The Vixen & the Fox II

Chapter 287

Beginning of the school year sucked; that was all Vincent was going to say about it because good Lord he could not find half his records. More disturbing was the fact he was relatively certain someone had gone through his files, but he was thinking it was Dominic, given that they had welcomed a rat into the Skulk. Fool thought himself to be a fox in the hen house, but this was a den of foxes.

A light rapping on his door had him flicking his fingers so it jolted open.

"Oui?" he asked without looking up to see who was here. He was looking for the file he had on Anna-Marie Tarjan, it was missing; which was vexing as the young woman was one of the future Harvest Girls, who had been expressing behavioral problems. Perhaps, perhaps it was not Dominic who had taken Ana-Marie's file, but rather Cami, she did have access to the records, but she mostly returned everything or read it here... No, it had to be Dominic.

"We need to talk, privately," Davina's voice sounded and Vincent looked up to see Davina and Freya there. He gestured for them to walk in and he flicked the door shut behind them. He saw Davina casting a silencing spell while Freya was activating barrier runes.

"What is this..." he started.

"Dominic's from Iceland," Davina stated bluntly.

"Yes, we didn't hide that Davina," Vincent pointed out patiently.

"No, I just... eight years ago, when I first brought Inadu to you," Davina started.

Now Vincent stilled as he looked at her. "The Rite of Nine," he started.

"Yeah, I don't know why, but this is looping in my head, something about runes and the Rite of Nine."

"It was... Big You, I was working with Big You, it was the first time I worked with you, either you, Davina," Vincent admitted. Now Davina sat down and Freya tilted her head curiously. "Davina's time travelling soul, you two shared the body, and you worked well together, I never... I thought you remembered the Rite of Nine."

"Vaguely," Davina confessed. "What do you remember about the Rite of Nine, I remember how we undid it, but I, Little Me, helped with that, but I don't remember finding the kids."

Vincent nodded as he rubbed his hand over his mouth and paced a bit. "I remember everything about it..."

"Start when you and I were hunting for the kids," Davina prompted.

"Okay, it was my second day of knowing you, either you, again, and Kol was hunting Travelers, but you had swayed me to work with you by promising to undo what Eva had done," Vincent said softly.

"I don't understand, who is Eva and what did she do?"

"Eva Sinclair, a witch of the Tremé Coven and my ex-wife," he said for Freya. "You were in the coffin, this was about when we found you, just before we woke you."

"Oh," she nodded.

"So, in 2010, starting around September children were disappearing from Covens, Lou-Ann Hughes was the first, she was the first, from the Westbank Coven, then Amilie Dupree of the Garden District Coven, then Raymond LeBeau from Gentilly Coven, then Nicholas Alseis from the Tremé Coven. There was Emil Tran too, from the Ninth Ward, nephew of Kara Nguyen. Finally there was Nicholas Alseis from Algiers Coven and Louis LeBlanc of the Lakeview Coven. The children were taken from September to January, initially the Covens thought it was vampires; Marcellus was no friend of the witches and he had made it damn near impossible to practice in New Orleans, Ancestors were unhappy, and we wouldn't put it past him to snatch children to torture us.

"In January, just before the Harvest actually I found out Eva was responsible, she got caught attempting to abduct Mustafa Carbonneau. I had arranged her capture, I had started to suspect Eva was dabbling in Black Magic, and for as dark as we were willing to go we never crossed the line, but she started getting... secretive, and closed off, she'd disappear at all hours, or she would be taking phone calls at odd hours, she was caught though, abducting Mustafa, and with that, they knew who was taking the children. The Regent, Josephine LaRue could never get Eva to break, so she was sentenced to Fauline Cottage.