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| Damon |
Everyone seemed okay. Each of Damon's packmates had been patched up, clothed, and fed. Tokala was sitting on the couch by the window with Remus, Julian, and Lalo; they each had a burger in their hands from some fast-food place, and when Damon looked around, he saw that everyone had something. Where the hell did they get that from out here?
He got his answer when he spotted Sebastien sitting on his own by the fireplace. The white-haired demon had a vacant stare on his face while he watched the dancing flames, sipping loudly through his straw. Several empty fast-food bags lay at his feet, as did multiple wrappers.
"Oh, Dad!" Remus called excitedly. "Sebastien got us dinner from some place called Slappy's."
Damon frowned as he crossed the lounge towards him. "What?"
"It's a fast-food chain," Sebastien called. "Heir Lucian was heading over there, so I thought I'd grab something for everyone. The guys here have been living off pizza and shit, anyway. No one cooks."
"Here," Remus said when Damon reached him; he offered him a burger and some fries from the bag sitting between him and Tokala.
"Thanks," Damon said as he took them from him and sat on the arm of the couch.
"Where's Jackson?" Tokala asked with a concerned tone.
"He went to see Wilson," the Alpha replied as he unwrapped the burger. He tried to focus on the fact that he was hungry and eager to eat, but all he could think about was that fucking muto. He hated Wilson, and he had to fight every urge and instinct to race to Jackson's side and ensure that he was safe...and that Wilson didn't try anything. He didn't trust him, but he did trust Jackson, so he'd just have to do his best to ignore his anger and concentrate on what he wanted to ask Cyrus.
Wesley grunted irritably as he swallowed his food. "That fucking demon kid, I swear."
"Yeah, that's pretty much the gist of everyone's reaction to him," Sebastien said with a sigh.
"He shouldn't be allowed to get away with it," Lalo exclaimed.
"Jackson didn't even do anything to him," Julian agreed.
"I don't wanna get into this again," Sebastien said with a sigh. "It's demon stuff, okay? Heir Lucian had every right to do what he did. Now can we move on? It's done with."
"You wouldn't be saying that if it was you," Ezhno accused.
"I've already spent my free pass, so if I chewed up Heir Zephyr's leg, I'd be in Daevor," the white-haired demon said.
"You hurt one of them?" Dustu questioned.
Sebastien finished his drink and dropped the cup into one of the bags at his feet. "Yeah. I punched Heir Lucian a couple years ago."
A chorus of curious and amused laughter circled the room.
"You punched him?" Remus asked with a smile.
"I was babysitting him for Lord Caedis and he did some whack-ass shit—I mean, are we surprised?—and he wouldn't back the fuck down, so I broke his nose," Sebastien explained as he crouched and took another drink from one of the bags.
"I'm surprised you're still alive," Lalo mumbled.
"Oh, he wanted to kill me, but Lord Caedis let me off with a warning."
Damon took a bite of his burger, and to his surprise, it was actually quite good. He waited for a break in the conversation, and then he asked, "Where's Cyrus? I need to talk to him."
Sebastien shifted his sights to him. "Uh...I think he's in his office with Apex Idina. Just like...go out that door, turn left and walk across the hall and under the stairs. Follow that hallway to the end. Door on the left."
Damon ate a few of his fries and then handed them to his son. "I'll be back in a little," he told him.
Remus nodded. "Okay, I'll just be here with Tokala."
As he took another bite of his burger, Damon got up and left the lounge. He navigated the house following Sebastien's instructions, and when he reached the door to what he presumed was Cyrus' office, he knocked.
"Yeah?" came Cyrus' voice.
Damon pushed the door open, and when he stepped inside, he set his eyes on Cyrus. The black-haired man was sitting behind his desk, and a brown-haired woman—who he assumed must be Idina—was standing beside him.
"Oh, Damon," Cyrus said as he put his phone down. "We're not ready for the meeting yet if that's what you're here for."
"No, that's not why I'm here," he told him, standing in the doorway. "I have questions...about my bloodline."
The woman patted Cyrus' head and said, "I'll just be upstairs."
Cyrus smiled up at her. "Get some rest," he told her.
She nodded and then headed towards the door.
Once she passed him and left the room, Damon closed the door behind him and walked to Cyrus' desk. He watched the man pull out a cigarette from his pocket, and as he lit it with his lighter, he gestured to one of the empty leather armchairs in front of him.
Damon sat in the right one and waited.
Cyrus put his lighter down and drew a light breath from his cigarette. When he exhaled, he blew the smoke to the side so that it didn't hit Damon's face. "So, what do you wanna know?"
"Everything."
He chuckled and took another breath of his cigarette. "Everything is a lot, man. We got the time—we're waiting on Lucian to hear back from Alucard—but I need you to give me some sorta like..." he paused and drew another breath... "starting point, you know?"
Where did he want to start? "Fenrisúlfr is my ancestor, as he is yours, but I don't have demon blood like you or Raphael."
"Mm," he murmured as he leaned back in his seat. "That'll be the whole...weakening every generation thing. My father, Greymore, otherwise known as Fenrisúlfr, had kids with my mother, who's a demon. My siblings and I were born these sort of...wolf walkers with demon blood. Hybrids technically aren't possible and can't be created the way we were because the ethos doesn't mix; the stronger ethos would annihilate the weaker ethos, and whatever remains would die. But Fenrisúlfr isn't like other wolf walkers—wasn't. He was crafted by a cult to be a weapon, some proper cultist shit. Somehow, whatever those people did to him made it so his ethos bonded with my mother's."
Damon nodded slowly.
"But again, hybrids aren't technically possible, so we're not demon wolf walkers, we just have demon blood because of my mother. Like demons, we don't age once we reach our late twenties or early thirties, and we also heal a lot faster. I don't know which one of my siblings you're related to, but there've been a lot of generations since we were born. My mother's blood weakened every generation because most of my siblings went on to mate with and marry wolf walkers, and it eventually got to a point where the demon blood was eradicated entirely."
That made sense. "And Raphael?"
Cyrus drew a deep breath from his cigarette and sighed when he exhaled. "Yeah, him. My sister, Lydia, married and had kids with Zacaeus, Alucard and Zalith's son. Alucard's ethos is stronger than Zalith's, though, so it's the dominant ethos in every one of his descendants. That's why they all have orange hair; it's like...a lighter shade than his because these kids only have a fraction of his power, you know?"
"So, the Redblood line was born from Alucard and Zalith—the Zenith?"
"Yup," he said and finished his cigarette. "So, Zacaeus obviously has hella ethos 'cause his parents are gods, and his and Lydia's kids have access to that power through blood or some shit. That's why Raphael's so powerful—and don't even get me started on his sister. Anyway, yeah...that's pretty much the gist of it."
Damon pondered for a moment. Did this mean that Tokala had access to power that he didn't even realize was there? "So, my Zeta, Tokala should have access to that power, too? He's a Redblood."
"Yeah..." Cyrus drawled. "We had a brief talk about him. Jackson tells me that his mother or someone left behind the Redblood way to join your pack. If his mother left before he was born, then there's a high chance that she never told him what he was capable of. When power like that isn't honed from a young age, it's likely gonna just...fall asleep, I guess, and it's real hard to wake it up."
If Tokala had access to the power Damon had seen Raphael display, then their chances of getting through the mountains and to Greykin Valley would be a whole lot higher. "Could he learn to use it?"
"The best person to ask about that is Raphael. But the same generational weakening applies, I believe, just at a much slower rate since Alucard's ethos is a lot stronger than my parents'."
"Is Raphael still here?"
"I think he's with Lucian listening to Alucard's orders. I'd wait to see him if I were you."
Damon nodded and shifted his attention back to his own bloodline. "I have the names of quite a few of my ancestors. If I told you, could you help me find out which of your siblings I'm related to?" If he had more family out there, he wanted to know.
Cyrus scratched the side of his face. "Uh..." he drawled. "I mean maybe, but my mom knows more than I do. I can get her to come back down here."
"I don't want to impose—"
"Nah, it's fine. I'll just shoot her a text," he said as he grabbed his phone. He typed on it for a few moments, and then he put it back down. "It wasn't too long ago that we all came out to Ascela, so it shouldn't be too hard narrowing it down."
Damon nodded and waited, but before silence could fall between them, he said, "You've been in this part of Greykin longer than us. What else is out there? We didn't start seeing variant cadejo until we crossed the mountains."
Cyrus' nonchalant expression faded, and a conflicted frown sat in its place. "I reckon that's something we ought to cover in the meeting. The cadejo have increased in numbers very rapidly over the past week, and we don't know why. Alucard suggested that it might have something to do with Jackson being over there, and most of his council seem to agree."
"But you don't?" Damon questioned.
"I don't know. It makes sense. I mean, Jackson's a hybrid. He could be the very thing that stops the virus, and maybe those smarter cadejo know that, so they're over here to try and stop him or something, but I can't help but feel like there's more to it," he said as he tapped his fingers on the desk. "Raphael and his team saw your little Jackson talking to and commanding cadejo; I want to hear more about that when we convene."
Damon frowned strangely. "Commanding? He hasn't said anything about that to me."
"Well, you guys have been through a whole lot lately, so I'm not surprised he hasn't had time to talk about it. Hence, the meeting. We'll cover everything once everyone's ready."
Just then, the door to Cyrus' office opened, and Idina walked in carrying what looked like a photo album. "I haven't been able to update it recently," she said as she made her way towards the desk.
"That's all right," Cyrus told her. "He has the names of some of his ancestors, so we should be able to make a connection."
Idina smiled at Damon as she placed the photo album on the desk in front of Cyrus. "Who do you remember?" she asked.
Damon took a moment to recall who and what he could. "My mother, Audrey West, and my father, Nanook Greyblood. My father's father, Siqiniq Greyblood, and my father's mother, Lenora Heartford."
Idina and Cyrus looked through the book, but they didn't find anything.
So, Damon continued. "My great grandfather, Amaruq Greyblood, and my great grandmother, Alasie Geela-Blood."
They both shook their heads.
"Great great grandfather, Siku Silana-Blood. Great great grandmother, Koko Greyblood."
Idina's face lit up. "Oh, right here," she said as she pointed to the page she just flipped to. "Koko," she said as she turned the book and pushed it across the table to Damon.
Damon pulled the book closer and stared at the blurry photograph of a native Ascelan woman. Her hair was as black as his, and she had several feathers and ceremonial beads in it. The man at her side must be Siku, and they had their toddler son standing between them.
Cyrus reached across the desk and flipped through a few pages, revealing a hand-drawn family tree. He traced his finger up until he reached a line of six men and women, one of which was him, and another man was off to the side. But his finger hovered over a woman named Eden, who married and had children with an Ascelan native man, Ikiaq Kolaut-Blood.
"Oh, Ikiaq is so sweet," Idina said. "I'm glad he and Eden met."
"Are Eden and Ikiaq still around?" Damon asked.
"Eden's my sister, so yeah," Cyrus confirmed. "Our whole demon agelessness didn't get passed on to our kids, so sadly, none of them are around anymore. But my siblings and their mates are; those who get imprinted on by an ageless demon stop ageing, too—you know...fate and all that."
Idina frowned despondently. "It's quite sad, really. I don't like to think about it much."
"I'm sorry for your loss," Damon said to her.
"Thank you," she said sadly. "Eden is busy searching Greykin for survivors right now, but she is due back here next month if you want to meet her."
Damon nodded and said, "I'd like to. But I don't know where I'll be in a month." He then realized that he was still holding his half-eaten burger. He didn't know whether he wanted to finish it or not.
"Yeah, a lot of crazy shit happening," Cyrus said with a sigh. "And shit just keeps getting crazier."
"How's Jackson doing?" Idina asked. "I heard about what happened with Raphael and Lucian."
"He seems better now," Damon answered. "He went to see Wilson."
"I heard about him, too," the woman said sympathetically. "You and your friends have been through so much."
Damon wanted to make it clear that Wilson wasn't his friend, but he didn't want to be rude, especially not to someone who'd only been kind and helpful, so he held his tongue and nodded. "We've been through a lot before; we'll bounce back."
Idina smiled and said, "I'm sure you will."
"I think we should have a talk with your Redblood friend," Cyrus then said. "If we don't cover it in the meeting, I'll get Raphael to join us after."
Damon nodded. "All right."
Cyrus then looked up at Idina. "Do you know if Raphael and Lucian are done with Alucard yet?"
"I think they're still talking. I can check if you'd like."
He nodded and then set his sights on Damon. "Do you have any other questions?"
Damon thought about it for a few moments, but he felt as if he had most of the answers he was looking for. He was a descendant of Fenrisúlfr, but he was so far down the line that he didn't possess demon blood. He did have living relatives, and Tokala...he might just be as valuable as Jackson.
The Alpha shook his head. "No. Thank you for talking with me."
"No probs. You can head back to the lounge where all your pals are eating. I'll send someone to fetch you all once we're ready to begin the meeting."
With another nod, Damon stood up. "It was nice meeting you," he said to Idina.
"And you," she replied with a smile.
He then turned around and left the office. As he navigated the huge house, he finished his burger and tossed its wrapper in a trashcan as he passed an empty lounge. He wanted to go and find Jackson, but he didn't want to invade his space or privacy when he insisted on being alone. So, he dismissed that wish and instead focused on finding his way back to his pack. For now, he'd rest; a lot of talking, questions, and answers were due very soon, and he wanted to make sure that he had the energy to say everything that needed to be said.
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