Vallen: The Marking (Vallen series #1)

Chapter 45

I somehow managed to live through my exams. The last two were especially difficult because my ability to concentrate seemed to have left me completely. Still, when I got to walk away from my wooden table outside one last time, the overwhelming feeling of freedom was like nothing I had ever felt before. I could breathe again. I could enjoy myself again.

That feeling lasted for about four hours, until Alaric and I ran into Eldon. Though I would have loved to just take the day off and actually do some fun things for once, they seemed to think that preventing the extinction of the Vallen race was a little more important. Alas, we went to the library to look for information.

The library was all I saw the next three weeks. I woke up, ate my breakfast and settled into the corner where I would stay until dinner. Eldon couldn't sit still for very long so he was usually the one who stole some sandwiches from the cafeteria for lunch. We had found the perfect corner for our studies. It was in the eastern end of the library, near where Alaric and I had searched for Gregory Welt, and hidden behind two bookshelves. There was one table with two chairs, but the ground was pretty comfortable too. No one ever came here, so it was perfect to secretly discuss our plans. 

First, we searched for other historical events that indicated the extinction of the Vallen race. Events like the Slaughter of 1919 and the Uncovering, which was when the humans found out about the Vallens, came up. Alaric thought that the Heroes must mean that a human was planning to kill all Vallens. But Eldon and I thought that the clue about the king was far more important. 

When that didn't turn anything up, we started searching for info about Edda. I learned that she was the first human to... Well that was where it became difficult. The Lauwers thought that she was the first human to kill a Wiedergänger, a German tale about some sort of zombie ghost mashup monster. However, the Scandinavians thought she had killed Garmr, the Dutch thought she bargained with Elegast to escape her family and the Africans thought she killed the Grootslang and slept in a diamond cave which gave her a gift. 

Every twist and turn of Edda's story was different for every descent. I thought this wouldn't be news to Eldon and Alaric, but even they seemed to get more and more annoyed by our lack of progress. As it turns out, most Vallens don't pay attention during mythology class, their families know better so they are expected to pass the tests but know the true story through their parents. 

"Shut up." Eldon growled. I had my nose in a book about the creation of the world and had hardly heard Alaric say anything. We had all started to occasionally snap at each other, it was nothing new. 

I brushed my finger over the page to see where I had left off. The book I was reading was handwritten. It was about a fifty-fifty split here in the library. Even some of the newer books would be handwritten, it really depended on the author. There were some which were typed out, but more traditional families wanted the author to bleed into the pages rather than easily type it on a laptop.

"Don't fucking talk to me that way." Alaric answered back. Alaric was sitting on the ground with his back against the wall, while Eldon was sitting on the chair next to me. I really couldn't say what they were reading up on. We all followed different ideas. I thought that the creation of the world must hold some clue about how it would end. Alaric thought that the answer was in a more recent book about how to deal with humans, Eldon figured that Edda was the key. We were completely lost and without a plan.

"Shut, the fuck, up." Eldon said again, loudly shutting his book. Now I did look up. Sure we made snappy comments at each other but it seemed an unspoken rule that we didn't respond to it.  They were breaking the rules. 

"I am the leader of the family." Alaric answered, getting up from his spot. "When I say don't talk to me that way, you better swallow those words back, boy."

Eldon got up too now. I knew that this was nothing more than three weeks of frustration rushing to the surface, but that did not mean that I felt like sitting in between two fighting brothers. 

"You're a child, Alaric." Eldon answered. Now it was my turn to stand up and make a statement. I got up alright, but Alaric had swung his fist at Eldon, who dodged it and let the punch hit me instead.

It landed on my jaw and neck, making me fall back onto my chair again. My hand immediately went to cover the spot where he had hit me. I felt the numbness before the pain, Alaric was a big guy after all, while they both stared at me with big eyes.

"Eira, I-" Alaric started but I wouldn't let him finish. 

"Why is it that both of you always insist on acting like fucking idiots?!" I shouted at them. I got up again and put a threatening finger in Alaric's face. "I don't give a flying fuck about family honour, about your new position over Eldon or about your stupid frustrations! You do not get to hit me, or your brother for that matter. God, how can you two expect me to care about saving your family from extinction when you two assholes are the representatives?" 

I didn't wait for a reply, both of them seemed dumbstruck by my outburst anyway, and pushed them aside to leave. I went a little too far, but maybe it left an impression on them. They weren't the only ones who were frustrated with all of this. They weren't the only ones who wanted nothing more than to just relax for once. 

I stopped dead in my tracks. A few rows away from me was Professor Dehaven, reading the back of an emerald green book. We weren't getting anywhere, it was the simple truth that three students could never save the world by ourselves. Wars are won with men, not little girls. Alros had told me that. 

I liked Lourdes, but so far he hadn't been particularly interested in mentoring me. Woodville wasn't even an option and Eldon and Alaric's mentor was more interested in watering his plants than in saving the world. Out of all my teachers, Dehaven seemed like the perfect person to tell.

"Professor," I said after walking up to him. He decided to keep the emerald book and added it onto his pile.

"Good afternoon miss Lovell, I didn't expect to see any students-" He stared but stopped once he saw my neck. "What happened to your neck?" 

I'm sure it wasn't bruised just yet, but it probably was a little red. I covered it with my hand again. It would be a lie to say that it didn't hurt, I could feel the pain spread across my jaw, but it wasn't that bad. 

"Oh, it's nothing." I shrugged it off. "I was wondering if I could speak to you in private, it's about my gift."

He was quiet for a few moments. A lot of students had asked me if the heroes had mentioned them, but Dehaven was too smart for that. Technically it was about my gift, just not in the way he probably thought.

"Are you sure you don't want to talk to Professor Spyro about it? Or your mentor perhaps?" He asked me back, raising one of his eyebrows. It would make far more sense for me to speak to the mythology teacher about it if it was indeed about my gift rather than my encounter.

Oh. It finally clicked in my head. He thought I wanted to talk to him about his father. That's why he was hesitant. I tried to put up my kindest smile. 

"I want to talk to you about it because I trust you more than my mentor," I said. "Because there is some overlap to your history classes and because Alaric, Eldon and I have been trying to prevent the extinction of the Vallen race but we have been getting nowhere. We need your help."

I whispered the last part. There really weren't a lot of students in the library seeing as it was the one time in the year when there weren't any classes to study for. But still, you never knew who was lurking behind a bookshelf. 

He agreed to speak to me that night.