Katlyn Duncan - The Life After Trilogy - Soul Taken / Soul Possessed / Soul Betrayed

I looked behind him, but the stranger in the distance was gone. “Were you spying on me?” I balanced myself and he let go of my arm.

“No,” he said. “I just got here. Felix sent me for you.” He sounded in a hurry.

“It’s my off day,” I challenged.

Not that I would turn down a case, but this guy didn’t know that.

“Felix needs your help with something,” Cooper said in a strained voice.

“What is it?”

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said, disappearing as quickly as he came.

I took one last glance at the empty space where the man had been before transitioning to the After.

I arrived outside of Felix’s office and lifted a hand to knock, but stopped when I heard the hushed voices inside.

“I thought they couldn’t come back here,” Cooper was saying.

Who couldn’t come back here? A chill ran through my soul, not unlike when I’d seen the man at the cemetery.

“Never underestimate a Shadowed,” Felix’s voice grumbled.

“Okay,” Cooper snipped. “What’s next? We need the Collector to find it? Are you sure she is the right one for the job?”

I stiffened.

“This True Soul will call to her, and her alone. She will not fail.”

Pride swelled within me. I knew my talents weren’t underappreciated.

Their conversation turned from rushed to silent. The door opened in front of me and Felix’s form crowded the doorway. He indicated for me to enter the office and closed the door behind me.

Felix turned his gaze on mine. “A Prognatum True Soul has been taken.”

“A what?” I asked. “What’s a Pregnortom?”

“Prognatum,” Cooper corrected.

“Aren’t there a dozen Caeleste guarding the vault at all times?” I asked. And why is this Prognatum soul so important?

“I need to get back to her,” Cooper interrupted.

“Yes, absolutely,” Felix said then trained his gaze on mine. “Go with Cooper and do what he asks. Treat his orders as if they are coming from me.”

Cooper hesitated. “Are you sure about this?” he asked Felix.

Felix’s expression darkened. “It’s the only way.”

Cooper nodded and reached his hand out toward me.

I stepped back from him, my head spinning. Someone got into the most coveted place in the After and Felix wanted me to, what, confront them? “What am I up against here?”

“Maggie, this is important,” Cooper said.

I stood my ground. If I was going into this blindly I’d need an incentive. “Will this help me with my promotion?”

“Like I said,” Felix stated, “you have to prove yourself worthy.”

I clicked my tongue. “See, that’s not good enough for me.”

“Are you serious right now?” Cooper snapped.

I shrugged, keeping my eyes on Felix. “I don’t know. Am I?”

Felix’s nostrils flared; something he did to strike fear in his Guard. But I wasn’t buying it. “This situation is very serious, Maggie.”

“I understand,” I said. “And so am I.”

We stood, holding each other’s gaze. Cooper remained silent, but I felt his restiveness.

Felix broke the stand-off first. “Do this job and I will reconsider your case.”

Good enough for me.

I stuck out my hand toward Cooper. “Let’s do this.”

He entwined his fingers with mine, the touch sending a spark of energy through me and Felix’s office dissolved around us.

We landed in front of a high school. The wooden welcome sign read: “Fairview High School, Home of the Colts.” A breeze whipped a flag around a pole, next to the sign. I scanned the campus. The three-story tan brick building reminded me of a detention center I’d Collected from a few years back more than it did an educational institute.

Cooper dropped my hand as if it were covered in scales.

He disappeared from my side then reappeared at the school entrance where a few Guard were stationed.

Couldn’t he have transported us any closer? He probably did it on purpose, getting back at me for negotiating my soon-to-be status on the Guard. I opened and closed my buzzing hand as I walked across the pavement toward the school.

By the time I made it to the group of Guards, they dispersed.

Okay, time to be serious. I needed to show Felix that I could work on a team.

Aaron was the last member of the group to leave on his assigned task. “Good luck with this one,” he said, grinning at me.

I wiggled my fingers at him. “Bye bye now.”

I didn’t need to work with all of them.

Cooper and I transitioned through the front doors. He disappeared at the bottom of the stairs to the second floor.

This transitioning thing was going to get old real quick.

He reappeared at the top of the stairs seconds later. “Come on,” he said, that rushed tone back in his voice again.

I took the steps two at a time. I didn’t want him to leave me to wander the halls alone. Even though they were empty now, I’d been at enough schools to know what happened when the bell rang. I shuddered at the thought of that many humans passing through me.

At the top, I followed Cooper’s quick pace down a hallway lined with metal lockers peering into each classroom we passed. Each of them was filled with bored-looking students and enthusiastic educators.

We stopped at a classroom near the end of the hall and transitioned inside.

A dozen waist-high benches faced a white board at the front of the classroom. An experiment was outlined on the board and the students quietly worked in pairs. The only sounds were the soft hissing of the open flames and the tinkling of glass rods against the beakers as the students swirled the liquid.

A pulsing throughout my body broke my trance. I wandered to the back of the room where Cooper stood next to a female Guard I hadn’t met before; they conversed inaudibly. So I studied her instead. Her short black hair formed around her face like a lion’s mane and she stood at Cooper’s height. I guessed her soul age to be around twenty-five years.

“Thanks Calliope,” he said to her as I neared.

Her eyes flicked to mine. “You’re the Soul Collector?”

“Yeah, I’m Maggie.”

“Cool,” she said. “Nice to meet you.” She turned back to Cooper. “I’ll be by the car until you need me.” She placed her hands on his shoulders, bringing their faces close together, forehead to forehead. “It’s going to be fine.”

I turned away, feeling like I was intruding on a personal moment between them and looked around the room at the students. A persistent pulsing flowed through me as I walked down the aisle growing stronger as I neared the front of the room.

I stopped next to a bench where two girls sat. One of them, a dark-haired girl, played with a phone in her lap. I had Collected a few souls who were playing with those while driving. But it wasn’t her that called to me. The golden-haired girl next to her radiated a glow I’d only seen from a Caeleste. She looked up at the board and I couldn’t hide the gasp whispering across my lips. She even favored the looks of the Caelestium, with smooth, unblemished skin and an unmistakable otherworldliness to her. Her green eyes sparkled with the very essence of life.

“That’s Allegra, but she prefers Ally,” Cooper said, suddenly standing next to me.

“What is she?”

“What do you think?” he answered reverently.

I leaned closer to the girl. “I thought the Caeleste couldn’t cross over?”

“The Prognatum are descended from the few Caeleste who mated with humans centuries ago. This practice has since been forbidden but there are a few genetic lines left. It’s another job that the Guard take very seriously. We are sworn to protect these humans from birth until their transformation at eighteen.”