Page 110 of Caelum

EIGHT SOULS

THE MORNING THAT CHANGED IT ALL…

Samuel

There was an unspoken rule at Caelum. That rule? Packs were king.

Packs were groups of students who came together of their own volition, became friends and family, and who studied as a unit before being set out into the world as a team. “Packs were king” was an unspoken rule because the faculty were really in charge, but in the grand scheme of things, nothing worked without the Packs.

At first, people were lulled into the idea that Caelum was a school, an academy for gifted people, as it were. But the older we became, the more ridiculous we knew that to be.

That wasn't to say I hated Caelum. I didn't. It had saved my life and the lives of many creatures before me. It also, though they didn't know it, saved the lives of millions of humans from the scourge that were Ghouls. But that didn't mean I always appreciated its Big Brother ways.

Caelum sold itself as a place of learning, a retreat for those of us with a singular issue—a disorder that came across to humans as schizophrenia. We weren't schizophrenic, however, we simply appeared to be. When we reached a certain age, it seemed as though we had seven personalities to deal with on a daily basis, but those personalities were genuine creatures. Each one was unique, and each had a power that helped them fit in to the army Caelum was building.

Firstly, there was the Gargoyle. This creature, like the sentinels thatstood guard on the corners of buildings, watched over doorways and the like, was a strong guardian. When a Gargoyle orgouille, as we called them, was of age, his or her skin would shift, turning leathery. But this was no kind of leather humans had ever known before.

The skin morphed into a dull gray, tightening to the point where not even a knife could slice through it. They were walking Kevlar vests, but they made Kevlar look like butter. Nothing could get through their skin while they were shifted. And, if one of their own was attacked, then they also had the ability to produce a set of wings that allowed them to fly to a downed Pack member.

Gargoyles were protectors, just like Sin Eaters. Unlikegouilles, Sin Eaters didn't shift. They had no physical abilities to transform into something else. Of the seven souls, it would seem as though they were the least gifted, yet in truth, they were the most dangerous of them all.

My Pack brother, Frazer, was a Sin Eater. Sometimes, he appeared to be mellow. But he wasn't. He, too, was a watcher. But unlike agouille, he wasn't watching to protect but to attack. Sin Eaters stuck to the shadows, peering out with eyes that were well aware of the harsh realities of this world. They were one of two creatures who could kill our natural enemies, the Ghouls. They did this by sucking the souls from them and annihilating them from the inside out.

Natural assassins, they were brilliant fighters, capable of hundreds of kills in a battle. While they couldn't shift, couldn't make their skin tougher than Kevlar, their mad skills with any weapon was like watching magic unfold. The shadows were their natural home, and they used them to their advantage, slipping in between the light and the dark to fulfil the requirements of their nature.

But Sin Eaters weren't the only creatures who could destroy a Ghoul. There was one more, and the other was an Incubus. Though humans technically knew of this one, they believed them to be sex demons. In part, they weren't wrong. Incubi and Succubi were reenergized with sex, but they didn't live off it. They had the power to entrance, becoming physical magnets to others.

Unlike the Gargoyle and the Sin Eater, they weren't protectors. They enticed, charmed, and manipulated people into coming to them, into doing their bidding. They did this with their bodies and their sexuality. To them, sex was a weapon, and they used it however and whenever they wanted. Because most people could be led around by their cocks and pussies, this was a distinct and powerful weapon, not unlike the Lorelei.

The Incubi and Succubi used their bodies along with their dicks orpussies as a weapon, while the Lorelei used their voices instead. Their voices were capable of magnetizing and hypnotizing people, letting them do whatever they wanted to that person. They could lull someone to sleep or coerce them into a rage. Push someone away or draw them closer. In a battle, the Lorelei and Incubi worked hand in hand, both having their place as they controlled a crowd, using their skills in the midst of a war.

Then, there were the two shifter creatures. Men and women whose bodies transformed into that of another beast. A Shifter, when of age, would be able to morph into an animal. They were stronger, faster, and deadlier than a natural beast. They could heal almost any wound they suffered, and in a war against the Ghouls, they were the perfect herders—not unlike the Hell Hounds.

Hell Hounds were a little different. They were wrath-filled beasts, like Cerberus but with one head. Although these mythological creatures had never guarded the gates of hell, that was just a myth humans had created when they'd seen one of our kind shift into the terrifying creation.

They were ugly motherfuckers, with black skin and spikes so tough they were capable of piercing through bone. There was only one issue with the Hell Hound—their tempers. They were difficult to control and easy to anger. But in a battle, they were a wrecking ball. Shifters and Hell Hounds were the perfect soldiers because they could attack swiftly. The nest of Ghouls a Lorelei had gathered on their Pack’s behalf could quickly be felled by a Hell Hound, who would raze them to the ground, leaving them exposed for the Incubus or Sin Eater’s wrath.

Finally, there was me. The Vampire. Just like in human lore, I depended on blood for sustenance. Without it, I would be very weak, just like a human without food and water. That wasn't to say I couldn’t eat or drink, but blood was my major food group.

Unlike the other six creatures, I didn't have a natural pairing. In that, Vampires were naturally solitary, naturally unique. We were a blur of the three traits each pair provided. Vampires were fast and limber, making them great fighters, and when injured, we had the ability to heal ourselves with sustenance. We required less sleep than the others, therefore, in a pinch, we made good sentinels, able to stay awake to guard over our Pack if necessary.

Our senses were like quicksilver, meaning that, in the darkest of nights, we could see the tiniest of movements. And though we didn't have the voice of a Lorelei or the body of a Succubi or Incubi, with our eyes, we were able, to a certain degree, to mesmerize—only weak-willed humans though. Thatparticular power was very limited and dependent upon the individual Vampire.

All in all, those seven creatures were what battled it out in my head every day. It was only recently that the Vampire had become more dominant. At the age of eleven, I'd been dealing with seven distinct souls, each with personalities of their own, each with temperaments and physical requirements that were unique to them.

Was it any wonder humans thought people like me had schizophrenia or borderline personality disorder?

My parents had believed that too. Yet they'd loved me, truly loved me, and I had loved them. Most children like me were not loved by their parents. They were abandoned, tossed into mental health facilities or asylums, drugged up to their eyeballs on meds that actually exacerbated our condition, but that didn't matter to a lot of folks. My parents, on the other hand, had tried for me, and that was why I was currently watching them.

I knew it was creepy. Knew many would see it as beyond weird. But it was my lifeline to them.

Before I'd left for Caelum, I'd set up the cameras in my parents’ living room. Knowing I was never going to see them again, I'd asked the recruiter who’d discovered me, and who would be taking me to the Academy, to help stage my death.

Some days I thought Caelum had more resources than God. Their reach was incredible, and because of said reach, my parents thought I was dead. Why? Because the faculty had helped mock my death in a car wreck, giving my family closure from the mess that was my life.

To this day, my mother would visit my grave every week, my father every two weeks, and even though they had believed me dead for over six years, Mum would still cry when my name was mentioned.

Every time I saw that, I was hit with the depth of her love for me, and it almost came as a surprise. I was around other children who had been abandoned by their parents, but mine still missed me as if I'd left them yesterday.

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