Familiar Souls
960 Words
I stared at him.
He stared back.
For a few seconds, neither of us said anything.
The classroom continued around us. Pens scratched against paper. Chairs shifted. Professor Elara continued speaking about the first creatures that crossed the Ripple, completely unaware that the most interesting thing in the room was sitting directly beside me.
Talon leaned back in his chair as though he hadn’t just knocked me unconscious in the forest the night before.
I narrowed my eyes.
“You.”
His lips curved into a slow smile.
“Me.”
My fingers tightened around the edge of my desk.
I remembered his voice.
The darkness.
Those red eyes.
The enormous shadow behind the trees.
And then nothing.
I had never been knocked unconscious before.
Not once.
“You’re the one from the forest.”
His smile widened.
“I was wondering when you’d figure that out.”
My stomach twisted.
Who was this man?
More importantly, why couldn’t I sense him?
Every supernatural creature I’d encountered since arriving at Shifter Academy had a presence.
Shifters had a distinct animalistic energy.
Witches carried magic.
Vampires had something cold and hollow around them.
Fae felt strange—beautiful, but dangerous.
Even humans had a faint warmth to their souls.
Talon had nothing.
It was as if I were looking at an empty space wearing a human body.
I leaned closer.
He smelled like something I couldn’t place. Not human. Not anything I’d encountered before.
“What are you?”
His eyes flickered.
For the first time, the amusement disappeared from his face.
“That’s a dangerous question.”
“So is knocking someone unconscious.”
“I didn’t hurt you.”
“You knocked me out.”
“You followed me into a forbidden forest in the middle of the night.”
“I was hunting.”
“I know.”
Something about the way he said it made me freeze.
He knew.
My hunger.
My hunting.
My feeding.
I slowly turned toward him.
“What exactly do you know?”
Talon looked at me for a long moment.
Then he leaned closer, his voice dropping so low that only I could hear.
“Not enough.”
My pulse quickened.
That answer irritated me more than it should have.
Professor Elara suddenly stopped speaking.
“Miss Blue?”
I looked toward the front.
The entire class was staring at me.
“Yes?”
“If the lecture is boring you, perhaps you’d like to explain to everyone what the Ripple was responsible for.”
I glanced at the board.
I hadn’t been listening.
“The arrival of supernatural creatures on Earth.”
Professor Elara raised an eyebrow.
“And?”
I hesitated.
Talon whispered beside me.
“Don’t embarrass yourself.”
I shot him a glare.
“The creation of the supernatural bloodlines.”
Professor Elara nodded.
“Correct.”
She turned back to the board.
I slowly faced Talon.
“Don’t help me.”
“I wasn’t.”
“You literally whispered the answer.”
“I was testing you.”
“You failed.”
His smile returned.
“I don’t think I did.”
I hated that smile.
Mostly because some part of me wanted to know what it looked like when it disappeared.
Professor Elara continued.
“The first creatures that crossed the Ripple were not all the same. Some were powerful. Some were primitive. Some were intelligent.”
She paused.
“And some were never meant to remain on Earth.”
The room became unusually quiet.
I looked toward the board.
“Why?”
Professor Elara’s expression changed.
For the briefest moment, she looked afraid.
Then it was gone.
“Because some beings do not belong in our world.”
My gaze shifted toward Talon.
He wasn’t smiling anymore.
Interesting.
Professor Elara continued the lecture, but I barely heard her.
My attention remained on the man beside me.
I had spent centuries learning how to recognize monsters.
Talon wasn’t hiding his nature from me.
He was hiding it from everyone else.
And whatever he was…
he was old.
Very old.
I could feel that much.
The bell finally rang.
Students immediately began packing their things.
Talon stood.
I grabbed his wrist.
He looked down at my hand.
Then back at me.
“You’re not leaving.”
“Apparently, I am.”
“What are you?”
His eyes glowed faintly red.
For just a second.
Then they returned to normal.
“You first, pretty girl.”
My grip tightened.
He smiled.
Then he disappeared into the crowd.
I stood there, staring after him.
Nobody else seemed to notice anything strange.
Nobody else seemed to realize what had just happened.
But I did.
I had spent centuries learning how to recognize monsters.
And Talon was the first one I couldn’t recognize.
I turned toward the classroom door, determined to find him.
He was already gone.
Then I heard his voice.
Not beside me.
Not from the hallway.
Inside my head.
“You really should stop pretending to be Blue.”
I froze.
My blood ran cold.
No one knew.
No one could know.
I slowly looked around the classroom.
Students were laughing. Talking. Gathering their books.
Everything was normal.
Except for me.
Then I noticed something on my desk.
A single black feather.
I hadn’t seen Talon leave it there.
I picked it up.
The moment my fingers touched it, a strange pulse ran through my body.
And for the first time in centuries, something inside my soul recoiled.
Not from fear.
From recognition.
I dropped the feather.
My breath caught.
Because somewhere deep inside me, beneath every stolen memory and every borrowed life, a voice whispered the truth I wasn’t ready to hear.
I knew Talon before.
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