“Wrong about what, little witch?” he murmured in that cool, silky voice of his. The voice a snake might use before it struck.
“I…I’m not a witch,” I told him, lifting my chin and meeting his eyes, though he radiated danger the way another male might radiate body heat.
“Oh no? Then what are you, Megan Latimer?” he drawled, putting emphasis on my last name.
“I’m just a Null,” I went on doggedly. “I can’t even light a candle with magic. I don’t have any magic—I don’t belong here.”
“Yet, here you are. Putting yourself in harm’s way. Why?”
He reached out and gently—oh so gently—stroked one long, cool finger down my hot cheek. The key jumped at his touch and so did my heart. I was beginning to feel like I couldn’t get a deep enough breath.
“I…I don’t know,” I whispered. And then—either daringly or stupidly added—“Are you the harm you’re talking about?”
“Maybe.”
His fangs had grown as he talked—I could see them glimmering when his lips moved, long and curving just under his lush upper lip. He tilted my chin up, holding my eyes with his own and leaned over me. For a moment, I thought he was going to kiss me or maybe bite me and indeed, I felt his cool breath against my lips, though his mouth never touched mine.
“You should stay away from me, Megan Latimer,” he murmured. “Far…far away, little witch. Don’t you know our kinds don’t mix?”
“They don’t? Why…why not?” I asked breathlessly.
“Do you really have to ask?” he said, his voice as silky and seductive as dark chocolate.
Poisoned chocolate, I thought, feeling strangely drugged. One bite would kill you but it would taste so good and feel so smooth going down.
It was then that I knew what his bite would be like. What it would feel like to surrender and feel his fangs sink deep in my throat. A pain so sweet you could die of it.
My flight or fight response had kicked in, but in a most peculiar way. My brain was screaming that I ought to run—run as far and as fast as I could to get away from him. But my body wanted only to get closer—to feel those lean, muscular arms wrapped around me, pulling me close to his broad chest. He radiated coolness the way a human male would radiate heat. It was like standing next to an iceberg and yet I only wanted to get closer.
But when I stepped towards him, Griffin stepped abruptly back.
“No!” he muttered and I had the sense he was talking more to himself than to me. “No, I can’t.”
“Griffin?” My stupid body took another step towards him. Honestly, did I want to be hurt or killed? Or maybe the right word was exsanguinated. Wasn’t that the term for when a body was drained of all blood?
“Stay away from me, Megan Latimer.” His eyes flashed like lightning in the dim hallway. “It’s easier for me and safer for you.”
I shook my head.
“I don’t…don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t. You really are ignorant of all this, aren’t you?” He shook his head incredulously. “When I first saw you this morning, I didn’t believe it—I thought it was an act. But no witch would knowingly put herself in such a dangerous position with a Nocturne. Not unless you have a hell of a lot more power than you’re showing.”
“I don’t have any power,” I protested again.
He gave a low, mirthless chuckle.
“You can lie to yourself, little witch, but you can’t lie to me.”
“But—” I began but he turned and headed for the door. He opened it again, letting in another gust of humid night air. He was halfway out before he turned his head back to give me one more glimpse of his perfect face—still set in a strange mixture of anger and something else. Hunger? Desire? A little of both? I didn’t know.
“Stay away,” he said again—almost growled. Then he was gone, allowing the door to slap shut behind him.
17
The echo of the door slam seemed to wake me from some kind of trance. I jumped and blinked, feeling a little like a mouse that has escaped the cat. My heart was still hammering in my chest and the key around my throat was jerking—almost tugging me towards the door that Griffin had disappeared through.
After him—go after him! it seemed to be shouting…almost pleading.
“No,” I told it, speaking aloud as I put my hand over it to quiet it. I had a sense that I had barely escaped. I’d be a fool to call him back again or go after him.
And yet, that was what my foolish body, as well as the key, wanted me to do. Why did I feel so drawn to the tall, foreboding Nocturne? Did I have a death wish?
My legs felt shaky and weak, like spaghetti, as I forced myself to turn away from the dark hallway and go back to one of the broader main thoroughfares of the school.
That had been close—too close.
But close to what?
I felt like I had more questions than answers as I wandered blindly until somehow I found myself inside the cavernous Dining Hall again.
I stood there in the deserted dimness—clearly there was no point in lighting such a huge space when nobody was in it—and wondered why I was there. Oh right—the dungeon—I was looking for the dungeon. I had been meaning to find someone and ask them the way before I had run into Griffin and acted like some kind of a masochistic rabbit that wanted to be eaten by the fox…
This is stupid. I’m not going to find anything in here.
I turned to go but just as I did, I heard someone calling my name.
“Megan? Megan is that you?”
Turning, I stared into the gloom of the Dining Hall—someone was calling me—a familiar voice. But who? The voice was female, anyway, so at least I knew it wasn’t Griffin, whose voice was deep and silky and completely masculine.
“Megan, down here!” the voice called again.
I walked cautiously deeper into the Hall and then I saw something really weird.
It was Emma who was calling me but she was calling me from the floor and all I could see was her head.
“Oh my God,” I whispered, feeling sick. Had someone beheaded her and now her ghost had come to haunt me? The idea would have seemed ridiculous only a day ago but after everything I had seen and experienced my first day at Nocturne Academy, anything seemed possible.
“Emma?” I whispered, taking a step closer even though I really didn’t want to. “Is that you? Did someone hurt you? Do you…” I swallowed hard. “Are you here asking me to avenge you?”
It was the only reason I could think of that her ghost—or rather the ghost of her head—would suddenly appear to me like this, calling my name.
“What? What are you talking about?” the head demanded. And then suddenly it was more than a head. Emma’s neck and shoulders emerged from the floor, followed by the rest of her torso. She was dressed in a nightdress and a comfy looking furry pink bathrobe belted at the waist. And as the rest of her came into view, I saw that she was wearing fuzzy pink bunny slippers with long, floppy ears to match
Definitely not ghostly attire.
“Whew!” I put a hand to my heart, which was thudding like a jackhammer, though the key had finally quieted down. “I thought you were a ghost for a minute! Where did you come from?”
“From the dungeon, of course,” she said, frowning. “And why would you think I was a ghost?”
“Well, I mean all I could see was your head and it’s so gloomy and dark in here and after everything I’ve seen today I just thought—”
“You thought I had been killed horribly and my disembodied ghost head was asking you to avenge me?” Emma put a hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle.
“Well, I’ve had a really crazy day,” I pointed out a little defensively. “At this point, anything seems possible.”
“I get it,” she said kindly. “My first day here was pretty overwhelming too. But still…a ghost? Avery’s going to die laughing!” She giggled again.
I found myself laughing along with her—more in relief than because I found
it genuinely funny. I felt light all over. My body was reacting as though I’d just had a narrow escape—a brush with danger—and I found that the laughter coming out of my mouth was ever so slightly hysterical. It might have been because I was glad I’d been wrong about Emma being a ghost…or maybe it had something to do with my encounter with Griffin.
“I didn’t know the entrance to the dungeon was located in the Dining Hall,” I finally managed to say. “I’ve been wandering around forever trying to find it. I even ran into—”
I stopped abruptly and put a hand to my throat. The black, fine-link chain the key was on had tightened all at once, cutting off my air. Clearly the key didn’t want me to talk about Griffin, though I couldn’t understand why.
All right, all right! I thought at it angrily. I’ll keep my mouth shut—just let me breathe!
“You ran into who?” Emma was looking at me curiously.
I shook my head.
“Nobody.” My voice came out sounding rather choked but at least the chain had loosened enough for me to breathe again. Though I could still feel the key drawn up into the hollow of my throat instead of dangling between my breasts as it usually did.
Like some kind of Mob enforcer waiting to garrote a witness if they spilled the beans.
And to think I had been imagining it as a friend or even a harmless little pet! This pet could kill me as easily as Griffin could have, I reminded myself. And it clearly had its own agenda.
I needed to be careful who—and what—I trusted.
“Nobody,” I said again. “I was just looking all over for the, uh—what did you call it? The Norm Dorm?”
“Yeah.” Emma smiled at me happily. “It’s this way. Look.”
She pointed and I saw that she had come from a square hole cut into the flagstone floor. It was located in the far corner of the Dining Hall, where no tables were set up, and there was a wooden trapdoor with a rug fixed to it which obviously covered it when the door was shut.
Looking into the hole, I saw a winding spiral staircase leading downward. Far below, was a warm, flickering golden light that made me think of a fire burning in a fireplace.
“Come on down,” Emma offered. “You look tired. We missed you at dinner—where have you been?”
“It’s a long, long story,” I mumbled as I started down the spiral staircase. Emma came after me, being careful to pull the trapdoor shut behind me. I heard the soft thump as the attached rug settled into place and I was certain that no one who didn’t already know it was there could find the dungeon at all.
As I descended, I had the strangest feeling that somehow I was coming home. I just wished I could talk to my new friends about what had just happened with Griffin—but clearly the key wouldn’t allow that.
Well, maybe I could find some way around the key, I thought. Some other way to find information about the mysterious Nocturne.
There was nothing I could do but try…
18
“It’s not nearly as fancy as the Others’ dorms in the towers,” Emma told me. “But it’s cozy and it’s all ours. There aren’t many Norms attending this year and besides Kaitlyn and me, the ones who are, are all boarding off campus, so Kaitlyn and Avery and I all pretty much have the run of the place.”
I looked around appreciatively at the small space. When I had heard I was going to be staying in a dungeon, an image of vast, dark, echoing chambers filled with torture devices, rusty chains, and horrible mysterious stains on the floors had immediately sprung to mind.
Instead, the space that housed the “Norm Dorm” appeared to be divided into many smaller rooms, with the largest central chamber being here in the middle.
There was a hint of chill in the air, despite the warm Florida night outside—probably because we were underground and the room was built of the same thick gray stone that made up the rest of the castle. But the large fireplace set into the far wall had a roaring blaze that offset the chill nicely. In fact, the flickering flames and the slight chill and damp in the air reminded me nostalgically of my old home in Seattle.
My mom used to love to have a fire burning in the fireplace on damp, rainy days—which was most of them. Though of course, our tiny gas fireplace was nothing to the huge hearth I saw here. It was big enough to roast a whole pig in.
Which was what Avery was apparently intent on doing. At least, he was kneeling on the hearth and turning what appeared to be a large chunk of meat on a spit. I stared harder, making sure I wasn’t mistaken. Yes, it was an honest-to-God spit. I had never seen anyone cook anything on a spit except in movies about camping or Medieval times.
But the archaic cooking style didn’t matter—the smell coming from it was mouthwatering and I heard my stomach gurgle in response.
Emma laughed. “Wow, that was loud.”
“Oh my God!” I exclaimed, putting a hand to my midsection. “I’m so sorry—I’m just so hungry. What is he cooking?”
“Just a little something I liberated from the kitchen,” Avery said, getting up and dusting off the knees of his immaculate looking blue pajamas. “It’s a pork loin, actually. I purloined a loin.” He grinned at me charmingly. “Just for you, newbie. You’re lucky—I don’t kill the fatted calf for just anyone, you know. Or the fatted pig in this case.”
He, like Emma, was wearing a robe, though his looked more like one of those old-fashioned smoking jackets you saw in old movies. It was maroon with wide black satin lapels and pockets in the front big enough to hold a pipe or three. It should have looked silly but with his sleek blonde hair and debonair air, Avery made it seem fashionably retro. He was wearing leather slippers too that completed the look.
“Don’t listen to Avery—he didn’t raid the kitchen just for you. Dinner was awful tonight,” Kaitlyn’s soft voice said from behind me.
I turned and saw she was sitting, curled up with a book, on a soft-looking dark blue couch that sat facing the fireplace. There was another couch perpendicular to it, forming a kind of L shape with the first one. Across from the second couch, were two large, overstuffed leather chairs which had seen better days. Their stuffing was coming out and the leather was bald in some places but they still looked extremely comfortable.
“This is amazing!” I said, turning around in a circle to take in the full effect. “I’m so glad I’m down here with you guys instead of up in the South Tower with the Sisters!”
“More trouble with the Bitches of Eastwick?” Avery asked sympathetically.
I nodded. “You have no idea.”
“You can tell us over second dinner,” Emma said, smiling.
“It smells like it’s going to be way better than first dinner,” Kaitlyn remarked, smiling. “But then, Avery’s cooking is always good. He’s so domestic.”
“Why, thank you, girls.” Avery smiled self-deprecatingly. “I’ll make some lucky man a wonderful wife some day,” he said, putting a hand to his heart and fluttering his eyelashes dramatically.
“Come on and get into your jammy-britch,” Emma said, beckoning to me. “You can’t eat second dinner in your uniform!”
“Uh…jammy-britch?” I asked uncertainly.
“It’s what we call pajamas around here.” Kaitlyn gestured to her own soft blue robe and slippers. “It’s always chilly down here so you have to get all warm and comfy before you can relax.”
“Which is really kind of nice, if you think about it,” Emma remarked. “I mean, I’m a native Floridian and before I came here, I never lived anywhere you could put on a robe and sit by the fire. It’s always too hot.”
I had to agree with her there—Florida was terrible temperature-wise and the slightly chilly air in the dungeon made it feel like fall instead of eternal summer.
I said so and Avery nodded eagerly.
“Exactly! It’s kind of like The Chronicles of Narnia, only instead of the White Witch making it always Winter and never Christmas, someone made it always Summer and never Summer Break,” he remarked. “That’s Florida for you.”
&nbs
p; “I loved those books when I was a kid!” I exclaimed. “Did you read The Lord of the Rings?”
“And The Silmarillion,” Avery said proudly. “Did you know Tolkien was an Other?”
“Really?” I was surprised and curious. “What kind?”
“Okay, okay—if we start talking books and authors we’ll be standing here until the roast burns and Megan will never get out of her uniform,” Emma remarked practically.
“Jammy-britch time it is then,” I said, grinning at them. “Uh—if my things really did get delivered and I have jammy-britch to wear, that is.”
“You do,” Emma said. “They put your stuff in our room. There was an extra bed in there and I guess they figured you’re rather stay with us than be all alone.”
“But there are empty rooms on either side of us, if you’re rather have your own space,” Kaitlyn offered. “Though we’d be glad to have you,” she added shyly.
“I’d much rather stay with you guys—if there’s really enough room,” I said honestly. As cozy as the common area seemed, I didn’t like the idea of sleeping in a room all by myself in the dark down in a dungeon.
“Oh, that’s not a problem,” Emma said. “Come on—I’ll show you.”
She led the way into one of the doors that lined the outer walls of the common area, to the right of the fireplace. It opened into a perfectly enormous stone chamber with three beds—two set on the far wall and one on the wall across from them. All three were twin-sized and each one had an old wooden wardrobe standing on one side of it and a nightstand with a lamp on the other.
It wasn’t fancy but there were some threadbare oriental rugs on the cold stone floor to warm it up and the beds all had puffy comforters on them. The two beds on the far wall were obviously Emma and Kaitlyn’s.
Emma had a pink flowered bedspread on her narrow bed and Kaitlyn had a blue patchwork quilt. There was a silver frame on her nightstand with a picture of a happy, smiling family—a tall father with golden hair and aqua blue eyes the same shade as Kaitlyn’s and a mother with dark eyes and dark chocolate skin tones. A much younger Kaitlyn was standing between them, laughing, showing her lovely face freely with her hair pulled back in braids.
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