Blood Trials
The Scary Axel

In Loving Memory Of

Tomás Édouard Adrahasis du Luq

14 June 1643 - 9 June 2022

&

Fitzwilliam Sebastian Charles Randall

10 October 1779 - 9 June 2022

Dominique hummed her wallowing sadness as Clarke, Ahmed and Dane covered the joint grave. Her knees were weak, despite the firm link between her arm and Ridley's. She was sobbing loudly over the priest giving the final blessing. He concluded with the Sign of the Cross before shaking the hands of the aunt-niece duo. The priest concluded his business then took his leave.

The Mesopotamian-French woman picked her basket from the floor and began to decorate the granite placard with a bottle of wine, an enamel bowl of Ridley's chocolate balls and pint of blood. She dirtied her slip dress - which was white - but continued with her handiwork. Around the assortment of food, she also layered white lilies. She just knelt there, allowing her tears to water the flowers she had picked.

Ridley set her wreath of orchid against the bottle of wine. Dominique leaned into Ridley, sobbing loudly. The Source had an arm around her aunty to hold her as they got up. The goldblood turned into her niece, panting. Ridley gathered her in a firm hug, taking in the headstone Clarke arranged from the hunters' fund. The fresh grave tended to, Dane and Clarke joined them. Ahmed stepped aside, joining Morgan, Falk and the åse.

The rest of the colony therianthropes were huddled in the treeline, but watching too. Falk growled lowly before leading a howl. The åse, the therianthropes in the trees and Morgan too joined him. Dane cupped Ridley's shoulder as they spectated the howl. Not just wolves; foxes, hyenas, jackals, all of them howling. The choir - haunting and otherworldly - didn't sound entirely like a howl. A melancholy chant in a different language, more like.

Falk snorted then licked his snout before looking towards the Source. The howl dissipated with his lead. Let this be a sign that my trust in you and our role in this campaign is unquestioned. She nodded sullenly.

The Source glanced next to the placard to the headstone alongside Tomás and Sebastian. Dane firmed the toned digits on her, when he noticed where her eyes had wondered. Side-by-side for the first time ever, and forever, Ridley read the granite beside her brother and friend:

Ryan Aimée Axel

Rogue

07. 11. 2003 - 30. 11. 2021

She seethed a breath then looked away, feeling Dominique stiffen in her arms. We warned you, Ninsun revelled. Now do you see? To continue with this game, now that others know who you are, will only bring about the end of your family.

I hate to admit it, Ms Axel, there is a grave truth to Ninsun's words. Yes, Mr Wolfensøn will continue on this path but the damage will be less if we do not stand in his way. The Bloodline is what's most important here. Your family, I'm afraid, can no longer be a priority. I beg you...

I understand why you are such an embittered one, the åse said through a chuckle. The ghostly white wolf trotted to Ridley with a gleam in her blue eyes. All those millennia wrapped into one under-experienced mind. The Source nodded curtly at the wolf. My dear girl, our Source is secured by a Family. Yours is a person. One damned soul, meant to carry the weight of this burden alone. Forever.

Ridley looked down at her hands. "You think they're right?" Dane and Clarke looked to her over the unfilled silence. Dominique too glanced towards her niece.

I do not, the åse answered. Ridley felt a glimmer of hope swell in her chest. I know they are right. The white wolf sat, before the Source, with her blue eyes not wavering from Ridley. There's only one of you. If the wrong person drank enough of your blood, would they not become the next Source? Would they not have you in their head for the rest of eternity? Perhaps these old men merely wish to protect you.

"They're protecting themselves by shoving their world view down my throat."

With skills like yours, you should be free to live your life however you see fit, Falk argued. But I can see reason. Since there is an amnesty between your people and mine, albeit a fickle one, you are welcome to live in the colony.

Gods, no! Not while I have a say in this matter, Ninsun jeered.

"Be quiet," Ridley groaned in murmurs. "All of you," she pleaded coldly. She crossed the ending funeral towards Ryan's grave. "I just want to be without my skull splitting."

The åse lowered her head then spun around and left with Falk and his colony. Dominique tugged her niece's hair behind her shoulder, allowing it to catch the breeze, before she followed Esmeralda and Mariska off. The passed Sources too fell silent. Clarke glanced to Dane them ordered the young hunter off wordlessly. Dane looked to Ridley's back.

She wore a sleeveless trench coat dress, with leather opera gloves that neared her bulging biceps; all in her signature black. The Danish hunter trailed after Dominique and Esmeralda. Clarke released a heavy breath as he paused beside her, mindful of the Hoyt recurve bow she had slung over a shoulder. The seasoned hunter exhaled sharply again, taking in his daughter's grave.

"We never spoke about it, did we," Clarke asked. "Coping with death."

"We're taught it's a necessary evil, papa. That it come with the job, that the dead are-"

"Ridley," Clarke sighed. "Esmeralda and I buried a daughter, we're in pain. We're still in pain. You're in pain. A pain I never stopped to release you felt. Not just your brother, Ryan, all of it. Apart from Renee, those weren't justified deaths."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"That's my point. It took you running away for me to realise that you were never this... rock. This unfeeling, hardened rock. You were supposed to come to me with anything. I was supposed to know that something was-

"But you didn't, did you? Isn't that a testament to your shitty parenting skills," she countered. "What do you want me to say, Clarke? How it felt like my throat was compressing when I jammed a knife into my sister's neck? Feeling her carotid pulsate through the handle. Or how I watched the life leave her eyes, and felt her go limp. How I realised, at Christmas dinner, that I slaughtered my own mother? And now, Tomás and Sebastian - my brother and his best friend, who died because I endangered their lives, recklessly - are buried next to the person I cherished the most and also murdered. Great talk," she concluded sourly then left.

The scowl was going nowhere on Ridley's face. The evening air was almost frigid, a familiar feeling; it had been months since her last patrol duty. Crouching on the ledge of the library with only Marie for company. The Source surveyed the quad that only had speckles of moon students coolly hang around. Around - out of sight, but well-heard - were sun students going out or returning jubilantly. Once they swiftly scattered off campus or back to their dorms, it was dead still. It was a quiet she didn't realise she missed until then.

Through the Bloodline's psionic link, she could feel Marie boredly behind her. A sigh to match, the French huntress began pacing slurvishly about the rooftop. The school's unassuming atmosphere was a welcoming change of pace from the mission. The cloudy sky above lightly covered the stars but didn't dim their glow. That with the caressing breeze was a tranquility much needed. The Source looked down, continuing. Her bow, spread across her thighs, she was tightening her spyscope with her Allen key.

When she turned back to her domain, she tilted her head at the faint darkness. “Movement on the school hall, westside." She looked through her spyscope, changing the filter to thermal.

"Engaging," Marie declared.

"Wait," Ridley ordered, seeing a canine figure. Marie slid down the rain spout. Ridley rolled her eyes, changing her posture. "All units stand down." Drawing an arrow from her hip quiver, she aimed at Marie. "Same old Chasseur."

She fired! Marie's scream of agony echoed over the muted hilltop. She fell onto the damp grass with an arrow in her shoulder. A sneeze came from behind her. She spun around, another arrow knotched. Creeping into the moonlight was a white fur coat. The åse licked her snout then sat obediently before the Source. Ridley lowered her loaded bow, inching her chin up. Thank you, Ryo, the åse stated. Falk said you were here, I hope you don't mind my interrupting.

Ridley tugged out her earpiece with a defeated sigh. "I came out here to be alone. Go away."

Do you know what an åse does? Ridley rolled her eyes, turning back to the quad. You will defend our ways, but you do not want to know our ways?

"It's in my job description not to ask questions. If you want to look it up, it's in The Hunter Association Codex. Chapter 13, page 1578, paragraph 10."

Your stoic is admirable for a hunter, but lacking as a Source. Ridley squared her shoulders, watching Marie sitting on a marble bench. An åse is the spiritual leader and keeps the ceremonies on behalf of the colony. She is considered wise and perceptive, and held in equal regard as the ikon. Unlike priests who answers to gods, åse women answer to nature and to the primal. On technicality, that would mean I am meant to answer to you. What is the Bloodline but a piece of primal, morphed to give the world the fangs?

"What's the point to this?"

There is no point, the åse confessed. Ridley shook her head, drawing a knife to each hand. She straightened up then jumped off the roof. Her knives tore into the outside walls upon descent. Have you noticed that fangs and furs both descend from the primal yet the only trait they have in common is psionic?

"Shut up."

Once an åse woman commits her life to spirituality, she gives up her human and primal forms. We learn secrets during our meditation. Secrets that most men would kill to know. Ridley strutted through the quad. Secrets like the very first fur and fang. The Source halted, piqued, the looked up to the rooftop. Against the darkness, against their distance, Ridley saw a smirk on the åse's snout. You have all the passed Sources in your mind, including the First. I sense him there, I do not hear him. Why do you think that is? How old do you think he is? What do you think he knows?

Do not listen to this mutt, Ninsun ordered.

The Second objects, only because he knows a great deal. Much like the First.

Fare carefully, Onuris warned. Upuaut is the Egyptian god of war; a god with the head of the wolf.

The Third. The objective-minded, yet a skeptic. Not as knowledgeable but he grew to knew things too.

Ms Axel, perhaps we should put some mile between us and these... new friends. Perhaps their psionic with you is much like those radio things.

The Fourth. A young pup, much like yourself. He, however, fears the unknown and is grateful to be in the mind of one capable of defending oneself in the unknown.

"Shut up," Ridley bellowed! The serene school surrounding her only became deafeningly silent. "Can none of you understand the right to remain silent, or do you lack the capacity!"

"Wow," Marie commented. Ridley gandered over her shoulder to see Marie twiddling the blood-tainted arrow in one hand. "Badr said you went 'round the bend with voices in your head." Ridley folded her arms but said nothing. "Chill, oh great, All-Seeing One. Badr told me everything. Said I was his contingency, should he be compromised."

"He couldn't have chosen a worse hunter."

"Oh, burn in Hell."

"I packed sunscreen and marshmallows, I'll be fine." Marie put her hands on her hips, not letting go of the arrow. "At least he had a backup plan," the Source sighed.

"One question." Ridley arched an eyebrow. "I'm thinking of a number between..."

"That's not how it works."

"Okay, second question: if you see everything, why didn't you see him telling me all this?"

"I probably did. I just had other things on my mind: wedding anniversaries, high school graduations, babies' first steps. Children dying."

"Fine. So where is he?"

"I don't know."

"How is he?"

"Alive, barely."

"What's he doing right now?"

"He's strapped down. They're doing blood transfers on him. It's what they do before they start with the configurations to create therians."

"So they're going to turn him? What are chances he survives?"

"3/12, I'm guessing, prejudicially. As far as I can see, Morgan is the only successful one. My bias is telling me his brother, Logan, was turned too. And I added one more for good measure."

"25% is not even cautiously optimistic, Riddles."

"Gee, I didn't know that."

The Source turned away and made to leave the quad, linking her fingers together. She breathed out heavily, feeling the summer breeze grow frigid. Glancing to the library's roof, she saw the åse was gone. Ridley closed her eyes then continued off, looking for somewhere else to replace quiet. "Hey, Riddles," Marie called, earning a distant over-the-shoulder glower. "My condolences." Ridley only nodded before leaving.