"Here we are," Crale said, opening the door to let them in. Sandy's eyes were nearly bulging out of their sockets. Rose remembered her saying at the bar that no one knew where Locious lived; she thought Sandy had been lying to protect him but it was clearly her first time there.
"Dude this is a freaking fortress!" she shouted with a laugh. "God I have never felt energy this strong. How many powers are locked in here? My skin is prickling!"
A soft laugh came from behind the stairs. A woman appeared in the hallway in a white flowing dress. She walked so delicately that she seemed to float. With her dark messy hair and large green eyes she looked ethereal. She approached the group and pulled Crale down by his neck for a kiss before smiling at them. Rose was sure she was Crale's wife and now she could understand where the unique came from.
Crale introduced them. When the woman recognized Rose her smile widened and her eyes lit up. "My my... so you are the Variant. I can see it. It's so beautiful," she said, her eyes growing watery.
Rose and Sandy exchanged a confused look. What was she seeing that made her want to cry? Before they could ask, a deep voice made everyone turn around.
"Kiizary stop doing that. There will never be anyone like Laeyla so don't even think for a moment of comparing this girl to her." The disgust on Hariiel's face made Rose feel as if she had suddenly made something wrong and was about to face the punisher, who didn't believe in her innocence.
"Who said I was doing that? I'm just mesmerized by the beauty of it. I love pretty things. If I didn't I wouldn't be with my little panda bear... am I right?" she said, caressing Crale's face.
It was as cute as it was bizarre. This woman had just used a ridiculous nickname for a powerful Angel in front of another incredibly pissed-off Angel. Do these people have no fear at all? Rose wondered. She was trembling just from the tangible power Sandy had mentioned but Hariiel didn't even respond to the jab. He simply walked past them, giving Rose a look of pure disdain on the way.
"What's with the nasty look?" Sandy snapped, noticing his gaze. Knowing Sandy could easily go overboard, Rose tried to calm her down before she did something to anger him even more.
"It's nothing. That's just the way he is. Don't worry about it."
"What a jerk," Sandy muttered when Hariiel left, closing the door with a loud bang.
"Ha ha ha! I like you. You are very interesting too," Kiizary said, looking at Sandy with a smirk and a calculating spark in her eyes. For the first time Rose saw Sandy anxious. She was usually so fearless that seeing a woman who looked like an elf make her shake and change her weight from one foot to the other nervously, was surprising to say the least.
"Don't worry. Right now my focus is on your friend," Kiizary said. With another smile she took Rose's hand and guided her to the living room. Rose remembered the state she had been in the last time she sat there and felt a surge of shame.
"Let me start by explaining my reaction. You know that Angels have many different skills and we—" She was interrupted when Crale tapped her knee. The act was so intimate and beautiful that Rose felt uncomfortable just watching them. It made her feel a sudden hole in her stomach. I miss him. I already miss him and it has not been even a whole day. I still have more than ten days to see him again, she thought with a sad heart. SHe suddenly felt… lonely, abandoned, left behind. She blinked a few times, trying to get her mind back from the emptiness.
"Sweetie, I think you should first explain who you are." He said with a sweet smile and then turned around to look at them on the opposite couch. "This is Kiizary. She is my Eternal Anchor or in human words, she is my wife. She is a Tier 2 angelic being. As you know they all have different skills that allow them to ascend. She is an expert tracker," Crale said, the pride in his voice impossible to hide.
"Wait wait. So you are the human who ascended? The one that no one knows how?" Sandy asked, completely submerged in the couple's dynamic and their identities. Rose felt lost. Was this the couple Sandy had mentioned at the bar who had been together for a long, long time?
"Yes I am. And no it's not that no one knows; it's just that we belong to a different branch of the training camp. My division is called the Echo Pulse. As you already know humans with no Emissary blood are not supposed to possess any skills, least ascend. However, when I met Crale and we activated the Anchor I was automatically registered in the Ascencio Book." Rose felt as if she were back to school. She wanted to raise her hand and ask all the questions that were popping in her mind. What is the Ascencio Book? Did she say Anchor? Why is Kiizary special? Rose wondered and hopefully waited for Kiizary to answer them.
"When the book keeper noticed the new name, he took me to the training camp. It was a huge deal at that time. Even some people thought there was something wrong with the book and I shouldn't be taken seriously. "Kiizary laughed out loud as if just the thought was unbelievable" You know the book is a spiritual device with its own energy system so it can't make mistakes. Angels can be so… hard to deal with sometimes " she paused for a second, her gaze wandered and she seemed to leave the present for a while until Crale touched her hand with tenderness. The gesture made her blink and she continued with her explanation.
"Anyway, you may wonder why I was able to ascend if I was just a simple human. Well, as a matter in fact, I was Case Zero. I was the first human with special skills and no Emissary's blood in my veins discovered by the Society. If I hadn't met Crale and Ascended, the Society may have never found out that special traits could be found outside the Emissaries and the tier 2. " she finished and gave them time to process what she had said.
Sandy and Rose couldn't make a sound. As far as they knew normal humans didn't have skills. Now they were being told there were even more layers to the world than what they were originally taught.
"But... Why isn't it taught in training? And why are you telling us?" Rose asked when she finally found her voice. If it was a secret, wasn't sharing it with them a huge risk for her?
"Well, because I trust you. And also because I think you will need this information to understand my skill and why it's so secretive," Kiizary answered. Rose understood then: all this secrecy had something to do with the drug and her strange reaction to it. Maybe she would finally know why she felt something had changed inside of her and why she had those emptiness attacks.
"As I was saying, we track humans who possess special skills. Since they cannot belong to the Society due to a lack of Emissary blood we help them in a different way. But that's not the point, we can talk about that some other time, " Kiizary said and Rose felt the urge to grab her hair and wear a new bold look. It was exasperating that all of them seemed to be able to follow the whole conversation.
I want to know now! Why do you all assume we are on the same dial! I feel like an info dumpster who is not working properly. Not knowing what's to be discarded, recycled or kept. She thought, feeling lost. She couldn't link or even know how to store the amount of information and unknowns. However, Kiizary didn't know what was going on so she went on with her explanation.
"In my division we all possess a variant of the tracking skill, same as you, Rose. I'm not quite sure how it mutated this way just because of a drug. Even if it is from the Aethium Umbra. It can't create special skills out of nowhere. So it has been within you this whole time but I checked your blood when you passed the tests and there was nothing out of the ordinary about it."
"You need to understand that she is the boss in her division because she is an expert tracker," Crale added. "So if she says your blood had nothing, it literally had nothing. She has the soul tracking variant." Sandy and Rose looked at them confused. Angels could track essences and energy waves but they had never heard of a soul being able to be tracked.
The soul was like an autobiography. All your history was recorded there, your whole identity and personality. As it didn't have any energy and worked as a records book, it was impossible to be tracked. And scary, imagine if someone was able to know every little detail about someone else's life? It would stir up chaos in the whole world, no secrets would be hidden and that would create a breakage in the balance of power.
" Not that I can actually track souls. I can't read what the Soul has written in, my skill means I can track the vibrations souls leave behind, That's how I can track humans with special abilities. Their souls, even if they don't know it, vibrate a certain way that sets them apart from the Angels and Emissaries. And that's what made Crale notice me, too. I recognized his soul and retained memories of him even after he was gone." She smiled as if reminiscing about the past brought joy to her present. They looked at each other and Rose knew without words that their story must be long and deep but worth it. No one could miss how much they loved each other.
"Anyway the second time Crale brought me your blood I could see the vibrations of your soul on it. And Wow! I wish everyone could see how beautiful your variant of the tracking skill is. It's almost as if it had its own light. I can't explain it but it's like an amalgam of colours. Your variant is a tracker because you can detect spiritual essences. It's astounding because it's not a passive skill. When it detects danger it completely purifies it inside your body, transforming the corrupted Energy and expelling it. Which is something unheard of and mostly coming from an Emissary who doesn't have any special family lineage." Kiizary stopped talking and looked at Rose with shining eyes.
Even if her granny had been special for her and her role model, compared to the Society beings she had been a simple human. Kiizary was used to being around powerful Angels and Angelic Beings so compared to them, her family lineage was nothing worth of attention. However, if what she said was true, her blood was rare and even, something unique. Which made her wonder: Who was my grandma Marian really like? What was she really doing here? If she was a simple Emissary, how do I have a special tracking skill ?
"But why didn't Locious's skills work on her? He would never hurt her," Sandy asked and Rose's heart skipped a beat. Her grandma's thoughts were lost , overran by Locious sleepy face looking at her as if she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Locious voice promising to tell her the truth. Locious refusing to leave her side and giving her his all.
"Oh! That's because the skill was going on a rampage. It was activated by force so any energy—even healing energy—was rejected. That's why she could go to the Demon Association and didn't go for anyone's throats. Her skill is slowly getting used to her surroundings." Kiizary's cheerful words brought her back to the present. However, her tone changed when her gaze landed on Rose.
"You will have to get used to your skill, too. That's why I asked Crale to bring you here. You don't know how big of a deal this is but you need to be able to control it. If something like the club were to happen again and your skill doesn't let Locious or any of us help you it would become a problem. It could mean your life or the life of anyone around you. As amazing as it is, it has its own perks and learning to control them is a new set of skills. The good news is that I am an amazing teacher, even if my panda bear doesn't let me work with Phaeria and Dyaion. I will teach you all I know" Kiizary stood up and clapped her hands.
Rose wasn't sure of what to say or do. She hadn't even finished processing everything that was said when she was taken to the kitchen and her lessons started.