Drink Deep (Chicagoland Vampires 5)

"You wil have classes from eight twenty a.m. until three twenty p.m., Monday through Friday. You wil have dinner at precisely five o'clock and study hal from seven p.m. until nine p.m., Sunday through Thursday. Lights-out at ten o'clock. You wil remain on the school grounds during the week, although you may take your exercise off the grounds during your lunch breaks, assuming you do not leave the grounds alone and that you stay near campus. Curfew is promptly at nine p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights. Do you have any questions?"

I shook my head, which was a fib. I had tons of questions, actual y, but not the sort I thought she'd appreciate, especial y since her PR skil s left a lot to be desired. She made St. Sophia's sound less like boarding school and more like prison. Then again, the PR was lost on me, anyway. It's not like I was there by choice.

"Good." Foley pul ed open a tiny drawer on the right-hand side of her desk. Out of it she lifted an antique gold skeleton key - the skinny kind with prongs at the end - that was strung from a royal blue ribbon.

"Your room key," she said, and extended her hand. I lifted the ribbon from her palm, wrapping my fingers around the slender bar of metal. "Your books are already in your room.

You've been assigned a laptop, which is in your room, as wel ."

She frowned, then glanced up at me. "This is likely not how you imagined your junior and senior years of high school would be, Ms. Parker. But you wil find that you have been bestowed an incredible gift. This is one of the finest high schools in the nation. Being an alumna of St. Sophia's wil open doors for you educational y and social y. Your membership in this institution wil connect you to a network of women whose influence is international in scope."

I nodded, mostly about that first part. Of course I'd imagined my junior and senior years differently. I'd imagined being at home, with my friends, with my parents.

But she hadn't actual y asked me how I felt about being shipped off to Chicago, so I didn't elaborate.

"I'l show you to your room," she said, rising from her chair and moving toward the door.

I picked up my bag again and fol owed her.

St. Sophia's looked pretty much the same on the walk to my room as it had on the way to Foley's office - one stone corridor after another. The building was immaculately clean, but kind of empty. Sterile. It was also quieter than I would have expected a high school to be, certainly quieter than the high school I'd left behind. But for the click of Foley's heels on the shining stone floors, the place was graveyard silent. And there was no sign of the usual high school stuff.

No trophy cases, no class photos, no lockers, no pep ral y posters. Most important, stil no sign of students. There were supposed to be two hundred of us. So far, it looked like I was the only St.s tos, n Sophia's girl in residence.

The corridor suddenly opened into a giant circular space with a domed ceiling, a labyrinth set into the tile on the floor beneath it. This was a serious place. A place for contemplation. A place where nuns once walked quietly, gravely, through the hal ways.

And then she pushed open another set of double doors.

The hal way opened into a long room lit by enormous metal chandeliers and the blazing color of dozens of stained glass windows. The wal s that weren't covered by windows were lined with books, and the floor was fil ed by rows and rows of tables.

At the tables sat teenagers. Lots and lots of teenagers, al in stuff that made up the St. Sophia's uniform: navy plaid skirt and some kind of top in the same navy: sweater; hooded sweatshirt; sweater-vest.

They looked like an al -girl army of plaid.

Books and notebooks were spread on the tables before them, laptop computers open and buzzing. Classes didn't start until tomorrow, and these girls were already studying.

The trustees were right - these people were serious about their studies.

"Your classmates," Foley quietly said.

She walked through the aisle that split the room into two halves, and I fol owed behind her, my shoulder beginning to ache under the weight of the duffel bag. Girls watched as I walked past them, heads lifting from books (and notebooks and laptops) to check me out as I passed. I caught the eyes of two of them.

The first was a blonde with wavy hair that cascaded around her shoulders, a black patent leather headband tucked behind her ears. She arched an eyebrow at me as I passed, and two other brunettes at the table leaned toward her to whisper. To gossip. I made a prediction pretty quickly that she was the leader of that pack.

The second girl, who sat with three other plaid cadets a few tables down, was definitely not a member of the blonde's pack. Her hair was also blond, but for the darker ends of her short bob. She wore black nail polish and a smal silver ring on one side of her nose.

Given what I'd seen so far, I was surprised Foley let her get away with that, but I liked it.

She lifted her head as I walked by, her green eyes on my browns as I passed.

She smiled. I smiled back.

"This way," Foley ordered. I hustled to fol ow.

We walked down the aisle to the other end of the room, then into another corridor. A few more turns and a narrow flight of limestone stairs later, Foley stopped beside a wooden door. She bobbed her head at the key around my neck. "Your suite," she said. "Your bedroom is the first on the right. You have three suitemates, and you'l share the common room. Classes begin promptly at eight twenty tomorrow morning. Your schedule is with your books. I understand you have some interest in the arts?"

"I like to draw," I said. "Sometimes paint."

"Yes, the board forwarded some of the slides of your work. It lends itself to the fantastic - imaginary worlds and unrealistic creatures - but you seem to have some skil .

We've placed you in our arts track. You'l start studio classes within the next few weeks, once our instructor has settled in. It is expected that you wil devote as much time to your craft as you do to your studies." Apparently having concluded her instructions, she gave me an up-and-down appraisal. suitpraou Any questions?"

She'd done it again. She said, "Any questions?" but it sounded a lot more like "I don't have time for nonsense right now."

"No, thank you," I said, and Foley bobbed her head.

"Very good." With that, she turned on her heel and walked away, her footsteps echoing through the hal way.

I waited until she was gone, then slipped the key into the lock and turned the knob. The door opened into a smal circular space - the common room. There were a couch and coffee table in front of a smal fireplace, a cel o propped against the opposite wal , and four doors leading, I assumed, to the bedrooms.