Read The Xoe Meyers Trilogy (Xoe Meyers Young Adult Fantasy/Horror Series) Online
Tags: #Vampires, #Werewolves, #demons, #Teen & Young Adult, #Fantasy, #Paranormal, #Romance, #paranormal urban fantasy, #coming of age fantasy, #Witches
The Xoe Meyers Trilogy (Xoe Meyers Young Adult Fantasy/Horror Series)
The Xoe Meyers Trilogy
Xoe, Accidental Ashes, and Broken Beasts
©2014 Sara C Roethle
Xoe
Book One
I
stared up at the moon, partially obscured by ominous looking clouds. I brushed a loose flake of ash from my hair as I tried to forget the overwhelming, acrid stench of smoke that had nearly overcome my lungs. I shivered. At least I was still alive. I blearily thought back over the past week, knowing my life would never be the same again.
––––––––
A
nother year at Shelby Heights High School in not-so-sunny Shelby, Oregon . . . oh joy. Shelby isn’t exactly a small town, but it’s definitely not a city. I’m not much of a “people-person”, so the size is one of the few things I like about Shelby. That, and the woods that surround it. Tall pine trees are never out of reach. I’ve always been outdoorsy. My dad took off shortly after I was conceived and my mom raised me on camping trips and hiking. My name’s Alexondra Meyers, by the way. I know, it's pretty horrible. Mercifully, the few friends I have call me Xoe.
Back to the matter at hand . . . junior year. I am not a fan of high school, or the teenage experience in general. I don’t consider myself antisocial, though most of my fellow students might argue that point. Really, I just don’t like to waste my time with pretense. Why bother being nice to someone I secretly dislike? Why engage in small talk if nothing meaningful is accomplished? I’d rather have a few real friends than a bunch of fake ones.
I trudged toward the towering, gray brick monstrosity that was Shelby High, feeling morose. Where there wasn’t sidewalk or asphalt, the ground was covered with lush, green grass. Shelby is always green and moist, which is nice, except for the mold and mildew that tend to grow if you’re not careful. Once my mom got a new car windshield that wasn’t sealed properly. Within weeks the insides of her windows had grown algae.
I forced my sneakered feet to continue forward, concentrating on the sound of my footfalls, one foot in front of the other. As I approached the dreaded double-doors, my best friend Lucy joined me. We usually walked to school together, but Lucy always arrived at school early on the first day. She liked to “prepare” her locker and map out all of her classes beforehand. She’s a bit of an over achiever, to put it mildly.
Lucy and I pushed through the double doors together. I held onto my door long enough for a girl with a mass of brown curls to grab it and keep it open for herself. See? Not antisocial. I glanced down at the top of Lucy’s dark-haired head as we made our way down the hall.
Lucy and I are complete opposites when it comes to appearance. I’m a giant compared to her. Well, not really a giant, but her petite 5’1” frame makes my willowy 5’8” seem excessive. Her long, dark, glossy hair is in complete contrast to my shaggy, shoulder-length, white-blonde mop. Lucy’s skin is deep olive all year round, whereas mine is pale, and at times, a little pasty, what my mom kindly refers to as
porcelain.
Did I say that I’m a little jealous of Lucy? If I didn't love her so much, I would probably hate her.
Lucy had chosen dark wash jeans with a pale blue button-up blouse for her first day attire. The tips of conservative brown shoes peeked out from the bottom of her jeans. Lucy’s sense of style errs on the side of caution. Her pin-straight hair was parted down the middle to cascade nearly to her waist, framing her fine-boned, delicate face, void of make-up.
Lucy’s almond-shaped brown eyes peered up into my large green ones, waiting for my whining to begin. She’d had to deal with my complaining on the first day of school every year since second grade. We’d become friends when my mom and I first moved to Shelby, as Lucy’s family lives just down the street from us. Alone and friendless, I had gone exploring in the woods behind my house, against my mom’s strict commands, and Lucy was doing the same. We both had a stubborn independent streak that constantly ordered us to disobey our parents. How could we not be friends?
I glanced out the windows at the other end of the hall as we moved to stand in front of Lucy's locker. To add to my first day misery, the sky above Shelby was an angry gray, promising rain. Black clouds rolled ominously in the distance. So what else was new? I hate the rain. I’m not like a girly-girl that’s afraid to get my hair wet or anything, but I’m at my happiest when I’m outdoors, and it’s not terribly pleasant to be outside when it’s raining. So, despite my pallid appearance, I much prefer the sun. I took a deep breath of the ozone-scented air that flowed in every time the doors opened. Let the whining commence.
“It’s not that bad,” Lucy consoled, taking in my grimace. “We have three classes together and you have two more with Allison. That leaves only one class to trudge through without us.”
Allison was another on my short list of friends, though I'd only known her since freshman year. Lucy and I had met her during our first lunch at Shelby High. Allison's family was new to Shelby, so she didn't know anyone. Rather than taking a seat at one of the loner tables, she had marched right up to where Lucy and I sat, slammed her tray down, and began chatting away like she had known us for years. I was skeptical of Allison's blunt style of friendship at first, but she turned out to be genuine. Plus, she adds a little bit of girliness to our small group.
“A small consolation at best,” I replied sullenly as I looked up at the numbers on the wall of lockers, wondering where mine would be that year.
Lucy hummed happily as she opened her locker and pulled out the book needed for her first class. Her eternally sunny attitude could be quite vexing at times. Though, if she were a pessimist like me, the complaining would never cease. Lucy’s glass half full philosophy made my glass look empty, dirty, and cracked.
Turning to me to take in my dejected expression, Lucy frowned. “I’ll see you in French.”
I managed a small smile, despite my misery. “See you then.”
We parted ways as the first bell rang, and ran toward our respective classes to the sound of clanging lockers and hurried
see you laters
. I still hadn't found my locker, but it would have to wait.
I trailed my fingertips across the aged walls as I walked, in no real hurry to get to class. Shelby High is old, and I mean
old.
I could feel the bumps of countless layers of peeling paint beneath my fingers. The newest layer of paint was a pale yellow that was trying hard to be cheery, but fell a little short. I went past a row of faded green lockers, then took a left into my classroom.
My first class of the day, which I had with Allison, was biology. I scowled as I entered the classroom. It was simply too early in the morning for science. The room boasted lab tables instead of desks, making the space feel even more small and cramped than normal classrooms. The buzzing of the fluorescent lights mixed with the din of murmured voices made me feel instantly claustrophobic. I searched across the tables, which were set up to seat two people, with a little sink and electrical outlets in the middle, until my eyes landed on Allison. She waved me over to the table she had reserved for us at the back of the room.
I liked sitting in the back of the class. I don’t enjoy the feeling of people’s eyes on the back of my head, and teachers usually tend to call on people in the front of the class, ignoring the back. It’s not that I don’t understand the questions, I just prefer not to answer them. Allison was more than willing to sit in the back of the class with me.
Lucy was a whole other story. I always tried to lure her to the back, the
Dark Side
as far as she was concerned. We ended up front and center every time, where she could be sure the teacher called on her when she raised her hand to answer every question. But hey, she diverts the teacher’s attention from me, so I can't really complain.
As I approached, Allison looked me up and down, ending with a look of distaste at my ratty old sneakers. “Xoe, we are going shopping this weekend, no arguments.”
Smirking, I looked down at my dark blue, vintage
Doors
tee and holey jeans, then at her blue sundress with strappy dark brown sandals, artfully applied makeup, and perfectly styled, long, honey blonde hair. Unlike me, Allison embraces the blonde. She is the master of the hair flip. I’ve never felt like a “blonde”, but I’m too pale to pull off much of anything else, so I just try to ignore it.
At 5’6” Allison almost reaches my height, though she has a few more curves than I do, perfectly accentuated by her dress. She was still staring at my outfit with a perfectly arched eyebrow raised. Maybe Allison had a point.
Maybe
.
“Sure Allison, whatever you say.” I was keeping the sneakers no matter what clothes she tried to put me in. They were my tried and true favorites, perfectly broken in and shaped to my feet. They had started life a solid black, but had faded to what I considered a rather pleasant gray. Allison took one last look at me, pity in her blue eyes, then turned toward the front of the class.
A throat cleared, bringing my attention to where our teacher, Mrs. Sanders, was waiting. Mrs. Sanders taught both biology and microbiology at Shelby Heights. She was a short, dare I say dumpy kind of woman with a horribly monotonous voice. She stared at me in mock exasperation until I slumped dejectedly into my hard plastic chair.
Mrs. Sanders went on to drone for an hour about her syllabus and all that other nonsense, with occasional pauses to straighten her lumpy pink cardigan. I drew on the cover of my notebook and tried to ignore her. By the time class was near its end, my notebook was covered with a mish-mash of nonsensical doodles.
Impatient for the bell to ring, I shoved my books back into the green backpack I used every year, throwing my pencil in haphazardly on top. I watched the clock, counting away the final seconds of class.
Finally the bell rang, and it was off to my next two hours of torture: French and World History. Even though I’d be with Lucy, I knew time would creep by at an alarmingly slow rate. I’m horrible at French, the pronunciation is simply beyond me, and World History is, well, World History. When I entered my French class, Lucy was already sitting front and center. Her new navy blue backpack was sitting in the seat next to her, waiting for me to take its place. After what seemed like days of words I didn’t understand, followed by a lengthy discussion on “the cradle of civilization”, it was finally time for lunch—my brief reprieve from the monotony.
The cafeteria is one of the few spacious areas in Shelby High. The brightly lit fluorescents are diffused by the copious amount of natural light that pours in from several large single-pane windows mounted in two of the walls. My little group always claimed the same table at the beginning of each year. It was in a corner, so we only had to deal with two other tables near us, rather than four. We were also stationed directly below one of the aforementioned windows. Said window looked out over the courtyard area of Shelby High, which is basically just a large square of grass with several picnic tables stationed in the center. On rare sunny days we would eat outside.
Occasionally other acquaintances would sit with us, but most of the time it was just us three, and that was the way we liked it. Well,
I
liked it at least. Allison and Lucy are slightly more social than I am.