Chapter 26 - Getting Sparkly

Sundays are the busiest days for Nephilim at the Cathedral, so on Monday I wake up planning to go to there immediately. Emily will for sure want to know how yesterday went, and meeting Elio and Marie last night left me with a bunch of extra questions about the Nephilim that kept popping into my mind one after the other as I was trying to fall sleep.

While I'm awake, still in bed thinking, I hear a knock at the door. "Hmm?" I ask myself, getting up to see who it was, but when I open the door, there's no one there. An out-of-place pop of color brings my attention to the ground and I see a bouquet of white roses in an intricate vase with a deep red ribbon around its neck. Picking up the vase, I look both ways down the hallway as if whoever brought them would still be in sight. There wasn't anyone in sight of course.

"Could they be from Caius?" I think to myself, noticing a note stuck to the bottom of the vase. As I bring them back inside my room, I see sure enough, they are from him.

-Thank you for spending your day with me, hopefully there are many more to come.

Wow. Who knew he was such a romantic? I add some water to the vase with a smile and set the flowers in the sunlight on my window sill. I wonder if I should dispose of the note in case Athenodora comes back here at some point. Caius said he'd make sure she doesn't, but I'm a bit worried about taking any chances with her. I stuff the note in one of my closet drawers and head out, shutting the door securely behind me, before heading outside to call one of the castle's drivers to pick me up.

* * *

"So Raphael, I saw that Elio and Marie are expecting a baby," I start. Emily and I are in the midst of some glitter and glue art. She went all out making an intricate flower design with the liquid glue, while my initial vision of the Volturi castle looks barely recognizable.

"It's exciting, isn't it?" he confirms.

"Yeah, it made me wonder, will the baby be half Nephilim? Are there a lot of half Nephilim? Do their Nephilim gifts and powers get diluted if their kids genetically become more human each generation?"

"There is no difference between Nephilim born of two Nephilim parents vs. one. The baby will be fully Nephilim with all our abilities," he smiles.

"That's fascinating."

"If children of one human parent were 'diluted' as you say, there would definitely be far fewer of us around."

"Do you have any humans in your family tree?" I ask.

"A few ancestors here and there, but my family for the most part has always been heavily tied to our work at this cathedral. We have more often than not met our spouses here," he explains.

"What work do you do exactly? And why did it look like you were working at the restaurant I first met you at?"

"We have connections at the restaurant. The area you dined in is a private meeting space for us. Sometimes the different beings who need to meet with us feel more comfortable at a third party location rather than at the cathedral. I wasn't technically a waiter, but your friends didn't want to leave you sitting there with nothing, so I sent your order to the kitchen myself, since the restaurant staff aren't allowed in that area."

All of a sudden a gust of glitter flies onto the side of my face. I swivel my chair around to face Emily, who sits with her art up to her mouth and a guilty look on her face.

"I'm sorry!" she says immediately, "I didn't think I blew it off that hard."

"Eh, it's fine," I assure her. I try wiping the glitter off my skin and clothes but it's as stuck as the glitter still held down by the glue on her paper. At that moment, a woman comes into the room, locking eyes with Raphael.

"There's a visitor for Anna," she tells him. I scrunch my eyebrows, trying to think of who would need to visit me here?

Raphael nods and the woman moves aside to let none other than Daniel in.

My eyes widen. I would have thought he went back to the U.S. by now. Now that Emily is safe here at the cathedral I figured his business in Italy was done.

"I know what you're thinking. I just wanted to keep an eye on things for a bit so I could return home in good conscience," he explains, turning to look at Emily, who takes a break from touching up her design to study the man at the door.

"You're not Derek," she determines, "You smell a little like him but not exactly."

"This is Daniel, Derek's twin brother," I confirm, "Derek was wrong for sending you here unprotected, so Daniel came to make sure everything turned out okay." I don't want to crush her spirit right now by telling her about what Derek actually did, and why Daniel was actually here. I figure I'll need to tell her the truth eventually. She deserves to know. Now just isn't the right time.

"Nice to meet you Emily," he smiles, "I figured I'd say my goodbyes before heading back to my home in the woods. And Anna," he starts, meeting my eyes, "If you ever start missing home, or you need a break from the stiffness of royal life, you're welcome at my cabin anytime. I wish I could offer more to apologize for my brother's actions."

"I appreciate that," I tell him. Honestly, Minnesota isn't a place I imagine myself missing after everything that I've been through there, but I do want to make sure my grandma is okay. I did just get up and leave her with no explanation after all. "Actually, could you do me a favor? " I ask, feeling that guilt grow exponentially as I think about it more.

"Of course," he says.

"Could you check on my grandma for me? And maybe give her a letter for me?" I ask.

"It's the least I could do," he tells me. Raphael finds me some paper and a pen and I sit down to write.

Dear Grandma,

It's Anna. I know I left suddenly and I can't imagine the worry I put you through. I'm so sorry. I wish I could go back and do things differently rather than leaving without at least telling you my worries, my reasons, or where I was going. I was just so worried that the people who killed Mom and Dad would want to find me too, and I was worried my being with you was putting you in danger in the process. I have recently gotten word that the people who killed them are dead, so there is thankfully no more danger.

When I left, I went to Volterra, Italy and quickly found a job and a place to live, and I'm doing great now. I've built friendships, and am starting a life here that I can be proud of. I will visit you soon, hopefully before the end of the year. In the meantime this is the address I'm using now.

Love, Anna

I sign my name and scribble Grandma's and the cathedral's address on the envelope. Raphael offers to help me connect my phone to a printer to print off some photos I can send to her. I add some pictures to the envelope of me at some of the sights Heidi, Jane, and Alec took me to before handing the letter over to Daniel.

* * *

"What is that all over your body?" Caius asks. When I arrived back at the castle he was already there waiting for me outside.

"What do you mean?" I joke, knowing he's referring to the glitter Emily blew on me.

"You're sparkly."

Looking down, I see that a bunch of the glitter had spread from my shirt and arms down to my legs as well. I smirked. "Now that I know there are guard members suspicious of my human-ness I thought I'd disguise myself as one of you to throw them off."

"Yeah, that would surely make them double-take," Caius says sarcastically, "They'll be so confused that they'll completely overlook your very strong human scent."

"Ugh, well if you don't think it'll work I'll just have to wash it all off," I say, carrying on inside and towards my room. I hardly make it a few steps into the castle before his fingers wrap around my wrist.

"It's all over your back, too," Caius informs me with a devilish smile, "Are you sure you'll be able to get it all off on your own? Maybe you'll need a little help?" He suggests, pulling me closer.

"It's glitter, not glue, but nice try," I grin. Caius lets my arm go, and his hand travels to the back of my neck instead.

"I'll see you after dinner then," he decides, smile still not faltering.

"For what?" I ask, completely unprepared for the sudden proposal.

"I still need some practice." He leans down until his lips make contact with my neck, giving me the chills. After feeling my body shake under his touch, he smiles into the kiss before straightening himself back up and turning to go, leaving me alone with the goosebumps he just planted. "I'll bring you to my quarters at eight," he says before disappearing around the corner.

I actually don't have time to shower before my Italian lesson with Antonio. Now that Aro, Caius, and Marcus have it in their heads that I could possibly be changed soon, they're doubling all my current classes and sprinkling a couple others in to give me as much preparation to join the guard as possible. On the bright side, that's two hours of Italian lessons a day. On the unfortunate side, that's an extra hour of training. I've grown to like Felix as a person, so nothing against him personally, but one hour of training was already exhausting enough. Even worse, because of my ability and my apparent potential to extend it to others, it's rumored that I'll be joining the Volturi's first line of defense if they ever get into any scuffles. The pro to that is I'll have a top position alongside Jane, Alec, Felix, and Demetri, but the obvious con of that is that my training will be even more of a necessity. Just my luck!

An hour of vampire history classes was also added to my schedule on Tuesdays and Thursdays, as well as hour long classes on the inner workings and responsibilities of the Volturi and their "empire" on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. With this schedule you might as well call me a college student majoring in Vampire Studies at Volturi University. They had better give me a diploma when this is all said and done.

As I weave through the hallways I get the eerie feeling that someone is watching me. I turn around to check, but there's no one as far as I can see. I take a couple more steps and the hair on the back of my neck prickles up. This time when I turn around I see a man at the other end of the hallway, unmoving and staring in my direction. It's not someone I've seen before, but he's wearing the classic Volturi robes so he must be a part of the guard. He has light brown hair that has been buzzed Viktor Krum style, and keeps his penetrating gaze fixed on me.

"Do you need something?" I call out, but he immediately speeds off. That was creepy. I think, keeping course towards the kitchen.

"Do you know anything about a guard member with a buzz cut?" I ask Antonio after our lesson.

"Eh, I can guess who you're referring to, but I don't know him well. He's possibly on one of the tracking teams. Why?"

"Maybe it was nothing, but I was starting to get the feeling that he was tracking me," I say with a sigh, taking in the new info on him. "He crept up behind me and ran off when I called him out on it. Do you have any idea why he would do that?"

"I wish I knew, Piccola. But maybe the Masters would know something about that."

"Yeah," I agree, waving goodbye and finally heading back to my room to rinse off.

Luckily I don't sense anyone following me to my room, but my relief is short-lived when I notice my door is open a crack. On any other day I probably wouldn't have noticed, but I specifically remember purposefully closing my door because I was so paranoid about Athenodora or someone sneaking in and finding the note Caius gave me this morning. Surely it could have been anyone from the cleaning staff, to Jane or Alec, but that encounter with Viktor Krum has really added a coat of paranoia to my thoughts.

I push the door open slowly, and at first glance nothing seems amiss. I instinctively go into my closet to check for the note from Caius, but it's laying exactly where I left it. I breathe a sigh of relief as I close the drawer and head straight to my bed to rest. At this point I'm still too on edge to shower. It'll make more sense to shower after my training session anyway. I opt for a nap instead and set my alarm to go off right before my next class starts.