Frederick got comfortable in his seat as he turned to Hartridge, Dimitri took the one Destiny had vacated.
"Is it adviceable to have her here?" He asked. He didn't like the Sisters, frankly, he felt they were all better without them.
Their true purpose was something he never understood. Keeping the balance his ass, they did nothing and got away with a lot.
Hartridge sighed. "She means no harm I assure you. But that isn't why I called you."
The principal's expression became frighteningly serious. He pulled out a paper, it was a sketching.
"Do you know the story of the cursed child? The original one?" He asked and pushed the paper to them.
Frederick shook his head. "What exactly am I looking at?"
He had a puzzled expression on his face that satisfied Hartridge.
"Many years ago, a child was born, long before the sisters came into existence. The people thought she was a prodigy when she could bend water at the age of two. Usually, abilities start to show at the age of six, ten for late bloomers. There are situations where a child is void of ability, but this case was different. At the age of 5, the child named Hera could blood bend." Hartridge explained to them.
Dimitri studied the picture and asked. "What do you mean by blood bend?"
"The way a water bender controls water, a blood bender controls blood. It will be like mind control but you control just the body. Every human is filled with blood, so it would be easy to control every part of them. The victim will be aware of what they are doing unlike mind weaving, and they won't be able to do anything about it." Hartridge elaborated.
Frederick held a breath and released it shakily. "That means she'll be able to stop their heartbeat with just a thought."
Hartridge nodded. "Precisely. It was a scary and new concept no one understood yet, so they thought it was sloppy mind weaving. But she had no mind weavers in her ancestral line."
He paused to let them take it in. He tapped his fingers on the table, ready to continue.
"At the age of 7, she could stop heartbeats in a moment of anger and start them back as long as the body wasn't cold."
Frederick tapped the paper, he was shaken by the new development. It changed everything.
"What does this have to do with our current situation?" He wondered. Why was Hartridge bringing it up now?
Dimitri rubbed his eyes. "This tips the scale of things doesn't it?"
It had been a picture of Kara.
Frederick tapped the picture again. "Are you saying she is the blood bender reincarnated?"
"Its tricky. The blood bender reincarnated inside her, but isn't her."
"How does that make sense?"
"There are two souls in her body."
The younger men frowned at the new information. Frederick sighed and ran his hand through his hair.
"That's not all uh?"
Hartridge smiled sadly. "It is rumoured that some shadows can pull a soul out of a body into a new body. It is a complicated phenomenon considering it sounds more like the soul will take on its own body."
Frederick stood up and began to pace. "You are losing me Hartridge."
The older man sighed. He was tired, the research had drained him. "When pulling a soul out of a body, it is believed that there must be another body it will be put in right? In this case, there is a theory that this soul will conjure its own body. It will be like an identical twin to the original body."
Dimitri stared at the picture of his niece. "A theory means it has never happened right? How do we know this?"
"My source guarantees this theory."
Frederick eyed him. "And who is this source?"
He had planned to keep her involvement a secret but he might as well. "Anastasia Deville. She felt the presence of another in her daughter and knew there would be a time when the other soul would fight for control of the body. The fates say the souls have to be separated upon maturity of the body. Kara in her own body and Hera conjuring hers." Hartridge raised his hand to stop their interruption. "We are linking maturity to eighteen years. There are a lot of problems attached to it but I will reveal just two."
He rubbed his temple. Years of research had finally led to this disturbing revelation. "One, only the shadow prince can help. Two, Hera was murdered."
Just then, they heard the cry that had them all holding their head and trying to cover their ears.
Frederick and Dimitri growled and started howling. The howl spread across the entire school, every wolf was howling and it wasn't even a full moon.
■■■■
Destiny had seen the girl rushing to the dungeon and had followed. She called out to the girl but it was as if the girl didn't hear her... couldn't hear her.
She hurried after her, making sure no one followed them. Why was she going into the dungeons? Ahead of her, she saw the girl slam against the wall, as if to steady herself. Soon she felt the cold and shivered. The girl's hair had turned totally white.
"Hey..." Destiny started just as the girl screamed.
Her leg was twisted in an awkward angle. Destiny didn't notice the ice around her till she almost slipped, her eyes had been fixated on the girl. She had to hold onto the wall as she followed the girl but it wasn't easy. One thing Destiny noted was that the girl was glowing, her white hair was shining and her skin looked very different.
Just as she got close to the cell she'd seen her drag herself into, her scream had Destiny crouching and covering her ears. Her fingers could feel blood coming out of her ears. The scream reverberated on her insides and the walls around her. It took a while before all became silent.
"What the..." She whispered to herself as her eyes adjusted to her surrounding again. The dungeon had definitely seen better days. She could hear wolves howling, was it a full moon?
Destiny rubbed her ears and groaned at the pain, it wasn't too bad. She raised her top and cleaned her ears of the blood, with a loud exhale she stepped forward. She peered into the cell and gasped. A white wolf with blue eyes stared at her, its expression that of wary. It looked like it wanted to attack her or it wanted to fall to the floor. It fell to the floor with a thump.
"I heard it come from here..." she heard someone say and pushed herself into the cell.
She locked the door and pulled the wolf into her laps. Not the brightest idea but the only idea that came to her. She knew a white wolf was a very rare occurrence, so rare that she had never heard of their existence. Let alone one that could blast out ice. She didn't think the wolf wanted to be known just yet or they wouldn't have been in the dungeon.
She heard footsteps as they passed her cell, making her hold her breath. If mind weavers, shadows or wolves were among that search party, they were done for. She tried to calm her loudly beating heart, she should be used to situations like this by now. She wasn't a child for crying out loud.
"Was the dungeon always this cold?" Someone asked.
"I don't know and I don't care, let's get out of here. This place gives me the creeps." A female voice said and the footsteps got farther away.
When Destiny was sure they were gone, she sighed. Her hand involuntarily rubbed the wolf's fur.
"You must be Kara Cahill, May told me so much about you." She whispered and leaned her back comfortably on the door.