Chapter 59: Chapter 59

I threw myself into the arms of my London saviour. Sitting in the chair, a black suit over expensive shoes, he took my face in his hands and understood all the pain that emerged from it.

“How did you find my little gift?” he said after a silence.

Taken aback and not knowing what to say, I shook my head in incomprehension. I have no recollection of any gift unless it referred to Morgan’s death. Was that a gift?

“I’m talking about our friend Gregory and your rival Naomi.”

I frowned and then it was clear. I hadn’t had time to fully rejoice in his return when I sensed a change in his attitude. I took a step back when I realized with horror what his words meant.

“Blake?” I stammered.

My legs barely supported me as my eyes widened in fear. I went to sit on a chair and no longer dared raise my gaze to him.

“Gregory, Naomi, the Monteiros, and even the Van Durens… were all present when you were raped. They all answered Magnus’ call, but you were so high you didn’t see them.”

“But Naomi,” I said in a weak voice, “She was a mother.”

“That’s the problem with revenge, my dear, it’s always ugly.”

He hadn’t expressed the slightest emotion when he uttered this acerbic sentence. I didn’t recognize my saviour, the man who had gone through everything to get me out of my hell and who had stayed by my side, faithful until death.

“Why?”

Blake got up, went to the window and gazed at the full moon.

“If I told you the story of a man who lived so long that he began to hate the world and all its inhabitants, would you listen to me?”

“Yes.”

“This story starts when this man, at almost four hundred years old, adopted his ward and raised her with all the love that a father can give to his daughter. I think you know the rest, so I won’t talk about Eleonore’s death any further. After the death of his ward, resentment ate away at what was left of this man. Devastated, he vowed a fierce hatred towards his own brother, husband and murderer of his daughter. Years passed during which the man’s resentment towards his brother spread to the rest of the world. He travelled and began to slaughter people at random, to sink into the abyss. Madness had largely consumed the man when, in the year 1651, he met a Londonian woman more beautiful than a summer sunset.”

“Elisabeth Darville,” I said, “She’s buried next to Eleonore in the Pomona room.”

I was right because he continued his story in a more hesitant voice.

“I loved her more than my own life, more than anything. She was barely twenty when I met her. She had understood that she wasn’t like the others since she was sixteen. The first time I approached her and told her who she was, she got scared and ran away. The next day she came to find me. She understood that her telepathic power had no effect on me and never left me again until her death. She calmed the fire in me. After all this time, I had found a woman capable of softening my character and I never knew greater happiness than the sixty years I spent at her side.”

My tears came back and shared Blake’s pain. I didn’t know anything about his past and, far from thinking that his murderous acts were forgivable, I couldn’t help but feel sadness when I looked at this unfortunate man. He took a breath of air and resumed his story.

“The following century and during a long descent into hell, the man dreamed of finding a way to end it. He attempted death by burning but woke up weeks later in excruciating pain. Realising that he couldn’t do it alone, he asked for help from Morgan, his brother’s enemy. At first, he accepted on the condition that the man stays a few years at his side. Time seemed infinitely long to him and Morgan’s thirst for power was pathetic. With him, he slaughtered other villages and continued his atrocities without caring the least about the havoc he was causing. Morgan never kept his word, and when he saw that the man’s patience was beginning to show signs of failing, he took a boat to another country. He still brooded for years, but towards the beginning of the 19th century, he encountered revolutionaries near the ramparts of Glamis Castle, eighteen miles from here. His hatred was so strong at that time that he now wanted all the castes dead. Caught up in his madness, he manipulated the human minds of the revolutionaries and a troop of villagers, then brought them inside the domain of Mortain. They began by setting fire to the annexes, and as the flames created a diversion, they turned the castle into a torch. The revolutionaries all died, killed by the castes, while the man remained in the furnace hoping that the fire would be strong enough to scatter his ashes with no chance of returning.”

He took a deep breath and left a silence.

“But Carmichael had decided otherwise. He tried to save me, but the flames had taken hold of this idiot. He will die for the first time that day.”

The horrific spectacle that imprinted itself on my mind made my blood run cold and I couldn’t help but imagine the indescribable pain he must have felt. A shiver of fear shook me.

“After that, Magnus had me locked up. He kept me in London. Oh yes! I was far from honest with you. My brother didn’t keep me in London to torture me. He was doing it to protect me from myself.”

Blake sat down on a chair and looked at me.

“At the beginning, he locked me in one of the rooms of the tower. I then threw myself out of the window and escaped. Every time he captured me, he tightened the security, but I started again. He had no choice but to opt for the catacombs. I refused to eat and sank into a deep silence. One day when Egeria and Magnus were visiting me in my dungeon and I was pretending to be asleep, I overheard a conversation that occupied my thoughts for the next two centuries. Egeria was talking about a prison in Amsterdam, to which my brother replied, ‘There’s no way my brother knows about your family of cadavers!’ I remember it like it was yesterday. His voice sounded angry but also fearful. It’s this detail that appealed to me the most. What could my brother be afraid of? After that, I pretended to make an effort and ate a little more each day. Egeria, who had always been good to me, came to me quite often and talked to me. One day I asked what happened to her family? She was so surprised by my request that she flinched and jumped up. ‘You mustn’t talk about them,’ she shouted as I stood up behind the bars in front of her. She remained silent for a moment, but in the end, she gave in and finally told me part of her story. The eldest of her sisters was named Althea, the other two were younger; the twins, Ludmila and Elinor. Her big brother Priam was a few years younger than her and her two other brothers, Soban and Thelion, were born last. She hadn’t said more that night, but over the years she’d let some very useful information slip here and there. I learned that they had all died in a terrible volcanic explosion on a Greek island. Of the whole village, only her siblings came back to life after being suffocated by fumes and burned by lava. That was three thousand years ago, do you realise, Eve? They are the origin of everything. They travelled the world and gave birth to children whom they abandoned when they were born. Egeria enjoyed the company of her siblings for many long years but understood the change when the thirst for power awoke in two of them. Althea and Priam had the character and the charisma to reign. They formed a couple and reunited their descendants. Their subjects, impressed by so much power, proclaimed them king and queen of the castes. Two millennia then passed, during which Althea and Priam reigned supreme over the entire community. Monuments were built for them. Even the Roman building on which the castle of Mortain was built had been constructed for the queen.”

“I thought you knew the legend of the Seven through Méziane,” I commented, taking advantage of the silence.

“As I said, I’ve been far from honest. Méziane was only an outlaw that I managed to behead in a public square. No. It was Egeria who told me everything. She had betrayed her family and even the passing centuries couldn’t lessen her guilt. According to her, it had become necessary. Althea and Priam were going insane and planning a massive attack on the human race. Egeria, who appreciated the delights of nature, life in the open air, night outings and festivities, therefore refused to imagine the world without humans. She didn’t like them, of course, but she couldn’t imagine her life without them. She was afraid that life would seem dull to her and was thinking only of herself and her own happiness when she poisoned all her siblings. She locked up their bodies in Amsterdam. At first, she recruited two trusted castes and asked them to inject the poison every week, never forgetting a dose. They had to be replaced quickly, these castes because the years were passing and her troops weren’t immortal. Technology, which appeared in the middle of the 19th century, helped her find a system for passing the poison intravenously and, in the middle of the 20th century, everything was automated. Her siblings became mummies. Magnus wanted to burn them, but Egeria had always refused and even often went to Amsterdam to talk to their corpses. Without them, she had never been herself. Her act had cursed her. She began to have very strong visions, her powers increased so much that she couldn’t control them without hurting herself. One day, she tried to wake them up to stop her suffering. She was starting to show signs of old age and couldn’t bear it. Magnus stopped her in time and made her swear not to do it again. Egeria was still in love with Magnus at this time, and she understood that her living family would take away all power from her lover and that would certainly cause his final death. It was only afterwards that she realized her mistake, but it was already too late to go back. Now it is you who has the chance to make a difference.”

“So this is why you’re here? Do you want me to be queen too?”

“Do you think you have a choice now? I did everything for you to succeed!”

“What did you do, Blake?” I asked as a shiver ran down my spine.

“I manipulated Eric’s mind for months before finding you in your refuge in Ariège. I just had to let him come to the castle and choose the moment. I had already heard of the Hanlons and I wanted your reunion to be intimate so that I could reach you better afterwards. So I sent him with you. The problem is that his conscience tended to resurface in your presence and I had to put an end to this strategy and adopt another. I used Alysson to get you away from him and again I waited for the moment when I would complete my plan. Kill you.”

He blurted out his words as if the possibility of me not waking up didn’t matter. My terrified eyes couldn’t move away from his. Under the shock of his revelations, I remained silent and horrified.

“Don’t get me wrong, Everliegh, I hoped that you were immortal. And now look at you!”

“Did Ethan know about Eric?”

“About Eric, no. But about Naomi, that’s a different story. I had already stolen your DNA strains before the assault was launched on the Canary Wharf Tower. I found Naomi in Spain and drugged her. Once she was at my mercy, I sent her back to Mortain. It wasn’t difficult for me to contain her mind during all those months. That girl had little sense, damn it! I had decided that she would be my guinea pig and injected her with a dose of my preparation. The results were quite disappointing compared to what I had hoped for, but Naomi proved to be formidable when she killed the Van Durens and the Monteiro couple.”

The blood left my head. So many castes had died because of his madness that thinking about it made my stomach churn. I ran to the sink next to the dressing table and threw up my entire meal there.

“Your brother caught Naomi torturing Salomon and stopped her from killing him. Intoxicated by her new powers, she liked to play with her victims. I was so mad at her for being so reckless that I ordered her to kill the Monteiros in their sleep. It was when I learned that Egeria had transmitted visions to you that I began to feel the urgency of getting to the end of this. She had wanted to counter me, that crazy old woman! I went to retrieve the Six and you suspected nothing because of your blind faith in me. Carmichael was furious, knowing that I hadn’t disclosed such important information to him, so he had to speed things up because he was starting to have doubts!”

He took another breath.

“But it was time for you to die. So I dispatched Morgan, who was suffering terribly from the consequences of his isolation in Amsterdam. I helped him to recover and took advantage of his weakness to put him at my mercy. At the same time, I got hold of Gregory and converted him to the same fate. The goal is to remind you of their existence. So everything came together and I put my plan into action. I had hidden the Six in one of my old residences. They had finally recovered. They were particularly interested in the prophecy that Egeria had made. Remember: Two chosen ones whose sovereignty will be all-powerful, blood brother and sister, she alone will be the heart, because they will be at the origin of the advent of those who have been chosen. An ultimate power so great that an isolated act against them will bring about the annihilation of the earthly world. The final outcome will depend only on the choices they make. Chosen in soul they will remain, chosen in soul they will die. They were fascinated, convinced that this prophecy was about them, so I told them your story and your tremendous gift of attraction. They didn’t care at first, because they knew the prophecies were only about immortals. So I had to know, but I had to find out about your lineage first before I killed you. I knew that Camelia, the daughter of Eleonore and Magnus, had created a line in the greatest secrecy. It wasn’t until the 16th century that we succeeded in tracing your family tree. You’re the descendant of Isabelle Castellane. Your father had great powers, but I couldn’t understand your gift of attraction or your powerful telekinesis. So I continued my research and I found the diary of Joseph Ferloni, the protector of Eric and Thomas. He had secret documents in a vault in Switzerland. While rummaging through his paperwork, I then discovered two very interesting old portraits. One was your mother’s, the other was Carmichael’s great-grandmother. The truth struck me: you are both of the same blood.”

My legs gave out and I slumped to the ground. I clung to the bed to slow my fall. Blake’s words crept like poison into my mind.

“Is my mother alive?”

“Yes, she’s an immortal. I didn’t start looking for her since I had the information I had come for. I also learned that this woman was not Ethan’s mother, who died in childbirth, but a temptress who had charmed your father during one of his trips. Ethan’s mother had no choice but to agree to raise you when the woman had abandoned you in Nathan’s arms. The Six were very interested in this discovery and were surprised when they discovered her portrait. She looked like Althea, like two drops of water. The queen immediately recognized one of her daughters. Althea flew into a rage, for she thought all her children were dead. Today, I can assure you that she has found your mother and that she is keeping her locked up in one of her cells.”

“But why?”

“Because she gave birth to you! You’re a threat, and Carmichael just as much as you. You two have royal blood. Who prevents you from ruling the world? They’re too scared of losing an ounce of power, and if this story got out, then you’d have every right to claim the throne.”

My head ached. There were too many of these revelations.

“What do you want, Blake?”

“Now that I’ve planted the seed of conflict, I think I can deserve a proper death.”

“Carmichael!” I mentally shouted, hoping he would have heard me.

“Knowing the outcome of the coming war doesn’t matter to me. I had fun, and now it’s over, I no longer have a place in this world.”

“You used me.”

“Of course! Your imprisonment in London changed the prospects of my end and I took great pleasure in working out these last stratagems. I’d had three hundred years to think about it and there you are, arriving right next to my cell! But my brother, what a mistake!”

“They took him, your brother!”

“At my request. They’ll make him believe that they welcome him among them and wait until he feels comfortable before killing him in an atrocious way. I bargained for their resurrection in exchange for his skin, because doing it myself was impossible. The future is now in your hands unless you make the wrong decisions…”

He stood up and gave me a terrifying look.

“CARMICHAEL!”

“You have to do it, Everliegh!”

I looked at him in dread and he threw my body across the room.

“Blake, please don’t force me. There have been enough deaths.”

“I don’t care about the other deaths, I want mine!”

He threw my huge bed to crush me with it, but I was already levitating as the furniture smashed against the wall. He dislodged the freestanding tub and threw it across the room.

“CARMICHAEL!”

“DO IT!” Blake yelled.

He came in front of me and put both hands on my skull. The sharp pain tore a howl from me. I suffered, my muscles contracted and I knelt, on the verge of giving up.

The door shattered and Carmichael launched himself in Blake’s direction but was stopped by the mental barrier he had erected around himself.

“Damn, but what are you doing, Blake?!” he shouted.

“She has to do it!”

My torment made my jaw snap, my body was seized with convulsions.

“BLAKE, STOP!” yelled Carmichael, concentrating on stepping forward.

At the edge of the abyss, I was only a shadow of myself when an interior breath shook my spine. I felt the presence of my lover being welcomed into my flesh. Abandoning any attempt to move forward, he sent some of his powers and energy to me through his gift of attraction, which knew no mental barriers. His anger mixed with mine soon surfaced in my battered brain. My fingers moved to Blake’s skull. Neck veins erupting, I locked a dreadful gaze into my saviour’s eyes and screamed my lungs out.

Like Egeria, he was reduced to a cloud of dust.

In shock, I stared at the devastation in the room. The psychic battle against Blake had left nothing untouched, even the crystal ceiling light was lying, shattered on the floor. Everything had exploded. My legs gave out again. Carmichael grabbed me and carried me to his top-floor apartment.

“He gave me no choice,” I whispered as he laid me down on the bed.

He took off my shoes, took off my pants and pulled the covers over my shoulders. I realized that I was shaking from head to toe, numb from the burst of energy that Blake’s death had required. For an hour, I remained almost calm, then suddenly I started screaming. I struggled but Carmichael held my hands. I wanted him to back away, but he held on to me. My fevered mind no longer controlled my powers. The chests of drawers smashed against the fireplace, the fire appeared in the middle of the hearth, and the dressing table came crashing down a few yards from the bed. In a second of calm, Carmichael managed to give me a glimpse of his presence. A warm envelope caressed my cheek but I still screamed. He finally put a hand against my forehead and the warmth that spread through my skull calmed my mind. I watched him again before falling asleep for two whole days.

I had already realized that the best way to recover the energy left by a confrontation was to sleep. The body was crying out for it and mine has been doing that quite often lately. When I got up at the end of the afternoon, I noticed that nothing survived in the room, only the bed had resisted. I had managed to ransack two magnificent rooms in one night! Traces of fire appeared around the fireplace but everything had been cleaned. The memory of my temporary insanity came back to me, accompanied by all of Blake’s revelations. Calmer on waking, my gaze was lost on the ceiling while I thought of all that this meant for me and all that I had learned: My mother was by far the most devastating news. There were also the Six, who posed a mortal threat to the caste way of life and the human condition; And me, who had come back different from death and who had to accept the responsibility of seeing many people perish if I didn’t accept my fate. And Carmichael...

I got up and picked up one of his light blue shirts that was lying in the remains of a chest of drawers whose left side was held up by two huge books. Barefoot, I headed for the living room where I found him. Sitting on his chair, he felt my presence because he suddenly turned his head.

“How are you feeling?” he said, standing up.

“It’s okay, I’ll get over it.”

“Sweetie, I couldn’t hear you in the Pomona room,” he said without approaching for the moment, “We were in the middle of a council. I went out to find you and no sooner had I set foot on the stairs than I heard your call. I arrived as quickly as possible.”

“I saw.”

“Blake had lost his mind, you couldn’t have done anything to stop him.”

“Hum… and still you don’t know everything.”

I sat down on the couch, he imitated me on his armchair. We hadn’t touched yet. The fireplace crackled with flames as I told him Blake’s story. At the first sentence, he showed surprise, but what made him react the most was the revelations concerning my mother and also his grandmother. He had already suspected for a long time that Blake was hiding information from him. Not having told him about the Six, Morgan’s death, which he felt was unnecessary, and his sudden disappearance had already carved a path of suspicion in the Master Hand towards his uncle. My revelations made him realize how far back his real treachery went. Carmichael remained silent at the end of my story when I broached the subject of blood and prophecy. Worry overtook me.

“Does it disgust you to know that we are somehow from the same family?”

“Certainly not!” he replied. “At most, we’re distant cousins. That’s okay, isn’t it?”

“Not in this century, Carmichael.”

He smiled and came to sit next to me. He ran a hand over my thigh, not taking his eyes off me.

“Because after what just happened,” I continued, “I no longer see our union in the same way.”

“I’m listening,” said Carmichael, not without concealing a slight grin.

“We can’t let the Six get their way, they’re gathering a lot of our people, we can’t let them and…”

“And…?”

“They’re holding my mother…”

“And…?”

“And everything pushes me towards you... I feel like I can’t breathe when you’re away from me.”

This time he was really smiling.