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I lagged behind Avery and Megan and Griffin and Emma, who seemed to be feeling much better today. I, however, was feeling considerably worse. I was wobbly on my feet—faint and light-headed, though I was careful not to let my Coven-mates notice.
I didn’t want to worry them for no reason, I told myself. I was just a little off because I hadn’t eaten anything. But then again, I didn’t want to eat anything. The very thought of food made me feel nauseous—it was as though my body had decided to reject even the idea of nourishment. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was going to do about that—maybe the doctor could help me. But at the moment, I just wanted to get across the bridge and sink into the cool, leather interior of the Breedlove’s Benz to get away from the blazing sun.
When we were almost to the middle of the long bridge, I heard shouting behind me.
“Hey, watch out, you jerk!” someone exclaimed and somebody else yelled, “Watch it!”
I started to turn my head, squinting to try and see what was going on that was shaking the wooden planks under my feet. One of the strict rules at Nocturne Academy was no roughhousing on the bridge. That was because there were no guard rails all along its long length. So if anyone ran into anyone else by accident, they could easily be shoved into the inky, matte-black waters below.
Just as my brain processed that thought—rather sluggishly—a broad shoulder rammed into me, hard.
I cried out and staggered, waving my arms to try and regain my balance. But it was no use—I felt myself falling even as Avery and Megan started shouting my name.
I gave a gasp as the black water penetrated my clothing and then closed over my head. It was cold—so cold. You would have thought that being under the hot Florida sun and being so black it would have absorbed some heat. It ought to be as warm as blood. But being in the lake that surrounded the castle was like being in ice water. The freezing chill of it seemed to penetrate right to my bones immediately.
I kicked my legs and moved my arms frantically, trying to get back to the surface. I’m normally a good swimmer—living in Florida you almost have to be, there are so many lakes and swimming pools everywhere, not to mention the ocean—but the inky black stuff around me felt thicker than water somehow. It seemed to drag at my already exhausted limbs and it was so dark I couldn’t tell which way was up.
I had a terrible feeling that I might be swimming deeper into the murky depths instead of towards the surface and my lungs, which had only been about half full of air when I went under, were beginning to beg for oxygen already.
Then, just as I was about to panic, my head broke the surface.
“Oh thank the Goddess, there she is!” Avery was shouting. He was stripping frantically out of his uniform jacket, as though intending to dive in and Griffin was doing the same. “Kaitlyn,” he called, leaning over the edge of the bridge and reaching for me. “Come here—swim for me!”
His voice seemed to come from some distance away and when I shook my wet hair out of my eyes, I was surprised to see how far from the bridge I had somehow gotten. I would have sworn that I was so close I could reach out a hand and grasp the wooden side of the long platform. Instead, I was yards away and the bridge was well out of reach.
My limbs felt like someone had tied lead weights to them but even so, I started swimming. No use in Avery and Griffin jumping in and getting wet and chilly too when I could get my own self out.
And then something appeared in the water between me and the bridge—something huge.
26
Kaitlyn
I knew what the thing in the water was, though I had never seen it up close before. The Guardian was a water serpent—some said related to the Drakes—which lived in the lake surrounding the Nocturne Academy castle. The lake was supposedly so deep nobody had ever found the bottom—like Loch Ness in Scotland—and the Guardian lived in its inky depths, making certain nobody who didn’t belong got into Nocturne Academy.
As I stared at the huge, dinner-plate-sized eye which had surfaced above the black water and was staring at me, unblinking, I remembered reading that the Guardian lived on a strict diet of a special kind of fish that were kept stocked in the lake. Supposedly, it had no interest in eating humans or Others.
That was what I told myself as the eye, with its slitted vertical pupil like a reptile’s, blinked once, slowly, and a truly gigantic snout surfaced to join it. God, the Guardian really did look like an enormous alligator or crocodile, I thought uneasily, as I continued treading water in the cold, sludgy black liquid that filled the lake. Like one of those prehistoric ones you read about that had died out over a hundred thousand years ago—and a good thing, too—because they were huge and could swallow an entire person in one bite.
