They only liked live creatures to adorn themselves with—almost every one of the girls at the Fae table currently had a brilliantly colored moth or butterfly fluttering helplessly in her hair. I wasn’t sure what kind of magic they used to keep them in place but it was clear that whatever power had kept the Blue Morpho alive had run out.
I sighed as I stared at the tiny, brilliant butterfly in my hand. It made me sad to see the lovely little creature tossed aside like so much trash—and even sadder to think that it had given its short life in service to some bubble-headed Fae’s vanity.
“It’s a shame, isn’t it?” a deep, familiar voice said in my ear.
I gasped and jumped, nearly spilling my tea. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw a tall, muscular guy with dark gold hair and brilliant blue eyes standing beside me. Then my vision cleared and I saw it was only Bran O’Connor.
“Oh, the living ornaments, you mean?” I asked, handling the butterfly hair-comb carefully in one hand and still holding my glass of tea in the other. “Yeah, it is. It’s not right to make a living creature into nothing more than a piece of jewelry to stick in your hair.”
“It’s a perversion of the Natural Magic,” he agreed, which surprised me. “A living thing shouldn’t be fixed in place until it starves to death just to feed someone’s vanity.”
“A ‘perversion’ of magic? What does that mean? What do you know about magic?” I asked him. “You’re just a Norm like me, right?”
For a moment I thought I saw a look of alarm slide over his face. But I couldn’t be sure—as I mentioned before, it was really hard to keep him in focus for some reason.
“I’m just…stating what I learned in my Magical Studies class,” he said quickly.
“You take Magical Studies? Why?” I asked.
“Because I…want to know more about this world.” He gestured with one hand—the one that wasn’t holding a tray. “The Magical World. It’s one reason I’m at Nocturne Academy in the first place. My father is a Professor of Magical Lore and I want to follow in his footsteps.”
“Oh. Okay.” I shrugged, though it seemed strange. Not that many Norms know about the Magical World, as Bran had put it. I only knew myself because some unknown donor was paying to send me here, to Nocturne Academy.
I had no idea who my mysterious benefactor was or why they would pay the extremely expensive tuition to send a blah little nothing of a Norm like me to a magical school, but I wasn’t about to turn down the scholarship. The only other option for high school in the area was Frostproof High—a dusty, drab, D-rated school full of sullen redneck students who drove pickup trucks with those stupid fake testicles dangling beneath them and would rather be out shooting things in the woods with their shotguns than learning Trigonometry or World History or anything, really.
So, yeah, I was grateful to be at Nocturne Academy. Even if the Norm food did suck.
And speaking of the food, I saw that Bran had a scoop of the weird tuna-mango salad on his green plastic tray.
“I wouldn’t eat that if I were you,” I said, nodding at it. “You might really regret it later.”
“Oh, I wondered about that.” He gave the scoop a doubtful look. “I thought it might be some kind of regional specialty.”
“No, it’s definitely not,” I assured him. “It’s complete slop, but that’s what we Norms get to eat around here.” I shrugged sadly, indicating the vast stone Dining Hall. “Now, if you want good regional cuisine, you ought to come down to the I Scream, U Scream Ice Cream shop and Diner,” I told him. “I work there some days after school and most weekends—they make the best burgers and fries and shakes around. It’s not gourmet but it’s sure better than that.” I nodded again at his tray.
“Thank you.” Bran’s homely face broke into a smile. “I’ll take you up on that offer. What nights do you work?”
Oh crap—did he think I had invited him just to come and see me? And why did that thought make my heart start pounding?
“Um…” I was saved from answering by the realization that we were standing beside the Norm table and all my friends and Coven-mates were looking at us expectantly. We must have been walking while we were talking, though I had barely noticed moving, I was so engaged in our conversation.
“Hey Emmers,” Avery said, his blue eyes dancing, though he was careful to keep his tone light. “And who might this be?”
As if he didn’t know.
“Um, this is Bran O’Connor,” I said awkwardly, introducing him to the group despite my embarrassment, since it seemed I now had no choice. “Bran, this is Avery, Megan, Griffin, Ari, Kaitlyn, Saint, and Jalli,” I said, nodding at each of them in turn.