Page 43 of Ever Dark Academy: Vol. 3
“Did you find them?” Grayson asked.
“I might have.” Caemorn grimaced. He lifted one long-fingered hand to his temple. “When I absorbed the other slices of myself some of the memories were lost. Many were garbled. There was a lot of madness in them that I had to discard. I have to think about this and see what I can splice together.”
“Not if it risks harming you!” Balthazar cried.
Caemorn lifted a delicate eyebrow, but then he smiled gently, understandingly, knowingly. “I am no martyr, Balthazar, so no need to worry about that. If I can recover any memories safely, I will do so. Otherwise, we will need to uncover what we can in other ways.”
“It seems to me that the War Children have allied themselves with these Sect of Dawn people,” Ryder said darkly. “Whatever they were has likely been perverted by the twisted minds of our unwanted fledglings.”
“You said that you could feel structures in Jill’s mind, Grayson?” Fiona asked.
“Yes, I felt them. They’re traps of some sort for other Vampiric gifts,” Grayson answered her.
“But not for your gift?” Fiona pressed.
“I’m not sure,” Grayson confessed. “But I’m a little leary of having any of my Bloodline attempt what I did on Jill. That might set the traps off.”
“So you think the traps they’ve put together are for Vampires and not humans?” Fiona tapped her chin. “I suppose that makes sense. While those of us who were reincarnated were reborn with some form of our gifts, yours is the strongest I’ve ever seen. I would say you are as strong now as you were as an Immortal, Grayson.”
“You believe your power is different now?” Seeyr asked, lifting her chin slightly.
“It won’t make a lot of sense what I’m going to tell you, but the best way I can describe it is that your powers feel cold while mine feel hot.” Grayson shrugged. “Yours come from a blue-white eternal flame, while mine is the red-gold of a fleeting fire. At least, that’s what I picture in my head.”
They all looked unconsciously towards the fire that was popping and crackling behind the grate.
“You are drained quite a bit more using your powers than we are,” Caemorn said suddenly. “Your soul…”
Grayson looked down at his chest where Caemorn’s appeared to be looking and yet not looking at the same time. “My soul? You can see it now?”
“Of course.” Caemorn sipped his wine. “I can see all of your souls. Grayson’s is different from each of ours, but there is something there akin to ours too. I imagine when he is turned, he will become fully like us.”
“My soul isn’t completely like a human’s then?” Grayson asked, fascinated despite himself.
Caemorn shook his head. “No, in a way, you’re quite unmistakable.”
“So you could recognize another Immortal’s soul? Or are we too much like a normal Vampire’s?” Fiona asked.
“I could tell the difference, but it is harder to discern,” Caemorn answered.
His cheeks were a little flushed. Grayson realized that they had never really asked Kaly about his gift in the past. Maybe they had known and understood it, or maybe they had been uninterested. And maybe Kaly would not have answered in any case. But talking about it was pleasing to him, though it made Caemorn a little shy.
“So that’s one of the reasons I don’t want to be turned yet. My power will change and might set off the Sect of Dawn’s traps,” Grayson admitted. “So long as they think I’m just an unusual human and not an Immortal reborn, we have an advantage.”
“So Grayson is going to pretend to be a student!” Balthazar smiled at the others as if urging them to see the goodness of this plan.
“And he’s going to squeeze every person he comes in contact with, feeling for structures in their minds?” Fiona’s eyebrows lifted.
“When you say it that way, it sounds crazy, but yeah, I am,” Grayson admitted.
She shrugged. “I just wanted to make sure I understood this plan of yours. And we need to keep you from getting killed while you’re doing this? I suppose if we line them all up outside–”
“No, no, we need to not alert them that we know who they are,” Grayson interrupted. “Because their leader likely isn’t here. Just eliminating the Sect members here won’t do anything. We need to get to the source. So I’m going to squeeze people–”
“Surreptitiously?” Fiona’s eyebrows lifted.
“Ah, yeah, exactly! Dani or another Ashyr will be around me when I do it so it won’t be clear it’s me,” Grayson said.
“People are going to realize how special you are, Grayson, if we’re all around you, protecting you,” Fiona said.
