Lock and Key (Nocturne Academy 1)

“You’ll be sorry for that!” His voice was little more than a growl.

“Is that how you want to play it? You want to challenge me here and now?” Reyes demanded. He still sounded angry but not frightened at all. “Remember your place, Sanchez—and don’t make me put you in it.”

This seemed to make Sanchez even angrier because he rushed forward, his mouth and face becoming more deformed all the time. But just before he could land a blow on Reyes—or else bite off his head with the freakish animal mouth that had grown in place of his own—Coach Vasquez appeared from nowhere and stepped between them.

“De-escalate!” She shouted at Sanchez. “De-escalate now! You let your drake out on school grounds and I swear by the shells of the first egg I’ll have you sent back to the Sky Lands and busted down in rank so fast your head will spin, Sanchez!”

For a moment I didn’t think Sanchez would stop. The fury on his malformed face—which was more than half dragon now—was terrible to behold.

Reyes, however, just stood coolly by, arms crossed over his broad chest, watching. His big body looked poised, however, as though he was ready to face any threat Sanchez offered. I realized that he had put himself between Kaitlyn and the other Drake—almost as though he was shielding her.

I drew back and put an arm around her shoulders again, pulling her carefully back from the action. But Coach Vasquez’s threats seemed to have finally had an effect.

Slowly Sanchez’s face began to lose its reptilian cast and his long, toothy muzzle shrank back into a human mouth. His eyes, however, remained an angry bright yellow and when I looked I saw that Reyes’ eyes still blazed pure gold.

“That’s enough—both of you!” Coach Vasquez put a hand on both of their chests and shoved, forcing them apart. “Now what started all this?”

I wanted to say she’d know what started it if she had been doing her job instead of reading in the shade. But I had a feeling that was asking for trouble that would last the entire time I spent here at Nocturne Academy. So instead I took a deep breath and held onto my temper with both hands as I stepped forward and spoke.

“Sanchez threw a football and hit Kaitlyn in the face,” I said, glaring at him coldly. “Then he came over here and laughed about it and called her ugly names as though it was some kind of joke.”

“I only said what we’re all thinking,” Sanchez snarled. “I called her a freak because she is a freak!”

At that point Reyes drew back and punched him.

It must have been a powerful blow because Sanchez, though he was built like a bull, went to his knees. He shook his head from side to side, looking dazed, then he glared up at Reyes.

“I don’t care who your Sire is, you’ll be sorry for that, pendejo!” he snarled.

“I’m only sorry I have to take wing with someone who has no honor,” Reyes said coldly. Then he said something else in another language and I knew it wasn’t Spanish because I’d taken a year of it in my old school.

This new language was guttural and deep—slightly Germanic, I thought—but when Reyes spoke it, it almost sounded like someone else was speaking through him. Someone or something with a much larger frame and deeper chest.

Maybe something like a dragon, whispered a little voice in my head.

Sanchez drew back as though he’d been punched again but he didn’t say anything in return. He just sat here in the grass, with my handprint still vivid on one cheek and a dribble of blood coming from his swelling bottom lip and glared at Reyes.

At last he said, ‘This isn’t over,” in a thick, angry voice and spit blood on the ground. It looked very red against the green grass.

Coach Vasquez started to yell at Reyes, probably for punching Sanchez, but Reyes turned on her, his eyes still brilliant gold, and said something else in the strange, deep voice that made her flinch back.

She took a step away from him, eyeing him warily, then turned to me.

“Go on—get her to the Healer,” she snapped, pointing at Kaitlyn. “Be quick about it!”

“I’m going with them,” Reyes said, in his normal voice. “To make sure they get their safely.” He glared a silent threat at Sanchez and then turned to me. “Come on—this way.”

23

I wanted to tell the big Drake we didn’t need him but the sad fact was, we did. Kaitlyn still couldn’t see very well and I had no idea where I was going.

Reyes shepherded us along, walking behind as though to ward off any danger and glancing back over his shoulder, as if to see if Sanchez was coming after us. He wasn’t, but that didn’t stop the other Drake from glaring with those yellow eyes as we retreated to the safety of the castle.