Page 15 of Reign

“Hi Headmaster, um, I’m sorry to call so late, especially before finals, but my mom’s sick. Like, really not doing well. She’s been diagnosed with…with...ovarian cancer, and I’d really like to be with her. I hope you can understand. I’ll defer this semester in hopes you will allow me to repeat my senior year. You understand, family comes first. I need to be with my mum. Please send anything my parents need to sign through email. Thank you.”

Once the grief at hearing her one last time runs through my veins, once shock filters through my head—“No. No! Can’t you hear the fear in her voice? Ivy’s terrified! Sabine must’ve made her say this before she put Ivy on her knees. Sabine plunged a knife into her while Ivy’s had her back turned! And she trusted her! All Ivy wanted to do was save her family!” I stand so abruptly, my chair falls backward, knocking into a side table and scattering picture frames across the floor. “How could you defend such a woman? How can you encourage such hate against children?”

Marron watches my tirade in such a bland and non-reactive state, I’m actually terrified.

“Headmaster...” It comes out as a whimper. “Please.”

Marron purses his lips. “I’m sure you won’t be surprised when I say, as soon as I can prove you were the one who sent that baseless stream of consciousness to Briarcliff’s parents, you will be expelled from these grounds.”

“Don’t fall in line. Just once, do the right thing. Sabine can’t get away with this.”

“I’m afraid, Miss Ryan, that your disorder has clouded your better judgment. You’re an adult now, so there’s no possibility of forcing you to get the help you need, but I implore you, seek that rehabilitation. Not only am I genuinely concerned for the students around you, I’m also concerned for your well-being.”

“Fuck you,” I spit.

Marron tsks, then sighs. “Do I need security to escort you out?”

I turn my back to him in answer.

“Good girl,” he murmurs, but his voice no longer registers. “And I wish you the very best of luck with your exams today.”

I have to step over the scattered pictures, quelling the urge to kick and stomp on them until they’re as destroyed as my insides feel, but one overturned frame distracts me enough to pause. There’s a strip of masking tape on the back, and the name MR. MARRON, AKA HOWARD MASON, circa 2001, scrawled over it with black marker.

I’m bending and picking it up before my mind accompanies the movement. When I turn it to see the picture, my mouth drops open in awe.

“Who is this?” I whisper. Most of me doesn’t care if Marron heard me or not.

Yet, he stops his mindless shuffling of papers as soon as he registers what I’m holding.

“My old faculty photo,” he snipes. “I was a teacher here before I became headmaster. Do put it down before you ruin it further.”

“You ... you’re Howard Mason?”

Marron licks his upper teeth. “I haven’t been called that since my attendance here.”

I ask through the massive lump in my throat, “Why did you change your name?”

Marron’s expression hardens. “Miss Ryan, you’ve vastly overstayed your welcome. Leave my office before I’m forced to initiate a school lockdown and have you dragged out by police.”

His overdramatic warning doesn’t affect me. “You were against them. When you went to school here, you made it your mission to expose the Nobles, but now you’re one of them. Why? How?”

“Miss Taskin!” Marron hollers. “Allow security to escort Miss Ryan to her first exam, of which I have no doubt she will excel at.”

But I’m not finished. “2001 ... that’s when my mother went here. Did you know her? Were you her teacher?” My face goes numb. “Were you involved in her—?”

“Miss Ryan, you’re to come with me.”

I look over my shoulder and a beefy school security guy in a dark suit stands nearby. And he looks ready to drag me out by my hair.

“You’re not getting away with this.” I whirl on Marron, even as security moves to stand between me and the headmaster. “You’re just as culpable as Sabine. You covered up a murder last night, and the fact that you can just sit there and pretend an innocent girl isn’t dead sickens me. You’re pathetic. Disgusting. And when justice finally comes for you and you cry out your last words, I hope they’re the same ones you wrote in your journal—”

Marron’s eyes flicker.

“—Help me. This time, no one will. Nobody will come to your rescue. I’ll make sure of it.”

Security’s broad body wrestles me out simply by shadowing my smaller form, but I make sure my eyes are bright, that they’re made of starlit fire, for every second Marron holds my stare, until security pulls the door shut.

6

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