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After hours spent looking at the box and pouring over every fucking report I had received on it, I wanted to throw the fucking thing out of the nearest window and let its new home become a frozen lake. I was starting to believe that one of two things must have happened. One was that Amelia had officially hit genius status or the God of dumb fucking luck had struck a deal with the Fates and decided to give her a healthy dose of it!
Honestly, I wouldn’t have been surprised at either, but knowing how smart she was for this ancient crap, then I would put my money on it being mostly her doing and a bit of the other. Now, if the Fates would just be so fucking kind and grant me the same courtesy, then I could swiftly move on to the part where my ass was on a plane and heading to wherever the Hell it was in the world she had been hiding.
I pulled the map from beneath the papers it had got buried under and placed it angrily on top, putting the box next to it, expecting it to do something...fucking anything! Hell, I would take the fucking Devil’s hand reaching out of it and slapping me three ways from Limbo, just as long as what followed was the fucking answer!
“AAHH FUCKING THING!” I suddenly roared after grabbing it and throwing it at the wall. An action that ended with a small explosion of glass from the frame I had hanging there, with the picture I had taken of the lake now floating to the floor.
I raked a frustrated hand through my hair and held it at the base of my neck before releasing the strands on another growl. Then I got up with a sigh and went to retrieve it, first having to brush off the shards of glass and not giving a shit that doing so ended with a bloodied hand. Well, at least it was from something other than putting a fist through a wall, which was novel for a change, I thought sarcastically. To be honest, it was of little wonder why no one wanted to be near me these days.
But with my council spread out around the world dealing with the crisis the rogues had presented, then for once I found my castle near empty. At first I had been tempted by Adam’s offer in accompanying me in my decision to return here. But then, with Adam came Pip, and I knew that in this current state of misery I was in, then I wasn’t sure Pip’s personality would survive it.
Even having the new work being done on the club hadn’t been enough to keep me occupied. Surprisingly, of all people I had given Sophia, Dom’s sister, free reign to arrange this shit for me. This was after Dom’s recommendation as she too was worried for her niece’s safety and clearly needed something to take her mind off that worry. I had accepted the offer with only one rule put into place...
Not a single shade of purple.
This, Dom had found most amusing. On the other hand, I had walked out of the room, stopping long enough to warn Sophia,
“I am not fucking joking.” Then I had handed her a limitless credit card and left.
Well, it had to be said that she was good, for the club was nearly finished despite the fortune spent on overtime alone. But from what I had seen from some pictures, it was looking good. However, not good enough to tempt me into travelling back there to see it firsthand. At this rate I wouldn’t even be at the fucking reopening of it, as I refused to do so without Amelia by my side.
Speaking of which, I placed the box back down on my desk and sat staring at it as if this would help, before looking down at the blood pooling in the hand I had kept away from it. I snarled down at the sight, feeling as if my fucking blood was the cause of all of this. My blood and the tainted hand of a fucking Titan tyrant!
I fisted my hand, letting the thick crimson rivulets rain down through my fingers, before I hammered it down on the desk next to the box in my anger. It split the wood from the force, making the box tip into the bloody print of the side of my fist. The second it did, it vibrated before unlocking as it had done many times before. I decided I needed to do something. Maybe there would be some sort of specialist out there that I didn’t yet know about.
As much as I hated to admit it, one thing was for sure and that was I was out of my depth here. Which also meant that I was simply wasting time by sitting here staring at the fucking thing!
So, I decided to fold up the only copy of the map with my gloved hand being careful not to get blood on it. I intended to put it back in the box for safe keeping.
At the very least I knew that I didn’t need the original which I had intended to keep. This was before the Witch had got her hands on it, of course. Because somewhere between Dom’s vault and the portal door back into Afterlife, Amelia had opened the box. Fucking typical, seeing as that had been the only place a seeker couldn’t fucking seek!
Had Takeshi accomplished this, he would have been able to see how Amelia had unlocked the map’s secrets. That way she wouldn’t have stood a chance at being gone so long, as I would have discovered her destination from the start.
But yet again, it just felt like another barrier set against me by the fucking Fates themselves! I grabbed my phone off the desk and rang Adam, thankful that he answered on the second ring, well at least I thought he did,
“I’m sorry but Mr Ambrogetti can’t come to the phone right now, this is due to an unfortunate accident that we are calling The Great Inflatable Butt Plug incident of two thousand and...Ooops, no sugar belly, I most definitely did not, slash did...answer your phone again...eeek!” I groaned aloud and started to rub my forehead, knowing now how I’d made the right decision in not taking Adam up on his offer. Thankfully, Adam’s voice came on the other end after the sound of slapping naked skin was heard. This and demonic growls and giggles after it.
“Now sit still before I tie you over my knee again...Hello?” Adam muttered what everyone would have known was a pointless threat seeing as this was most likely her aim in the first place.
“Adam, its me.”
“My Lo...”
“Drop the shit, Adam, no one is fucking here!” I snapped making him release a sigh before muttering down at Pip,
“Time to get up, little one.”
“Aww, but you promised you would be the teacher this time and I stole your phone and everything!” I heard her say and knew she was pouting, even from here.
“We will play later, Peaches, now go do your homework ready for me.” At this she shouted,
“Yey! Hell yeah, I will, just you wait and see, those equations are gonna look the shit, we are talking hearts, kisses and little cupid cocks in the margins and everything!”
“Good girl,” he responded on a chuckle, making me regret the call and wished I had just sent him a fucking text!
“Alright Luc, go for it.”
“Are you sure, ‘cause you could just go ahead and rub salt in the wound and fuck whilst I wait?” I snarled making him laugh instead of taking me seriously.
“Don’t give her ideas, Luc, it’s the last thing she needs...now I take it you needed something...other than some alone time and a porno of course.” he added because the bastard knew he could.
“Asshole,” was my muttered response and again he laughed.
“I need to know if there is anyone else out there who can look at this map, anyone we haven’t thought of.”
“Luc, come on, we have been through this, we have had every geographical expert looking at it and half the idiots believed it was the lost city of Atlantis!” Adam certainly had a point and he would know being the poor bastard that had been charged with meeting with them.
“I take it this has something to do with Amelia taking an extra copy of the map?” he asked getting to the point.
“Stealing an extra copy of the map, yes,” I corrected before adding the real reason for my call,
“She found a way to decipher it, Adam.”
“Whoa, okay so that’s new...how do you know that?” he asked after first expressing his surprise.
“Because she purposely left a copy in her room and gave me back the box, now why would she do that?”
“Because she didn’t need it anymore...alright, point taken, and you officially have my attention,” he replied making me raise a brow,
“And I didn’t before?”
“Luc, I have my wife here dressed in a naughty schoolgirl outfit, bent over my desk and leaving very little to the imagination other than the fucking pencil she has been sucking on this whole time...yes, only now do you have my attention.” I scoffed before being the one to mutter this time,
“Point taken.”
The amusing part about this comment was that most people who knew Adam, had never heard him speak this way. But seeing as we had that kind of friendship, then unless anyone was around, this was the natural way of things. And in truth, it was that kind of honesty I needed right now.
“Okay, so what do you need?”
“I want you to put together a team, anyone from experts in the geographical field, to Philologists, to the study of fucking ancient map reading...Hell, get me a fucking Scribe for all I care!” Adam laughed and made another point as was his way,
“Unless you’re referring to the Jewish recordkeeper variety, then I think we are all out of luck at finding an ancient Egyptian who documents the life of a pharaoh.”
“Adam.” I growled his name as a warning of my dark mood.
“Alright Luc, I will see what I can do...where do you want to meet?”
“I will come to you, as I think you have more chance of finding the people we need in the States...fuck, but it’s not like it’s lacking in the amount of Universities.”
“That’s true...and the map?” he asked.
“I am putting it in the box as we speak and will bring both...wait...what the...?” My voice trailed off the second I opened the box further thanks to the blood I had already spilled for it. But the moment a drop of my blood dripped inside the box, it started to do more than just vibrate this time. No, now it started to open at the seams before it suddenly stopped.
“Luc? What is it?” I didn’t tell him, wanting to find out for myself first.
“Go, enjoy your wife, I will call you back later,” I said hanging up to the sound of him cursing me, no doubt for leaving him in the dark. Adam loved a good puzzle as much as the next geek. Hell, but from what I had been told, he and Amelia would often be found hunched over a crossword or some new challenge bought for them in the way of some plastic, multicolored puzzle cube.
But as for me, well this was challenge enough and it just looked to be one I had just cracked...finally. So, after throwing my phone down on the table, I shifted the box closer to me. Then I lifted my right hand to my mouth, one that had already started to heal. After this I let my fangs extend and bit hard into my own flesh, deep enough to make it bleed thoroughly. Then I removed the map and allowed my blood to pour down into the box.
In seconds it started to unfold before my eyes making me curse,
“Fuck me...it worked.”
That was when it all started to make sense, as seeing her hand bleeding had obviously been when she had discovered the box’s secret just as I had. Because once the box was flat, it was easy to see the channels of blood that had started to fill. Channels that were there for a reason.
But for me that reason became something else entirety as I placed the map over the now flat piece of wood, watching as its destination started to seep through the paper.
One that included a name.
One I knew all too well.
“Gods, can it be?” I muttered in astonishment as I looked up at the painting above my fireplace. And for the first time in a long time, a real grin emerged as that reason became one that mirrored both my past and my future.
After this there was only one thing left to say,
“I’ve got you now, my little Šemšā...”
“I’ve got you now.”
Amelia