Dangerous Creatures

The Mystery Chest

Despite Elijah's best advice, Mackenzie didn't sleep that night. She did take a shower however, and he was gone when she stepped out of the bathroom. So was Robert's body. The blood was still on the kitchen floor and she walked back to her bedroom as she didn't want to see it. It reminded her of what she did. She was cold in her white shorts and shirt. Her wet hair didn't help either. She sat on her bed, feeling exhausted, and yet with no desire to sleep. When Elijah came back about two hours later, he found the elemental sitting there, in the dark and in complete silence. He wasn't surprised. He had expected it.

"Hey," he said, as gently as he could, but Mackenzie didn't react. "Get up. You need to pack."

She frowned as she looked up at him with a confused look on her face.

"You can't stay here, it's not safe," he explained. "Any vampire can enter this place. Pack everything. Robert quit his job and left. He didn't tell you where he was going. You came back home and all his things were gone. Do you understand?"

It took Mackenzie a minute to respond. "I understand," she said as she nodded and stood up.

He gave her a minute to get dressed and then helped her pack. By sunrise, all of Robert's things were gone. Elijah didn't bother Mackenzie with the details but when he came back, he had a truck with him. He started loading all the boxes and, as he thought they were done, Mackenzie disappeared out of sight.

He returned to the house where he found the teenager in the attic, staring down at a big old dusty chest.

"We also need to empty this room."

"I know," she said so low a human wouldn't have heard her. "It was my mother's. For a moment I forgot it was there..."

When she stepped into the attic to continue packing, she found herself facing the old chest. It broke her heart. Whatever was inside must be all her mother's secrets. Everything she kept from her, including who she really was. She had always been curious to know what was inside, but now, she was scared.

"What's inside?"

"I don't know."

"You never opened it?"

"It's locked. I don't have the key."

"I don't need a key."

She looked up at him and understood the silent question. She nodded. He squatted down to break the lock. He made it look like it was the easiest thing in the world. And for him, it was.

"Do you want me to open it?" he asked as he turned to see her, unsure as to what her state of mind was. He too had an idea of what might be inside. She nodded again.

Inside were a lot of things. It was filled with pieces of paper which fell out as soon as Elijah opened it. Mackenzie knelt next to her friend and picked them up.

"Is that Latin?" she asked as she tried to read them.

"Yes."

They looked very old and had a brownish-yellow color. They looked very fragile and Elijah was careful when he too picked up one from the floor.

"This one is in German," he said. "Early New High German."

"Early New High German?"

"Yes, this dates back to the sixteenth century... ah," he said when he saw the date on the paper, "February 12, 1608. It's a Royal Pardon."

"What? For who? And from who?"

"One of your ancestors. From... Margo of Aragon?" he said, as if it didn't make any sense.

"Like... Catherine of Aragon?"

"Yes..."

"But... who's Margo?"

"I have no idea."

That in of itself was strange. Elijah knew his history. Especially because he lived through the last thousand years. He knew of Ferdinand II of Aragon, the King of Spain in the fifteenth century, and of his daughter, Catherine of Aragon, wife of Henry VIII and Queen of England. But he had never heard of Margo of Aragon. He was certain she wasn't a legitimate child of the royal family, and she was never in a position of power. Not in Spain, anyway.

"Margo of Aragon, by the power of Mother Nature and the powers invested in Her Majesty by the creatures of the Holy Forest, grants you, Tobias Julius Alemaund, immunity for all your past deeds, confessed or not confessed, and allows you to remain in the Holy Forest, until Her Majesty decides otherwise."

"The Holy Forest? What is that?"

"I don't know... This is an official document," he said as he looked at the royal wax seal at the bottom of the page. He couldn't recognize it. It had the form of an oak.

"Well... what about this one?" she asked as she handed him another paper.

"Margo of Aragon, by the power... declares you, Tobias Julius Alemaund, guilty of treason and sentences you to death," he translated, "this dates back to December 29, 1607."

"What did he do?"

"It doesn't say."

Elijah kept looking at the papers on the floor while Mackenzie took a look inside of the chest. There was an enormous book inside which she tried to take out but couldn't as it was too heavy. Elijah helped her. She didn't look at it right away. She put it next to her and kept looking inside the old chest. There were more books inside, none of them in English, though some might be in old English, but most of them were in Latin and in German.

"What is all that?" she wondered aloud.

"More official documents... Tobias was knighted in July 1608. He died in 1612 of old age."

"Why did my mom have these papers?"

"She probably got them from your father. This is your family history."

"But... why is it in German? Weren't the Aragons from Spain?"

"They're probably not related. Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand reigned in the fifteenth century. This was a century later."

"This is... crazy."

"You're getting more and more interesting each day Ms. Alemaund," he grinned. "But as curious as I am to go through these, we need to go. We don't want people to see us leave. They'd ask questions."

"Oh... yeah, of course," she nodded.

As much as she wanted him to translate everything at that moment, she knew that there would be a better time for it, and she couldn't wait to discover more about Tobias Julius Alemaund and the Holy Forest.