“Not all ailments are of the body.”
I shot him a swift glance.
“We’ll do our best for you, too, Saint,” I promised.
He nodded gravely.
“Thank you, Kaitlyn. I know you will.”
So it was with a happy heart that I watched the two newest students of Nocturne Academy come and take their place at our little table in the back of the Dining Hall.
Jalli had already settled in and was sharing a bedroom with Megan and Emma and me.
The Norm Dorm was plenty big enough that she could have had a room to herself, but she had admitted to me in a small voice that she was “still just a little afraid of the dark.” So we had moved another bed and wardrobe into our room and Jalli was as happy as could be, staying with the “older girls” even though she was only two years younger than me.
Saint had been a little bit harder to find a spot for. The other Drakes, knowing his reputation, absolutely refused to have him in the West Tower. It had started to look like he was going to have to sleep on a couch in the administration office when Avery spoke up and invited him to share the boy’s dormitory room in the Norm Dorm.
Saint had looked at him coolly, assessing my friend and Coven-mate until Avery’s cheeks had gone a little pink.
“If you knew who I am and what I have done, you would not, perhaps, be so willing to have me sleep with you,” he remarked.
“Uh, what?” Avery had gone bright red, his blue eyes raking over the tall, dark Drake. “Oh, you mean to sleep in my room. Of course, right,” he’d said quickly. “Well what’s so specially terrible about you, then?”
“I am a Blood Drake,” Saint told him. “I have killed while in my Drake form. More than once.”
“Well, it’s not your Drake form that’s going to be sleeping in the bed next to mine, now is it?” Avery asked tartly, recovering some of his poise. “So as long as you don’t plan on shifting shapes while you’re sharing my room, I think we’ll get along fine.”
Saint had seemed surprised that Avery was willing to share a room with him, even after hearing what he truly was. He had bowed formally and thanked my Coven-mate, accepting his offer of a bed in the Norm Dorm.
I couldn’t help secretly wondering how that particular arrangement was going to go. Avery was gay—completely out and proud—and most Drakes were known to be extremely homophobic, though thank goodness Ari didn’t fall into that category.
But so far the two of them seemed to be getting along. They had even formed a tentative friendship and Avery was showing the dark Drake around to his classes and helping him get through the unfamiliar routine of the school day.
So we were all happy and together again and we had new friends to be thankful for too. I felt I had regained almost everything I had lost.
Though The Fire had taken my parents from me, it had given me wonderful friends, a Blood-Bonded mate I would love the rest of my life, and the ability to change into a magical being and soar among the clouds.
Of course, you can’t play cards with peoples’ lives and say, “Oh, I’d trade this for that or his or her life for this or that ability or circumstance” but I felt less bereft now and I liked to think that my parents were looking down on me from the “Sky above the Sky Lands” as Ari’s people called it, and that they were happy that I was happy.
My new friends and Coven-mates were all sitting around the table. Ari was beside me and I could feel his love through our Bond. Jalli was getting her surgery soon, and Mr. Seahorse was sitting on my shoulder, chiming happily and eating the occasional piece of rare roast beef that I fed him. There was only one thing I needed to make my happiness complete…
And somehow Griffin seemed to know exactly what it was.
“Kaitlyn,” he said, leaning across the table to speak to me in a low voice. “I hope you don’t mind, but I left campus last night and told Alexander Breedlove about your new, er, circumstances.”
“Oh!” I put a hand to my heart. “You mean you told him I’m not a Made Nocturne anymore?”
Griffin nodded. “We agreed that what had happened was all just a misunderstanding.” He hesitated. “I do not think that you will be welcome to stay at their home anymore, but he did at least agree that you can come and see Allegra on the weekends.” He grinned and nodded at my pet. “I do believe she will love your ‘Mr. Seahorse’ as you call him.”
And now, at last, I felt like I was so happy my cup of joy couldn’t hold even one more drop.