to forget who I am and what brought me here? Although, if I don’t, I may not survive.
Hollow Hearts Academy is our home for the next three years, if we’re lucky and do not get dismissed. Its official name is Harkwright Academy, but no one within the walls ever call it that. I’ve already passed the screening process and I must have something that is deemed Harkwright worthy. I can still be kicked out right here and now and they have confirmed that not every one of the hundred ladies who have been admitted will spend the night. They just want to give the guys ‘options.’ We must have all heard the rumors, not every girl who spends a night within these walls, makes it to the final year. If you don’t make it, then you don’t get a single cent of the money you have earned. No matter how many times you have sold your soul for it. Your soul will be washed away and replaced with an empty shell of your former self. Nevertheless, I should feel lucky about being allowed to enter, even though there is nothing lucky about being in this cursed place, but the money I will have bestowed upon me will make it all worth it. Not for me, but for Poppy.
We are led into a private room, where someone dresses us up in an outfit best suited to our most prized features. I was going to dye my hair, but it wasn’t allowed. To be a finalist, everything about a girl must be real. I have to be pure and untouched, anything more than a kiss and I would never have made it past the electrified gate. There’s no pretending either, I have been through enough tests and exams to know they mean business. Although I know I would rather sit through the lie detector again over the examination. That physical exam nearly did me over.
Once we’re dressed, we are taken to a room for one last test before we are escorted out onto the stage with a spotlight shining down on us, the prized place of one is announced straight away. Not that I want that spot, being the most desirable is a punishment in itself here. The numbers are all called out until everyone of the males are staring at me. Cold, calculating, and they’re the ones who don’t terrify me to my very core. My palms are sweaty and my heart thrashes within my chest. All I have to do is keep it together a little longer and wait for my number. A fifty will be fine, at least it will show I am worth keeping around, but I won’t necessarily have to open my legs to keep that right.
“Luna Carter, zero.”
Zero, that can’t be good. I’ve failed before I even had a chance to start, I’m sorry Poppy.
1
Blood and Water
“You need to stop worrying Luna, I’ve got it covered,” mom says for the umpteenth time, if only I could believe her.
“You’re killing yourself keeping everything running, how can you hope to cover Poppy’s medical bills as well? Just let me help, you don’
t have to carry this weight alone,” I try to appeal to her, but I know she won’t listen.
“I am the parent Luna and I will take care of my daughters like I’m supposed to, focus on your future and let me take care of the present,” she presses a kiss to my temple before slipping her bag over her shoulder and leaving our home. Every day the bags under her eyes get deeper and darker and her shoulders get more and more worn down. If she isn’t careful she’ll kill herself with exhaustion, then where will me and Poppy be?
I get started on scrubbing the house top to bottom, working my way up from the kitchen. Mom hates that I do this, but she doesn’t have the time to cook food let alone clean up after us, well me now. With Poppy in the hospital there’s only the two of us here and mom is barely eating enough to function. I’m worried about her but I can’t make her stop, not with Poppy at risk. Without money the doctors won’t even pretend to look after her, they only see a dollar sign, not a name or a face. It doesn’t matter that Poppy has a light that makes even the sun jealous or how her laugh is the envy of every singer. She’s perfect, and she’s stuck with me. It would be better for all of us if I was the ill one, I would gladly give my health and life for her, if only it were that simple. I scrub the surface harder until my elbow jams the small television that sits on the counter and the news flicks on.
I should turn it off, it’s a cost we cannot afford at the moment, but they’re talking about Harkwright Academy again and my curiosity is winning out over sensibility this time.
“Sir Harkwright, do you really believe that this will be the year? That your son will finally find a worthy wife and remove himself from the academy once and for all?” The reporter asks the man who has been shrouded in shadows to give him the privacy that he doesn’t deserve.
“That isn’t a question for me to answer my dear, that decision will always be up to my son. I will admit that I had hoped he would have found a suitable wife by now, but he has my full support as he embarks on this endeavour. His elder brother held out for many years and now he has a woman deserving of the right to be seen as his… equal,” is his bullshit response, he’s probably the reason his son is still running the show. Why pick one girl for the rest of your life when you can have fifty new ones, every three years.
“And what about the rumors of the girls who try to leave without consent? How, they seem to fall upon rather brutal injuries and even a few disappearances?”
Well, she’s braver than most or maybe just more stupid than the rest, I can tell by his body language alone that he does not appreciate where her inquiry is taking him.
“Harkwright Academy is a highly prestigious institution, every woman who has completed the full duration of their stay has gone on to amazing things. They are never left wishing or wanting again, yet you would rather look at the unprecedented rumors that have clearly come from my competition than focus on what I am giving to these young women. Most come from nothing, yet I offer them everything,” he leans forward and steeples his hands beneath his chin, she’s flinching back, I can’t help but wonder what she is seeing within his eyes. “No disappearance has ever been reported and every girl that leaves my walls before the required duration, have been free to do so. I can not help what may happen once they leave the safety of Harkwright’s, I can only hope that this world will encourage the brightness we saw within them, rather than extinguish it.”
The interview is cut off and replaced by the faces of two reporters who are doing a gloriously poor job at hiding their true opinions of the ruler of the world.
“The time has come, Harkwright Academy is preparing to open their doors to a new generation of ladies. Details regarding their website will flash across the screen, applications are now being taken, and they have placed all rules and regulations upon the site. Remember their numbers are limited, so be sure to put your name down if you are in search of a brighter future.”
It’s clear they are reading that off of a screen, their eyes are darting left and right and the female can’t stop fidgeting. They don’t believe their words, but yet they say them. Harkwright really does rule the world, he is the richest man alive and even the president couldn’t lay a finger on him. I wish I could say that turning the screen off and returning to my task removed all thoughts of the Academy, but I rarely tell a lie and I won’t make an exception for this. Besides, looking at a website wouldn’t hurt, for research purposes. I would never think to apply to such a place.
Throwing my tatty jacket on, seems rather pointless. It isn’t going to protect me from the chilly air, but then again can the air be any colder than the icy vice that is pressing around my heart. I have to help Poppy, I can’t let her rot away in a hospital that isn’t doing a damned thing for her and can’t even tell us why she is so sick. Mom will work herself into an early grave and no doubt it will be an unmarked one because we wouldn’t be able to afford a gravestone. We would have nothing to mourn, just the memories of a mom who loved us more than life itself, a life that crushed her the moment she was too tired to keep pushing back.
Walking down the road, staring at the cracks running through the ground is nothing more than another clear sign that we were born into a broken world. Why does it appear the rich gain more and more money, while the rest of us are left broke and desolate?
Yet another opinion and thought I will keep to myself, I can feel people watching me as I walk past so I flip my hood onto my head and pull my zipper up further. I’m used to people staring at me, but it doesn’t mean I like it. I keep contemplating dying my hair but my mom always seems to find a way to talk me out of it. Apparently having pure white hair, alabaster skin and pale blue eyes can’t possibly be a hindrance. Easy for her to say. She doesn’t look like she's knocking on death’s door every day and she is not five foot nothing with a frame that is much too small to be seen as healthy and a chest that makes my back ache. I’m not even that large, but I was apparently blessed in the chest department, hence why I love to wear baggy hoodies so they don’t draw even more attention to me.
My mother however was born to be a dancer, legs that go on forever, lithe and toned and so beautiful. Her constant state of tiredness doesn’t even take that fact away and my sister takes after her completely, I may be a little jealous but I would never tell anyone. I don’t like confrontation and I would disappear into the shadows if I could, I hate being noticed. Yet here I am, heading to the nearest library so I can borrow a computer and look into this Harkwright Academy some more.
I know I can’t sign up, mom would have a fit and they would never pick me, anyway. It isn’t as though I come from high breeding and I’m worthless, except to those that love me. Poppy would get selected and she would probably make it close to the top spot, if not claim it for herself. She’d get herself the husband and she would save our mom from a life of gruelling hard work that is making her waste away right in front of me.
Needing to stop thinking like this, I look up. The library is looming over me and it won’t hurt to look at the website. It may even give me and mom an extra thing to mock the rich with. I slip inside and my eyes stare at the floor and flicker up occasionally so I can safely maneuver around the vast space. My mom knows a lady that works here and I don’t want her to know what I’m doing and tell on me, it's only research.
Sitting down at the table with the row of computers lining it, I log in my details, and watch as it slowly kicks to life. Watching the clock tick over is frustrating, and I’m developing a slight twitch in my left eye, but I can’t hold in my deep sigh as the web browser finally loads and I type in the Harkwright Academy address.
I keep expecting a huge message to flash across the screen ‘you don’t belong here’ but it isn’t happening. There’s a picture of the estate that the unlucky girls will live in for three years, it’s immense but I doubt the luxury is for their enjoyment. It’s all for the men, even the ladies are nothing more than playthings to them. There are a few attachments on the site and a button that my mouse is hovering over, the ‘ap
ply here’ button of doom. It’s okay, I am not here for that, I just want to read the guidelines and the rules regarding the potential applicants. It’s the news’ fault really, they piqued my curiosity, no wonder mom doesn’t watch it anymore.
Okay, I’m clicking on the rules and regulations and I’m just going to see what they say, there isn’t going to be anything that will make me want to hit the button to apply. I know I’m safe.
So, you wish to spend the next three years within the walls of the Harkwright Academy. Whatever your reasons for wishing to join our illustrious institute you must be aware of what we will ask of you. Now, we believe in sustaining a top level of privacy, therefore you will only be given enough information to help you decide if applying is truly for you. If we select you to be considered to join the ranks of those who came before you, then you will be invited to a face-to-face appointment where you will be assessed further and we will lay out the full level of commitment required from you. Should you agree to the full terms, you will undergo testing to ensure you will be a suitable match and then your name may or may not be chosen for the last round of selection.
If you are chosen to join our Harkwright family, then you will dine like royalty, be given rooms so lavish you will never want to explore further and a payment of a thousand dollars will be paid in perpetuity each month, to your loved ones to help subsidize the loss that your absence may create within the household. As for yourself we will assign you a number, which will be used to determine your ranking within the walls. This number will decide how much money you shall earn each year and the end of term bonus that you will leave with on your graduation day. Those who leave our walls on completion have all gone on to live a life that they had never believed possible. Job opportunities will be in abundance and it will give you the skills to go out into the world and make a name for yourself. No poverty shall befall you, that is a Harkwright guarantee.
Can I really apply? No I shouldn’t, it would be crazy. Although, I’m not going to be chosen and it would be silly not to at least look at the application form, where’s the harm in it?
The form loads up and it's insane, can they really ask someone these kinds of questions? Why would it matter if I was a virgin or how many people I had kissed? What kind of things does this place expect from the girls who are selected to stay? I need to forget all about this and go home, I definitely should not fill in this form and send it off. Nope, I shouldn’t do it, I won’t do it, it could end up being the biggest mistake of my life.
Two weeks, is that really all it's been? I should visit Poppy but I don’t think I can, it’s hard to see her all tubed and wired to these different machines. I need to think of a way to help my sister, maybe I can find a job somewhere and pay some of the fees. I’ll just make sure they don’t tell mom, she’s too proud and stubborn for her own good.
“Luna, can you come down here for a moment please?” Why does her voice sound so strained? Stupid question, she’s tired and worried, I think I would be more worried if she doesn’t sound strained.
I need to take some painkillers, my head is pounding, hopefully mom will have something for me.
My breathing is labored as I jog down the stairs, I really need to exercise more. Although why should I waste the energy, it’s not like I eat enough to waste it on pointless exercise.
“Hey mom,” I drop a kiss on her cheek before falling onto one of the dining chairs.
“Luna, you stupid girl,” she turns to me and her eyes are red, and she has her hands on her hips with a large envelope clutched within one of them.
“That’s a little harsh don’t you think, I mean I know I’m not book smart like Poppy but I wouldn’t say I’m stupid,” my voice wobbles as the tears hit the back of my eyes, I won’t let them fall. Mom is the only one who ever believes in me and to hear her call me stupid is heart wrenching.
“You applied to be a Harkwright girl, there is no intelligence in a decision like that,” she’s spitting venom and I can feel my vision clouding over slightly.
“You’re opening my mail now, what gives you the right?” I demand, I can’t believe I’m raising my voice to my mom, I am so going to hell for this.
“I didn’t have to open it, their crest is right on the damn envelope,” she shouts as she slams her palm down on the table and leaves the envelope in her wake.