Soulhunter Academy

by L. J. Swallow

  I wince at the sound as Keir slams Zach’s head into the ground. “I didn’t need fucking rescuing.”

  “I was about to slash your throat,” he laughs back.

  The two nephilim lock gazes and I take advantage of their distraction. They can kill each other. I don’t give a crap, but Keir? His soul’s mine. Throwing myself at Keir, I manage to knock him off Zach.

  “For fucks sake, Ava!” Keir jumps to his feet and seizes my arms, pinning them behind my back. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “What do you think?” I growl and pull against his iron grip.

  Zach rolls over, pushes himself up on his hands and knees, and coughs.

  “Get the hell off me!” I shout at Keir, unable to move at all against his strength.

  “See you later then. I’ll leave you to whatever it is that’s going on between you two.” Keir’s head snaps around as the leaves on the ground blow outwards, Zach’s figure blurring into the night.

  “What the fuck did you do that for?” Keir yanks me to face him and shakes me.

  “He was going to kill you. I saw him,” I retort and dig my nails into the back of his hands. He drops his grip and swears.

  Keir’s eyes glitter in warning, his tall figure hunched forward, coiled for attack. I step back. “I don’t need your help. I need to kill him, and you got in the way. Again. Why? Wanted to get in and kill me first, did you?”

  “Was he telling the truth? Zach?”

  Keir winces and holds his head. My heart skips as I look at the blood caked above his ear. “Yeah. He has no soul. Without our angel souls, that’s what we become. Empty vessels feeding on others. Pure, remorseless demon.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Something else they never told you, Ava? These people you work for?”

  My uncertainty edges in. What the hell is happening? This. The night in the alley. Our roles in the world aren’t as clear-cut as I thought. Lost in confusion, I’m not ready for Keir’s assault, and he throws me onto the ground. My back hurts from the impact. No. Not again. I scramble back to my feet and shove him in the chest. Keir winces with pain and doubles over, sucking in air.

  “I’m weaker and that makes us equal.” He pulls the knife from the grass and holds it out to me. “Take the blade.”

  I stare at the glinting dagger. We’re not equal—Keir’s at a disadvantage after Zach’s attack.

  Keir straightens. “Kill me. Take my soul.”

  I stare in confusion. “Why was another nephilim trying to kill you?”

  “That doesn’t matter to you. All that matters is taking my soul back to the high angels, right? Claiming your freedom and living in blissful ignorance. Is that true?”

  I suck in a breath. “Stop messing with me, Keir.”

  “Fight me,” he urges. “Be rewarded with the life you want. Live in their world and let the corruption continue.”

  Mind tricks. I shiver against the cold as we stand off against each other and don't move.

  “Why the hesitation, Ava? Because you can’t kill me?” he taunts.

  What the hell am I waiting for? This is my chance. I push him in the chest and he sinks backwards into the leaves. “If I wanted to kill you, I could,” I snap.

  He looks up at me. “So, you don’t want to?”

  “I do—I need to.” I grab the dagger from where he dropped it onto the ground.

  “Do it. I’m weak. An easy target.” He smiles slowly. “Unless you can’t.”

  I grip the dagger’s hilt and pause as he looks back at me, goading me to act. He knows. Keir realises I won’t. Taking advantage of my distraction, Keir jumps to his feet and shoves me backwards against one of the trees. I gasp as the air is knocked from me.

  He curls his fingers around my hand holding the dagger. “Don’t hesitate, Ava. I might kill you first.”

  Keir’s hand remains around mine, our bodies pressed together the way they were the night in the alleyway. He doesn’t wrest the dagger away to attack, but the reality of our situation hits me instead.

  “You didn’t kill me last time we fought and you won,” I whisper. “You can’t kill me either, can you?”

  Keir’s look intensifies, as his eyes search mine. “I’ve killed soulhunters, waiting for the right one to arrive.”

  “Arrive and do what?”

  The blood and sweat on Keir mingles with the scent from before, and I fight the drowning sensation of his body pressing into mine.

  “To help us.”

  “I’m not going to help you,” I reply hoarsely.

  “The others before you. They found me quickly, and they died just as fast. You haven’t tried to kill me tonight. Why?”

  “You haven’t tried to kill me either.”

  Keir’s gaze remains steady. “I haven’t tried to kill you because I see something in you I once saw in myself, that made me turn away from what I was being forced to do.”

  “No. We’re nothing like each other.”

  “Something inside you is the same as me. You can feel it. I can feel it.” Keir’s intensity grows, eyes darkening as he curls my hair around his hand. I dip my head, but he pulls my face towards him. “Otherwise, one of us would be dead by now.”

  Lips brush my cheek, pulsing energy through my weakening body. Keir’s mouth moves across my face and I close my eyes, in anticipation of the kiss I don’t want—but crave with every cell. When nothing happens, I snap my eyes open and meet Keir’s. Time pauses, the same imperceptible connection between enemies forged again.

  Keir’s mouth assaults mine, and I struggle to move my hair from his hand. As his kiss deepens, I weaken against him, mouth searching his in return as our bodies meld together.

  I grasp at the part of me yelling stop, but not hard enough, as the nephilim seduces me with a kiss, reaching for my precious angel soul, which stands between me and mortality. But the thoughts won’t hold, and I allow Keir to crush me tightly against his broad chest, body igniting into flames as his tongue explores my mouth. I relent, return his passion, and dig my fingers beneath his shirt and into the hard muscle.

  No. I want this, but I can’t risk my life.

  I attempt to pull him away from me, and Keir wrenches his head away and steps back, breathing heavily. I lean back against the tree, convinced my legs will collapse from under me now Keir has dropped his hold on me.

  “No more games, Keir,” I say annoyed by my breathlessness.

  Something catches my eye and the dagger glints in his hand. He held the weapon the whole time? Weakened by Keir’s assault on my senses, I’d made myself an easy victim. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I bang my head against the tree, pissed off how close I came to failure and death.

  “So, do you want to kill me or not?” Keir stops short of touching me again and raises his arm, resting his hand against the tree above my head.

  I stare back, wide-eyed. I’m so far out of my depth I don’t think I’ll surface again, not with whatever else he awoke inside me. Keir’s lips hover close to my forehead, and I feel them as if he’s placed them there. What does he want me to say? Do?

  Keir pulls himself back, confusion crossing his face too. “I’m not sure what games you’re playing with me, where you’re finding the power to do this. How you make me want you. You won’t win.”

  His next move throws me harder than anything else in the last ten minutes. Keir turns, his powerful figure half-stumbling away, broken, rubbing his injured head. I touch my mouth as he blends into the shadows, and my mouth tingles from Keir’s harsh lips. As soon as Keir put his hands on me, I should’ve kicked him to the other side of campus, not enthusiastically taken part.

  Logic doesn’t belong in my dealings with Keir, on any level.

  The dagger lies at my feet and I pick up the weapon. One thing I’m sure of is Keir isn’t a true nephilim. Is he a true enemy? I catch my breath, debating whether to run after him for answers. No. If I follow this guy, I’ve no idea what I—or Keir—will do next.

&nbs
p; Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Keir follows me around campus for the next week with no attempt to hide his scrutiny. He rarely speaks, and watches from across the room or the hallways when I walk by. His intense eyes hold onto his half-hinted secrets, and unease spreads whenever I meet them. The mutual desire flowing between us has intensified after the kiss, but I’m uneasy with his reaction.

  Keir swings between flirting with and ignoring me; following, then avoiding me. Some days I catch his expression filled with anger and a cold creeps through my veins, convinced he plans to kill me. Other days he corners me, acts as if he’ll kiss me again, then walks away. Mind games.

  Questions tumble around my head. Why did he kiss me? Was he playing a survival game or did the same need overwhelm him as it did me? Has he spoken to Dahlia about what happened? Her avoidance of me now includes turning and walking in the opposite direction whenever she sees me.

  I continue to sit on my favourite bench each evening, breathing in the freshness of the outdoors—away from humans. Some days Keir and Dahlia pass, sometimes not. If Keir’s attitude is aggressive in the daytime, I avoid sitting here alone that evening. His physical strength overwhelms mine tenfold, and I refuse to wait here as an easy victim. But I have a strength too and an unknown, shared power over him, which has kept me alive so far.

  The cold of the oncoming winter bites, a painful reminder of my ongoing failure. This can’t continue. I’ll talk to Keir one last time, then make my decision, before Darius makes it for me and I’m dragged back to the academy.

  We can’t avoid this forever.

  Keir rounds the corner alone, his tall figure wrapped in a leather jacket and jeans. I straighten, two weeks is a long time to leave things without fully acknowledging the change that night made. Zach. The kiss. Keir doesn’t register me and walks by.

  I refuse to run after him and sink back against the bench watching his imposing figure. A group of guys step out of his way, and the girl with them double takes. How many of the deaths in the area are because of Keir?

  I dig my hands into my coat pockets and sigh. Maybe tomorrow.

  Keir pauses, turns, and walks slowly across to me, eyes on mine the whole time. “Ava.”

  His face betrays nothing—it’s impossible to tell which Keir he’ll be tonight. Nice or nasty. His hand moves to his jacket pocket and I stiffen.

  “Oh, I don’t have a weapon.” He holds his hands up. “Empty. How about you? A dagger in your boot maybe?”

  Silhouetted by the light from the halls of residence behind him, face half-shadowed, Keir should frighten a girl sitting on her own in the shadows. Not Keir. Does he realise he exudes sexuality the way he does, not only to me, but to the soft-eyed girls gazing at him as he moves around campus?

  A power he’s used to weaken me.

  “You shouldn’t have kissed me like that,” I blurt. Whoa. Okay. Great way to start at a disadvantage. How was that the first thing to come out of my mouth?

  Keir smiles. “Why? How do you like to be kissed?”

  “That’s not what I meant to say.”

  Keir sits next to me and shuffles closer. “What did you mean to say?”

  How does Keir turn my soulhunter self into the lost, frightened girl who left the Fated? I duck my head. I can’t let him confuse me again. Can’t do this.

  “Get lost, Keir.”

  He smirks. “Nice. I’m not surprised you have so few friends.”

  I shift away from him, the awareness of the tiny space between his leg and mine too much. “I don’t need friends.”

  “Dahlia’s your friend, isn’t she?”

  So he’s that Keir. Smart, snarky Keir, and not the Keir who holds me to trees and kisses me until I can’t remember my name.

  “Ha bloody ha. She doesn’t like me. Won’t even talk to me.”

  “I don’t like you and I’m talking to you.” He looks ahead and the smirk remains. “I probably could like you, once you stop plotting to kill me.”

  “I’m not plotting to kill you.”

  “No?” He tucks his chin into the top of his coat.

  “No. I mean, I was. Not anymore. Too hard.” I dig my nails into my palm. Shut up.

  “Then why are you still here?”

  “Why is Dahlia still here?” I counter.

  Keir puffs out a breath. “She can answer that one for you.”

  “Why is she helping you?”

  “Ask her that too.”

  I stand and look down at him. “I don’t want to play word games with you. Just leave or I will.”

  Keir rises and moves too close for comfort. “We can fight instead, if you like?” he asks, in a low voice. “I always find that very stimulating.”

  My cheeks flush red, and I’m thankful the shadows disguise this. “No.”

  “Because you’ll lose?”

  “Stop being such a smart-ass. What did you come over to me for? To talk? Fight? Kill me? If it’s to fuck with my head, congratulations, you win.”

  “Sometimes I want to talk to you. But I have trust issues around soulhunters. I’m sure you understand why.” Keir raises a knowing brow.

  “Apart from Dahlia.”

  “She’s not a soulhunter anymore. I didn’t really know her when she was. Besides, Dahlia has never tried to kill me. That helps with our friendship.”

  This guy is infuriating in his ability to confuse and silence me. I can’t keep doing this. “You want to talk? Talk. I’ll start. You’re not a normal nephilim. I understood that the day I saw you killing the demon. Then you and Zach. Why? If you aren’t sided with the other nephilim and the demon lords, why aren’t you siding with the high angels?”

  Keir sits back on the bench and stretches his legs in front of him. “What happens to your collected souls? Where do they go?”

  “I don’t question what I’m told to do—I perform my role or face the consequences.”

  “But you are questioning what you do. You’ve been questioning since the moment you decided not to kill me, since your curiosity got in the way of your duty. I can hear you questioning your role now.” His eyes shine, the blue visible despite the dim light.

  “No. Nephilim and demons steal souls. I kill them and take the souls back to where they belong. End of.”

  “Where they belong? Is that what your superiors tell you?” Keir’s voice is derisive, mouth twisting.

  “Well, souls don’t belong trapped in demons.”

  “But I’m a demon. Partly. But my soul is an angel’s. Where does mine belong?”

  “With the high angels. They’re doing what’s right, taking back the lost souls to safety.”

  “For their war,” says Keir. “Trapping them and putting them in bodies to use as an army against the demons. This is what the demons are doing too—making an army to use against the high angels. What right do either side have to use human souls?”

  I hold onto my protest—the idea knocked into me when I trained. “Demons steal souls. They kill people. I help return the lost souls.”

  Keir rubs his lips as he stares at the ground. His expression is unreadable, and he’s quiet long enough that I consider walking away.

  He’s switched off and given up because his lies haven’t worked on me.

  “Souls should be free, Ava,” he says eventually and lifts his eyes to mine.

  “What?”

  “That’s what I do. That’s the secret you’re so desperate to know. I free souls. Every soul I release from a demon is truly free. That’s the ultimate freedom for them—not inside a body with a good or evil label. Not trapped and used by someone else for their selfish plans. Souls should just… be.”

  He’s lying. The high angels couldn’t hide something this big. “Be where?”

  “Wherever the souls want to go. I don’t know. Nobody really understands. They’re intangible, a part of the universe, and not attached to either side of this stupid war. Some choose to spend time in a physical body, often when they’re lost and searching for another soul. They
stay until the human dies, and then they return to the stars.” His mouth pulls tight. “If they’re not stolen first. And if they are stolen? I free them.” His eyes shine with a strange fervour. Keir believes he’s telling the truth.

  “That’s wrong, Keir.”

  “Is it? You’ve never questioned any of this? You’re not a typical soulhunter—you’re a survivor. And survivors live because they question and they challenge. Like you.” He pauses. “Like me.”

  I am not him. “You can’t free every soul.”

  “Not on my own, I can’t. That’s why there’s a group of us who do this. We free the souls trapped in the easiest place to find—demons. For now and later we plan to…” Keir pauses and bites on his lip.

  “Plan what?”

  “Nothing, Ava,” he says in a quiet voice.

  “Everybody knows you’re doing this?”

  “Of course they do. They’ve tried to stop me for a long time now. I’m not Mr. Popular with the demon lords because I’m not behaving—and the high angels hate me because I’m nephilim. Life’s interesting.” He smiles weakly.

  Souls free? The cool winter chills my face as his words run cold through my blood. Is this the answer to my buried questions? I know about the battle between good and evil, the war that makes Keir and me enemies. But souls belong on my side—saved and protected. Souls aren’t a race of their own.

  If I stay here and listen to more of his insanity, I’ll lose my own. “I have to go.”

  Keir catches my arm and spins me to face him. “I don’t want to kill you, Ava, so I haven’t. Yet. But that doesn’t mean you’re safe from me. Don’t try to stop me. I’m giving you a chance by asking you to help me.”

  His grip hurts. Keir can’t ask me this. Releasing a soul is forbidden. All souls must be returned.

  “I can’t.”

  “You mean you won’t.”

  Passing voices distract me, young humans enjoying their freedom, untroubled by life or death decisions, and unaware of what walks amongst them. The girls jostle each other playfully and their laughter carries through the empty space between us.

  I sling my bag across a shoulder, and Keir watches intently from under his long lashes, waiting for the response I can’t give. His word games and rapid personality changes always confused me but does he honestly free souls as he just admitted?