Chapter 12 Royal Blood #2
I exhaled, then looked at Luc. “So what is it you need from us, exactly? You said books and records, but I’m assuming what you want is fairly specific. Are you looking for esoteric texts on magiancestry? Are there particular titles you want us to find? Auric scans? Family trees that interest you?”
Luc shoved his glasses up with a knuckle, and for the first time since he and Bones started arguing, I saw his expression relax.
“I have some thoughts on that, yes,” he said seriously.
“I’ve plumbed what I can from the Bones Library here on campus,” Luc explained. “Blackstone and I’ve been scouring all the records here for auric scans, as well. I’ve also gone through every book I could find in Bonescastle, London, and here on campus, that talks about magical degeneration.”
His blue eyes grew serious as he looked around at us.
“Up until now, finding enough clean, undamaged auric scans from the right time periods has been a challenge. Outside of an academic environment, they can be stashed pretty much anywhere. Libraries. Private collections. Museums. We’ve also found a number in government record-keeping facilities, particularly for the royals.
Hospitals are a fairly obvious repository, but they only began keeping systematic records a few centuries ago. ”
He exhaled, combing fingers through his hair.
“Unfortunately,” he added. “The older ones, the ones we really need, can be found just about anywhere. Trunks in attics, detached garages, private libraries, bank vaults, cellars, tombs, catacombs, stables, random drawers hidden inside massive estates, even embedded in headstones on graves in family plots or public cemeteries. Blackstone and I will likely continue working on that side of things,” he added, glancing at me.
“Partly because, as Greythorne and Bones have now pointed out, the two of us are less likely to attract attention.”
“So what about us?” Nyx asked, clasping her hands together.
Luc hesitated, as if thinking about the question.
“I do have a few books I haven’t been able to find,” Luc said, glancing at Nyx.
“I’ve got a list of mostly out-of-print texts and original scrolls that deal with the Separation and first person accounts from right after it happened.
I’d hoped maybe you or Leda could help me with those.
I’d pay, of course,” he added hastily, pushing up his glasses.
“I’ve actually got a budget from the university on this, especially if you need to purchase anything.
It’s more an issue of time. I know Leda’s been through probably every bookstore in Bonescastle––”
“Not to mention half of greater London,” Alaric murmured.
Bones gave him a slightly frosty look, and I wanted to elbow him.
Luc cleared his throat, and glanced between Alaric and Bones.
“You two have access to the homes of royals,” he began carefully. “Two of those homes, at least. Although, I admit, it’s a bit inconvenient you likely can’t gain access to any of the others at the moment.”
“Inconvenient,” Bones scoffed. He looked interested though, or maybe I could just read it in his magic despite his sneer. “What is it you want with royals’ homes in particular? I thought you said the blood thing has nothing to do with being a royal or not?”
“Yes.” Luc cleared his throat. “That’s true.
But there are still advantages to looking at their family trees.
Royals tend to keep meticulous genealogy records.
That’s more true the higher they are in the succession order, and both of you are high up.
I’m guessing you’ve also got auric scans that go really far back.
If there’s any possible way you could borrow those, at least long enough for me to get a good look at them––”
“How much have you got on blood spells?” Bones asked.
Luc flinched, then frowned. He gave Bones a wary look. “Did I mention that part of my research to you?” he asked. “I don’t remember getting into that yet.”
I glanced at Bones, too.
Was he reading Luc? I wouldn’t put it past him.
“You didn’t mention it specifically,” Bones said, darting a glance at me.
“I’m assuming you’re using rituals, or planning to use rituals, for the auric imprints you can’t get through other means.
As you pointed out, families that fall within the royal succession order tend to be a bit obsessive about bloodlines.
” He glanced down at my cat, who he’d gone back to stroking with his fingers.
“As you can probably imagine, we have all the best spells when it comes to assessing both magic and magical bloodlines.”
Nyx snorted, and Bones aimed a rare smile at her.
“I’m also guessing,” he added, returning his stare to Luc. “You’ll want to look for any similarities or differences in Magical blood that might explain the discrepancy in magical abilities, if only to rule it out.”
Luc continued to look at him a bit warily, but he nodded. “That’s right.”
“Have you found anything at all in that regard?” Alaric asked, leaning forward again. “Are there any bloodline differences in the rate of magical loss?”
Luc hesitated.
I could tell from his expression he didn’t want to talk about that aspect of his research, and I had a pretty good idea why.
“You found a correlation,” I said. “So Dark Cathedral might be right about that part. About blood being a factor in magical ability.”
“No.” Luc turned on me, his jaw hard, his voice low and vehement.
“No, that’s not what I’ve found, Leda. Not the way those disgusting wankers think.
But yes,” he continued with a sigh, sounding slightly defeated as he combed a hand through his hair.
“I’m worried that’s how they would try to read what I did find. ”
“Which is what?” Bones asked, sharper.
Luc pushed his glasses up his nose with a knuckle.
Watching him do it, two things occurred to me: one, it was a nervous tic that Bones seemed particularly successful at triggering, and two, I’d never seen Luc wear glasses before now, which made me wonder what kind of glasses they were, exactly.
I’d assumed most physiological problems like poor eyesight got fixed with magic here, not corrective lenses.
Luc sighed and clasped his hands, as if collecting his thoughts.
“It’s a little difficult to explain without getting overly technical,” he began.
“Oh, gods, please don’t,” Alaric complained.
Nyx snorted, but looked at Alaric with more amusement than annoyance.
I got the impression she’d relaxed around the two royals for the most part, definitely more than Luc had.
I’d never seen Luc so tense or irritable or suspicious before.
I knew there was a history there, with the three of them, so I guessed that was the cause.
Still, it made me nervous. Luc was usually the laid-back, unruffled, philosopher of our group. If he couldn’t handle Bones and Alaric, I would hate to see how Miranda, Draken, and Jolie might deal with the two of them.
“The bottom line,” Luc went on, sparing Alaric only a flat glance.
“Is that yes, there is a physiologic component that can be measured in the blood, but it’s not one that correlates to royal blood, from what I can tell.
I’ve actually got reason to believe that royal blood is, at least on average, more magic-deficient compared to the wider population.
But I’m not sure that has anything to do with the fact of it being ‘royal’ blood, per se, either.
I suspect it’s more likely to have arisen from the concentration of certain tendencies due to intermarriage. ”
“Inbreeding,” Alaric sniffed. “You can say it. It’s hardly a secret.”
Nyx laughed, and Alaric winked at her, raising his teacup to his lips.
“You’re hogging the kitty, Bones,” he scolded his friend.
“It’s not your cat, Alec.”
“It’s more my cat than yours,” Alaric retorted.
“Not true,” Bones said. He rubbed Wraith’s nose. “As it was a present from me, I would very much argue it’s more my cat than yours.”
I flushed a little, and wrung my hands before looking back at Luc.
“Go on,” I urged, ignoring his quirked eyebrow at what Bones had just said. “You were saying the blood difference doesn’t correlate to royal versus non-royal blood. Does that mean we’re all losing our abilities at roughly the same rate?”
At that, Luc tore his eyes off Bones to look at me. I felt him hesitate, as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to answer that question.
In the end, he went on in a more matter-of-fact, scholarly voice.
“Not exactly,” Luc hedged. “I noted a slight acceleration of magical loss in several branches of the royal lines I was able to study. Like I said, it’s long been known there’s a danger of increasing tendencies in bloodlines from a concentration of those same tendencies across generations.
But honestly, I think the relationship is weak. ”
He clasped his hands tighter, looking at me.
“There’s a much stronger correlation with blood on a different variable, however,” he said, clearing his throat.“But for that particular variation, my data suggests it really has nothing at all to do with the royal bloodlines, that they aren’t a factor in and of themselves.”
I frowned, exchanging looks with Bones.
I looked back at Luc. “What does it have to do with, then?”
Luc cleared his throat a second time. “Well… and this is only a theory at this point, mind you… the stronger correlation seems centered in more drastic variation. That variation appears to be directly related to the bloodlines all Magicals lost access to following the Separation.”
There was a silence.
“You mean humans?” Bones blurted.
Luc nodded slowly, giving me a sideways glance. “Yes.”
“You’re saying Magicals are losing their magic because they’re no longer cross-breeding with humans?” Alaric asked. He sounded borderline delighted. “That’s… almost perfect, really.” Something seemed to occur to him then, and he glanced at me.
Luc hesitated, also glancing at me for the barest breath before he shifted his gaze to Bones, and then to Alaric.
“I think it’s possible, yes,” he admitted. “That’s my working theory right now.”
“And you think my father might know this?” Bones asked.
Luc exhaled again, leaning down to lift his teacup up off a saucer on the floor by the base of the couch.
Given how long it had been since he’d picked it up, the tea inside must be stone cold.
If so, Luc didn’t seem to mind. He swallowed down the rest of it, set the cup back on the saucer, coughed, and looked at Bones.
“I have no idea what your father knows and doesn’t know,” Luc said, opening his hands. “I really don’t.”
“Does Blackstone?” I wondered aloud.
Bones and Luc both looked at me.
Neither of them tried to answer my question.
I found myself thinking about all the humans who had been disappearing from Earth, the ones the Praecuri had been trying to trace.
The rituals Malefic had been conducting required blood, lots of it, and Forsooth told me they now thought the humans being kidnapped were used for many of Dark Cathedral’s rituals over the past year.
That, plus Malefic’s seeming-obsession with getting his hands on me, or my brother, or both of us, all pointed towards the same rough conclusion.
“He knows,” I found myself saying, staring into the fire.
I felt them all look at me. I didn’t try to return their gazes.
Luc frowned. “Why would you think that, Leda?”
I clutched the edges of my jumper, still facing forward. “It’s logical. He must know. Suspect, at least. Well enough that he’s been conducting his own experiments.”
Next to me, Bones cleared his throat.
“I agree,” he said.
They all turned towards him, and Bones shrugged.
“My father very probably interprets the problem differently, and sees it through more of a religious and apocalyptic lens, but like Leda said, his actions make it pretty damned likely he has some awareness that human blood might be the missing ingredient.”
His fingers continued to gently stroke Wraith’s ears.
“He’s always viewed Magical overthrow of the human world as necessary to restore our species to greatness,” he added, quieter.
“He’s never agreed with the current strategy of ‘unobtrusive influence,’ as practiced by the Praecuri.
He views it as an abject failure.” He gave me a somewhat harder look.
“I don’t entirely disagree with him in that. ”
I wasn’t entirely sure I did, either.
But Malefic Bones wanting to murder most of the human race and establish himself as god-Pharaoh wasn’t my idea of a reasonable alternative.
Again, my mind returned to the gold tattoos on Alaric’s chest.
We still didn’t know anything about those rituals, either. Did the gold tattoos have anything to do with the ritual Malefic wanted the hybrid blood for? Forsooth told me the Praecuri hadn’t been able to identify the type or purpose of that magic, even after an extensive search of the Bones estate.
I still didn’t know how Malefic had possessed Bones, either, or how often he’d been doing it, or if that was directly connected.
I had no idea if Bones himself knew those things.
I suspected he didn’t.
“If he does know about the blood-problem,” I muttered.
“I would very much like to know what he’s decided the solution to that problem might be.
” I glanced at Bones. “In the short run, I mean. Before he starts his war. I assume he’d want to do whatever he could to boost the magical abilities of those fighting on his side.
If he stumbled upon the thing that’s diminishing magical abilities, he’d try to reverse that, wouldn’t he? ”
Bones frowned back, but I could see him turning over what I’d said.
Slowly, he nodded.
“Yes,” he said reluctantly. “Particularly if he’s still encountering resistance in getting key families and institutions to join him.” His eyes locked with mine. “If he did find a solution, it would serve as carrot and stick. Join us, and your bloodline will be restored.”
“Or,”Alaric piped up. “Don’t join us, and we’ll rip your entire failing bloodline out of the ground by the roots, and feed whatever’s left to the dragons.”
All of us looked at Alaric.
He returned our gazes with an innocent expression.
“What?” he said, holding up his hands. “That’s the idea, isn’t it?”
Bones snorted, but grudgingly nodded his head.
“Yes,” he said. “That’s more or less exactly the idea.”