Strange Angels 3
Lili St. Crow
Dru remembers her dad, Dwight, leaving her with August, a djamphir, to go out hunting her mom, Elizabeth’s, murderer.
Dru wakes up to howling in the middle of the night. She rushes out the door and immediately runs into Graves. Together they run to the concrete room where Ash is kept. She goes in and calms him down. Benjamin and the rest of her guard arrive to try to get her away from the Broken. When she refuses, they all stay waiting for dawn, while Ash tries to revert to his human form.
When daylight hits, Benjamin tells Dru that she is going to go in front of the council to tell them what happened at the reform Schola and with Christophe. She locks Ash in and is taken to her room to get ready.
Graves and her guard walk Dru to the Council meeting room. Graves points out they can only trust wulfen and the djamphirs take offense. Dru gets ready to enter armed with her hidden switchblade. Graves tells her to yell if she needs him.
Dru arrives in front of the Council and is surprised to find them relatively laid back. they offer her breakfast and ask her to tell her story. A few of them (Hiro, Bruce, and Alton) knew her mother. She tells them how she had to kill her zombie dad and starts crying. They assure her that she can take her time.
After telling her story, the Council of the Order have a few questions. Anna comes in and seems surprised to see her. When Anna asks about her story, Dru says she has already given it. She makes it a point to say Christophe saved her life. Dru refuses to back down and Hiro walks her out, letting her know it was unwise to stand up to Anna. Dru and Graves go to her room and she explains what happened. She admits that she does not know what to do, and Graves comes up with a short term plan. He falls asleep on her bed. Dru goes to the computer. Her mind drifts off to remember staying with August in NYC and not realizing he is supernatural. She remembers her helping when he came home beat up.
When Dru is done on the computer, she crawls into bed with Graves. He wakes up and she kisses him. After a while, he pulls away saying they should be careful. He goes to the bathroom leaving Dru confused about how he feels about her.
Something scratches at the window. Dru gets out of bed thinking it is Christophe, but doesn’t tell Graves that. He starts to avoid her, saying that he should go find Shanks. Dru tells him she only feels safe when he is around, so he decides to stay and they both go back to sleep until the sun goes down.
Dru wakes up and does some internet shopping until she hears someone knocking at her door. She tastes the wax-oranges that indicate danger. She waits until she hears Benjamin call her name before she opens the door to find Leon. Benjamin returns from down the hall when Leon tells him Dru was in her room. They determine that Anna, the Red Queen, was at her door. Her guard tells her that she should start getting ready for classes. Benjamin suggests they go shopping the next day. Dru and Graves close the door on them. They have a short discussion about liking each other before Dru hides in the bathroom to get ready.
Benjamin and the other members of her guard lead Dru and Graves to the Council. Graves follows Dru in. Anna immediately starts commenting on getting along while flirting with Graves. Dru gets an even worse feeling about her when they shake hands. Hiro offers to go to Orientation with Dru and Graves (as is traditional) and points out that Graves will have to be escorted because he does not have the privileges Dru does. She notices Kir’s disdain and loyalty to Anna.
Dru goes with her guard and Graves to Target for supplies. She shops like she normally does and Benjamin tries to convince her to go somewhere high-end. Dru refuses and the djamphir are surprised at how easy she is to deal with.
That night, Dru dreams about what happened before her mom died. This time she remembers Anna coming to visit, looking for someone (Christophe). Elizabeth sends her away and threatens her life if she returns. Dru completes the dream with her mom hiding her in the closet. She wakes up screaming and Graves comforts her.
A couple of weeks later, Dru goes to class as has become her routine. Her teacher tells them about a particular ephialtes (djamphir trained to hunt other djamphir), Scarabus, who hid his svetocha sister and drank her completely right before she bloomed. This gave him the strength to kill his master, the Vampire King, and the others dispersed. Without regular svetocha blood, the nosferatu were no longer able to go out in the sunlight. After class, a guy named Zeke asks her to go for coffee and she agrees. Leon warns her about the boys and the Trials. Dru likes her shooting class and the instructor is wiling to give her answers when she asks. She gets excited when he mentions sorcery, which they will be learning in later years.
Kir comes to get Dru for a Council meeting. When they arrive, he leaves her in a room with Anna alone. Dru asks her about Christophe and Anna explains he was her first love. Hiro rushes into the room and instantly finds the marks Christophe left on Dru’s wrist. H asks her how much he took and she answers. The Council members believe her, but Anna is outraged, saying Dru cannot be trusted, like her mother. Hiro tells Dru there was not a meeting planned. Dru goes up to her room, realizing at least one djamphir in her guard is probably on Anna’s side.
After visiting Ash to calm him down, Graves asks Dru what is going on. She tells him that Anna does not like her because Christophe bit her. Graves points out that Anna is jealous and accustomed to being the only girl. She wants to leave the Schola Prima, but he talks her out of it until they are able to learn more. They fall asleep in bed together.
The next day at lunch, Dru notices Graves and Benjamin having some sort of verbal exchange about her and Anna as they approach. While going to get food, Dru sees Kir sneaking around towards the teacher’s wing. Leon urges her to move on.
Dru is in the middle of sparring with her wulf gym teacher when a djamphir teacher comes to clear out the gym. Anna arrives and Dru asks her to leave her alone, saying she has more important things to deal with than the older svetocha’s mind games. Dru sees a cat form of the aspect at Anna’s feet, which distracts her enough to let Anna punch her in the face.
After the first hit, Dru starts to fight back. When Anna’s cat attacks her, Gran’s owl appears to fight it off. Dru tries to hold back from the blood-hunger and killing Anna while they fight. Anna says Dru is just like her mother. She takes it as a compliment and tells Anna so. Anna tries to threaten Dru, but she won’t hear it and tells Anna that no one loves her. Anna flees with a vow for vengeance. Shanks appears from behind the bleachers to help Dru once she calms down.
Dru hides in the bathroom, but Graves comes in after her. He wants to know who hit her and she begs him to leave. they both refuse the other’s request. Graves storms out, slamming his fist into the tile. Shanks and Benjamin come to find her.
Dibs is pulled out of class and he and Shanks lock Benjamin out of the room. They tell her that svetocha and djamphir that drink blood smell differently than most djamphir. Dibs patches her up while Shanks talks. He points out that the screen is missing from her window. After Dibs leaves, Shanks suggests that Dru not stay in the room alone. She decides to stay with Ash and Shanks will pretend like she is still int he room.
Dru apologizes to Ash for shooting him. She sleeps easily at fist and when she wakes up expecting him to go crazy like he does every night, he is just laying at the door watching over her. She dreams about Christophe training her mom. Elizabeth points out that Anna is crazy about him, but he doesn’t show any interest. Dru notes that he looks at Elizabeth like a wolf. Elizabeth wants to go home and live a normal life. When Dru wakes up, Ash is trying to get her attention. Vampires are in the Schola.
Dru gets the door open and Ash leads her. They make it to the hallway with a door leading outside, but some vampires find them before they can get out the doors. Ash immediately takes on two male vampires. The world slows as two females come over them at Dru. She is able to kill the first one before time speeds back up. She hexes the second one and the owl appears again, scratching the vampire’s face. Christophe and his aspect in fox form arrive to finish her. Ash slumps against Dru after killing the males. Christophe asks if she is okay.
Christophe starts ordering people around to help Dru and Ash. When the Broken is taken away, Dru wants to go with him. Leon warns Christophe that the Council is on their way. Kir, Bruce, and Hiro arrive, none seem happy to see him. Anna comes along and demands Christophe be arrested. He asks for a trial. The Council members agree, even after Anna protests. She calls them all traitors. Christophe points out how badly Dru has been treated.
Dru remembers staying with August and the night her dad came back for her.
Relocated to her mom’s former room (much bigger and nicer than her last room, which had its location compromised), Dru wants Graves to be there. However Christophe is the one in the room promising that he will not disappear again. Dru doesn’t believe him and wonders how to find Graves. She’s worried that he left for good.
Christophe tells Dru about her mom. Elizabeth’s dad was a djamphir and her mother a human. They were killed by Sergej when she was 15 and she was brought to the Schola. Christophe trained her, but she kept talking about going home. Eventually, She left. When he found her again, he was furious that she fell in love with Dwight. Dru points out the strangeness of how he acts with her when he was in love with her mom. Christophe explains that he plans to train her so she can kill Sergej. The vampire’s closest thing to a king is afraid of her because she has survived everything he has thrown at her. He also tells her he knows Anna is the one that routed her to the reform Schola. Dru starts to tell him about her encounter with Anna, but breaks down instead.
Christophe tells Dru that his trial begins at sundown. She asks if she smells funny and he explains that all svetocha do when they get close to blooming. She asks why he smells different, but he does not give her a straight answer. She tells him she wants to see Ash and look for Graves. Christophe wonders if he might have left the Schola, but Dru insists he would not leave her.
They go to see Ash first. Dibs is taking care of him as he lies restrained on a table trying to change back to human form. When Ash starts to react, Dibs sends Dru away. they decide to ask Shanks where Graves may have gone. Christophe asks what happened between them. Dru refuses to answer and asks him about him and Anna. When he does not answer either, they take off.
Dru and Christophe talk to Shanks and they all go outside the way Graves went. Dru uses the aspect and can see Graves running off in anger. She follows as quickly as she can until she looses him in the woods. She finds a piece of his coat and wants to try again, but dusk is coming and Christophe’s trial is about to start.
The trial is held in the middle of a courtroom-like setting in the middle of the Schola Prima. It quickly fills with djamphir. Christophe is told by the Council that his peers will judge him, but he points out that none of them qualify as peers. He asks about the djamphir and wulfen that were sent to kill him. Kir explains that he though Christophe was a traitor and agreed to send them when Anna asks. He points out the directives signed that put Dru in Danger. Marcus says that he signed the paperwork to put Dru in the reform Schola, but though it was for a male djamphir, not a svetocha. The paperwork mysteriously went missing upon Dru’s arrival. August arrives and Dru rushes up to hug him, not letting go while he gives his testimony. He plays the recording of the conversation Dru read in the transcript. Anna and a vampire plotted to kill her mom. August was able to get the location of the recording from Dylan, but is not sure if the other djamphir lived through the attacks. Anna arrives with an automatic rifle and starts shooting. Christophe covers Dru and knocks her to the ground, taking August with them. She has pain in her shoulder and eventually in other places as well. She passes out.
Dru watches herself being worked on in the infirmary. Christophe pushes his way through to give Dru his blood. Bruce protests, saying that they have not yet typed her and it could kill her. Christophe bites his wrist and offers it to Dru. She watches her body take three pulls of his blood. She starts to heal and is pulled back into her body. Bruce is upset about the blood exchange, but Christophe sends him away. Dru wakes up and he gives her his seater to cover up. She notices the scars on his back as well as three new bullet wounds he took to protect her. She points out that she isn’t Elizabeth. Christophe explains that he never felt this way about Elizabeth. His feelings for Dru are different and stronger. He kisses her and Dru forgets about everything else temporarily. Eventually they go to get cleaned up.
They go see August. he tells them he met up with Dylan who told him about the recording. Hw was chased all the way back to the Schola. Christophe promises August will live and leads Dru to rest and heal herself.
Dru wakes up feeling normal. She gets ready to go find Graves, but Christophe tells her there is a Council meeting. He leads her there.
When they arrive, the remaining Council members (Kir and Marcus are no longer fit leaders) show Dru Graves’ coat and letter from Sergej. He plans to replace Ash with Graves. Dru freaks out and is ready to leave, but Christophe convinces her she will need the Order’s resources to find Anna and Sergej. She agrees and becomes the new head of the Order.