He looked at the huge round clock face painted with elaborate designs hanging on the far wall of the Dining Hall which drew my attention as well. I hadn’t paid much attention to it the day before but now I saw the significance of the paintings.
There was a green and gold dragon twined around the number 3, a gorgeous flower with silky purple petals and a vivid green stem twined around the 6, a black cat was arching its back at the 9, and at 12, a single glittering drop of ruby red blood hung from the top curve of the 2.
A symbol for each group of Others, I thought. But where were the Norms? Clearly they didn’t count enough to be painted on the clock. Just another example, besides the substandard food, that plain humans without some kind of power were second class citizens at Nocturne Academy.
I wondered again if I belonged there.
“I’ve got to get going if I’m going to make my first class in the South Tower on time,” Avery said, breaking into my thoughts.
“I have to go too.” Emma got up and picked up her untouched tray with a sigh. “Don’t know why I even bother.”
“Let’s go,” Kaitlyn said as she and I both got up as well. “What’s your first class, Megan?”
“Physical Education,” I said and made a face. “I’m really not looking forward to it.”
Kaitlyn brightened.
“Oh—that’s my first class too—we can walk together.”
“Great, because I have no idea where it is. It just says ‘left field’ on my schedule and I didn’t think there were any fields around the castle—isn’t it all surrounded by the lake-moat?”
“Not the back part,” Kaitlyn said as we dumped our trays in the dirty chute. We waved goodbye to Emma and Avery and turned in the direction she pointed. “Come on—let’s go.”
21
Kaitlyn chattered in her quiet, friendly way as we walked, pointing out features of the castle I had missed during my crazy first day. But I noticed, as we got closer and closer to where we were going, that Kaitlyn got quieter and less-happy looking.
By the time we turned down a short hallway off of the main corridor between the North and West towers, and reached a solid wooden door which led into the girl’s locker room, Kaitlyn had gone altogether quiet and had an apprehensive look on what I could see of her face.
“Hey,” I said, touching her shoulder to stop her before she pushed through the door. “Are you okay? You seem kind of upset.”
“It’s the new Gym teacher—she’s a Drake,” Kaitlyn said in a low voice. “She’s…kind of rough so far. Last year it was a lot easier. We had a Fae teacher and all she wanted to do was sit around and brush her hair so she let us do whatever we wanted. We didn’t even have to dress out. This year…well…” She shrugged unhappily. “You’ll see.”
I guessed that I would. With a sense of apprehension, I pushed open the heavy wooden door and found myself in a locker room which looked pretty much like any other such room I’d ever been in—well, with the exception that the walls were made of gray stone instead of tile, that was.
Rows of lockers lined the walls with long benches in between to sit on while you changed, I supposed. Further on was a long row of shower stalls with green plastic curtains and opposite them, a line of sinks and mirrors. There were stacks of white towels on a wooden bench outside the showers—the implication clearly being that everyone was expected to take a shower after class.
I began to get an uncomfortable sensation in the pit of my stomach. Yesterday I had deliberately chosen long-sleeved winter blouses, even though they were hotter, just to hide the scars on my arms. I didn’t want to expose them to everyone in my gym class if I was forced to shower here.
“Does everyone have to take a shower after class?” I asked Kaitlyn.
She nodded unhappily. “We didn’t have to last year but this year the new coach insists on it. She says, ‘Let me explain this to you—it’s hot out there in the Florida sun! You get hot, you sweat. You sweat, you stink. So you have to take a shower.’”
Kaitlyn’s low, gruff imitation of the Gym teacher’s voice would have made me snort laughter but the fact that we were given no choice about showering took all the fun out of her act. What was I going to do? Maybe I could take two towels and wrap one around my shoulders and hold my arms really close to my sides…
“Hurry up, hurry up—who’s holding up my roll call?” a deep voice suddenly boomed through the echoing locker room, making me jump and put a hand to my heart. It occurred to me that Kaitlyn and I were the only ones in the large stone chamber—was everyone else already out on the field?