Fang and Claw: Nocturne Academy, Book 2

by Anderson, Evangeline

  “Emma’s right, Katydid—you’re an extremely lovable person,” Avery said, smiling at me.

  I couldn’t help smiling back, though my cheeks were warm. It felt good to be wrapped in the blanket of their love—to know that they cared so much for me.

  “But you guys are my Coven-mates,” I reminded them. “Ari isn’t.”

  “Maybe he would like to be,” Avery suggested. “Maybe we ought to invite him down to the Norm Dorm like we invited Griffin.”

  “No one actually invited me—I just took my chances and came down, hoping you would tolerate me for Megan’s sake,” Griffin said quietly.

  “Griffin, how can you say that?” I asked him. “We do more than tolerate you!”

  “We love you, too!” Emma exclaimed, and then went pink. “In a purely platonic way, of course,” she added quickly.

  “Speak for yourself,” Megan said, grinning. “There’s nothing platonic about how I feel for my Tall, Dark, and Fangy guy.” She grew serious. “But it’s true that you all took Griffin into our Coven just like you took me and for that I’m really grateful.”

  “There’s nothing to be grateful for—Griffin belonged and so he came to us,” Avery said simply. “There’s something that binds us together—something stronger than the binding on any Coven I ever heard of.”

  “It’s like…we were meant to be together,” Megan whispered. “Like we just belong.”

  “Exactly.” Avery nodded. “But don’t you see? The same binding could work for Ari Reyes too. If we invited him in the way we did with Griffin and with Megan, he might become one of us too.”

  I bit my lip at the thought of coming down to the Norm Dorm every day and seeing Ari sitting there on one of our tattered but comfortable blue couches waiting for me.

  “I don’t know, Avery,” I said slowly. “I feel like I want—I need—someplace to be away from him. This is all so new—so strange for me. And being around Ari is so intense. I mean, I feel really confused when he’s near me.”

  “She needs someplace to just be safe and to herself, for a while,” Megan said firmly. “I have to say that I like Ari and I think he has honorable intentions towards Kaitlyn, but I don’t think we should invite him down to the Norm Dorm on a regular basis just yet.”

  “Thank you.” I looked at her gratefully. “Maybe someday I’ll feel differently but for now, everything is already so strange. I think I just need time to adjust.”

  “Of course you do, Katydid,” Avery said tenderly, reaching across the table to squeeze my hand. “And you’ll get as much time as you want, we promise.”

  But in that, he was wrong.

  45

  Kaitlyn

  I was really nervous about meeting Ari again later that day. In fact, I was so distracted thinking about it that Megan and I had to rip out two whole seams I had sewn in the dress we were making in Home Ec. Mrs. Hornsby came to check our work and smirked triumphantly when she saw what a mess I was making of the skirt part of the dress.

  “You’ll never pass this unit if you can’t do better than that, Miss Latimer,” she said to Megan. “But I wouldn’t count on passing it anyway, all things considered.”

  As she walked away, I could feel Megan seething beside me.

  “I’m really sorry,” I whispered to her as I adjusted our sewing machine and prepared to try again. “I don’t mean to be making such a mess of things—I’m just kind of…distracted right now.”

  Megan took a deep breath and made a visible effort to calm her emotions.

  “It’s not you I’m mad at,” she told me. “It just drives me crazy that Hornsby is determined to fail us because she thinks Nancy’s nasty stunt with the cake is our fault!”

  “Well, you’re going to have to get over that,” I advised her. “With the feel good charm Nancy and the Weird Sisters put on her, Mrs. Hornsby is never going to blame them—even if the evidence was staring her right in the face.”

  “You’re right.” She sighed and looked over at the trio in question.

  Nancy and her two friends were holding up a blouse with an obviously crooked seam to display for our Home Ec teacher. And, as she had during the baking portion of our class, Mrs. Hornsby was falling all over herself to compliment their good work.

  “Such needlework!” she was exclaiming as she beamed at the three of them. “I’ve never seen anything like it, girls! Keep up the excellent work.”

  “Ugh—it makes me sick,” Megan groaned. “Watching how they play her—and it’s almost like she wants to be manipulated.”

  As we watched, Nancy shot her a glance of triumph. But when her eyes turned to me, her expression grew darker. She was looking at me almost with an expression of hate, I thought. I met her eyes for a moment, then looked away. What had I done to make her despise me so? Even with her magic supposedly neutered, it was now clear that Nancy Rattcliff was not without resources.

  She was a bad enemy to have.

  “Don’t look at her—don’t give her the satisfaction,” Megan whispered, giving me a nudge with one elbow.

  Clearly she had seen the silent exchange between me and Nancy. She shot a last glare at the other girl and then pointedly turned back to our dress.

  “Show me again how to do a seam?” she asked me. “Maybe I should try the next one.”

  “Maybe you should,” I said, relinquishing the sewing machine. “My head just isn’t in the game right now.”

  “You’ve got other things on your mind, I know,” Megan said sympathetically. She lowered her voice. “Is it hard, getting used to having Nocturne senses now? I know from talking to Griffin that they can see and smell and hear and just about everything else better than humans.”

  “Actually, aside from the smell of human food making me feel like I’m going to hurl, I haven’t noticed much improvement,” I admitted, also keeping my voice down. “But that’s really not surprising since I’m a second-rate Nocturne, you know.”

  “You are not!” Megan said indignantly. “You’re not a second rate anything, Kaitlyn!”

  I smiled at her, grateful for her kindness and loyalty.

  “Thanks, but that’s not how I feel.” I lowered my voice even more, glad that we were at the back of the room and our conversation couldn’t be overheard over the hum of the many sewing machines. “I mean, I can’t even drink bagged blood. I wish I could at least do that.”

  “Why?” Megan arched an eyebrow at me.

  “Well, because,” I said. “I don’t want to have to be dependent on someone I barely know to feed me. It’s like being a baby again or something! I’m sure Ari must be doing it out of obligation or some other reason that only he knows, but it makes me feel really uncomfortable.”

  “It doesn’t feel like an obligation to me when I give Griffin some of my blood,” Megan said quietly. “It’s a pure pleasure—a sensation of sharing something incredibly intimate with someone I love.”

  “But Ari doesn’t love me!” I protested. “And I certainly don’t love him.”

  “Well, maybe that could change in time,” Megan said lightly.

  “I don’t see how,” I said darkly. “He’s a prince or whatever the Drake equivalent of a prince is and I’m just a nobody human who got turned into a nobody Nocturne.”

  “Kaitlyn, you are not nobody,” Megan said fiercely. “You need to stop putting yourself down and feel your own self-worth. Remember what I’m always telling you?”

  “Yes…” I sighed. “Nobody can make you feel inferior unless you let them.”

  “That’s right,” Megan said decisively. “So don’t let anyone make you feel like that—not even you.”

  I thought of how Ari had put his hand over my mouth when I started to put myself down. He had said that he wouldn’t let anyone speak badly of me—not even me. It was basically what Megan was saying too.

  Maybe it was time to start listening.

  I wanted to—I swear I did. But it was really hard to have self-esteem and see myself as a worthwhile person who was
worthy of taking the vein of such a high-ranking Drake when I looked like I did and had just been cast off by the Breedloves like a piece of unwanted trash.

  That kind of thing really messes with a girl’s self-confidence, you know?

  “I’ll try,” I said to Megan. “I can’t promise anything but I’ll try to feel better about myself.”

  “You can start by talking better about yourself,” she said firmly. “What you need is a self-affirmation mantra. Every time you start to have doubts about your self worth, just say to yourself, ‘I am a sweet, kind, wonderful person and I have people who love me.’”

  “Oh, Megan…” Her words made me want to tear up but I knew I couldn’t cry in public anymore than I could puke—the blood tears would give my new Nocturne status away just as fast as vomiting a gout of crimson at the dinner table would.

  So I didn’t cry, but I did hug her.

  “You’re a wonderful, supportive friend,” I told her. “Thank you, Megan.”

  “Anytime.” She hugged me back, hard and then we pulled apart and she went back to the sewing machine. “Now let me see if I can get the seam straight this time…”

  46

  Kaitlyn

  I thought of my friend and her kind words to me as I made my way to the Drake’s Den before dinner. Megan and Avery and Emma and Griffin were the best Coven-mates anyone could ever hope for. I was so blessed to have them and…

  My thoughts trailed off as I realized I didn’t know where I was going. Where was the Drake’s Den located again? I had been so out of it that morning when Ari brought me there, I had barely noticed where he was taking me, let alone how to get there.

  Well, maybe if I went back to the History of Magic classroom and then retraced my steps from there I could find the secret room.

  As I went, I looked up and down the long stone corridor where students were bustling by, putting up books and getting ready to go to the Dining Hall. Several times I saw little groups of girls, huddled in knots, talking together and looking at me speculatively.

  I could just imagine what they were thinking—what they were saying.

  What is Ari Reyes doing with that nasty, scarred little thing? What in the world does he see in her?

  Suddenly I realized I was doing it again—putting myself down, just like I always did.

  Stop it, I told myself firmly. I made myself lift my chin as I strode down the stone corridor. “I’m a sweet, kind, wonderful person and I have people who love me,” I murmured under my breath, pointedly ignoring all the curious glances thrown my way. “I’m a sweet, kind, wonderful person and I have people who love me.”

  “I would certainly agree with that,” a deep voice said in my ear. “And I am glad to hear you speaking more kindly of yourself.”

  I whirled around and saw Ari standing there, a slight smile playing around the corner of his lush mouth.

  “Oh, you…you heard that?” I blurted.

  He nodded and his smile widened.

  “I did and as I said, I agree with it one hundred percent.”

  I felt like my whole face was on fire with shame—how horribly embarrassing that he had heard the little mantra Megan had given me to say!

  “I don’t really think—” I began but Ari cut me off by taking my hand and lacing our fingers together. Then he pulled me down the stone corridor as casually as though we were a couple and always held hands in the hallway. People stared as we went by but Ari didn’t seem to care. He kept his head high and his gaze open as he led me along.

  At last, not far from the West Tower, he turned a corner that shouldn’t have been there and we found ourselves alone in a short stone hallway.

  “Where are we? I mean—I know where we are but how did we get here?” I asked, looking around. “I was looking for the, uh, Drake Den when you found me but I didn’t see it anywhere.”

  “That is because the doorway needs to be called,” he explained, as though it was an everyday thing to call a door into existence out of nowhere. “Watch—I know you weren’t up to absorbing this the last time we were here.”

  Staring at the blank stone wall, he spoke that same guttural word I’d heard him utter that morning.

  “Verrotix-offen.”

  And as before, the solid wooden door magically appeared in the wall.

  “Wow…” I murmured. I had been too out of it that morning to appreciate this display of power but it certainly impressed me now. I looked up at Ari. “I thought only the Sisters had magic powers—I didn’t know Drakes could do magic too.”

  He smiled.

  “We can’t. It’s not my magic that calls the door—it’s the magic of this castle—of Nocturne Academy itself. Here—you try it.”

  He waved a hand over the wooden door and said, “Disparran.”

  As he spoke, the door faded away, disappearing as quietly and suddenly as it had appeared.

  “Now it’s your turn,” Ari told me. “Call the door. Do you remember the words?”

  Actually, I did. Taking a deep breath, I looked at the blank stone wall and said, “Verrotix-offen.”

  The strange language rolled off my tongue as though I had been born speaking it and the door appeared for me as quickly as it had for Ari.

  “Oh, it worked!” I looked up at him to see him staring down at me thoughtfully.

  “Indeed, it did. You pronounced the Drake mother-tongue surprisingly well.”

  “Um…thank you.” I looked away from him, embarrassed by his intense scrutiny.

  After a moment, Ari looked away as well.

  “Anytime you come here, you only need to find the West Tower, go a few steps past it, and this corridor will appear,” he told me. “Face the wall and speak the words and the door will be yours to open.”

  As he spoke, he opened the door and held it for me to enter the Drake’s Den once more.

  I stepped inside and noticed that it had somehow rearranged itself. The huge brown leather chair was still in the middle of the room but now there was a fireplace in front of it with a cheery little fire glowing in the hearth. It reminded me a little of the Norm Dorm down in the dungeon and the association made me feel more comfortable than I had been earlier.

  My feelings of comfort dried up, however, when Ari sat in the chair and patted his lap.

  “Come, Kaitlyn—let me nourish you.”

  I hung back from him, suddenly shy. That morning when I’d been in his lap I’d been too weak and out of it to even think about how close we were. Now I was much more alert and active and the idea of actually going over there and climbing into the big Drake’s lap was intensely embarrassing.

  Ari seemed to see my reluctance because he frowned and lifted an eyebrow at me inquiringly.

  “Is there something wrong, Kaitlyn?”

  “Not exactly,” I hedged, although there certainly was. I kept thinking of the intense sensations that flew between us when I took his vein and the idea of repeating them was both scary and intriguing.

  “Then why don’t you come to me?” Ari asked. “Aren’t you thirsty?”

  I couldn’t deny that I was but I had a sudden thought.

  “What about you?” I asked him.

  He frowned. “Am I thirsty?”

  “No.” I shook my head. “I meant, how is this affecting you? You can’t just keep giving me a pint of blood twice a day—you’ll get as anemic as I was this weekend!”

  He laughed softly.

  “Dios, of course you would think of such a thing and put my comfort before your own needs. Please don’t worry, Kaitlyn, I have immense resources to call on. You could drink a gallon from me twice a day and I would have no problems at all.”

  “Immense resources?” I asked and then understanding broke over me. “Your Drake,” I murmured. “You can…can draw from him. Is that right?”

  Ari nodded. “Yes, my Drake and I are one and so everything he has, I have as well. And since he is much bigger than I am, all I need to do is a minor partial shift in order to replenish myself from
his resources.”

  “A minor partial shift?” I repeated. “What…what’s that?”

  “It’s like this.” Ari went very still in the immense leather chair.

  I tensed, waiting for the awful thing that had happened to Sanchez out on the field to happen to him. I hadn’t been able to see much, since I’d been hit in the face with a football. But the hazy image of Sanchez’s face elongating into a scaly green snout and his eyes turning blazing yellow still haunted my dreams some nights.

  But nothing seemed to happen to Ari at all—he just sat there. I stared at him uncertainly. His face was the same—high cheekbones, lush mouth, pale amber eyes…

  No, wait.

  As I stared at him, I realized it was his eyes that had changed. They were no longer amber—they were pure, brilliant gold. Also, the pupils were gone—there was nothing but a pure gold disk where his irises had been. As I watched, the gold spread out and flowed over the whites of his eyes too, until the entire surface area of each eye was just a deep, glimmering gold.

  It was eerily beautiful and frightening at the same time. Because I felt—as I never had before—that there was something else in the room with us. A third party that Ari was holding back by main force of will—something huge that had an intense interest in me.

  Then he blinked and his eyes went back to their normal clear amber.

  “Do you see?” he asked.

  “Was that…” I licked my lips, which were suddenly dry. “Was that your Drake I saw, uh, looking at me?”

  He nodded.

  “He has a high regard for you, as I told you before.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  Ari shook his head. “There is a saying in the Sky Lands—The reasons for a Drake’s regard are as many as the sunbeams in the sky and as easily held in the hand.”

  “Meaning what?” I asked. “That nobody knows why a Drake, uh, takes a liking to someone?”

  Ari shrugged. “Essentially.”

  “But he’s never even met me!” I exclaimed. “Well, except for when he fished me out of the lake so the Guardian didn’t eat me, but that was hardly what you’d call a, uh, proper introduction.”