Winterly (Dark Creatures Book 1), стр. 100
I could find you anywhere. How those words haunted her now. But that was before last night. Horror-struck by the belated and awful disclosure, Emma tore her eyes from the fire. Why had that vital detail not been disclosed before he’d glutted himself on her flesh and forged this unbidden link? She was a wretched fool for giving the fiend the very compass to her everlasting whereabouts, and a fool who’d all but handed her own sister over to him. She had given herself, her virtue, and her heart to the devil. What a witless morsel she’d proven herself to be. Finally, her tongue unfroze itself. “And whoever has fed from my sister can now do the same.”
“Ay, until death severs the link.”
Whatever the nature of the mark she’d seen on Milli’s throat, she had to assume that her sister had been bitten. And what of the blood Markus had shared with Milli? How would that affect the girl?
“That is why you cannot drink his blood,” said Ana, answering her unspoken question. “It only redoubles the blood link.”
“What do I do now? How shall I save my sister?”
“By saving yourself. And by listening closely for I will tell you how to kill him.”
Emma’s face blanched. Had this been done before? “You said there were once four of these creatures—these angels.” Who were the other two besides Markus and Gabriel?
“The first seraph to fall fell in love with a mortal king and died by the hand of her own daughter. She was the original grail.” And from two gods and a mortal, she begat three children before Lilith slew her.
The Grail? The riddle in Vampyris! She could not recall the particulars exactly, but there had been mention of a grail.
“She is the mother of your ancestors,” said Ana. “You are of seraphic provenance. A mortal king and royal star begot the first nephilim—You, Emma, are of royal blood.”
That royal blood was rushing in Emma’s head so violently that she could hardly process this new revelation.
“Her fall, like her brothers’, was a consequence of mortal lust. Nephilim, you see, are the forbidden fruits of such blasphemous couplings—children of gods and mortals. They defy the laws of nature and so they are smitten at infancy. All the monsters of the earth are in some way relicts of the Nephilim scourge that escaped the Blades of Heaven.”
Emma dropped her head into her hands. “It is like drinking from a waterfall!”
Mina made a rude hissing sound and glared pointedly at her watch.
Ana nodded and turned back to Emma. “I truly wish we had the luxury of time to help you make sense of it all, but—”
“What was this Fallen’s name?”
“She had many names. By some she was known as Mother Isis.”
“So I am some blasphemous royal bastard?”
“You are the grail, Emma. The descendants of the Mother goddess all bear her fateful legacy; you too bear it.”
“What?” Emma looked up. “What exactly do I bear?”
“The blood! Blood of the gods. Continuance. Immortality. The fruit of darkness.”
“How can you be sure that I am…a grail?”
“A Nephilim carries a distinguishing mark over her womb—the crescent moon. The mark of the grail.” Ana’s eyes narrowed. “And by the look on your face I know you bear just such a mark.”
No! Emma shook her head, horrified anew.
“And you are not the only one,” said Mina.
Dear God, poor Milli too!
“Now Markus knows you are marked.” Until now, Ana had always been solicitude itself, but for the first time her eyes betrayed her, scathing Emma as though she herself might draw blood. “You must never lie with him again, Emma.”
“But what does it mean to be a grail?”
Ana’s brow furrowed with impatience. “You are the vessel through which immortals may propagate the earth. You are the wellspring that nourishes eternal life…as well as the cup that bears the spawn of the undead.”
A descendant of Isis, the sister of Death. Was it possible? “If I bear the blood of Markus’s sister, that’s…” God help her, it was not to be borne! “That’s incest!” she cried.
“Only insomuch as it is incestuous to believe that your father is related to your mother by blood, for they are both the children of Adam and Eve?” Ana’s smile was hard. “No, my dear, blood, as you understand it, connects only beasts and mortals. Watchers were not begotten from mothers and fathers. It is nothing so simple, nor so complicated, as that.”
“Enough, we have to go,” said Mina, pulling her hood securely over her head.
Emma stood abruptly from the chair. “Yes, and I’ve heard enough!”
“Wait!” Ana was hurrying after Emma. “You would return to him after all I have told you?”
“My sister’s life is forfeit if I do not! What would you have me do?”
“I would have you resist him! And at all costs you must never take blood from him! In fact, do not drink anything—not even what you think is wine—if it comes to you by his hand or his bidding.”
It was too late for that. “How can I know whom to trust? You might be lying to me about all this?”
“Oh, Emma.” Ana gave her head a tragic shake. “I believe you are sage enough to know when the truth is spoken.”
“Even if what you say is true, I cannot escape him now that he has drunk from me.”
“Kill him, that is your escape!”
Emma froze at the threshold.
Ana’s voice had dropped so low it was nigh impossible to hear her. “But I warn you, it is almost impossible to kill a vampyre let alone a Cardinal.” She leaned in closer still. “Play his games if you must, Emma. For your sake, I hope you win.”
“Win against one such as he?” She had no such conceit. “I’d be mad to even hope for that.”
“Have faith, I believe he has a weakness.”
“What is it?”
“You.”
She shook her head and tried to pull her arm away from the watcher, but the creature was impossibly strong and her endeavors remained futile. “How would you have