Blood Ties (NaNoWriMo 2015)

Thirty-Five

Exactly ten minutes later myself, Damon, Johnathan, Caiyun, Keith, Doc as well as some stranger I'd never seen before were in Johnathan's office, sitting around in various chairs and places waiting for the reason we were all here to fall.

"This is the third attack on Ember, second since she arrived here." Damon began, eyes fixed on me. Had I not already learned this trick for public speaking, picking a focal point and sticking with it, I'd have been uncomfortable, but knowing this, I reasoned that he was only trying to make this easier to say. "I know we promised you that you'd be safe here, or at least safer than you would have been in the human world." He took a deep breath and his hand rose halfway up his neck, no doubt to mess with his hair before he froze and realized it. "We acknowledged that they could still track her here, and it appears they have. However, this most recent attack is worrying in more ways than one."

You're telling me, I thought recalling the serrated edges of the knife in the dark.

"This attacker," Damon continued. "Was a vampire, and he attacked during the day. There is no way he could have broken into the manor during this time, he'd have been burned alive.  He was either here at the party the other night, a guest and remained behind or he was not invited and someone let him in anyway."

I felt the room grow colder at Damon's words, I heard the meaning behind them and I'm sure everyone else present did too. Someone on the inside is working against us. I pulled the puffy winter coat tighter around my body and shivered. I felt Ife squeeze my shoulder and realize she might have mistaken my being chilly for worry. Not to say I wasn't worried, but the cold was certainly in the forefront of my thoughts at the moment.

"So you think we have a traitor in the coven?" Johnathan asked, his voice was groggy like he had a frog in his throat. He looked worse than he had last night, his grey hair was unkempt, face even more gaunt than usual.

"Worse," Damon replied, his eyes firm as they passed over everyone present. "I think there's a traitor sitting right here in this room."

It was like he'd set off a bomb. People began shouting at him and each other, the volume so loud I was certain that someone was going to bust an eardrum. I noticed Damon across from me, trying to make his voice heard, but he had his brother and mother towering over him, faces contorted in anger as they tried to voice their views.

I rolled my eyes at this. I understood their anger, but regardless, this argument of how they were all innocent was not going to get us any closer to working at solving the problem. I took a deep breath and used the one clear gift my dad had passed onto me, the ability to whistle very loudly. The sharp, shrill sound cracked around the room, startling everyone and they all turned their gazes to me.

"Shut up," I said in the now dead silent space. I stood up, legs cramping and fixed everyone in the room hopefully with the same sort of blaze in my eyes Damon told me I had. "This is a pointless argument, Damon didn't personally accuse anyone of you, he's just being realistic. This latest hitman is either part of a rival coven, my money goes to Crustallos by the way, or he's technically independent of any coven and just a hired thug. That would mean he got help from someone who knows the ins and outs of this manor and how the coven is run.  That's everyone in this room, Caiyun, Johnathan, Keith, Doc and," I looked over at the stranger and frowned. "And whoever you are, I don't believe we've met before."

"I'm Archie," the man replied, adjusted his robes which looked like bedsheets. "One of the priests here in Zalam's temple."

A priest named Archie? That was strange. "Nice to meet  you," I said with a polite nod of my head. "Anyways, despite how much none of us like the idea of someone close to us being a traitor, this attack proves it is a very real possibility. Quit freaking out, if you're innocent then what in the hell do you have to fear? Please," I sat back down and crossed my arms. "Let's get onto the next part of whatever it was Damon intended to say before you all started acting like children?"

Every vampire that had been shouting ten seconds earlier looked properly ashamed. I didn't blame them for it, Damon was one of the youngest people here and he was over a century old. I was eighteen, a child to almost all of them and I was the voice of reason. I'd be ashamed too.

"Thank you Ember," Damon said pleasantly, folding his hands and taking a deep breath. "And what I was going to say," he looked pointedly at his mother who was still fuming. "Did you send that tail out like I told you to?"

"Yes," she said curtly.

"With the excuse I gave you?"

"Word for word," Caiyun said between gritted teeth. 

"Excuse me," Johnathan said, looking between his son and wife. "What do you mean by a tail?" Damon quickly explained to him-and by extension-everyone else in the room about our theory about Richard Erable.

Johnathan listened quietly, as did everyone else in the room and once Damon finished he looked at his son with a grim expression. Whatever he was about to say, I had a very strong feeling it was not going to be something I or Damon would like to hear.  "That's a risky move son," he said finally. "Richard's a powerful man and if you're wrong about him, you just took a man who was your alley and turned him into a foe."

"Richard has never been Damon's alley," Keith interjected. "You've seen the way he treats him, he's disapproved of your choice of appointment since the day you announced it."

"But he's not the only one," Johnathan retorted. "There are many people that thought and wanted you to be the next leader Keith. You know that as well as I."

"Yes," he replied, crossing his python like arms across his chest. "But most of them got over it when I showed my support for the appointment of my brother," he jerked his head towards Damon. "And even if they didn't, the Cruor Luna he just pulled off changed their minds. Richard's the only one who isn't letting go of this."

Caiyun spoke up then. "Ember," I jumped, surprised that she addressed me. "You ought to go and rest, you've had a stressful night and I don't think there is much else you can do here."

"Really?" I asked, unable to keep the ice out of my voice. "Even though I'm the one that keeps getting targeted? I know they're after Damon, but he's not the one they're trying to kill is it?" Caiyun worse an expression then that I would expect to see on someone who was forced to swallow a glass of lemon juice. "I have just as much right to be here as the next person and besides, I do have a little more information regarding Richard Erable."

"And what would that be Miss Hawthorn?" Archie asked me, his bald head gleamed as he moved under the light towards me.

I fingered the scar on my wrist, suddenly unable to look at him. Something about the ghostly-looking priest unsettled me. "He knew what was on my wrist, said Damon was irresponsible for not covering his tracks better, said that left the human as a target. How would he know and I think everyone here knows that the only reason he hasn't let that slip to the rest of the Twelve is because he's waiting until he's going to benefit the most from it. I didn't really have a long encounter with Mr. Erable," I smirked a little then. Almost bitter. "But he doesn't strike me as the sort to do anything out of the kindness of his heart."

I yelped when I felt someone grab my arm and I looked up the see the skinny white priest staring at the scar on my wrist. "Excuse me?" I gasped, trying to yank my arm away. "Have you not heard of personal space or did that not exist in you're time?"

Archie's blue eyes started to change, turning a little white-ish grey, like fog. "Miss Hawthorn," he said completely ignoring my barb. "You need to come with me, right now. To the temple, post-haste!"

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