1
Alone in Darkness
Cool silk sliding across my calves is one of the most incredible sensations I’ve ever felt, but it’s ruined by the thudding of my panicked heart. The unnerving sound of scraping against the stone flooring, followed by the rattling of an ancient predator’s growl, drags me from a deep sleep.
The sound immediately halts the moment my eyes fly open. The room is pitch black and utterly still now that the sound has stopped. Unease rushes through my veins. My limbs and lungs freeze in place.
I don’t dare move as my mind works through rational thought.
I’m alone—or at least, I should be—in Jarron’s room.
He hasn’t been back to the academy in the weeks since the war began in his home world, but I’ve been sleeping in his bed, surrounded by his smell and these decadent silk sheets, every night because it’s “safer” here.
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard or felt the presence of something else in the darkness, though, and it instantly makes me regret my choice not to go back to my itchy blankets and tiny bed in Minor Hall.
Slowly, the hair on my arms rises.
I stare, horrified, yet uncertain what it means.
The darkness around me is thick. Charged with alien power that most certainly is not coming from me.
Is some powerful magical being watching me? And if so, who?
The air remains still. Is it in my head?
My heart aches with several emotions. Sadness because I miss Jarron. Hope because part of me prays I’m right and he is here watching over me, waiting to see if I’ll wake so he can pull me into his arms.
Fear because there’s a high likelihood that if someone is here, it’s not my demon boyfriend watching me from the foot of my bed.
My lungs burn, but I refuse to give in. I wait. And so does the darkness, still and quiet.
I press my eyes closed. Nothing changes. The charge in the air dissipates.
And I allow my lungs to suck in those desperately needed breaths as quietly as I can manage.
I can clearly imagine that scraping sound was from massive leathery wings sliding against the stone floor. The rumble so much like what I’d heard from both Jarron’s and Mr. Vandozer’s monster-like forms while in their most instinct-driven states.
But the longer the silence stretches, the more my heart settles. There’s no more scraping. No claws carving the stone. No rumbling growls. Only the gentle whisper of the wind outside the large glass windows feet away.
The weight of loneliness and longing retake their place in my heart. Reality settles in my mind that I must have been dreaming. Or at the very least, if someone was here, they are gone now.
While that means I’m probably not in immediate danger, it doesn’t mean there isn’t cause for concern. Maybe it was only a dream that felt incredibly realistic.
Or maybe I’ll wake to find a message.
Just a few weeks ago, I’d been getting strange, cryptic notes regularly, signed “The Jinn.”
Will I find another pinned to one of the bedposts? Nailed to the door?
Now that I know the true identity of the jinn, it should alleviate some of my fears, but it’s a hell of a lot more complicated than that.
I came to Shadow Hills Academy at the beginning of the school year intent on finding my sister’s killer and getting revenge. Instead, I uncovered a secret organization that’s forcing children to fight to the death for entertainment.
My sister was one of their contestants, that much is true. But she didn’t die.
She fought in the games and lived. She won.
She became the jinn.
