Page 101 of He Who Sleeps

Chapter 35

“You guys on the way?”

Petra nodded though Jack couldn’t see her. “Yes. Just had to get the crate all loaded up. You guys already there?”

“Just waiting on Carter and You. None of us are looking forward to seeing you off.”

“Don’t you mean me seeing you off?”

“Same thing.”

“But when you guys get back, I’ll be welcoming heroes.”

“Yes, you will. Okay, see you at the airfield in a bit.” He hung up as Carter slipped into the car.

“All set?”

"You should see the side-eye he's giving us," Carter laughed. "He hates the crate."

“Brutus baby, I promise...won’t be long,” she said to the back of the SUV as Carter pulled away from his curb and pulled out onto the street. “Jack said they’re just waiting on us. And thanks for letting me watch him this week. We need bonding time.”

"Just don't let him sleep in the bed, okay?" Carter laughed. "I don't want him picking up bad habits while only Mama's home."

Mama. She blushed and giggled. “Don’t worry, Brutus, you can get the couch,” she teased. “So you guys ready for this?” They had been prepping for this for weeks. After finding the information they had during the birthday, and then what else they figured out at Thanksgiving, then further when Finn and Emerson had visited one of the high priests...there was so much they had uncovered and Finn had been a monster trying to make sure that at the end of this, they won.

"Of course we are," he said easily. "We've been planning this for weeks. Finn's a smart dude. You don't have to worry about us, Petra."

“But I do worry, Carter.” She grabbed his hand and squeezed. “You figure out about my orphanage yet? I know you were looking into it. I wanted to tell you, I asked my friends about stuff, see if they remembered anything that might help.”

"Honestly, I couldn't find much about it online," he said. "Which leans toward it being Order. I'm still following the trail of shell companies, but I figured that it would be easier to just ask whichever Order accountants are still alive when the purge is over. Did your friends remember anything?"

The conversation came back to her quickly. They had been talking the night before, since all their plans for the holidays had fell through, too many life things happening at once that they couldn’t collectively get away for longer than a few hours, so their meeting was to set up their Xmas Eve gift exchange virtually. It had turned into the four of them sitting around their living rooms with a bottle of wine each, courtesy of Vic, catching up and reminiscing. "They did. We talked about...remember when I mentioned what they did when we got our periods?"

"Yeah?"

“Well, Carlee remembered something that I think the rest of us blocked out. She said that one of the matrons collected phials of our first blood. We all remembered the flowers and the pomegranates, but Carlee, she remembered one of the matrons having each of us sit, and collecting our blood straight from the source, so to speak, and...” She swallowed, this was the thing that freaked her out most. “She remembered them saying that this would have to do because virgin blood wasn’t an option for us.”

"Virgin blood?" Carter frowned, not taking his eyes off the road. "I wonder what they meant about it not being an option. I'm guessing they were sending some kind of blood sacrifice."

“Well, that’s the thing... After Carlee said it, Fi was all ‘I remember that, and I remember one of the matrons saying that this class won’t get offered.’” She frowned. “If we were Order, and I found you guys through him... Carter, it means my friends are, too, and we have all been cut off from Him.”

"Maybe not," Carter shrugged with a quick glance across at her. "You said it was a decent place. And you've all done okay for yourselves, which is pretty good considering you're all orphans and the cost of living is prohibitive. You have your dream jobs and the others are studying. Maybe He's been watching over you all this time."

“It’s possible,” she agreed. “What will you do while in the Balkans?”

"Normally? Or what's going to go down this time?"

“This time. I mean I assume things aren’t going to go like they normally go. Did Emerson get through to Damon? He wouldn’t be there, right?”

"No, only the groups tend to go to these things," he said. "And yeah, things will be different this time. We don't want to run the risk of pissing off the big guy, so nothing is going to happen until after the ritual. He'll get what's His and then we'll get what's ours."

“The ritual for the Solstice?”

"Yeah. There's robes and chanting and ritual bleeding into the well. You know. A regular night out on the town." He smirked.