Lock and Key (Nocturne Academy 1)

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.”

“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.