Halls of Splintered Souls (Wandering Souls #1)

Chapter One

There were too many spells in the Great Hall. I could practically smell the unmistakable sweet scent of magic. It was the first day of the new semester at Arce Umbra and everyone was helplessly trying to navigate through the ocean of students. Everyone was looking for their friends, their dorm, their suitcase, or their pets with their spells but they just ended up fogging up the air. There were too many searching spells being cast for them to work properly.

Arce Umbra has several buildings and towers, but today the main building where the great hall and most of the classes are located were especially full. They should consider moving the administration and customer office somewhere else. I could barely move in the middle of the hectic students.

I yelped as someone bumped my shoulder and walked past me without saying sorry. I wanted to yell at them but quickly decided that it'd be useless anyway. It's not like they'd be able to hear me over the noise. And seeing as this is my first year, I probably shouldn't go around causing troubles.

I rubbed my shoulder and was taken aback when I felt a sting. Did the bump cause static electricity? I don't think the uniforms are made of anything that could easily generate statics. I frowned and spaced out without realizing it. I didn't notice someone calling my name until they pinched my arm.

"Ow!" I yelled and looked next to me to see my twin sister, Ayn, with her suitcase and her cat, Artemis.

"Seriously, Aya, where did you go in that head of yours?" she asked while shaking her head.

"Don't worry about it," I tell her, pulling her outside to head to the girls' dormitory building, "some jerk bumped into me earlier and didn't even apologize."

She laughed at my reply before handing me the forms we need to fill out. We have to hand them over to the administration office tomorrow. There were quite a lot of it.

I took the forms and looked at her with a questioning glance. "You filled them out already."

"I couldn't find you anywhere so I did it to pass the time while my spell looks for you." She wiggled her finger playfully in an attempt to demonstrate her spell casting. "Let's go check out the room assignments."

"I already did that," I say, handing her the first-year guides, "you're on the second floor and I'm on the third."

I watched as Ayn's eyes widen in horror. I couldn't blame her. I reacted the same way. We've always been a package deal so we were hoping to at least be assigned rooms on the same floor. I mean, we can always visit each other but it wouldn't be the same as actually being together.

"Ugh, let's just toss in our stuffs in our room and head back down to see some potential boyfriends. Unpacking can wait."

"Ayn," I laughed, "we literally just got here."

"That's the point, we have to tag all the good ones before they get taken." She winked and dragged me with her to climb the stairs.

***

The girls' dormitory is one of the original building in our school. Thirty rooms are located on every floor and two students occupy each. The third floor is the highest floor and it's much quieter than the first and second floor. My room is 303, almost at the end of the hallway. As I walked there, I took my time to admire the architectural design of the school. It's not a wonder that the designs were stunning. The school used to be a castle.

The Sorcerer King used to live here and so did his descendants. He was the first conjuror and the one who created the first of us. The castle was transformed into a school not long ago in the late 1800s after the Shadow War. None of the royal family survived so there was no use to keep it functioning as a castle. The council decided it was better used to educate young sorcerers and sorceresses. They kept the name of the castle as the name of the school, though, Arce Umbra.

When I finally got to my room, I gasped in astonishment. The room isn't less impressive than the rest of the school. It seems that most of the original design of the room are kept intact. The beds are twin sized with canopy and curtains over it. It felt like walking into a fairy tale.

In my amazed state, I almost didn't notice my phone ringing. I took it out from my bag and checked the caller ID and saw that it was just Ayn. She must have felt the same feeling looking at her room.

"Are you kidding me? This room is so beautiful I don't know if I want to leave it ever again!" She shouted into the phone.

"Calm down. The whole school hear you," I laughed.

"That's got to be the least of my problems," she mumbled before continuing, "I swear I feel like some kind of a princess."

"Uh huh, what's missing is only a prince."

"See? You get me," she paused and I heard her door open, "I've got to hang up. My roommate just arrived. I'll see you at dinner, bye!"

Ayn hung up and I shook my head, laughing at my sister's actions. It's not a secret that her weird and stupid actions combined with my weird and stupid actions always end up creating quite an interesting story. As I lie down on my bed, I wondered what event studying here would bring in the coming days.

It was a few minutes later that my own roommate arrived. She had platinum blonde hair and icy eyes. I noticed an aura masker bracelet on her left wrist. Those are used by some conjuror to hide their aura so that other conjuror couldn't see it. At first glance, she doesn't look like someone who'd be secretive about something like that, but the bracelet said otherwise.

"Oh, hey," she greeted, offering her hand for me to shake, "I'm Padma."

I smiled at her before replying. "It's nice to meet you, I'm Aya."

After that we talked about ourselves and the excitement of starting our first year here. After about twenty minutes, Padma excused herself to go to the bathroom, we have one next to the closet. It has a bathtub, and it's huge. Like Ayn said, this school makes me feel like a princess.

I sat on my bed scrolling through Instagram while waiting for Padma. I posted a story on snapchat too. I was about to call Ayn back, but then there was a sudden knock at the door. Well, guess I didn't have to call her after all. Look how fast she found her way to my room.

I stood up and was about to tell Padma that I was going to open the door for Ayn. However, halfway to the bathroom the knock on the door became rapid and fast and I decided to just open the door. Ayn could be very impatient at times. I just hope Padma doesn't get surprised seeing Ayn. I mean, we don't look that much alike since we're not identical twins. But it's still kind of weird seeing the two of us without prior notice.

"Seriously, Ayn, you need to be more patient," I mumbled as I reached for the door handle, "what's the matt..."

I trailed off, the blood draining from my face. My hands felt cold and my heartbeat quickened. I braved myself to glance left and right to check the corridor but there were no one in sight.

There was no one behind the door.