The Cainite Order

CHAPTER 13

HIJ DAT ZAL VEROVEREN MOET VECHTEN

CHAPTER 13

"He that will conquer must fight."

The last few months Ruaraidh had been teaching Beathen all of the procedures he needed to know for his new posting. Beathen had been surprised at the volume of paperwork needed for much of what they did. This morning was supposed to be an uneventful blur of food, training and conversation. The last few days were Ruaraidh's way of welcoming him into the Order. Even with a strong new friendship as a distraction and more reading than he thought possible, the feelings kept getting worse as nothing but normalcy happened. He was slightly distracted when Ruaraidh brought him several new charms to try out. The Horn of Hephaestus which teleported his axe and armor on him anywhere, a second Eye of Thoth that allowed for extreme speed reading and better retention, and lastly Loki's Lock Pick which allowed entry into almost anything. The endless possibilities that his combined charms gave him were able to distract him for a few days; at least until today. Arriving in the Mess Hall, he spotted Ruaraidh devouring a mountain of food to start the day.

"I see you're not that hungry this morning." Beathen laughed, setting his own food on the table.

"Muph Eee HUr hipr today." Ruaraidh intoned with a full mouth.

"Even with my charms up all I got was gibberish and today. Swallow then talk." he laughed again.

"I said you seem chipper today. Ready for some more training?" said Ruaraidh before shoveling more food into his mouth.

In truth Beathen wasn't ready for more training. Along with the foreboding feelings he was having, there was an interesting development in his family history. He had been doing research on his bloodline since the first time he tried a charm with Instructor Attar. The more he researched the more questions he began to dig up. With resources on the normal internet and the various tomes and scrolls available from the chapter library he was able to trace his lineage back to some of the oldest recorded names with only a few gaps.

The problem now was that after months of research he had reached the end of the trail, or rather the end of what had been written down. He had almost given up when the librarian suggested he put in a request to the main archives. Beathen was just happy to have another lead instead of a dead end. It was only supposed to take a few days to get a response, today or tomorrow he was supposed to hear something back. Even Ruaraidh hadn't heard of someone with his ability to make a charm a part of him. Though he did ask if Beathen knew how to teach someone else how to do it.

"Choke Down what you've got left. We have a problem!" said Gott, interrupting Beathen's thoughts.

"What, did you find a date? Do we need to help you pick out an outfit?" teased Ruaraidh.

The daggers shooting out of Gott's eye's told both of them something was defiantly wrong. "Finish eating in five minutes and be in the briefing room in six!" he barked sternly, rushing out of the dining hall.

They exchanged quick glances and swallowed as much food as they could. Beathen flashed on his physical training time and laughed at himself. He thought after that ordeal eating would go back to some semblance of normal, but alas it was time to do what one of his instructors had described as "eat it now and taste it later". After two minutes he had choked down all the food on his plate and was chugging his orange juice on the way to the dish area. He decided to hand his coffee off to one of the other Chapter members, Wakahisa Natsumi. She had just stumbled into the hall and looked as though she hadn't slept more than ten minutes. She smiled and thanked him as he handed her the coffee running for the door.