Faith Heights

Chapter 38

I hoped, by now, I'd be much better at lying. Yet, I still had to look away when Jackson asked how my training had gone. 

"I-It was fine. I just sat with my eyes closed for most of the time."

He looked up at me from the library desk, disbelieving. "Really? That's all you did?"

I tugged a strand of hair behind my ear. "No, but it took up most of the session. We didn't really have time for anything besides the meditation."

"And after that?"

"And after that we talked about the meditation."

He put up his hands with a sigh. "Fine, I get it. You're not supposed to tell me. Lydia must be more of a hard-ass than I thought."

I let him make his own assumptions, and went back to practicing Punnett Squares while my thoughts ran rampant. I couldn't take my mind off the image of Lydia's face when the plant had exploded. She'd looked... scared. I had never seen anything but overwhelming optimism on her smiling features, and yet she'd looked at me as if I was a monster that didn't have a place even at Faith Heights. What I did truly must have been horrific if she wanted it kept a secret...but I couldn't figure out why. Were my powers really so different to the rest? Even if Lydia had allowed me to broach the subject, I doubted Lucas would give me the answers I needed.

"Did you always know you were special?" I asked Jackson.

"Special?"

"Different to humans."

He laughed, and violently shook his head. "No. Definitely not. I figured it out about the time I hit puberty, luckily enough. There's only so many rare steaks a kid can eat before he realises something unusual is going on." He chuckled. "I was at a perfect age to start at Faith Heights when the changes began. They just hit me one day, all these powers, these strange cravings... My Dad was the werewolf of the family, but Mum knew. They'd both agreed to keep it from me until absolutely necessary."

"I thought you said it was unsafe for a werewolf to get involved with a human?"

He shrugged. "Usually, yeah, it is. I honestly never thought anything of it until my education here, when it was practically branded as taboo. Dad mostly stays at a distance from the werewolf community back home. He doesn't bother them, and they don't bother him.

"I hated them for keeping the whole transforming-into-a-wolf-by-tearing-your-bones thing from me at first, but I'm thankful now. I mean, I doubt it would have helped my control by being at a school like this at a younger age. And if I didn't grow up with humans, I don't think I'd even know how to be friends with non-werewolves." He scribbled a few lines of notes before asking absently, "What makes you ask?"

I couldn't tell him about my session with Lydia, so I replied, "I'm just anxious for my powers to start developing."

He nodded sympathetically. "It must be strange, still seeming so human when you're soulmate is an angel."

I flinched at that. I'd been trying to avoid thinking about it too much, but I couldn't help but wonder why everyone was so sure that I was Lucas' soulmate. If he was who I was meant to love, then why didn't my heart pound like it did around Nick? Why had my body's initial reaction to Lucas been to run?

I knew I had to tread carefully, but I trusted Jackson- and I needed answers. "If I asked you to help me with something, can I trust you not to tell anyone? Not Theo, or any of the boys?"

He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Of course. I mean- I can try. I won't tell them, but Theo will practically be able to smell it on me if I'm lying."