‘It might have been nice if my father changed his name. That could have saved us some trouble.’
Even as the thought crossed my mind I knew it was ridiculous. I came from a family that had nobility dating back to the 13th-century. The Blackburn name carried a heavy weight to it. Along with expectations. My father wouldn’t dream of diverting his reputation away from the name. If anything, it might have helped with his career in Parliament.
I scanned more pages. The writing on each one morphed into new words every time I turned a page, allowing me to read its cursive script one word at a time as the letters revealed themselves to me. The one that caught my attention immediately and I took my time reading through was the long list of victims of the Dolch Erbe. Those who were suspected of being brutally sacrificed during their rituals in the forest of the Czech Republic and those who simply disappeared. The list appeared endless, going on and on for pages until they reached a stop some twenty pages through. My eyes lingered over each name for a few seconds, as though reading them each in my mind would give them the respect that they deserved after meeting such an untimely death.
Once I reached the end, I discovered that Margaux kept another list. One that wasn’t just reserved for the Dolch Erbe’s victims but those who fell prey to becoming members. The list included those who fell to the inner circle and those who joined as members willing to do the inner’s circle’s work. Included were witchlings, vampires, lycan, and even humans.
‘Were they actually loyal servants to them or slaves?’
The thought lingered in my mind for a few seconds before I saw the final name listed at the bottom of the page.
DIRK BLACKBURN?
‘Why did she write a question mark? Was she uncertain?’
Alexei said my brother lived with them. He even suggested that he had a crush on Margaux. Did she suspect from the start that his death wasn’t just a mugging? Were there signs? The same signs that Edward saw in Sybil’s behavior? Surely my father would share that information with her if they were working together to break the curse. Or maybe she was like me and she didn’t want to believe it right away.
The list of Dolch Erbe members was longer than I expected. But when she listed those she thought might have been in the inner circle once every century there was a common thread. Two people within the inner circle were always listed side by side. A male and a female.
‘Oh my god! She did it! Margaux made the same connection that I did!’
Margaux caught on that each century the grandmaster chose a set of twins to take for his newly acquired bodies. Only Margaux didn’t have my name listed next to Dirk’s. Maybe because I hadn’t been bitten yet? I held the Blackatter gene but I was still human. Until Devon found me. And that was after Dirk already fell prey to them.
‘I might be right. There’s more to this than anyone knows.’
The curse wasn’t just about bringing Blackatters together to mark their lines. It makes sure suitable twins are always born for the grandmaster to acquire.
I smirked when my mind went to the most obvious conclusion. My father didn’t tell Margaux about me until he had to. He didn’t want anyone else knowing that he had a daughter that could be preyed on. Only after I became a lycan did he probably confess it to Margaux. And soon after, she disappeared.
‘I have to get this notebook to Adeline. It has the proof she needs for her theory all listed out.’
I was ready to close the notebook until I saw a few more notes stuck into the back in a piece of loose-leaf paper. When I took them out I saw drawings along with some notes on the bottom. The markings on the pages were recognizable in an instant. They were the same brands my brother and Devon had on their bodies at the ritual. There was the symbol of the Dolch Erbe along with many others. Margaux’s notes even gave names to the various symbols along with theories on what each meant. From what I could gather, they were signs of the devotionals they gave to the Dolch Erbe’s cause. There was a brand for murdering a lycan, one for murdering a human sympathetic to the lycanthrope, and even one more sacrificing a lycan in a ritual. They were spelled with magic to appear on one’s body once they did the bidding of the grandmaster.
‘The Vontex and Dolch Erbe have that in common.’
None of that particularly struck me given I had seen most of the brands already. But one note along the bottom of a page did catch my attention. It explained in a few words the way the brands were often formed. They wouldn’t show up right away. The process was slow, often appearing as a black smudge like an ink stain on the skin and forming the symbol after a matter of weeks.
I sat back in my chair and reached for my heart, feeling it beat a little faster with each breath I took.
‘Alina had ink stains on her skin. She’s been studying the Dolch Erbe for years.’
I shook my head. It wasn’t something I wanted to consider. And yet, part of me knew the pieces fell together in a way that was too convenient to be ignored.
Edward described how Sybil gradually fell away. She disappeared for days on end, she had markings on her body, and she was irritable with him. Her entire personality seemed to change, just like Alina’s had.
I peered back over to Alina’s perfectly made bed. It didn’t appear as though she had slept in it for days. And I rarely saw her outside of the classroom anymore.
‘Does Lothar suspect it too? He said he was covering for her. Would he listen if I tried to tell him?’
I tucked the notes back inside the back flap of the notebook and let the writing slowly dissolve and disappear. Then I shut it and tucked it away into my desk only to pull out another notebook. The one Adeline gave me.
I took out a fountain pen from the desk’s drawer and began writing.
“Adeline,
Please let me know when you’re available again. I have something in my possession that you need to see. I think it will provide many of the answers you’ve been searching for.”
I waited for the ink to fade into the page. It quickly did so but there was no reply.
‘She must be busy. I’ll hear from her soon.’
I was ready to scoot the chair out and get ready for bed when a small detail in Margaux’s notebook re-entered my mind. The twins born each century on her list of Dolch Erbe members had corresponding dates.
I pulled out Margaux’s notebook once more, spread my magic over the page, and skimmed through the pages again to make sure.
Beside each member of the Dolch Erbe’s inner circle were the names along with their birth and death.
All the twins that succumbed to the Dolch Erbe died on the same day.
‘The grandmaster makes the link every single time so they’ll die together.’
It didn’t take a genius to figure out why. If one died or the other was captured, the secrets of the Dolch Erbe and how they’re reborn would die with them. No amount of torture would expose them. All they had to do was have one of them die and they could wait until they had a newly acquired set of twins to possess.
A lump formed at the back of my throat. The link between my brother and I meant more than just dying together. It meant the grandmaster wouldn’t stop. He would continue hunting me so his sister’s spirit could inhabit my body. If she took hold of my mind and continued pretending to be me, it would cause great destruction to the academy and the Vontex. I knew things. The location of the hidden realm, the weapons the Vontex used, and so much more.
‘He won’t stop until he has me.’
And worse yet, he might have been using Alina to get to me.
Was that why she befriended me so quickly? Would the others have known right away?
I didn’t want it to be true. Just like how I didn’t want my brother’s fate to be true. Even so, I learned one solid truth since being at the academy. The truth didn’t care what I wanted. And if I ignored the truth right in front of me for too long I might end up dead.
13
Alina never came home and I didn’t bother continuing to check for her. The
only thing I had on my mind was telling Lothar about the black stains I saw on her skin and asking him if he thought the signs held up. Did he notice the same things? Would he stick to their story about it being ink? Or did he secretly suspect the worst? Would he snap at me for suggesting that his former girlfriend and fellow member of the Northern Vontex could have something so terrible happen?
I wouldn’t know unless I asked him.
I shifted the silver box into my forearm, making it one with my body and hiding it from plain sight. Then I pulled on my trench coat and headed out into the night, making sure to keep to the shadows as I walked out of the fortress to meet the Vontex on the other side of the bridge. The only problem I ran into was the guards. They usually stepped aside and lowered their weapons when I approached. Not this time. Word of me no longer having permission to join the Vontex must have reached them because their swords came down to cross one another the second I got close. I stood there in a state of shock as the sharp blades clashed before me, making sure I could go no further.
“I wouldn’t do that, mate,” a familiar voice said from behind. Jake must have been running a touch late because he appeared behind me and approached the guards. “This one has special permission from Ellinor Prescott. Unless you want to take it up with the vixra personally.”
“We follow Dean Everleigh’s orders,” one guard said harshly. His silver armor glistened in the moonlight, shining light right into my eyes.
“Are you openly confessing that you don’t adhere to vixra authority over this realm?” Jake defended me. “I don’t think that will go over well with the vixra council. I’m not above reporting it to them directly.”
“The Prescott family might have authority over the realm but Dean Everleigh’s word rules the academy.”
Jake’s face twisted into a smile. A sign that he was up to no good. He cleared his throat and brought his arm up to usher me backward. “You heard the guard, Riley. This man follows the Dean’s orders over the vixra.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I roared, not quite believing that he was going to take their side as he pushed me away.
Jake dug into his pocket and took out a black dusty substance that looked like gun powder.
‘Oh no, not again!’
It was the same powder Lothar used on me after I first shifted and was tossed into the back of the Vontex’s SUV.
Jake blew the powder out of his hand. I thought he would aim it at me and then cart me back to my room. He didn’t. He blew it right at the guards and blinded them.
“Better hurry,” he urged me as they let out a growl and their swords started slashing at the air, trying to find fresh bodies as they shrieked.
“Can they find us?” I asked.
“They’re lycan, of course they can. Their sense of smell alone can track us.”
Jake reached for the collar of my trench coat and pulled me along. I threw my crowning magic out of my hand and surrounded us with it. It was the only thing I could think of to prevent the guards from getting lucky and swiping down their blades in the right direction. One hit true and struck down at my magic. The second his blade collided with the scarlet light the guard went flying into the stone wall of the fortress and crashed down to the ground. The other one tripped over him and lost his sword. It went tumbling away in the grass several yards away.
“Shift!” Jake yelled at me.
I did as he said and shifted as I was running. A new thing for me and one that I instantly took a liking to. My speed went from a human level to darting across the path to the bridge in a matter of seconds. I only looked back once we reached the other side of the bridge.
I grabbed a hold of a beam cascading down the bridge’s height and shifted back into my human form. The guards were still fumbling around blind and striking down their swords at the blades of grass.
“Great guards we have protecting us,” I mumbled as Jake yanked me away from the bridge and towed me along. I never even saw or heard him unshift, making me wonder how long he had been a lycan. I could usually hear the movement of muscles and bones when another lycan took their shifter form. He was nearly silent.
‘Jake might be a wanker but he’s skilled.’
“The guards here are usually the students who graduate at the bottom of the class. Trust me, we’re not dependent on them. The fortress is protected by magic more so than their dedication.”
He pulled me away from the bridge and toward the forest before we could get to the Vontex’s usual meeting place.
“What are you doing?” I asked as he took my arm into his hand and ushered me along.
“What Lothar ordered.”
“And what’s that? Disposing of me in the woods?”
“You’re far too pretty to meet such a dire end,” he said with a triumphant smile.
Once we were shaded by the forest’s trees Jake reached inside the breast pocket of his trench coat. He pulled out a small piece of paper with a single red droplet on it.
“You’re giving me vixra blood?” I asked him.
“No. Lothar is. Adeline gave him a fresh supply.”
“Why isn’t Lothar giving it to me?”
“Because he doesn’t want Alina knowing he’s giving it to you and me but not her. He expects you to keep it a secret. She doesn’t know he has a fresh supply. As far as she’s concerned we’re nearly out. Got it?”
I took the small piece of paper from his hand. “Got it. But why?”
‘He has to know something too! Or at least he suspects. It’s not just me.’
Jake looked away and gave an uncomfortable shrug of his shoulders. “She’s been off lately. The last thing she needs if she’s off her game is to have powerful magic inside her system. It could make things go badly. So if she asks, only Lothar has it and he needs what’s left to open the vixra tunnel so we can leave and get back.”
‘So that’s why you stayed behind. Not just for the guards but to give me vixra blood without Alina knowing.’
“We’re taking the vixra tunnels tonight?” I asked, figuring it would just be another night of hunting freshly bitten werewolves. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere I think you’ll recognize. Lothar tells me you’re from a town near Bakewell.”
‘Oh lord. We’re actually going to do it. We’re hunting down Margaux tonight. No wonder Lothar wants vixra blood in my system.’
“Lothar said Margaux was spotted there.”
“Go on,” he said. “Swallow.”
I shot him an annoyed glare. He had a way of making that sentence sound disgustingly perverse.
I placed the piece of paper on my tongue and felt it slowly dissolve. The rush of energy through my limbs tightened my muscles then released them, giving my entire body a feeling of euphoria.
‘I can easily see how people could get addicted to this.’
My magic tingled inside my skin. It moved inside me, rushing along my veins with my blood and pulsating through my skin. I was confident and ready. A feeling I only ever got when I was on stage with a guitar in my hands.
“Ready?” he asked, offering me his arm to loop mine around his.
“Yes and no,” I said, walking out of the forest and refusing to take his arm in mine.
“Fine, be that way. You know you steal glances of this when you think I’m not looking.” He motioned to his body as though he was showing off a bodybuilding physique that girls longed to touch.
“You wish, Jake!”
“Because you only have eyes for someone else?”
I didn’t look back and I refused to answer him. Mostly because I didn’t know who he was referring to. Rodrick or Lothar.
“Oh, come on,” he said, catching up with me as I walked down the dirt road with a determination I only ever felt when trying to get away from Devon in the train station. “Rodrick covered you up with his scent for one reason. He wants Lothar backing off his territory.”
I shoved both my hands into his side and thrust him away from me. The vixra
blood must have been working in my system because he not only backed off, he fell to his rear.
“I’m no man’s territory!” I shouted down at him. “Don’t speak to me like that!”
‘Besides, Rodrick already admitted he did it to motivate Lothar. He wants me off his hands.’
Jake tossed up his hands as though he was surrendering to me. “Whatever you say, sweetheart.” The ridiculous perverted smile graced his face once more, reminding me not to take him too seriously.
“Get moving, you two!” Lothar shouted from down the dirt road. “We don’t have all night to listen to your banter.”
‘Shit! Lothar heard all that.’
I didn’t wait for Jake to get up. I walked down the road as he hurried back up to his feet and followed along behind me. It didn’t take a wild imagination to know he was staring at my backside.
‘This isn’t for you and it never will be.’
And thank god for that. If it wasn’t for Jake’s less than gentlemanly-like conduct I might have fallen prey to him when I first arrived. Just like every other male lycan that set my insides on fire when I was still a werewolf trying to pass the trials.
Lothar and Alina stood side by side, not speaking and obviously not thrilled with one another. They looked as if they just had a heated argument. On any other day, I might have asked what the hell Lothar said to piss her off. This time, I wasn’t sure Lothar was the problem.
Alina still looked tired. Her head drooped, the circles under her eyes were darker, and her hair was tied back in a messy bun that didn’t suit her. She didn’t take the usual time she enjoyed to get ready and make herself presentable before going out.
I was half-relieved to see her and a bit irritated. If she was here, that meant she wasn’t thwarting her duties. But that also meant I couldn’t talk freely to Lothar about my concerns.
Rescind: (Lycan Academy of Shapeshifting: Operation Shift, Book 4) Page 12
