Descendants

by Rae Else

  ‘It’s alright, I heard.’

  Had he heard everything? She felt a surge of relief that he knew she wasn’t entirely to blame, that the Order had known about Anna’s deception before El had needed rescuing. He knew that if it wasn’t for the full power they had foreseen her possessing, then she’d be dead too.

  She squirmed, wondering if he’d picked up on her jealous tone earlier too, when she’d asked if he’d lived with her mum and Alex. She skimmed his face. This mysterious man, who was part of her mum and Alex’s family – and by extension hers. When she’d been young, she’d wished her mum had been around, wished that she’d had a dad, as well as brothers and sisters.

  ‘Nosy,’ she said.

  The hint of a smile crept into the corners of his lips but almost immediately disappeared. ‘So … about competing in next week’s arena…’

  El held her breath. She wondered if he was about to start again: tell her what a coward she was, how she only cared about herself.

  ‘I’ll train you,’ he said. ‘But it’s going to be tough. You’ll need the week to get ready.’

  She nodded. ‘And in return?’ she asked, sensing that there was more he wanted than for her just to agree to stay a week.

  He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. ‘For a long time the Opposition has sought to take out the Triad – the one thing we were unable to know was where they would be, all together, and when. So, it’s simple really, you compete in the first arena in six days’ time – on Friday. Matches are scheduled on Saturdays too so all being well, you will qualify for the second arena the same weekend; when you do reach the final arena, the Opposition will infiltrate the Olympia and take out the Triad.’

  El shook her head confusedly. ‘Wait a minute. How do you know that the Triad will even be there at my final match?’

  ‘Because they won’t want to miss it. They wouldn’t want to miss seeing you come into the full power.’ His dark eyes held her for a moment and then flicked to the firepit. ‘As far as I know your grandma is the only other serpent in living memory to have possessed that power. The Triad will be there.’

  The magnitude of his words settled on her. Is this what had always been awaiting her she wondered. She’d always known she was cursed, capable of wounding those around her, but the graeae had foreseen her kill. Is that what she was destined to do?

  Dan’s strong voice interrupted her train of thought. ‘The Opposition can take care of the rest. We’ll be able to infiltrate the Olympia once you’ve got through the first two arenas. It doesn’t matter if it takes weeks or months for you to pass them, the point is that when you get to the final arena, the Triad will be there, and so will we.’

  El frowned. ‘But how can you infiltrate the Olympia? I thought that only those recruits whose blood was drawn into the kerykeion could get in?’

  ‘You’re right. We need to have a kerykeion marked on the building – one that contains Opposition blood. I’ve got a contact who will see to that.’

  She could feel his impatient eyes glued on her. The same zealous light burnt in them as had last night, when he’d spoken about attacking the Order.

  Footsteps roused her from her thoughts and Alex came out of the flat, a frown on his face and a cup of coffee in hand. ‘Dan, you haven’t mentioned that it isn’t the veiling alone that is the only obstacle to infiltrating the Olympia. It’s impervious to attack and entry because the kerykeion have another type of blood in the mixture. It’s what makes the building invisible to arete until they are incorporated into the veiling.’

  El remembered the arete in the catacombs whispering about the Olympia.

  ‘As well as that,’ Alex continued. ‘To enter the final arena, this same blood must be in your system.’

  El looked at Alex questioningly. ‘And what is this blood?’

  ‘It’s something Anna managed to procure for the Opposition,’ Dan said quickly. ‘Empousa blood. The same thing the Order used to heal you last night.’

  Alex sighed loudly and sat down on the couch next to El. ‘Of course, it’s entirely up to you if you choose not to do any of this, El. I can keep a high dosage of graeae blood in your system to conceal you.’

  She shook her head. She had her doubts and concerns, but she already knew that she had to go to the Olympia. Her grandma was there. Dan’s plan of having the Opposition attack and take out the Triad was the best plan that she could hope for.

  ‘No, I need to do this,’ she said.

  Alex frowned. She imagined it was difficult for him to see her agreeing to oppose the Triad after Anna had tried to protect her from it, and after he’d lost Anna to them.

  ‘I’m sure mum would understand,’ she said gently.

  Alex’s eyes grazed her and he seemed to struggle with what to say. He looked at Dan and his expression settled into one of exasperation. ‘You’re right – she would.’ He got up and went inside.

  El stared after him.

  ‘Give him time,’ Dan said quietly.

  El nodded, her eyes slipping to the fire.

  Moments later, Alex issued back out onto the terrace. He presented El with a book. Its pages were thin and tissue-like. She reckoned it had been printed in the latter part of the 19th century; her granddad had been fond of collecting old editions. Dan watched from his chair, his eyes suspicious.

  ‘This is an empousa,’ Alex said, showing the page to her. He traced his finger over the words as he read aloud. ‘“Empousa blood rejuvenates damaged tissue. It accelerates cell replication at such a rate that damage which should take months to repair, or even that which is classed as irreparable, heals within minutes.”’

  ‘Do you know what they are?’ El said.

  Alex nodded. ‘They’re near enough a legend amongst arete, as they are amongst humans. The more modern word is vampire.’

  El’s gaze leapt to Dan, but he looked unsurprised.

  ‘Only the most senior Order members,’ Alex said, ‘can confirm their existence. In the Victorian era, when this book was published, more arete knew of them.’ He tapped the thin pages. ‘Arete writers like Byron and Stoker appropriated facts about them for their stories. So, the restorative, life-prolonging and hypnotic properties of empousa blood are some arete truths that have found their way into human culture, in the guise of fiction.

  ‘I know,’ Alex said, observing her wide eyes, ‘but seeing is believing. And you were privy last night to its effect first hand.’

  El, still speechless, merely nodded at the thought that there was another arete with such miraculous power. But thinking about all the incredible things she’d experienced in this world: serpent blood that altered human perception and graeae blood that shielded one’s power, it wasn’t that much of a leap to imagine that there was an arete whose blood could repair tissue. Her throat dried as she remembered that the liquid she’d been fed in the catacombs was this arete’s blood. Empousa blood. Vampire blood.

  ‘I’m not going to grow fangs, am I?’ she asked.

  Alex smiled. ‘Those are embellishments. No, the blood has no long-lasting effects. The empousa cells remain in one’s system for up to twenty-four hours. In that time, the cells will help repair damaged tissue. If one were to receive a minor wound shortly after being given a few drops of empousa blood, the tissue would repair itself. However, one would need a high dosage to heal arterial bleeding or organ damage.’

  El nodded. She remembered the thick liquid in her mouth. She’d almost choked on the substance but swallowed reflexively every time they had given her another mouthful. She must have had a lot to repair the severed arteries in her wrists.

  ‘Have you tested the blood on diseased human cells?’ she asked.

  A thin smile swept across Alex’s face. ‘No, I haven’t had a chance yet, but I’m sure the results will be positive.’

  ‘Well that’s good, isn’t it?’ She smiled, thinking of how passionately Alex had talked about arete molecular biology being the key to curing h
uman illness and disease. He’d found it.

  Dan was nodding. ‘It is. And the Opposition has a real chance now – having empousa blood and knowing where the Triad will be at a specific time. We can infiltrate the Olympia and annihilate them. If we can do that, it’ll show arete worldwide that the Order isn’t indestructible.’

  A cold chill ran down El’s spine as Dan’s far off look made her think of the graeae’s milky eyes. She forced back the sense of disaster. He was right. It was the best chance she had of freeing her grandma. Now, all she had to do was make sure that the next time she stood before Louisa and the Triad, she wouldn’t go down without a fight.

  - Chapter Eighteen -

  Dark Eyes

  The first day of her training passed in a blur of fire and smoke. El learnt to manipulate her element after just a few attempts. The power was like a coiled spring wrapped in her core. It was the one that leapt out when she influenced humans – the one she’d spent years trying to extinguish.

  The first time she willed that energy and heat to rise, the tiny flames that answered seemed deceptive, as though despite their size they would consume the whole world. As this sense ate at her, she tried to smother it, but instead lost control. The fire grew and flew towards her. She dived to the terrace floor and buried her head in the crook of her arm. On looking up they were gone. Dan reminded her that breaking eye contact with the flames extinguished them. Managing the fear of her power and mastering her emotions was enough to occupy their initial training session.

  Over the course of the day, work progressed inside the apartment too. Lots of arete came and went; Opposition members who had been drafted in to help redecorate. They ripped out the kitchen, the couches and the rest of the furniture from the open plan living room. A varnish was applied to the walls, ceiling and floor of the area: the gloss contained a dose of empousa blood. The arete tested their handiwork and attempted to ignite the floorboards, to crumble the plaster work of the ceiling and walls, and to break and dissolve the glass. However, none of the surfaces could be altered either by force, or through elemental manipulation.

  When El and Dan came in after their first day’s training on the terrace, the open plan area had been transformed. A mound of boulders was heaped in the centre of the room, within which a fire roared. A channel of water wound around the outskirts of the room. El recognised a resemblance to the platform and pits of elements contained in the catacombs.

  This was her practice arena. She was told that the first and second arenas at the Olympia had the addition of trenches. In the initial few training sessions they improvised by coating the sofas with a protective layer of empousa blood and placing them intermittently about the room. On the first day, Dan and El practised alone and only for a few hours at a time. During the working week, their presence would be well camouflaged by the influx of arete workers, but with only arete residents in the area at the weekend, they had to be cautious and took a dose of graeae blood every hour.

  After a couple of days, they established a routine, training from early morning until late evening. A variety of arete joined them over the course of the week; Dan wanted to ensure that El had practice fighting arete of all elements. At the end of each evening they were dirty, tired, and ached all over. Nevertheless, they spent the first hour tidying up in order to make the space habitable once again.

  As they’d demolished the kitchen, Alex ordered takeout every night. Over dinner, Dan and El would debrief on the day’s session, and whatever Opposition members were around joined them. There was talk about what would be needed to coordinate the attack which, if El won the matches in both arenas this weekend, could happen as early as next weekend. They reckoned they could muster a force of a hundred Opposition members. Alex had already started scheduling appointments at the lab and taken blood donations from members. Their blood would be mixed with that of empousa, ready for Dan to use in marking kerykeion, once he was in.

  Each night, El was also eager to hear of any news the Opposition brought about her grandma. They had picked up a few rumours from contacts who had entered the Olympia at the weekend. There was hushed gossip about a serpent with the full power. They couldn’t be sure whether the talk was about El though, or about her grandma. Either way, everyone thought it likely that Helena was being held there.

  Adam and Tia often visited the penthouse. Although their elemental abilities weren’t strong enough to be of use in the training sessions, their company and the way they organised the evenings was like a breath of fresh air. Tia never failed to bring an exotic plant with her each night. By the end of the week they had eaten under coconut, banana and palm trees. Adam too made sure that they had a sandy beach-like floor to sit on every evening. With the fire in the middle and the exotic topiary, it felt like they’d been transported to a tropical island.

  El was so exhausted by the time everyone left that sleep should have come easily, but she tossed and turned due to the ache in her leg. The injury had healed – a lot more than it would have if it hadn’t been for the infusion of empousa blood in her system when she’d received it – but it was still painful. She’d wanted to ask Alex for another dose of empousa blood, but Dan said that they couldn’t afford to spare any as every drop was valuable and needed for the Opposition’s infiltration of Olympia. As well as the pains, El’s growing fear of the approaching matches meant that sleep grew ever more elusive. Whenever she did drift off, she invariably woke in a cold sweat, having escaped a nightmare.

  The first night that she woke screaming, she found Dan at her bedroom door. On rising the other nights, he was already sitting in the hallway, where there was a sofa and desk. He was a light sleeper and her shouts roused him first.

  He didn’t ask about the nightmares and she didn’t bring them up. Instead, they fell to examining the bookcase that spanned the wall above the desk. Its floor to ceiling shelves ran along one wall of the flat. Soon El discovered that they harboured not just books, but a treasure trove of objects. She recognised a few crude attempts at pots, cups and a mask that she had made when she was little – not relegated to the attic or chucked out as she’d thought, but sent to and stowed away by her mum. Dan critiqued her pottery skills and decided she wasn’t destined to be an artist.

  Over the next few nights, El asked about some of the pictures and objects. The black skeletal dragon was from Krakow – the sinewy bronze sculpture a replica of the life-sized version on the Vistula River. Dan was in a photo before the full-scale one, its seven heads dominating its body, more snake-like than dragon.

  El teased him about the kerykeion scrawled across all these items that he’d sent from Europe to Anna. His lame explanation was that he hadn’t trusted the postal service. By the end of the week they’d examined most of the objects about the place. She was quick to put away a beautiful, Venetian mask. Its watery motif so suited her mum that it instantly recalled the sensation of her eyes. The blue and gold colouring evoked their exact shade too.

  The photos interested El the most. In the majority, Dan was alone, standing before different sculptures and street art. In one he was in front of a pair of giant eyes painted on a wall in Paris. He couldn’t be more than twelve – tall and awkward looking, amidst a few slim trees lining the bank of the Seine. Even though the photograph itself was unmoving and showed that there had been no kerykeion or serpent blood involved in its development, the eyes conjured to mind the All-Seeing Eye. It was clear also, not just from this image, but in all of them that wherever he was, thoughts of the Order were never far away.

  On waking on Thursday night, El found the hallway empty. Turning the desk light on, she took down a photo from the shelf and sat on the sofa. In this one, Dan was only marginally younger than he was now. He hadn’t quite gained the width of jaw and chest but otherwise looked much the same. He stood before a pale face painted on brickwork, its eyes closed. The photo had been taken some distance from him, and the reflection of the painted face was mirrored in the surface of the water by whic
h he stood. Once more he’d sought out artwork that was evocative of his and Anna’s fight against the Order.

  El took time studying the image in a way she hadn’t had the chance to do yet with Dan present. He’d already mastered the brooding look he seemed to favour. There was something vulnerable about him, sandwiched between the white face and its reflection. Despite being tall, the dark boy was dwarfed by the artwork. He looked lost, like he was in danger of being engulfed by the murky waters of the river. El felt like she wanted to hug him. She saw that this picture didn’t bear any kerykeion.

  ‘That one’s from Rome,’ Dan said as he came out onto the landing. He slumped into the desk chair.

  She hastily lay the photo in her lap, her cheeks burning. She scolded herself. It’s not like he could tell what she’d been thinking.

  ‘Why did you really put the kerykeion on the others you sent back?’ she asked, looking up at the bookcase.

  ‘I told you.’ He rubbed sleep from his eyes. ‘You can’t trust the postal service.’

  Her eyes fastened onto him. She didn’t know why she was pushing it, but talking about him all week had become a welcome distraction from her own thoughts.

  ‘I don’t buy it,’ she said. ‘You marked ordinary objects and pictures with kerykeion when there was nothing to hide.’

  His eyes took on the hardness of burning coals. ‘I didn’t trust any humans. My adoptive parents were human. When my powers first manifested, I was always influencing people to do things: give me things, explain things they never naturally would have. It terrified them. They were religious too. I think they thought I was the devil or something.’ He smirked, but the look in his eyes was serious. ‘And then the Order … well, your mum … intervened.’

  A chill swept through her at the thought of what Anna must have rescued him from. They weren’t on familiar ground any more. The object in El’s hands wasn’t a shield for her to hide behind either. And the man who had only offered her small talk when not training, had given her more. The semblance of routine that they’d built over the week was disturbed. She could pick up something else, stick to discussing places and travels or …