The Heart Collector (Under Editing)

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Genealogy

Fare swallowed hard. She stared at the first page. Written in bold black ink was 'Blackglade'. She traced an index finger over the writing. Judging by the appearance of the book and its pages, someone had taken good care of it. The leather showed some signs of age and the spine looked like it was patched up recently. She had a hunch what information the book held but she hesitated to turn to the next page. She eventually took a deep breath and flipped. The next page was the start of a very intricate genealogy chart. She expected not to recognize any names on the first page, but at the head was one she was surprised to see: Faina Blackglade. Fare thought to herself that there was no way for it to be the Lady Faina that the statues are built in honor of, but she knew deep down that it was her. She ran a finger over the name. She wondered how Lady Faina fit into all of this and here was the answer.

Fare looked to the left of her name and saw that she was married to Brayan Blackglade. It looked like that they had two children. One was a girl, Ailsa, but the other she could not make out because it was blacked out with a blob of ink. She scanned down the rest of the first page and a few others to see if any other names were blacked out, but she discovered that after the third page it looked like a diary began. She flipped back to the first page.

"Why is it only the one name blacked out?" She said aloud.

She followed the tree looking for her name and she found it at the end of the third page. Her mother's name was Kenna Blackglade and her father was Lei Waylon. She was a descendant of Ailsa, but one thing she could not understand was why the women in the family did not take their husbands' last name. In several instances, she noticed that the male spouses kept their names or changed them to Blackglade. Did the name hold some sort of meaning? If so, how come it was hard to find any information in regards to it? She flipped a page to turn her attention to the first diary entry. The handwriting was gorgeous, but due to the cursive Fare could not make out the whole context of the page. Under normal circumstances, she could read cursive, but whomever wrote it must have been in a rush. Several of the 'o's looked like 'e's and the 's's looked like 'r's. There were barely enough legible context clues for her to make out that it was about someone named Calder. The entry continued on for three more pages before it ended midsentence. The last word trailed off onto a line like someone jerked the pen suddenly. She could not say for certain, but the word looked like 'Medusa'.

Fare felt like pulling her hair out. She felt as if every new information that she stubbles upon leaves her more confused. She pulled the desk chair out and sat down. After she dwelled on it a little more, a thought came into her head. What if the name blotted out was Calder Blackglade? She turned back to the first page and realized that the name blotted had no names associated with it. They never married or had children. She flipped back to the first page of the entry and made out the year: 1821. That was around the time the Fae laws and treaties were first established with the humans. She leaned back in the chair. Now that she thought about it, she believed that the legend of the Heart Collector surfaced around then as well. Is it possible that she was related to the current Heart Collector? If so, was the ability passed down by bloodline? Fare has never been able to use that ability, but she has never thought to try either. It was already rare for a Fae to have two abilities. It was unheard of for a Fae to have three. While Fare had never heard of a Fae with three, that did not mean that there was not Fae out there with them.

She looked at her hands and could not help but wonder if she had another ability. She already was cursed with an ability she was afraid of and one that she had to admit that came in handy from time to time. She did not know how she would take another one. Fare shook her head in attempt to clear it. She was getting ahead of herself. At the moment, it was only speculation, but it was speculation with some evidence. She looked at the book and secretly wished she never opened it. She cursed her curiosity as she slammed the book shut. A chuckle came from the entrance to the cave that caused her to look in its direction. The Fae was leaned against one side smiling. The chair scrapped against the ground when Fare went to stand.