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“The chance to Blood-Bond and live happily ever after, you mean?” Avery raised an eyebrow at me. “Because is the Headmistress really going to let you do that? I mean, are you and Griffin allowed to go all around breaking the Edict in public?”
“There is no Edict, now,” I reminded him, frowning.
“Oh certainly—there’s no magic spell that keeps all the different races of Others apart,” Avery said sharply. “But there is a social convention which has been in force for centuries in all the Other communities across all the worlds and realms. And if you think you can get rid of prejudice and hate just by floating up into the air like a pretty-pretty flower and snapping your fingers, you are sadly mistaken, Princess.”
“Hey, that’s not very nice, Avery!” I exclaimed, glaring at him.
“Well, it’s true!” he shot back.
“I don’t think—”
“He’s right,” Griffin said quietly, cutting off my angry flow of words before I could get started.
“What?” I turned to him uncertainly.
“The prejudice against Others loving different Others is very deeply ingrained in all our peoples,” Griffin said. “I think we have to expect to get a lot of anger and disgust directed at us for quite some time—maybe even the rest of our lives—before the tide starts to turn and people accept the new order of things.”
I thought of the glances we were getting in the halls now and the way I had heard some of the other students whisper, “Did you hear? They’re Blood-Bonded! A Sister and a Nocturne! Isn’t it awful?”
Well, it was mostly the bitchy bubble-headed Fae girls in our English class saying things like that but still, the emotion was definitely there. Not that I cared—I would be with Griffin even if everyone in the whole school shunned us. But still, it would have been nice not to be stared at and whispered about quite so much.
“But what about the attraction that some Others are going to feel for other, uh, Others?” Emma asked, breaking my train of thought. “I mean, there’s bound to be some cross-species romances cropping up now that there’s no magic spell to keep people from being attracted to each other.”
“What are you trying to tell us, Emma?” Avery asked, grinning at her. “Maybe you have your eye on a hot Fae guy and now you think you’ve got a shot with him?”
“No—of course not!” Emma exclaimed, making a face. “I wouldn’t be caught dead with one of those conceited assholes! I just meant…other Others. You know.” She cast a furtive glance at Kaitlyn, who was sipping her hot chocolate and staring dreamily into the fire.
She seemed to realize we were all looking at her for a moment because she glanced up, a slightly guilty expression on her face—what I could see of it, anyway.
“You…why are you all looking at me?” she exclaimed, frowning.
“Maybe we’re all just wondering why Ari Reyes flew to your rescue when the ‘lovequake’ happened,” Avery remarked. “And how he knew you were in trouble in the first place.”
“I don’t know, okay?” Kaitlyn looked uncomfortable. “I don’t know how he knew where I was or why he came. He didn’t say anything to me. He was just suddenly there, untying those awful ropes the witches had on me.”
She sounded a bit defensive, I thought, and I didn’t like making her uncomfortable.
“Well, who knows,” I said vaguely, hoping to change the subject. “But did any of you see the size of his Drake? It was huge.”
“I did,” Emma said. “I looked up and it was like a massive cloud blotting out the sun! And its wings were even bigger than its body. They looked like the sails on those old-fashioned sailing ships you see on historical tours at the harbor sometimes.”
“I wonder if it’s a fire-breather?” Avery mused. “I think I saw some smoke or steam coming from its muzzle. Do you know, they say a Drake’s internal temperature can reach over fourteen hundred degrees Fahrenheit or eight hundred degrees Centigrade? That’s hotter than a forest fire!”
Kaitlyn’s one visible eye widened and her creamy skin got pale.
“Will you excuse me?” she said, putting her mug of hot cocoa down on the coffee table and standing up—a bit shakily I thought. “I’m really tired—I think I’ll go to bed early.”
“Oh Katydid, I’m sorry!” Avery exclaimed but she only shook her head.
“It’s okay. I’m just going to turn in.”
After she was gone with the bedroom door closed firmly behind her, I looked at him.
“What was that all about?” I asked in a low voice.
“Oh, Kaitlyn really doesn’t like anything to do with fire,” Emma said softly, answering for him. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but she never even gets too close to the little fire we have in here most nights.”
She nodded at the grate where our cheerful, friendly little fire was still glowing and flickering under the caldron filled with hot chocolate.
