Gothicana

CHAPTER 13

Corvina

And she was the student again.

She kind of hated him, really hated him, for the ease with which he slipped into his role after they got back to the castle. With a gruff ‘good night, Miss Clemm’, as though he hadn’t spent the last hour buried inside her, as though she hadn’t been wet with his seed, he had dropped her off in the driveway and gone on his merry way.

Kaylin Cross, the woman she hadn’t really seen in months, had been waiting for her in the tower foyer. She had asked Corvina if her trip to town had been alright and if Mr. Deverell had been cordial with her. Corvina had smiled and assured Kaylin that he had been very kind, while ignoring the heaviness in her pussy. It had sent a secret thrill through her though, pretending that her muscles weren’t dying from the sexual exertion while having an absolutely contrary conversation.

That had been two weeks ago.

Two weeks, and her soreness had disappeared. Two weeks, and things were normal to the point where she wondered if she’d imagined the whole thing. 

Corvina made her way with her sandwich to the end of the dining hall, finally able to walk without even a twinge between her legs. Jade and Erica sat over the morning-lit windows on their usual table with Troy, Ethan, and Jax, chattering about something. She weaved between the other tables, her skirt flowing around her legs like liquid.

As she reached them, Jax shifted to the side, making space between him and Erica like he usually did, offering her a seat. Corvina gave him a small smile and slid into the space, her body sandwiched between the two on either side. 

“I can’t believe they’re doing this!” Jade muttered, stabbing her plate of fruit with a fork.

“What?” Corvina asked, taking a bite of her sandwich.

“The castle is opening up the Vault,” Troy said from his seat beside Jade. 

“The what?”

“It’s what they called this small dungeon underneath this building, but they locked it up years ago,” Jade informed her, sipping on her coffee. 

Corvina raised her eyebrows, waiting for her to explain. She didn’t have to wait long.

“That was where the Slayers were first found doing some dark shit,” Jade told her. “It’s after the university shut the place that they moved into the woods.”

“Why open it now?” Corvina asked, nibbling on her sandwich, her appetite low for some reason.

“Mr. Deverell convinced the board,” Troy supplied, his mouth half-full. “Said it would make an excellent recreation room, from what I’ve heard. And I don’t actually disagree with him. We don’t have any space for just chilling, you know?”

Corvina ignored the little stutter in her heart at his name. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”

“With the Black Ball in weeks?” Jade shook her head. “The timing just feels… off.”

“It’s not like the school stops people from going anywhere, Jade,” Jax pointed out. “Locked or not, if anyone wanted to use that space, they would. People wander around here all the damn time. No one cares.”

“You’ll learn after a little while how much power the legend actually has here, Jax,” Troy corrected. “That’s the major reason the university doesn’t have a rule for students not wandering around at night or going into the woods. Nobody who’s heard of them would dare to anyways.”

“Not unless you’re Mr. Deverell,” Erica chuckled. “I’ve seen him around at night from my window, and we all know he goes into the woods. I wonder why though.”

“It can’t be for fresh air,” Ethan theorized. “We already get plenty of that. And not for exercise either, since most of the faculty walks around the campus or go to the fitness room.”

“Wait, there’s a fitness room?” Corvina asked, surprised since she’d not seen it on her map.

“It’s in the Staff Wing,” Jax said from her side, eating his sandwich. “You know the building behind this hall?”

Corvina nodded, her own mouth full.

“They have a fitness room on top of their tower.”

“You saw him in the woods once, right Corvina?” Troy mused. “What was he doing in there?”

Smoking a cigarette. Fixing an old, damaged piano. Kissing the breath out of her.

She shook her head, her answer half-honest. “I was at the lake when I saw him. He told me not to be in the woods alone and then he left.”

“Damn,” Erica chewed on her food. “He’s so weird. Fascinating. But not go

Corvina could understand why. He had that air about him. But she’d learned years ago not to be scared of what she didn’t understand, and until she understood him, there was no room for fear. He’d had multiple chances to harm her, and for some reason, he’d made her feel safe instead. And Mo had told her something along that line.

As though she’d conjured him, she felt the weight of his gaze on her front.

She looked up from the sandwich to lock eyes with him for a moment before he looked away. He tried not watching her much anymore, not the way he’d used to. Maybe he was over whatever had pulsed between them after their one time.

She wasn’t.

After that box had opened, Corvina just had to think of him and feel the desire pulse in her blood. She would sit in his classes and watch him teach and feel her breasts get heavy. She would watch him tap the marker on the desk and remember the way he’d tapped her pussy. One time, she’d gone to the staff room to give her history professor a paper and found her silver-eyed devil reading in the corner, wearing a pair of square black-framed glasses she loved him in, and almost jumped him before stopping herself.

Yeah, she wasn’t over him.

She was attached, and she didn’t know how that boded for her. 

She saw his eyes flash to Jax beside her and realized she was sitting pressed to his side, something she hadn’t even thought about. Suddenly, she was hyperaware of it. She saw his eyes take in the places where she and Jax were pressed together before his eyes came to hers.

The silver was molten.

“Can I take one?” she heard Jax’s voice from the side, her eyes ensnared, her heart beating hard in her chest.

Mr. Deverell turned and went to the food.

Corvina inhaled, closing her eyes for a second to regain her composure, and extended her plate to Jax. “Sure.”

They all ate and talked about the classes. Troy and Ethan were seniors in their second year, so they had different classes and schedules, which kept the conversation about other faculty members interesting. Corvina liked how no one ever broached the subject of anyone’s past. It made her relax and open a bit more because all conversation with them rooted itself in the present or prospects of the future. She really, really liked that.

She also really liked how comfortable she had begun to feel with the boys. Having never really interacted with the male species in her previous life, she had been pleasantly surprised to find they were pretty nice. They loved to joke at each other’s expense and pull legs but they were genuinely nice people.

After breakfast, they all made their way back towards the towers in the bright sunshine. Troy stopped to tie his laces, telling them he’ll catch up, and Corvina stayed back with him, taking the chance to peek inside the windows.

Her eyes went to Mr. Deverell taking his wrapped sandwiches. He never ate in the hall with everyone else. A young female professor wearing a simple blue sweater and jeans, her blonde hair in a ponytail, approached him. Corvina watched as she laughed at something he said, resting her palm on his bicep, and something hot, ugly took a hold of her insides.