by HR Moore
*****
Anita had reached the castle at the same time as Marcus arrived back from Empire. She’d suggested they take a walk to the cliff where they’d danced before the ball. They’d made up, neither one really apologising and neither one adapting their point of view; Anita thought he’d be suspicious if she had. They accepted that their opinions differed on this subject, which would inevitably happen from time to time, so they agreed to draw a line under it and move on.
For a few days after that their relationship had been tense, but that wore off and it soon went back to how it had been before. Regrettably, there now seemed to be a silent agreement between them that Anita would no longer see Alexander, although that made her feel even more guilty about him. She hadn’t seen him, apart from bumping into him outside the Temples, since they’d got back from Kingdom. She’d been avoiding him as she didn’t know what to say, and now she was working for the Institution, it wasn’t the best time for Marcus to have something to be jealous of. She put off arranging any more Spirit lessons and spent more and more time with Marcus instead.
Marcus seemed to relax a little when he realised Anita wasn’t seeing Alexander any longer and their relationship strengthened as a result, however, he was also becoming more controlling as the days went by. He wanted to know where Anita was going and who she was seeing, and he tried to go with her practically everywhere she went. The only saving grace was that she could go to work at the Observatory, which gave her some much needed space. However, even this was unpleasant for a while, Bas appalled that she was still with Marcus. Luckily, Bas couldn’t stay mad with Anita for very long, his distain wearing off after a couple of weeks, but Anita found herself on the roof, lying on the largest energy receiver (who cared about the readings, there was still no improvement), much more often than usual. She needed time to consider what she was doing, whilst enjoying some coveted time by herself.
The quest to find Austin’s brass cylinder was going in much the same way as the quest to find the one in her head had; nowhere. There were no clues anywhere and Marcus didn’t let her near Austin and Amber, or any of the security guards, for her to be able to probe them for information. She’d seen a guard emerge from an invisible door in the panelling under the stairs one day. This had taken her by surprise, but that the castle stretched down into the ground wasn’t in itself surprising or suspicious, much to her disappointment. Although it wouldn’t be remarkable if that were where Austin kept his secrets, with nothing more than that to go on, Anita was not doing very well so far.
To compound her problems, Marcus now wanted to meditate with her as well. He kept harping on about how she’d meditated with Alexander, so it was only fair that he should be allowed to meditate with her too. She kept putting it off, but knew that would only fly for so long without him becoming suspicious. The problem was, she worried they might accidently find the cylinder in her head. What would happen then? She needed advice from Alexander before they meditated, but Marcus barely ever left her side, so she was finding it tricky to think of a way to get some time alone with him, without Marcus knowing. Eventually, Cleo saved the day.
Anita had been skirting around the issue of the possessive Marcus on one of her rare evenings out without him, when Cleo had mentioned that Marcus was spending a lot of time in the Archives when Anita was at the Observatory. She had no idea what he was doing there, as she only ever saw him coming and going, and was wondering if Anita knew. She’d replied honestly, saying she had no idea, although it did seem a bit strange, then had changed the subject to see if Cleo had found anything interesting in her research; she was looking into the relic discovery and the reaction of the Descendants, but hadn’t yet found anything. This wasn’t surprising given the Descendants controlled the Archives, but she was sure it was only a matter of time until something cropped up.