By day four in Paris, Sheera was settling into the first stage of training she'd been assigned to by Madam Quillfern. The mandatory program was written on a scroll, each training task laid out in Madam Quillfern's fine cursive; it was posted on the bulletin board that hung in Sheera and Orisa's room.

As morning creeped in through the window, the first rays of sun illuminated the scroll and her daily agenda:

-Morning meditation

-Café on a terrace

-Outdoor fitness

-Eat something heavenly

-2 hours of strolling

-Evening meditation

It seemed more like a vacation itinerary than a recipe for learning magical powers en route to saving the world, but Sheera was too overwhelmed to question the details of this strange new world.

The harsh ring of Sheera's analog alarm clock proved to be superfluous, as she was already wide awake and staring up at the ceiling. It was seven a.m. , and time to check off the first item on the list. She looked over at Orisa but she was already gone, off to some important assignment no doubt.

By half past seven, Sheera was up on the building's rooftop and private terrace, preparing for her meditation, or rather...admiring the stunning views in every direction. The Eiffel Tower was clearly visible on the other side of the river, and when she turned around she saw Sacré Coeur, the mesmerizing white-domed basilica on top of a hill. In between all of that were stunning old cathedrals, include the iconic rectangular shape of Notre Dame. If that weren't enough, the streets formed a cozy maze of apartment buildings constructed in the distinctive Haussmann style, recognizable by their uniform facades, wrought-iron balconies and weathered grey rooftops.

As her eyes poured in these sights for a third morning in a row, it seemed impossible to transition to eliminating thoughts through silent meditation. Maybe that was part of the test, to form an absence in her mind when it was brimming with inspiration. Whatever the reason, she never had more thoughts than she did while she was trying to meditate. Like now. And now. And still now. She shook her head and sighed.

The day before, she'd alerted Madam Quillfern to her failure in the art of meditation. Far from being shunned, Madam Quillfern had calmly explained that the cycling of thoughts was normal as a form of release, and that for most people, it often took years to fully achieve a silent mind. The only tricky thing was that Sheera didn't have the luxury of years to learn this craft, and maybe not even the luxury of weeks.

The foggy deadline for the dark days ahead was another thought that consumed her when she wasn't supposed to be thinking. She opened one eye and peeked at the wind-up clock resting beside her to see if she was nearly done. She scoffed. "How have I only done ten minutes?"

"Whatever you're doing, you're not doing a very great job at it."

Sheera followed the sound of Luke's voice to the glass terrace door where he stood smirking. His muscular crossed arms hinted at the ability to crush melons, and far from it making her blush she blatantly stared. She was young and hot-blooded, after all.

"You weren't supposed to get here until I finished..."

Since Madam Quillfern was insistent on passing on knowledge to the Kindreds so she wouldn't be the only source, Luke had been assigned to monitor her first week of training. He would also help her work through the spells when she was ready, but the way things were going that outcome seemed bleak.

He leaned over her and reset the alarm clock.

"There are no shortcuts here," he said casually. "Meet me downstairs when you're done."

She closed her eyes and heard the terrace door swing open before closing with a click. She squeezed her eyes and did her best to eliminate the image of him leaning over her. It was a failure.

***

After finishing another distracting meditation, it was time for the fitness portion of the day. For the first two days, they'd run along Canal Saint-Martin, past shops and cafés and one of the firefighter stations. It was here that the incredibly buff French 'pompiers' would faithfully emerge by ten a.m., washing the fire truck while smiling in her direction. It was as good a reason as any for cardio torture

Maybe it was only coincidence, but on that second day of the firefighters' smiles and "bonjours," Luke seemed to speed up his running considerably. His pace was so hard to keep up with, that by time they turned back and passed them again, Sheera was a sweaty hyper-ventilating mess. It might have also been a coincidence that on the following day, they skipped the Canal Saint-Martin entirely, running up to the hilly streets of Montmartre instead. They looped around the tourist-filled grassy expanse of the Sacré Coeur basilica, and as Sheera's breaths got shorter and shorter, Luke stopped at the foot of a stone staircase. A staircase so steep and so endless, that it seemed to shoot straight up to the clouds.

Luke started casually jogging up the stairs, his muscular legs paying no mind to the punishingly vertical ascent. He stopped when he didn't hear her hyper-ventilating breaths behind her. "You're holding us up."

Sheera looked up at him, her hands resting on her knees as the sweat of her palms soaked into her worn grey jogging pants (a substitute for the sexy, stretchy athletic wear she didn't own). She gasped for air. "This is a joke, right?"

He wasn't laughing. "Pushing your body past your perceived limits is a crucial part of learning magic. Mind over matter, my dear." He smiled. "As Madam Quillfern once said..."

She managed to stand up straight, but not without feeling a pain in her back. "I'm already getting sore from the run." Her eyes travelled up the brutal steps. "And where does that staircase even end?" She sneered. "It' looks like the stairway to Hell."

"Wouldn't that be in the other direction?"

She shrugged. "I'm not religious."

He grinned. "Well if you make it to the top of this staircase it'll be a religious experience, I promise." He gestured to the top with both hands, like one of the ladies on 'The Price is Right' who was presenting a shiny red convertible. From Hell. "Now come on!"

He jogged up the stairs and she grudgingly followed, at half his pace, and then a third, and then finally to a point where each step made her quads burn like the fire of a thousand suns, or at least that's how she imagined it in her sweaty, blurry mind. Miraculously and impossibly, she hauled her leg over the final step. She attempted to straighten up with both legs shaking.

"See?" Luke exclaimed. "You just pushed yourself past the limit! And you know what that means, right?" He clapped her on the back and she nearly fell over. "You're one step closer!"

"Uh huh." She stared out at her elevated surroundings; a quiet, cobblestoned street lined with bakeries, cafés, and little galleries belonging to solo artists who operated in their own unique niche.

She squinted. "Is that a gallery of scary clown paintings?"

It certainly was, because whether it was your first week in Paris or your seventh year, the city had a way of surprising you with something classic that always felt new, something new that seemed like it had always been there, or something strange that somehow fit the tapestry too. She crossed the street to take a closer look at the disturbing hellscape of art. "That clown has three sets of razor sharp teeth." She glanced at Luke with a fearful expression. "Aren't clowns scary enough without three layers of murder-teeth?"

Luke took her by the shoulders and guided her away from the gallery. "Let's walk back now, shall we? Orisa and Xavier are cooking up a special lunch."

"Walk?" She said grimacing.

He nodded. "It's only about two kilometers. Come on."

She kept herself upright as best she could, following Luke down the hilly street, and hoping to never encounter anything as frightening as the triple-layer razor-toothed clown...

***

Later that afternoon, Sheera helped clear the dining room after a delicious lunch of savoury crepes and homemade cider. "I've never had French cider before, Xavier!" She frowned. "Or any cider, actually. But it went great with the best crêpes in the history of the world!"

Xavier was a seasoned Kindred in his forties, hailing from the French region of Bretagne, otherwise known as the home of the crêpe. His family owned a crêperie in Paris's famous "street of crêpes" on Rue Montparnasse, and whenever he was off on "Kindred" business, he would say he was researching new suppliers or possible locations for expansion.

"I am glad you enjoyed it," he said with blue eyes twinkling. "My family's special recipe of cider goes just right with some pommes de terre and jambon inside a crêpe, non?"

Sheera rubbed her belly and smiled, as the potato, ham and cheese crêpe had more than hit the spot. "I couldn't agree more."

She saw Luke in the hallway gesturing towards her and pointing at his watch. It was already time for her next task, but it all seemed rather trivial in comparison to the other more intense-looking Kindreds, who now buzzed around the house with the weight of the world (and humanity) on their shoulders. Something was being planned, but Sheera didn't have the security clearance to know anything about it...

***

Sheera settled into a wicker chair on the terrace of a bustling square, as it was time for the day's allotment of 'café time.' For today's occasion, Luke had taken her to a café on the left bank's neighborhood of Saint Germain. They sat across from the famous Saint Sulpice church and its sprawling sculptured fountain. It was the perfect place for taking slow sips and watching Parisians go by, a pass time Madam Quillfern had strangely defined as an essential task on her to-do list.

"Alright I'll come fetch you in an hour," said Luke.

"Okay this is officially getting weird," she said.

"What is?"

"You're still spending your hour at a different café instead of sitting here with me?" She gestured to the wicker chair beside her. "Look; these little tables are made for two people."

"But that isn't really the point, is it?"

"What's not the point?" She crossed her arms. "What's the difference between people-watching alone or with someone else?"

He sighed. "She really didn't explain that part to you?"

Sheera clasped her hands in anticipation as her café crème arrived. "Merci!" she said gleefully to the waiter before returning her focus to Luke. "She didn't explain a thing, so...go on." In these first few days of foggy details and unanswered questions, she longed for any clarifying information she could get.

"Well...café life can technically be enjoyed two at a time, or so I've heard..." He scratched his head. "I mean I spend most of my time back home at Bondi Beach..."

"But..." she urged.

"But, one of the things a Kindred embodies is enjoying one's own company, of being content to just soak in life, to just be grateful for the ride, so to speak."

"Oh," she replied, as she absorbed the unsatisfying answer.

"It's about..." he rubbed his chin in an academic way, "...it's about being perfectly comfortable in your own skin, with or without attachment. Self actualization of the soul!" He smiled like he'd finally cracked it.

Sheera knew a lot about being without attachment, from growing up without a father, to losing a mother when she was only twelve. Even though the Lansens had been amazing at filling the void, she'd learned even more about being without attachment when she'd failed to form a single close friendship in high school, and had found herself spending so many nights reading books in her room on her own. By now she should've had this solo soul thing mastered.

"You okay?" he said, alerting her to the fact that her gaze had drifted off.

She sipped her café crème and smiled. "You better get outta here so I can enjoy this."

He checked the time on his watch and nodded. "I'll fetch you in an hour."

***

On their way back from the Left Bank, Sheera felt the chill of the autumn air when the big rustling trees on Ile de la Cité blocked out the early evening sun. This was the fifth time she'd noticed how much the temperature changed with the simple absence of sun, a meteorological quirk about Paris that would compel her to bring a sweater from here on out. She suddenly felt the warmth of Luke's jacket on her shoulders.

"Noticed your teeth chattering a bit there," he said smirking.

She elbowed him. "I did not chatter; if I'd chattered you would've heard it."

"Still skeptical," he said. "But if the clown with three layers of razor sharp teeth started chattering we would definitely hear it."

She burst into laughter then immediately shuddered. "Ugh! Don't remind me."

As they crossed to the other side of the Seine and continued north past the Chatelet theatre, Sheera now wondered what Luke had in mind.

"Does our stroll include our own neighborhood today? Seems like we're heading in that direction."

"We're not doing the stroll now," he said. "We're going back."

She took his arm and stopped him. "But the list said I have to do a two-hour stroll before the evening meditation!"

He raised his eyebrow. "Is it a numbered list?"

She pictured it in her head. "No..."

"Then aside from the morning meditation, what difference does it make how we order things?"

She quickly did the math in her head. "A two-hour stroll after the evening meditation?" Her eyes widened. "So a night stroll?"

"That's right!" His winning smile reminded her of the prom king from high school she'd admired from afar. The only time they'd breathed the same air was when he'd walked past her desk to take a selfie with Tiffany, the hot girl with false lashes super-glued to her eyelids like her life depended on it.

As they headed back to their secret townhouse, Sheera almost wished she could take a Parisian selfie with her Australian prom king and post it on her non-existent Instagram...

***

Luke had definitely downplayed the idea of a night stroll in Paris, never mentioning the fact that he had planned to take her to Paris's most distinctive symbol. Yet there they were, approaching the massive glittering Eiffel Tower, their feet crunching on the gravely path as they made their way over to the lawn.

"It's like a million diamonds," she said breathlessly.

"Should we sit?" He said, gesturing to where several groups of people (including couples) were sprawled out on picnic blankets drinking wine and admiring the view.

"Sitting doesn't count as part of my two-hour stroll task," she said firmly, deadly serious about not deviating from the list.

He put his arm around her shoulder and guided her to the lawn. "We'll walk all the way back along the river to make up for it."

Sheera didn't really hear him, what with every molecule in her body fixated on the weight of his arm around her shoulders. Was that a friendly arm? Or a casual arm between Kindreds? Or possibly something else? She wasn't sure, but this was the first time she'd been able to over-analyze attention from the opposite sex and she'd be lying if she said the neuroses didn't make her feel alive.

He opened up the backpack he'd had slung around one shoulder. Before they'd left he had claimed the bag contained some old books he needed to return, but of course that was now uncovered as a lie. He pulled out a blanket, a bottle of wine, and some cheese wrapped in brown paper that she recognized from their kitchen.

"Did you steal that?" she said accusingly.

He wasn't nervous. "Madam Quillfern let me have it when I said we were leaving for our stroll before the after-dinner cheese course."

"Well in that case..." She snatched the package from his hands and unwrapped it. "The comté!" she exclaimed, pulling out the hard yellow cheese. "And the smoked cow's milk! How did you know?"

He laughed. "You're a cheese gal, eh?"

"You mean am I a human who isn't dead inside? Uhh yes."

He seemed to find her geek-level of 'cheese love' endearing, but she didn't notice, as she was too overwhelmed with how the books on food and culture she'd read back home were now coming to life.

As they settled into their picnic spot, enjoying their wine and cheese under the orange glow of Tour Eiffel, Sheera strained her ears to take in the conversations around her.

"No one's speaking English," she said.

"You're surprised?"

"In the States there's this stereotype that Parisians think the Eiffel Tower is ugly."

He stretched out his arm towards the tower. "What about this magnificence could someone find ugly?"

"Hey you don't have to convince me; it was the prized feature of the eighteen-eighty World's Fair, and only gets more beautiful with age." She blew it a kiss and then noticed her empty glass. "Wine me."

He poured her another glass and winked.

As Sheera engaged in the beautiful youthful agony of having all the time in the world to analyze winks, another part of her mind woke her up from the trance. Her face grew solemn. "I'm assuming you've the seen magic atlas," she said.

He seemed alarmed by the change of topic. "I'd suggest you whisper from here on out."

"Oh right," she said lowering her voice. "Are you worried about the percentage counter?"

He looked a bit grim. "It sure isn't looking good."

"Why can't we just...raise it up?"

He gave her a quizzical look. "You'll have to fill me in on whatever the hell that means."

"I know we can never share what we know because nobody would actually believe it, but can't we just put together enough facts so they believe us? If they can't remember their mind being erased or can't sense the moments in between observable time when the magic is used anyway, can't we find a way to show them? Like what if we filmed it with a special camera that slowed down the time? Then they'd believe the rest of it too, right? Like how our souls need to be vibrant so society isn't at risk of annihilation?" His raised eyebrow reeked of skepticism, but it only fueled her passion. "It would be like confirming Santa Claus real, only in this case, yes, it's your souls that are real, you guys, like hello, they're these actual things that affect your existence, and now that you know that and they're slipping away, hold on to them and heal them and make the world better!" Her eyes glistened in the night sky. "Right?"

She looked at him with all the hope of a child who leaves cookies for Santa.

He didn't answer her at first, instead working over a sip of wine that was sloshing around in his mouth, like he was a suddenly a damn sommelier. "The first thing," he finally said, "is I'm certainly not an expert." He leaned back on the blanket, resting on his elbow and staring up at her like he was about to recite her a poem. "Aside from you, I'm the newest one here. And yet...if there's anything I've learned from following around Madam Quillfern and soaking up her pearls of wisdom and memorizing every spell...it's that...a soul is a part of someone. It belongs to them, so whatever their view of it, whether they believe in it or not, it's for them to decide."

She leaned back too so they were eye to eye. "But maybe they just hadn't thought about it in the right way. Maybe they don't know what was always there. We could show them...couldn't we?"

"It's not really about thinking though now is it," he said, matching her stare intensely. "It's instinctual; you either believe you're a part of the universe and somehow connected to all the things that ever lived, or, in the more likely scenario...you're just trying to find little moments of happiness to get through another damn day."

"Well that's depressing," she said, but even amidst the grim discussion, she couldn't help but notice he was more than just another Australian prom king. She smiled. "When did you have time to think about all this?"

His gaze became warm and reminiscent. "Australia has a lot of wide open spaces for star-gazing."

As the image of a sky full of stars filled her head, Sheera began to think about all the people she'd encountered in her life; the ones at work, or on the subway, or on the street...they sure didn't seem like they were having a crisis of the soul. "Is the fifteen percent on the magic atlas definitely accurate?" she pondered aloud. "I mean there's gotta be more connected souls than only fifteen percent."

"Being okay is not the same as feeling happy in the tiniest moments, or feeling satisfied with life even if it doesn't check off all the boxes of possessions and expectations." He brushed a fallen strand of hair away from her face. "Then there's greed...corruption...competition...envy...fear of dying alone..."

"Isn't it normal to fear dying alone?"

"What's the point of being afraid of something you won't be around to witness?"

He sat back up and checked his watch. "Three...two...one..." When he finished the countdown, the Eiffel Tower began glittering again, its five-minute per hour nightly show that delighted tourists from every corner of the city. "Enjoy this," he said. "Because there might come a day when you can't get the simple moments back."

His words were an eerie warning, and it reminded her of everyone in Madam Quillfern's home; friendly, warm, completely capable of enjoying the moment, but also...concerned. It was enough to convince Sheera to enjoy these magical Parisian nights that wouldn't last forever...