Paranormal Academy
Page 1
Paranormal Academy
A Limited Edition Paranormal Romance and Reverse Harem Collection
Elena Lawson
LJ Swallow
Lena Mae Hill
Rebecca Ethington
May Dawson
Scarlett Haven
Laura Greenwood
Kat Parrish
KN Lee
Madison Stone
Ashlee Nicole Bye
Elena Gray
Solo Storm
Angela Kulig
Kelli McCracken
Contents
LJ SWALLOW
Soulhunter Academy
Soulhunter Academy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Epilogue
ELENA LAWSON
Of Curse & Covenant
Of Curse & Covenant
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Lena Mae Hill
Wolf Boys
Wolf Boys
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Rebecca Ethington
Imdalind Academy: Pre Term
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
May Dawson
Strange Academy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Scarlett Haven
Mystic Academy
Mystic Academy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Epilogue
Skyler Andra
Life’s a Witch - Guild of Guardians Book 1
Life’s a Witch - Guild of Guardians Book 1
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Laura Greenwood
Catching A Vampire
Catching A Vampire
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
KAT PARRISH
Full Moon High
Full Moon High
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
K.N. Lee
Trials of Magic
Trials of Magic
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Madison Stone
Witchcraft is for Weirdos
Witchcraft is for Weirdos
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Ashlee Nicole Bye
The Fiercest Flame
The Fiercest Flame
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Elena Gray and Kelli McCracken
Destroyed by Magic
Destroyed by Magic
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
About the Authors
Solo Storm
Rising Princess
Rising Princess
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
About Solo Storm
Angela Kulig
Louder Than Worlds
Louder Than Words: A Soul Painters Novella
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Soulhunter Academy
LJ SWALLOW
Ava is trapped in a world controlled by the ruling angels, and her only chance of escape is to enter the Soulhunter Academy and fight for her freedom.
Half-angel Ava is determined to leave her life in the Fated world behind and create her own destiny. Seizing her chance to escape, she signs her life over to the Soulhunter Academy to train as a soulhunter. As a mercenary for the high angels, Ava’s mission is to enter the human world and retrieve souls trapped in demons. Once she collects enough souls, freedom is hers.
But Ava soon discovers this path to becoming a soulhunter isn’t as easy as she expected. Nobody told her the whole truth about what her new life entails—or the dangers she faces.
Daniel is an ex-soulhunter 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 the other recruits notice he takes a special interest in her.
But w
hat is Daniel’s real agenda behind his need to keep Ava alive?
*
Soulhunter Academy is a novella length introduction to the Soulhunter world and focuses on Ava and Daniel’s story. This novella is low heat and is not reverse harem.
Copyright © 2019 LJ Swallow
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Characters, incidents, and dialogs are products of the author’s
imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events is strictly
coincidental.
Created with Vellum
1
I grip the paper in my hand and stare at my scrawled signature on the bottom of the contract. My future as a soulhunter is sealed, and my life with the Fated is over.
Stomach lurching at the finality, I move to lean against the wall of the large hall and eye the others around. Not a big turnout—maybe half a dozen kids my age hang in corners or in front of the floor to ceiling windows.
Each new arrival's shoes tap across the tiled floor drawing attention from those already waiting. The low turnout surprises me—a crapload of kids I knew at school insisted they would sign-up to become soulhunters. I recognise one or two, including a girl with long black hair staring at a window as if she might jump out and leave.
I search my memory for the girl's name. Sarah? I remember her from school, but we rarely spoke—mostly because she's the quiet type, who blends into the background. I'm the exact opposite, and people kept away from me at school. But we’re nineteen now, and the soulhunter academy isn't school.
The training will be intense before we're sent out to assignments alone. Friends would be a handicap.
The angel representative sits 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, and her skin is stretched tight across her cheekbones. Beautiful. High angel? Probably not—this task would be too mundane for one of 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, held by red nails matching her lipstick, towards a corner.
"Is that it?" I expected more. Some pomp and ceremony—not a "your life belongs to us now, run along" attitude. 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 dull, shadowed world of the Fated. No, this is the right decision. I have to leave this place.
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.
When I was a child, I thought the high angels would select soulhunters by watching us fight to our death and take the strongest to their academy. Now I understand the high angels don't care how skilled we are in combat. The sole criterion for becoming a soulhunter is willingness—and a suicidal attitude to life.
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 bloody door then!"
A guy with close-cropped hair pulls a sour face and rubs his arm. I 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 glances over then averts her eyes when I look at her. 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. Slumping onto the seat, I stretch my legs in front.
A towering 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 scrutinise each other.
"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 the souls stolen by demons 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, once you reach the training academy."
With a tight smile, the woman clicks back out the door. That's the limit of our explanation? Wow. But I know my task once my training finishes: kill the demons and take the lost human souls back to the high angels.
The high angels. Their rule over my people, the Fated, is distant and absolute. I know little about our joint history; most detail is wiped out of existence. I do know that the high angels with their power and privilege once coexisted with ordinary angels. But the growing numbers threatened peace. The heavenly cities became overcrowded and resources depleted. Disagreements started, and the lesser angels wanted more input into the control of the world we shared.
They learned a hard lesson.
The high angels seized control. They blindsided the lesser angels and those who realised what was happening and tried to fight back paid with their lives. The high angels took away the others' powers and created a new world for these new half-angel Fated to live — a world where the Fated work for the high angels and do as they say.
There're two ways to escape this Fated world: by becoming a soulhunter, or death.
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. A small girl a few seats away fidgets and stares at the exit. I swear she's about to run back to our old world
A blond 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 soulhunters pass through the door he came through.