Reborn Series Box Set (Books 1-3.5)

by S. L. Stacy

  “Hey!” He picks up the laptop, brow creased as he inspects it. “It’s not like we posted the pictures!” he calls out behind me.

  I turn my head forward and keep walking. The brothers of Eta Tau Upsilon might be immature, but I know they didn’t post the photos. I sit down in the common area outside the café and call Victoria on my cell phone.

  “Hello?” she answers.

  “Hey. We have a problem,” I tell her.

  Her sigh crackles in my ear. “I saw. It seems like I was wrong about the Alpha Rhos. They mean business. Check your email. I told everyone to come an hour before recruitment practice so we can talk damage control. And do me a favor. Don’t tell House Mon—I mean, Farrah about the photos yet.”

  I choke on a sip of coffee. Victoria almost called Farrah House Monster. “Sounds good.”

  “I have to go—class is about to start. See you later.”

  “’Bye.” I end the call.

  I practically inhale my bagel, chasing it with a few more gulps of coffee. Kicking my feet up on the ottoman, I open my lab notebook and settle in to finish the practice problems before class. As I’m staring at the first saturation curve, my phone buzzes beside me. I glance at the caller ID and answer it. “Why hello, friend.”

  “I have a question for you,” Jimmy says over the clatter of dishes and drone of voices in the background.

  “Shoot.”

  “Do friends…share meals together?”

  I pause, pretending to think about it. “I believe they do. What do you have in mind?”

  “Dinner tonight at The End. Peter’s performing. Anna will be there, too.”

  “Ah, third wheeling it.”

  “She won’t be the third wheel. It’s not a date,” he reminds me.

  “I didn’t mean Anna,” I say, giggling. I can feel Jimmy rolling his eyes on the other end. “What time?”

  “Let’s say…seven-ish.”

  “See you then.”

  Looking forward to dinner with Jimmy and Anna tonight helps distract me from the curious glances and judgmental scowls thrown my way the rest of the afternoon. At a larger campus, I may have been able to get through the day without anyone recognizing me from the pictures, but gossip at Thurston spreads like a plague—especially anything related to the Greek community. Some of the more ruthless members of our fellow sororities will use the pictures to convince the girls going through recruitment not to join our house. The non-Greeks will use it as yet another example of our toxic presence at Thurston.

  When I get back to the house after three hours of biology lab, almost everyone is already congregated in the living room. Victoria paces back and forth in front of the television. Tanya stands off to the side, huffing as she swipes an angry finger down the screen of her phone over and over again. “This looks like a formal at a psych ward!”

  Carly is sitting on the floor near Tanya’s feet, her cheeks moist with tears. “What the fudge are we going to do? Everyone’s going to think we’re mean or weird or…crazy!”

  “Or that we all have rabies. We can be the rabid sorority,” I quip as I walk over to them and dump my messenger bag on the floor. Carly’s watery blue eyes gape up at me.

  “Now is really not the time,” Victoria tells me, the corner of her lip twitching.

  “It’s time for revenge,” Tanya growls.

  “That’s not quite what I had in mind, either. We need to remedy this and restore our reputation.” Victoria claps her hands twice, and the noise level in the room dwindles as everyone turns to face her. “Listen up! I know the timing of this sucks, but it’s not the end of the world. We will still have a fun, successful recruitment.” Her optimistic words are met with a roomful of doubtful stares. “We just need to remind this school about the good things we’ve done. Find all of the old pictures you can of us doing nice, normal, good things.”

  Tanya raises her hand. “Oh, like the ones of our Black and White mixer with the Sigma Iotas!”

  Victoria shakes her head. “I’m thinking more like the ones we took at our bake sale last year that raised money for the Cancer Research Institute. We can post a new album called—”

  “‘When Gammas give back?’” I suggest.

  “Clever. I like it,” Victoria says, smiling at me. “Liz, as our communications chair, I’m putting you in charge of this.” Liz frowns, giving a slight nod of acknowledgement. “In the meantime, I’ll set up a meeting with Panhellenic Council.”

  “A lot of good that will do. Sam Carson is on Panhel,” one of our sophomore girls says from the couch.

  “We don’t know that the Alpha Rhos posted the photos.” The room erupts into angry protests. “Okay. We know they did,” Victoria shouts, and the clamor dies down again, “but the thing is, we can’t really prove it. All we can do is enlist Panhel’s help to smooth this over. The Alpha Rhos think they’re making us look bad, but the reputation of the entire Greek community is at stake, too.”

  “We need to do more,” Tanya insists. “We need to get back at them.” A few people mumble their agreement.

  “We are not stooping to their level,” Victoria says.

  “Yeah!” says Carly. “We get them back, then they get us back. It’ll turn into a vicious cycle. I don’t want to fight with them.”

  “But we can’t just sit back and do nothing,” I argue. “They’ll take it as a sign of weakness.”

  Victoria holds up a hand to silence us. “This isn’t up for discussion. After tonight, we are not talking about this again to anyone.” A tense, stunned silence settles over the room. Some of the sisters have their lips parted in objection, but no one tries to argue with her. “If someone asks you in class or during rush about the pictures, turn the conversation around and talk about the good we do. Don’t badmouth the Alpha Rhos, and do not post anything to that horrible gossip site. If I find out that any of you do, you will be suspended from all of our activities for the rest of the semester.”

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but…maybe Farrah will have some more ideas on how to handle this,” I tell them.

  “Farrah and Hef probably haven’t heard about it yet,” Victoria explains, glancing nervously at the clock. “Let’s keep it that way. Farrah can barely even text on her smartphone, so she won’t find out unless one of us tells her.”

  “We can’t keep anything from you guys,” I point out. “You can read minds.”

  “It’s not like we’re constantly in your heads,” Victoria says. “And anyway, Olympians have ways of blocking thoughts from each other. I can extend that protection to all of you. Just act like nothing’s wrong so she doesn’t start to suspect something.” I nod in reluctant agreement along with everyone else. I wish I could get inside Victoria’s head and find out why she doesn’t want to involve her mother. This is one instance in which I would welcome Farrah’s interference.

  We collectively jump when someone slides a card key in the front door.

  “Well, isn’t this wonderful,” Farrah says, sweeping inside. She holds the door open for Hef, who propels himself forward with his cane, a brown sack hoisted over his other shoulder. Faces spasm as some of the girls try not to cringe at the sight of the mottled flesh and scars on the left side of his face. “Everyone is already here, ready for one more evening of work before the big day. We come bearing gifts.” She gestures to Hef’s bag. With ash blonde curls tumbling around her golden face and down the back of a red shift dress, all she needs to add is a pair of devil horns, and she would make a perfect Satan Barbie.

  “Get out those roleplaying cards, Tanya,” Farrah instructs. “Practice, then presents.” Hef sits out of the way on the couch and sets the bag down gently. Whatever’s inside clatters against the hardwood floor.

  Tanya obediently goes over to the kitchen table and picks up a stack of notecards, shuffling them in her hands. “Everybody partner up.”

  Carly meets my gaze, and we pair off. Tanya goes around the room, distributing the notecards.

  “I want to be
the rushee,” Carly says, taking a card from Tanya’s hands. She glances at it, then hides it facedown against her side.

  “Hi, Carly. Welcome to Gamma Lambda Phi,” I pretend to greet her. “We have some iced tea, lemonade or water if you’d like something to drink.”

  “No, thanks,” Carly says, crossing her arms tightly across her chest. Her eyes give a skeptical sweep of the room.

  “So, tell me a little bit about yourself,” I probe her. “Year, major, hometown. I’m from Laurel, which is a small town about an hour away from here, and I’m a junior biology major.”

  “I’m from Princeton, New Jersey. Junior math major.”

  “Ooo, a fellow STEM major. What made you decide to major in math?”

  Carly shrugs and stares longingly at our clock. “I don’t know. I like math.”

  “What do you want to do after you graduate?”

  “I don’t know,” she repeats, looking at a text on her phone. She starts typing a reply.

  “What do you like to do outside of class? Are you involved in any campus activities?”

  “Yeah, I do stuff.”

  “There are just so many ways to get involved at Thurston. Many of our sisters are very active outside of the house. I volunteer with the biology department at the Science Center. We do experiments for the kids. It’s so much fun.” During my spiel, Carly stays in character, fidgeting with the strap of her purse and looking at her phone. “Do you do any volunteer work?” I persist.

  Carly shakes her head. “No.” We continue like this for the next ten or so minutes, Carly giving me vague or one word answers to every question I ask.

  “Ladies!” Farrah finally calls above the swell of perky voices and high-pitched laughter. My next question falters on my tongue, and Carly and I turn toward her. None of the other sisters seem to have heard Farrah and continue talking excitedly. “Ladies!” Farrah shouts again, and the chatter cuts off.

  “What the heck did your notecard say?” I whisper to Carly.

  She holds it up to me. Only one word is scrawled across it in Victoria’s sloppy handwriting: difficult. “You were doing a great job,” she says. “You can talk to just about anyone. It’s not like we’re going to get anyone like this, anyway. Everyone wants to join our house.”

  Carly’s eyes beg me to reassure her. All I can do is wince and say, “I hope you’re right.” In the past, most of the girls rushing have been desperate to make a good impression on us and not waiting in agony for our party to be over, but that was before the photos leaked.

  That was before a lot of things.

  Farrah’s jade green eyes quietly assess us before she speaks again. “Thank you, ladies, for your hard work these last few days.” A sweet smile blossoms on her crimson lips. “Our rehearsals have gone quite smoothly, and I have no doubt that we will have a successful recruitment. Before we finish, Tanya and I have a few important reminders.” She nods to Tanya, who comes to stand next to her.

  “Let’s go over the dress code for each night one more time,” Tanya says. “Siobhan, what’s tomorrow night?”

  “I’m pretty sure we all have the dress code down,” Victoria says before I can answer. “There are way more important things we need to—”

  Farrah cuts her daughter off with a dismissive wave of her hand. “We’ll get to them. Go ahead, Siobhan.”

  I glance at Victoria. She shrugs helplessly and gestures for me to continue. “House letters with gold leggings and metallic or black flats,” I recite loudly.

  “Exactly!” Tanya chirps. “Saturday night. Carly?”

  “White skirts with green or gold tops and white or gold heels,” Carly says.

  “Sunday night. Liz?”

  “Coral dresses and white or pink heels.”

  “And the last night—our preference ceremony—black dresses with gold accents or jewelry and black heels. Like always,” Tanya finishes.

  “Everyone must be dressed and ready to go an hour before the party is scheduled,” Farrah reminds us. “I don’t think this will be an issue for anyone in this room, but, if you do need help with hair and makeup, Tanya and I can assist you. Maintaining our reputation as the most beautiful, charming girls at Thurston is perhaps the most important thing we can do to—”

  “Oh, my God!” Victoria bursts, her amber eyes bugging out at Farrah. “This is ridiculous! Tomorrow marks the first night of a new era of this chapter, and we’re standing around talking about fashion and makeup!”

  “Things you never did quite appreciate,” Farrah mutters.

  “Look, this is still a sorority—still a place of friendship and sisterhood,” Victoria concedes. “Where we can dress up, go out and have fun. But, as you now understand, Gamma Lambda Phi is so much more than that.

  “Last week, you chose to honor your duty as one of my descendants—as a guardian of the delicate fabric that partitions your universe from mine. Tomorrow night, we’re not just recruiting girls looking to enhance their college experience or even just have a good time. We’re looking for the women who have inherited this duty and are willing to embrace it. Sure, these first two nights will be about getting to know them and making them feel welcome here so that they come back. But by the final night, we will be asking a lot of them. To give up the life they know for a greater purpose, one they won’t be able to fully grasp in four short days.” Victoria jams her fist into her other palm in time with each word. “To sacrifice their own humanity in order to become humankind’s protectors.

  “There’s nothing wrong with being pretty, and nice, and fun to be around. I just don’t want us to forget our motto. Over the next four days, it should always be present in our thoughts. ‘Through strength of the mind, body and heart comes victory.’ Say it.” We repeat it, our combined voices a gentle, nervous rumble.

  “I think that’s enough of that.” The smile on Farrah’s face has faded, and she glowers at her daughter out of the corner of her eye. “Now, how about those gifts. Hephaestus has something for each of you. He crafted them himself.”

  Farrah walks over to Hephaestus as he carefully gets up from the couch. They open the bag together. Farrah lifts out a dagger by its bronze handle, its blade sheathed in black leather.

  “Weapons!” Tanya exclaims, snapping in excitement. Everyone—except for me and Carly—joins in, popping their fingers just like they would to applaud an upcoming dance or a successful fundraiser. Cradling the dagger in two outstretched palms, Farrah carefully passes it to the closest sister.

  “But we’re Nike’s guardians,” Carly says. “I thought we were just supposed to, you know…watch stuff. Maybe open the occasional portal.”

  “You are,” Victoria assures her as Farrah and Hephaestus continue to distribute the daggers, “but you’re also Earth’s first line of defense against intruders. They should be dealt with swiftly and as peacefully as possible. Physical combat is always a last resort.”

  “However, should you ever need to engage in combat to protect yourselves, you should be armed and trained to do so,” Farrah adds, skipping over me and handing the next dagger to Carly. She gulps, hands shaking as she accepts it. Our Greek letters are inscribed in the bronze hilt and give off a faint white glow in response to Carly’s touch.

  “These daggers can’t kill an Olympian or a halfling,” Victoria cautions. “Few things can.”

  “Then what’s the point?” Tanya asks, sounding disappointed.

  “We still feel pain, still bleed, and these weapons produce wounds that take longer for us to heal and leave scars that require centuries to disappear. Most Olympians are pretty vain”–Victoria casts a sideways glance at Farrah—“and getting an ugly scar is a fate far worse than death. For a long time, Olympians have satiated any bloodlust by watching and meddling in the wars of lesser beings. It’s been a long time since we ourselves engaged in battle. I do not want to cause pain and suffering to my own people, even if right now some of them are my enemies. Use these as a last resort.”

  Despite Victoria’s s
obering speech, when it’s over everyone starts talking over each other. The sisters gape in awe as they admire each other’s daggers, even though they all look the same.

  “Here, you can have mine,” Carly says, thrusting the hilt of her dagger toward me.

  I shake my head. “That’s okay. Hephaestus made them especially for all of you.”

  She shrugs and stares at the dagger like she has no idea what to do with it. “I guess I’ll put this in my room.”

  I nod and watch her plod over to the stairs, holding the dagger like it’s made of porcelain. The living room empties out as people go upstairs or leave the house to go to dinner and their evening classes. Farrah disappears into her room.

  “I made something for you, too.” I look up to see Hephaestus, light from the ceiling lamp glinting off his clean shaven head. In his large, brown hands he offers me a dagger with the same leather sheath and bronze hilt. Only the letters etched in the hilt are different: Ψυχε.

  “Psoo-khay,” he pronounces, making a rasping sound in his throat on the second syllable. “The soul. The breath of life.”

  “Psyche,” I realize, running my fingers over the grooves of the letters. They glimmer faintly. “Me.”

  He chuckles. “You. So, if the need ever arises, now you can defend yourself, too.”

  “Thank you,” I tell him. Nodding, Hephaestus withdraws, his right eye smiling at me, the left barely peeking out of the black slit between its perpetually closed lids. As he hobbles out the door, my chest aches. With his hideous scars and lame leg, he may not be as sexy as Eric or Jasper, but he’s one of the kindest Olympians I’ve encountered so far, second only to Victoria. Farrah probably doesn’t love him half as much as she pretends to.

  “I love him.” Farrah appears in the doorway to her room, her voice so low I might have misunderstood her. “You wouldn’t understand it, but I do love him.”

  “Try me,” I say, setting the dagger on the coffee table and sitting down on the couch.

  Farrah joins me. “Hephaestus is, sadly, scarred and lame through no fault of his own,” she begins, her eyes drifting to the front door, now closed firmly shut. “His mother, Hera, deserves the blame. If not for her and Zeus’s arrogance, Hephaestus would not have had to suffer the shame of being the ugliest among a perfect people.”