Fated Souls Read online

  Fated Souls

  A Soul Ties Prequel Novella

  L J Swallow

  Contents

  Copyright

  About Fated Souls

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Epilogue

  Soul Ties (Soul Ties #1) Sample

  The Soul Ties Series

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2016 Lisa Swallow

  Cover designed by Najla Qamber Designs

  Editing by Hot Tree Editing

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Fated Souls (A Soul Ties Novella)

  Fated Souls is a short prequel novella in the Soul Ties series and is the story of Ava’s life training to be a soul-hunter. This story takes place before the events in Soul Ties.

  Those who live amongst the Fated are subject to control by the ruling Caelestia. The only chance to gain freedom is to serve as a soul hunter.

  Ava is determined to leave her Fated childhood behind and create her own destiny. Seizing her chance to escape, she signs herself over to the Caelestia as a soul hunter. Her task: enter the human world, retrieve the required number of souls trapped in demons, and freedom is hers.

  But Ava soon discovers this role isn’t as easy as she expected and that nobody told the whole truth about what soul hunter life entails—or the dangers she faces.

  Daniel is an ex soul hunter in charge of training new recruits. Scarred by his years hunting demons, he’s ruthless in his treatment of Ava and the others. Ava is drawn to Daniel and his mysterious past, and others notice he takes a special interest in her. But what is his real agenda behind wanting to keep Ava alive?

  1

  My Fated life is at an end.

  I lean against the wall in the corner of the large hall, eyeing those around. Not such a big turnout—maybe half a dozen kids my age hang in corners or beneath the floor to ceiling windows. Each new arrival’s shoes tap across the tiled floor drawing attention from those of us already waiting. The low turnout surprises me—a crap load of kids I knew at school insisted they would sign-up to become soul-hunters, but few arrived today. I recognise a couple of those who did, including a girl with long black hair hovering nearby. I frequently clashed with her back in school due to the fact our personalities are both too big to coexist. I search my memory for the girl’s name. Sarah? Hopefully the training will be too intense, and we can keep the hell away from each other before we’re sent out onto assignments alone.

  When I was a child, I thought the Caelestia would select soul hunters by watching us fight to our death and take the strongest. Now I understand the Caelestia don’t care how skilled we are in combat. The sole criterion for becoming a soul hunter is willingness—and a suicidal attitude to life. I grip the paper in my hand and stare at my scrawled signature at the bottom.

  My future as a soul hunter is sealed.

  The Caelestia. Their rule is distant and absolute. I know little about our joint history, most has been wiped out. All I do know is the high angel Caelestia and the lesser angels, who are now the Fated, once coexisted, but our growing numbers threatened them. The cities became overcrowded and resources depleted. Disagreements started, and the Fated wanted more input into the control of the world we shared.

  Don’t fight with pure angels.

  The Caelestia seized power and took away ours. Most Fated were blindsided, but those who realised what was happening and tried to fight back paid with their lives. The Caelestia gave no explanation why they segregated and removed us from their world. Basically, we’re in charge, don’t spoil our perfect paradise, and do what the hell we say.

  Now there’re two ways to escape the Fated world: by becoming a soul hunter, or death. The one concession the Caelestia offer is the chance to join them in their carefully preserved world. If a Fated can prove themselves worthy, we can return to a life of free will. But that route isn’t easy.

  The Caelestia representative sits at the front at a small desk covered in neat piles of paper. My turn comes, and I step up to the woman to hand over the forms I filled in to sign my life away. Blonde hair pulled tightly away from her face, the woman’s age is difficult to gauge. She wears bright red lipstick, skin stretched tight across her cheekbones. Beautiful. Caelestia? Probably not—this task would be too mundane for them.

  The woman arches one of her perfect brows, appraising my less-than-groomed appearance. I glare back and don’t cast my eyes down as I suspect I should.

  The woman widens her eyes, amused. “Name and family number?”

  “Ava. 13686.”

  The woman writes the number in regimented letters on the paper in front of her and ticks some boxes. I attempt to read the words on the page, but I fail.

  “Over there.” The woman points her pen towards a doorway, a pen held by red nails matching her lipstick.

  “Is that it?” I expected more. Some kind of pomp and ceremony—not a “your life belongs to us now, run along.” Like we mean nothing. Oh, yeah, I forgot, we don’t mean anything.

  The woman laughs. “Oh no, this is just the beginning. Good luck.”

  The amusement in the woman’s voice is tinged with something else—is she mocking me? Unease creeps in, and I glance through the window, back to the dulling world of the Fated. No, this is the right decision. I have to leave this place.

  My task now? Rescue lost human souls from demons living in the human world. The souls resident in humans belong with the Caelestia once the bodies die. The Caelestia then keep the souls safe from corruption by demon forces. The Demon Lords steal the souls to create their demonic followers, and as their numbers grow, both worlds are threatened – Caelestia and human. We stop this.

  Once soul hunters collect enough stolen human souls, the Caelestia reward them with their Will: freedom to live in the Caelestia world and never return to the Fated. Soul hunters prove their loyalty and worth, and no longer belong with the weaker Fated people.

  If they survive long enough.

  I straighten. From this moment on, I am confident, and I will get what I want. Weakness belongs in the world I shut behind me.

  The old Ava stays with the Fated.

  The metal door the woman indicated is closed. I grab my bag, yank down the handle, and storm through. The door slams into something.

  “Watch where you’re bloody going!” growls a male voice.

  I bristle. “Don’t stand in front of the fucking door then!”

  A guy with close-cropped hair pulls a sour face, rubbing his arm. I highly doubt the collision would hurt him, built the way he is—broad shoulders and big hands. At least I’m tall enough to meet him eye to eye, even if I’m a hell of a lot slimmer. Sarah, the girl with the black hair sniggers. I huff, then cross the room to sit on a black plastic chair lined up against a wall, and only when I sit on one do I notice name badges on them. This chair isn’t for me. I sigh and locate the correct one. Slouching onto the seat, I stretch my legs in front.

  A large figure plants himself next to me, and I glance from the corner of my eye. Great. Mr. Muscles. Tapping my teeth
with my fingers, I ignore him.

  “That’s annoying, stop it,” he says.

  I remove my finger and turn to him, sucking my teeth. For a moment, we register each other, scrutinising faces.

  “You have no hair. That’s odd,” I reply.

  “And you look like someone could break your neck without any problem,” he snaps back.

  A retort doesn’t come quick enough, and I’m interrupted by the clicking footsteps of the blonde-haired woman. Her immaculate grooming extends to the clothes—a dress suit with a short grey skirt and a deep blue blouse accentuating her eyes.

  “Welcome. From this moment on, you have left the Fated. The next stage is your training, and from there you will conduct missions to collect souls until you have reached the requisite number. You have made a dangerous decision, but your reward will be great.” She looks at her paper with disinterest as she speaks, flicking through the pages. “You will be properly briefed in the morning.”

  With a tight smile, the woman clicks back out the door. That’s the limit of our explanation? Wow. I sit on my hands and glance around the room. Some of the others aren’t as good as I am at hiding their feelings. I swear a small girl a few seats away is about to run back out the door to our old world; she fidgets and stares at the exit.

  A man walks through the opposite door. Tall, rivalling farmer boy for muscles and dressed in a well-cut suit. In a low voice, he calls our numbers. One by one, the new soul hunters pass through the door he came through.

  I catch sight of myself mirrored in the window. My bright pink hair hangs to my shoulders, untamed. Pale green eyes full of trepidation look back. Why can’t I look tougher? Physically, I mean. People at school avoided me, once they realised I’m stronger than I look. Other kids’ parents didn’t want me persuading their kid to become a soul hunter and leading them down the same path. Then they would lose their son or daughter. I gradually achieved a reputation for not taking bullshit from anyone. And using my fists.

  They don’t know me, the hidden girl who’s terrified but determined.

  I will be Free.

  2

  I yawn and rub my eyes, leaning back in my chair. What the hell is this? School? Sitting in rows with the other new soul hunters, I tap my pen on the desk and gaze around. The room is large, windowless, and painted a stark white. The polished wooden floor is scuffed and squeaked when I walked across in my new boots. The look on a couple of the guys’ faces when the girls came in wearing the figure hugging, black uniform of a soul hunter didn’t escape my attention. Morons. Why do we need to dress up already? Sure close fitting, dark clothing makes sense in a fighting environment, but we’re not fighting yet. Or are we? Shit, I hope not. We don’t have our angel powers back yet—surely we’re “reactivated” or whatever before they shove us into the field.

  If Mr Muscles looks at me like a piece of ass once more, I’ll kick him in the balls with the heavy boots I’m wearing. I bet he won’t find that part of the uniform so alluring.

  A man enters the room and crosses towards a desk at the front. I stop tapping and shift upright. Older than the other students, but not by many years, the guy wears beaten-up jeans and a black T-shirt, stretched tight and following the curves of his muscled chest. The other guys in the room wear less distressed versions of his uniform but don’t carry it off as well.

  I push down the teenage hormones flaring at the sight of a successful and not too shabby looking soul hunter. Seated close enough to the front of the room to inspect him, I’m distracted by the scars on his forearms, including a white semi-circle which looks suspiciously like teeth marks. He surveys the group one by one, as if committing each of us to memory. I’m sure his green eyes rest on me a little longer. I stare back. Confident soul hunter now, remember?

  “Right. Demons 101,” he begins.

  “Aren’t you going to introduce us?” I interrupt.

  The guy raises an eyebrow at me and folds his arms over his chest. “You don’t need to know each other, Ava.”

  “Well, you know my name. Who are you?”

  The man pulls himself forward and strolls over. He places both hands on the desk and stares down at me, face so close I can smell mint on his breath. I repeat my new mantra: confident soul hunter, show no weakness. Remaining still, I study the man in return. His spiked dark brown hair and moss-green eyes weren’t what I expected. I’d presumed trainers would be the pale, blonde Caelestia, but that’d be lowering themselves. I suck in a breath; there’s something uncomfortably attractive about this man. Maybe because he’s the male embodiment of everything I dreamt of being and is standing in front of me.

  “I’m Daniel. I’m your instructor. And you just earned yourself a reputation you don’t want.”

  The guy next to me sniggers, and Daniel shoots him a look. “Do you want one too, Tom?”

  For someone who told us we don’t need to know names, Daniel is making a great job of telling everyone.

  He returns to his desk. “So, Ava, what do you know about demons?”

  The patronising tone in his voice reminds me of a teacher from school. School and teachers did not equal a calm and happy Ava. Didn’t I escape this?

  “That I should be killing them?”

  “You think you can simply step outside and kill a demon with no training?”

  “No. That’s not what I meant. Obviously.”

  Daniel regards me, running his tongue along his teeth, and I squirm. Maybe I need to rein in my personality and attempt to balance between confident and cocky. This isn’t school, however much he behaves like my teacher. School had punishments for disrespect, who knows what the punishment would be here? Watching just long enough to keep me on edge, Daniel continues.

  “There are four kinds of demons. Only one of which you are to approach, unless instructed otherwise.” He flicks a switch and pushes a button on the computer. A human face appears on screen. “These are the ones you kill.”

  I blink. I can’t see any difference between the demon in the picture and the other people sitting around the room. Opening my mouth to say something, I think better of it. Someone asks the question for me.

  “How can we tell they’re demons? They look like us. And exactly like humans too,” asks a voice from behind.

  “Once we activate the angel in your blood, you’ll know. You won’t even have to be close, and their presence will be obvious.”

  This is interesting. The prospect of my angel powers and the ability to kick some demon backside. Before anyone else can speak, Daniel hits another key. A yellow-eyed version of the same person appears with eyes like an animal’s.

  “When you’re close, this is how the most powerful demons will look. Newer demons have amber eyes. We’re not sure why the eyes are changing from yellow, but they appear to be attempting to blend with humans more, and perhaps it’s a side effect.” He narrows his eyes. “Anyway, they can’t disguise their form as easily once angered, and when they are, they hit. Hard. Unfortunately, not all the angel powers reactivated in your angel blood work in the human world. Even though you can track them, and physically you’re stronger, most of your power doesn’t work there.”

  I shift uncomfortably, heart rate picking up. What the fuck? My imagined role as a powerful human-angel, zapping demons and stealing their souls isn’t reality. I swear under my breath and look to Tom. His face is impassive.

  Before anyone can speak, Daniel clicks onto the next picture. A group of people sit together in a place I don’t recognise. Dressed in a variety of clothes, different shapes and sizes, they are definitely human. But it’s not the people who catch my eye. I’m transfixed by the world around them. Sunshine. Trees. Strange looking buildings.

  “Which of these is a demon?” asks Daniel. Silence answers him. “Exactly. This is how well-blended they are, and how integrated you will need to be in the human world.”

  “What the hell?” I say. He flicks me a stern look. Crap, I need to control my mouth. “Why integrate? We only go to their wo
rld and come back after a few hours?”

  “Not always a few hours. Some demons need tracking, and you have to live a human life for a few days until you find them.”

  “Seriously?” My skin crawls. Mingle with humans as well as the soul-stealing demon scum… ugh.

  Daniel laughs. “You may find you like being there.”

  “I doubt it,” I mutter.

  “So, anyone hazard a guess which in this image are demons?” Daniel sits on the desk and waits.

  “The guy? The tall one?” suggests Sarah.

  “Nope.”

  “The girl? The pretty one…?” asks another guy from behind me.

  I attempt to read him for the answer, but he’s inscrutable. Daniel holds himself with an importance that silences many in the room, and I don’t miss the way some of the other girls look at him. His arms crossed over his chest accentuate the muscled strength in his arms, his outstretched long legs perfectly gripped by his scruffy jeans. Not only that, but the power he has over everybody in the room draws some of us in the wrong way.

  He interrupts my musing. “All of them are demons. Never be complacent.”

  A murmur travels the room, but I can’t help it—I laugh. Should’ve expected that answer. When is Daniel going to share the important stuff such as how to kill the bastards? Or where do I put the souls I take? And most importantly—how many do I need to collect before I gain my Will?

  Shooting me another look, Daniel taps the keyboard again.

  Another human-looking creature, this time with paler skin and red-rimmed eyes, appears on screen. These eyes hold a darkness that shudders through my body.

  “This is a vampire. Do not approach them. They are not created by the Demon Lords, but they are an ancient race who has existed in the human world for many years. No one is sure where they came from, not even the Demon Lords. They are a mix of human and demon who can create other vampires through killing and resurrecting humans. Unlike the demons who need to be created and animated by using souls, these guys and girls can multiply at whatever rate they decide.”