Keys to the Repository

by Melissa de la Cruz

  “But you, my dear... you were a different story. You were very receptive to learning the dark magic. I had to hide it from your father. Charles would have protected you if he had known. Would have told me I was jumping to conclusions again.” Kingsley looked apologetic. “Old allegiances and all...”

  “You don’t have to remind me,” Mimi said, her face turning red. “I know what they say about Jack and me. That one day we’ll be Benedict Arnold vampires.”

  He nodded. She knew as well as he did that Azrael and Abbadon would forever carry the stain of once being Lucifer’s proudest generals.

  “The Incantation Demonata,” Mimi said. “Why did you do it?”

  “I was ordered to by the Regis himself. It was a test, he said.” Kingsley gripped his drink so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I thought he was playing me. Testing my loyalty maybe. But whatever. We just take orders, Venators. That’s the way it is. If he wanted me to call up the Silver Blood, I was going to call up the Silver Blood.”

  “But why would Charles have you do such a thing....” Mimi asked, horrified.

  Kingsley gripped her arm across the small table. “Do you remember anything about Rome?”

  “Some of it,” she said. “It comes in bits and pieces— flashes—images—I remember the crisis, demons walking in daylight, hunting them down... and that last night in Lutetia...” She closed her eyes. “I remember telling Valerius that Sophia was wrong—there was no way Caligula had turned—that Cassius was just jealous as usual—but then... we saw it.”

  Kingsley nodded. Caligula and his crimson eyes with the silver pupils. The unmistakable sign of Corruption. Agrippina Azrael and Valerius Abbadon had led the emperor down to the path, down to the newly forged gate, where Cassius—Michael—was waiting. The battle had not been easily won. But they had done it. Sent the Devil down to Hell.

  “But what does Rome have to do with what happened in the Repository?” Mimi asked.

  “Well, for starters, since the incantation worked, it proved that Silver Bloods still existed, and that they had a way into our world. Because Charles didn’t believe it—not at first, not even with all the killings. I don’t think he truly accepts it now. And he wanted to keep it from the Committee. But he had to do something if he was wrong—so he sent me to Corcovado. Because if they were back, that’s the first place they would go—to free Leviathan.”

  Mimi nodded, taking it all in.

  “Do you know anything about the gates? About the Order of the Seven?” Kingsley asked.

  Mimi shrugged. “I don’t think I was privy to that meeting. I was surprised as anyone to find that Michael had chosen to father us for this cycle. He knows we weren’t huge fans of the so-called Uncorrupted. At least, I never was.”

  Kingsley filled her in on what he knew about the Gates of Hell and the guardians ordered to protect them, as well as his part in it. “The gates keep the paths secure and the demons in the underworld. The gates should have stopped the incantation from working. But they didn’t. That was the test. The Silver Blood was able to break through the barrier. Charles suspects that Lucifer has been able to find a way into our world that we did not expect, did not foresee.”

  “But how?”

  “How indeed... especially since the Conclave took care of the biggest threat.”

  “Oh god. I had totally forgotten about that.” Mimi said, her palms at her cheeks, as if to hide from the truth. “It was you, wasn’t it? You were the one who took Gabrielle after I wasn’t brave enough to do it myself.”

  Kingsley nodded. The twins had been given the task, but had balked at the very wrongness of it—and so he and Forsyth had kidnapped Gabrielle from her room. He remembered everything. The silent birth, the frightened midwives, then Charles and Lawrence taking the baby... the burned swaddling clothes, the ghastly smell of death all around. Then Gabrielle waking up with no memory of her ordeal or even that she’d borne a child.

  “I don’t think any of us have ever forgiven ourselves for what we did that night. Not me, not Lawrence, not Charles, not Forsyth. War is a terrible thing. There is no room for mercy.” Kingsley’s face was drawn, hollow. He didn’t feel much like talking anymore. Poor Lawrence, his friend and mentor. And now Charles, lost as well. “Well. That’s everything.”

  “Oh, Kingsley,” Mimi said gently.

  Kingsley looked up, surprised to find Mimi with tears in her eyes. She put a soft hand to his cheek.

  She looked at him in silence, and in her eyes he found forgiveness and understanding, the two things he hoped for the most and expected the least. In Rio, Kingsley felt he had taken advantage of the situation a little bit—they had been so tired after their trek through he jungle, she couldn’t have been in her right mind when she’d knocked on his door that night, when she had sought comfort in his kisses. That was why he had kept her at arm’s length ever since.

  But she was here now. And she was the one leaning toward him. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry, baby,” Mimi was saying.

  They were words he had waited a lifetime—many lifetimes—to hear, and that they came from Azrael, she who had spurned him for centuries (Abbadon wasn’t the only one who had pined for one he could not have). She had mocked him in Rome—haughty, beautiful Agrippina, who had no time for Gemellus, no time at all for a weakling such as himself—a rare, solitary soul, never bound. Gemellus, who had loved and worshipped her from afar, she who was in his arms now....

  Victory was sweet. Who knew that the path to a woman’s heart was through the soul of an honest man?

  Kingsley Martin would never understand women. But that was all right. He didn’t need to understand Mimi. All he had to do was love her, and he could do that.

  THE VAN ALEN LEGACY

  AND THE PATHS OF THE DEAD

  With his dying breath, Lawrence Van Alen revealed a secret to Schuyler: she was the heir not just of the Van Alen name but to a very important legacy. He instructed her to find out more from Charles, but during the Silver Blood ambush at the Bal des Vampires in Paris, Charles became trapped in the subvertio, the White Darkness, and was unable to disclose what he knew.

  However, when Schuyler returned to New York, Allegra woke up from her coma, stirred from her unconscious state by a deep memory of another daughter, and within the safety of the glom, she was able to tell Schuyler the history of the Gates of Hell and the Paths of the Dead.

  In the days before the battle in Heaven and Lucifer’s fall, the paths between the worlds were open. Angels moved freely between Heaven, Earth, and the underworld. After the Fall, when Lucifer and his army of angels were cast out, the way to Paradise was shut forever. But the seven paths to the underworld remained open. These were the Paths of the Dead.

  In Rome, before Caligula was revealed as the Dark Prince, Michael, as Cassius, served as the emperor’s closest adviser. When Caligula found that one of the Paths of the Dead was anchored below the city of Lutetia, Cassius convinced him to let him forge a gate there to keep the demons at bay. Caligula stole the key from Cassius and, revealing his true nature as Lucifer, unleashed Abomination upon the world. The battle of Rome ensued. At the end, Agrippina and Valerius (Azrael and Abbadon) were able to coax Caligula to the newly forged gate, where Cassius (Michael) sent him to Hell, locking the gate behind him.

  After Rome, Michael ordered the Blue Bloods to locate the six other paths and build gates upon them to secure the divisions between the worlds and keep Earth safe from the creatures of the underworld. The guardians, keepers of the Gates of Hell, were known as the Order of the Seven, one from each of the seven original families of the Conclave. The guardians scattered across the earth, unknown to one another but passing down their knowledge through the generations.

  The guardians were to keep the gates secure, and the gates, imbued with the celestial power of the angels, were supposed to keep the world safe from the Prince of Darkness and the legions at his command. But with the growing number of Silver Blood attacks over the centuries, Lawrence suspected th
at somehow, the gates were failing and that Lucifer was plotting a way back from the underworld.

  Schuyler must now continue Lawrence’s search for the gates and their guardians before the Silver Bloods are able to destroy them all and bring about a second Great War. This is the Van Alen Legacy. Charles resented the Van Alen Legacy, displeased that Lawrence harbored deep doubts concerning the strength of the gates he forged centuries ago. The Gates of Hell must hold, or all the world will fall with their destruction.

  THE GATES OF HELL

  The Gates of Hell are located around the world, placed upon the seven paths to the underworld. The following are the three known gates so far:

  The Gate of Vengeance was Leviathan’s prison on Corcovado. Lawrence Van Alen was its gatekeeper. With his murder of an innocent (Dylan, in the guise of Lucifer), the gate was opened, but it was a solom bicallis, which can only be used once. Once Leviathan came through it, the path was closed to all.

  The Gate of Time was created during the reign of Caligula, who had discovered a path underneath the underground city of Lutetia (now located in present-day Paris). Lucifer and Leviathan assumed that Michael was its guardian. The Silver Bloods planned to open the gate by destroying its keeper. But when they released the subvertio, all they found was an intersection, which created a time vacuum. The true keeper of the Gate of Time is Kingsley Martin, who had moved the gate underneath the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City; an unfinished church, which meant it was not fully consecrated, and was a place of worship that a Silver Blood like Kingsley could enter.

  The third gate is known as The Gate of Promise. Lawrence, who left more than fifty-five notebooks with his Conduit, Anderson, believed its guardians are still in Florence.

  There are no other gates known to the Repository at this time.

  THE FALLEN BRETHREN:

  HOUSE OF THE MORNINGSTAR

  LUCIFER

  The Morningstar, Lightbringer, Prince of Heaven, Prince of Darkness, Archangel of the Dawn

  Known Past Lives: Gaius Caligula (Rome)

  Phosphorus Lucifer, leader of the Fallen, king of the Silver Bloods, was the Crown Prince of Heaven, the most beautiful and powerful of all the angels until he chose to challenge the Almighty in the War for the Heavenly Kingdom. Upon his defeat, he awoke on Earth to find himself a vampyre, among the cursed and expelled from Paradise. He refused to make peace with Michael and Gabrielle, the angels who vanquished him, or with Abbadon and Azrael, his greatest friends, who betrayed him at the last. Not much is known about the Dark Prince ever since he and his loyal followers severed their ties to the Coven sometime during the reign of Menes, in the kingdom of Egypt, when they rose up in rebellion. His last known interaction with the Blue Blood community came in the battle of Rome, when he was revealed as the mad emperor Caligula.

  It is said that in his true form, his presence is so bright it hurts to look directly at him. As Caligula, he was able to hide his true identity until Julia Livilla, the Pistis Sophia, discovered the truth. As Lucifer has been banished to the underworld since his defeat at the battle of Rome, the Repository is still unclear as to how, when, and where in history he fathered a child with Allegra. {INFORMATION REDACTED BY ORDER OF REGIS}

  Recovered from Bliss Llewellyn’s journal (unverified) is a decription of a man she called “the Visitor,” who appears as a handsome gentleman in a white suit with molten gold hair and clear blue eyes, whose beauty is remote and chilling, a description often attributed to the image of Lucifer by those who claim to have seen him in their dreams.

  Venator reports from the attack at St. John the Divine indicate that the Dark Prince battled Abbadon and Azrael in the glom, but was unable to escape the underworld, as Venator Martin released the subvertio and obliterated the path back to the living world.

  Current Status: Unknown. Presumed trapped in the underworld.

  LEVIATHAN

  The Giant, the Kraken, Goliath of the Glom

  Known Past Lives: Marcus Agrippa (Rome)

  Vesperus Leviathan, brother to the Dark Prince, was known as one of the cruelest Silver Bloods who ever walked the earth. He is partial to wearing dark cloaks and a hood that covers his face, described by those who have had the misfortune to see it as red and black, twisted, scarred, and burned from Hell’s flames.

  He was captured in {DATE REDACTED} by Gabrielle and imprisoned into the rock under Corcovado, the only place on Earth that could contain his power. Metraton (Lawrence Van Alen) was his gatekeeper and jailer, and Corcovado was put under twenty-four hour surveillance by the Venator elite.

  A crafty plan hatched by the traitor Silver Bloods of the Conclave, Nan Cutler and Forsyth Llewellyn, led Metraton to unknowingly destroy Leviathan’s prison bonds when he slaughtered an innocent (Dylan Ward, whose image had been manipulated to look like Lucifer’s). Reports from the European Coven indicate that Leviathan was in attendance at the Bal des Vampires, and those who survived the attack at St. John’s Cathedral testified that they witnessed Leviathan abduct Schuyler Van Alen before disappearing into the glom. Since Venator Martin released the subvertio, however, it is safe to assume that with the destruction of the path to the underworld, Leviathan is safely in Hell once again.

  Current Status: Missing. Believed to be trapped in the underworld.

  NAN CUTLER

  Harbonah, Angel of Annihilation

  Origin: February 12, 1917, New York, New York

  Known Past Lives: Anna Stamersly (Newport), Aemilia Lepida (Rome)

  The second-highest-ranking Blue Blood in the Coven, Nan Cutler served as Regent on the Conclave. She was notable for her loyalty, ferocity, and in this cycle, for a striking raven stripe through her white hair. As Aemilia Lepida, a trusted friend to Cassius (Michael) and Junia Tertia (Allegra), she was on the front lines in the battle in Rome.

  Warden Cutler was entrusted with the task of investigating young vampires for the mark of Silver Blood Corruption after the attack on the Repository. She affixed the false mark of Lucifer upon Mimi Force and cleared Bliss Llewellyn from suspicion. The Repository believes that Nan Cutler was the mastermind behind the slaughter of the Conclave in Rio.

  According to the Venator report, Mimi Force believed she had killed Warden Cutler in the battle. However, during their search for Jordan Llewellyn, the Venators came upon the Warden, who had survived the Black Fire and was now a living corpse. The Venators believe Warden Cutler had kidnapped Jordan Llewellyn on that fateful night and then posed as her grandmother, torturing her for information on the Order of the Seven, until she killed the girl (but not the spirit of the Watcher). According to Venator Martin, it is safe to assume that Warden Cutler is no longer with us.

  Current Status: Finished. Slain by Venator Martin.

  THE SEVEN RULING HOUSES

  OF THE CONCLAVE

  Blue Blood society is hierarchical and organized. The Conclave is the highest ruling body of the Coven. There are seven main houses that serve on the council as an homage to the seven original ruling families who founded it. Conclave members may also include Elders and Wardens who are not affiliated with any particular house but who have been nominated to serve by its current membership. However, the Code of the Vampires mandates that a representative from each of the seven houses is needed for a quorum of seven to pass changes to the Code of the Vampires and to call for a White Vote, the election of a new Regis.

  Domus Magnificat: House of Riches Traditionally the seat of the wealthiest family in the Coven, the House of Riches is currently represented by Josiah Rockefeller Archibald, whose family built Rockefeller Center. The House of Riches is responsible for the health of the Coven’s financial security. Other families who have held this position include the Schlumbergers and the Whitneys.

  Domus Stella Aquillo: House of the Northern Star The House of the Northern Star spearheads one of the biggest benefactors of art programs in the country, and is currently represented by Ambrose Barlow.

  Domus Veritas: House of the Venators Represen
ted by Abe Tompkins, the House of the Venators is the voice of the Truth Seekers on the council and responsible for the security and protection of the Coven. Other families who have held this position include the Van Horns.

  Domus Preposito: House of the Stewards The seat on the council traditionally awarded to the family of the Regent, the House of the Stewards was represented by Forsyth Llewellyn until his disgrace and disappearance, and before him by Nan Cutler. Other families who have held this position include the Stewart family, who derived their last name from having held this post for many centuries.

  Domus Domina: House of the Gray Lady, also known more commonly as the House of Records The position in the council that oversees the records of the cycles of Expression, Expulsion, and Evolution. Currently represented by Minerva Morgan, this seat was formerly filled by the Carondolet family.

  Domus Lamia: House of the Vampyres The House of the Vampyres oversees vampire–human relations, and its representative is also the head of the Conspiracy Subcommittee, which keeps the false myths and misleading legends about the Blue Bloods alive in Red Blood society. Currently represented by Seymour Corrigan, who is cousin to Edmund Oelrich, the Chief Warden who perished in the Rio massacre.

  Domus Fortis Valerius Incorruptus: House of the Pure Blood, of the Uncorrupted, of the Valiant and the Strong, Protector of the Garden, Commander of the Lord’s Armies The seat on the council given to the family of the reigning Regis, since the beginning of time the seat has been held by Michael and Gabrielle’s line; the Van Alen line is currently represented by Mimi Force since Charles Force’s disappearance.