“I can’t believe you agreed so easily to this,” Luke said, “what’s the deal?”
I shrugged without a word as we headed to B Hall. We’d left early today at my own request. There was too much nervous energy in my body, I was shocked Luke hadn’t noticed—I glanced at his hands, noticing their shake. Maybe he had too much of his own to notice mine. I let out a small sigh, wondering if I’d be more comfortable surrounded by people than alone. I’d stayed by Luke’s side for the past two days, unwilling to leave him alone should the man come back. I’d spotted his Charger while grocery shopping, and then again when I’d stepped onto the apartment balcony to call my dad. I’d barely slept with my mind running to all sorts of places—was this man planning on killing Luke or bringing him to the cops? Why was he involved in the first place? A private investigator maybe? There were too many possibilities and not enough information for me to draw any conclusions.
It was starting to piss me off.
My hands rubbed circles into my eyes, willing away exhaustion. When I could finally see past clearly something caught my eye. Small stones crunched beneath my sneakers when I stopped, staring dead ahead as I watched a car in my periphery. A black Dodge Charger. My head turned slowly to observe it, finding it empty. A stroke of luck, or the opposite.
“What is it?” Luke asked. He turned back to me, worry creasing his brow.
“Nothing,” I said, “let’s hurry up.” I pushed him towards the school and we made it safely inside.
I didn’t like this. I didn’t like how that man made me feel so uneasy, so out of control. One day I was going about my own way, enjoying a relatively normal life with Luke, the next I was stuck panicking over some stranger in an old car. It wasn’t like me to panic so easily. Was this how most humans felt after the revolution? Jumping at every shadow and corner? I bit down on my bottom lip as we entered the classroom, mind so lost I didn’t pay any attention to the people inside.
We sat down in the same two seats as before. It was no coincidence that the gunman’s car was there, and I couldn’t imagine there was an identical classic car rolling around town. But was he here for Luke, or for me? My heartbeat stuttered at the thought, making me shove my hands into my pockets and grip my phone.
He had programmed his number into it but how he had gotten it, I’ll never know. I must have dropped it while running to the police station. It was simple enough to find the new entry with only seven other contacts. Jared. A single name was all I knew about him and even that might be a lie.
“Who’s Jared?” Luke asked next to me. I shuffled my feet back as a person slid by and sat next to Luke.
“Nobody,” I replied. I willed myself to not feel guilty, knowing this was the only way Luke would get a semi-normal life. I wasn’t about to let some guy named Jared destroy all my hard work thus far. All the lies I’d told to teachers why Luke couldn’t make it to class, the pounding migraines as he learned to control his telepathic abilities—if he were to be arrested again they were all for nought.
Luke’s eyes stared down on me as I did my best to avoid them but the twinge behind my right eye stayed. I tried thinking random thoughts to throw him off, wondering what I would get Dad for his birthday, if I really wanted to pierce my nose or if it was just a passing fancy. Yet, I couldn’t do that—and all I could picture was the closed shower curtain, everything that had taken place after it opened, and what I’d found at Alice’s house.
I huffed.
“He broke into our apartment?” His voice was a harsh whisper in my ear. “And you broke into a crime scene? What part of ‘be careful’ do you not understand?”
“It’s not a big deal,” I said with a wave of my hand. “I just wanted to see everything for myself.”
Luke’s lips downturned, and I finally let down the wall around my mind. A shiver ran up and down my spine with an uncomfortably familiar gnawing sensation at my temples, the sharp pain behind my right eye making me wince.
“Sorry,” he said, eyes finally looking away. “I know you don’t like when I…do that.”
“It’s okay.” I rubbed at my temple with my left hand.
We had bigger things to think about now anyway; things like Jared. I rubbed my eyes, needing more sleep than I had gotten in the past two days. This wasn’t fair—I was always cool and collected. That’s the only thing people ever remembered about me, and it was all gone in a day. Jared was ruining my calm state of mind and he didn’t even have to lift a finger.
When I opened my eyes Dr. Wineman had just walked into the room. He looked like a completely different person; no longer full of energy and his eyes didn’t have the same brightness as before. His briefcase clattered onto the table next to the projector, eyes distant as he pondered something. A few whispers spread through the room, but there weren’t enough people for it to be widespread.
Then within a few minutes later the room was once again filled with Eidolons. From the looks of it everyone had taken the same seat they had days earlier. The fact that they weren’t human didn’t make them any less predictable. Dr. Wineman let his eyes roll over the room, counting each student. Something flashed over his face when he came to me and Luke; for a moment, I thought it was relief. But there was no reason he should feel relieved after seeing us, right?
My next thoughts questioned whether or not if the doctor knew about Luke’s arrest. Nothing had been reported about a suspect in custody, just a few mentions of the last moments of the girls’ lives. As glad as I was that Luke wasn’t outed as a suspect, there were always leaks. I was certain it wouldn’t be long before someone at the police department let Luke’s name slip.
The murders were the talk of the town. The most common theory being two men were committing ritual murders; one as part of an Eidolon tradition, another as a human making sacrifices to their Eidolon. I had no idea if that’s what the police thought, but I hated that I was even considering the theory as a possibility.
“Welcome back to New History,” Dr. Wineman announce, smile weak. “Today we are going to talk about the revolution. I was going to save this for a later class, but many of you have approached me asking about it.” He shuffled through his bag and pulled out a silver laptop. Holding up one finger he asked for the class to wait while he set up the projector.
“I wonder what he’ll tell us that we don’t already know,” Luke whispered. I raised an eyebrow. I hadn’t thought Luke would talk to me for the rest of the lecture, not after using his abilities on me. After the first time it made me a little nervous, but was always bearable.
“Guess we’ll find out,” I said.
Last year when the Eidolon’s came out of the closet a lot of people asked “why now” or “why not sooner”. The media did their best to report on it, but each answer was different. Some newspapers said they chose now because they felt it would be simple with the popularity of fantasy stories, others said it was because it was a now or never sort of thing. The television told us that the Eidolon’s were accidentally exposed to the government and some said they were trying to eradicate the human race. Most people believed it was because the Eidolon’s were planning on enslaving humanity, which caused uproar. I had my own theories on the subject but neither I nor Luke knew the truth.
“This area was not as affected as others,” Dr. Wineman said, pulling me back to reality, “that much you know. But the real reason was never reported as to why we chose now to reveal ourselves to the world. Many of us still believe it to be a mistake.”
“So do the humans,” I mumbled accidentally, forgetting for a brief moment that the doctor had excellent hearing. It must’ve sounded bitter, as if I didn’t think it was a good idea, but the doctor didn’t react. He paused for a moment, eyes on the floor.
“Human’s call us monsters, like we’re not people, because they don’t understand us,” he said, “but we have a word for ourselves; the Etheric Shade. The term comes from our origins in the Shadeland Islands, nestled deep within the Bermuda Triangle, hidden on another plane of existence; the latest generations abbreviating it to either Etheric’s or recently, the Eidolon’s. Please, use these terms rather than non-humans, or…monsters.” His face scrunched at the phrase; even the doctor wasn’t able to control his emotions.
“What really caused us to reveal ourselves to the world is simply that our population has grown exponentially,” Dr. Wineman said, arms crossed behind his back as he began to pace. “A hundred years ago only about fifteen per cent of the world was part of the Etheric’s, then there was a count ten years ago that raised that number the forty-five per cent, and now we’re at sixty-three per cent. Over half of the world is not fully human and this is what made humans think we’re trying to enslave them.”
After a deep breath, eyes closed, the doctor stopped pacing.
So, that was it? The only reason we know about the Eidolon’s is because of a population spike? Oddly simple for such a complicated group of beings. I peeked at Luke next to me, his pen scratching all this into his notebook.
“Our population grew fast because we began to make families with humans,” the doctor went on. He looked down at his left hand, thumb rubbing against the shining black loop that wrapped around his ring finger. I squinted at him, hoping to see more details but his hand quickly went behind his back.
He said, “Hundreds of years ago it was tradition to marry into the same species, so to speak. But slowly we lost that tradition and began to love humans. Though some families”—he paused, his back to the classroom and twirled his ring again—“still feel being with a human is wrong.”
When he turned back around he had that same weak smile on his lips.
“Is it just me or does he look kind of sad?” Luke whispered. I nodded.
“Last class I had mentioned the Shadeland council,” the doctor said, almost jolting out of his daze, “they are the leaders of the Etheric Shade. Last year they concluded that it was only a matter of time before the humans somehow discovered our existence, and they decided that if we were going to come out, it would be on our terms.” He began pacing again. “So the council went to the world leaders and told them everything. I’m sure you remember the announcements made by the countries; they were played on loop for days on end. But unfortunately, shortly after that, the riots started.”
I flinched at the thought of the riots. Other places just had thefts and beatings, we had fires. A lot of fires. I glanced at Luke, hoping he didn’t see my movement. I knew he had when he reached out to touch my hand but I tucked it safely in my pocket, out of his reach.
“Thankfully it was not long till they ended,” Dr. Wineman continued, “and though there is still violence in the world, it is no comparison to Revolution Week.”
But will it get better? Will humans ever stop their violence against the Eidolon’s and vice versa? It occurred to me that things could be worse. My thoughts drifted to different “what ifs” as the doctor told the class about the revolution. Luke gave me a gentle tap to my arm with his elbow when he noticed I’d begun to space out.
“Doctor,” a woman said from the back of the class, “can you tell us more about Shadeland? I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve never heard much about it…” She slouched in her seat, pulling a strand of dark hair to her lips as all eyes fell on her. The class seemed to agree with her, though, all of them nodding to each other. Dr. Wineman grimaced, maybe concerned with how he should answer.
“I’m sorry,” he replied, “but Shadeland is a place that only the purebloods and elders may go. I can’t tell you anything about it that you don’t already know.”
Interesting. What exactly did a pureblood look like? If what Dr. Wineman had told us at the last lecture was true, then almost nobody would be “pure”. Not if 60% of the world was a mixed of human and Eidolon. Were the purebloods just hiding in the Shade?
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