Scars of her Blood • Shadowhunters

Chapter 11: The Dead are alive

Maryse's office was just down the hall from Celia's and before she even reached the door, she could hear the discussion inside:

"... you don't seriously think that she was involved in those murders? Celia has too much on the line to do something so reckless.", Maryse sounded very angry.

"She also has quite the reputation...", Lydia replied.

Celia was frozen in place. They can't know what happened, can they? She quickly shook her head. No one here knew.

Celia knocked on the door and pushed it open without waiting for a reply:

"You wanted to talk to me?"

In the office, there were not only Lydia sitting behind the desk and Maryse standing beside her, but also Robert leaning against the fireplace.

"Hello, Celia.", he said – in an odd tone. Celia's relationship to the couple had never been as good as to their children, but especially with Robert, who had often been away on Clave business, Celia simply had no connection.

"Hi", she mumbled and turned to Maryse immediately, "what is going on?"

But Lydia was the one who answered:

"I just have one question: Where were you two days ago, roughly between about 10 and 12 o' clock pm?"

"Why is that important to you?", Celia could feel something more was coming. At the time, I was on the mission about the little vampire, but the Clave doesn't need to know that. They did not like to see Downworlders working out conflicts in their own ways, so the SRU kept most of the missions that were not officially sanctioned by the Clave under the radar.

Lydia reached under the desk and pulled a file out of a drawer. She handed it to Celia without a word. Celia took it and opened it, facing a picture of a dead body. She scanned the report to get an overview: Young man, killed with a bite in the neck... Those bite marks are very clean... Celia flipped the page and saw the second picture. Same age, but female, same injuries.

"What is this?", Celia looked up at Lydia, the room had fallen suspiciously quiet, "two dead people, killed by a Hybrid if you go by the pattern of the teeth. What do I have to do with this?"

Lydia sighed. She seemed unsure about what she was about to say:

"Those are Mundanes... And we found out the night they were killed, all active Hybrid fighters in New York were at a meeting in the local base. Except you."

"Yeah, because I don't have to attend those meetings unless I'm specifically asked to. Are you accusing me of double murder right now?!"

Robert jumped in:

"We already told her that every random Hybrid could just come into the city and kill someone."

Celia nodded:

"Thank you! At least someone in this room is in their right senses!", she turned to Maryse, "you don't have anything to say to this?"

They may have been having more differences than anything else with each other, but generally Maryse and Celia had a high opinion of each other. So Celia certainly counted on Maryse as an ally. Right now, she looked very uncomfortable, as if backed into a corner. But finally she spoke:

"Well, you would never kill Mundanes - unless it was a mission?"

Celia rolled her eyes. Of course, sometimes there were missions involving Mundanes. But they had always committed crimes in one way or another.