And now the bigger question was, what was happening in the depths of Solis Quarter to turn everyone’s markings and wings black?
Was it merely the difference in the gods they chose to follow, or was there something else at play? Something else we needed to uncover before Elion could move forward with the commands he’d received from the Eternal?
“Fuck.” The curse was a muffled noise as Axel stared at thedisplays. “I can’t figure this out,” Axel muttered under his breath in resignation as he fiercely tapped across a few more of the windows on the report, combing through the available data.
“You don’t say,” I sarcastically bit out as I glanced at my second. “Let’s go and take a look at another one of the unmarked. Perhaps we can get a bit more insight if we’re there for the entire marking process rather than just the end result.”
Axel sighed as he tapped out of the screen. We slowly slipped out, heading down the halls before entering the closest unoccupied testing room, waiting deep in the shadows of the room for the next unmarked angel to come in.
The second room we walked into was identical to the first, except that this time, the chair in the center was unoccupied. My eyes narrowed as we stood in the darkness of the storage closet, watching through the slight crack as the door opened. A lithe female was led into the room, nervously taking a seat in the chair she had been instructed to sit in. A priestess followed her into the room, her oversaturated perfume filling the air with an overpowering vanilla scent as she spoke to the young female while tapping calmly against the screen beside her.
I studied the young female closely, wondering why she looked so familiar, as I took in her dark brown waves of hair and light sea-glass hazel eyes, framed by high cheekbones.
I wondered again at why Solis Quarter chose to do their Marking Day in such a manner. It was standard practice in Aurum Quarter to hold true to the origins of the day, the way the Eternal had instructed. Each unmarked angel was awake during their marking, praying and worshipping Aeternus before receiving the marks of their affinities from him.
We stayed in the shadows, silent and hidden from sight as another priestess walked into the room, consulting with the priestess who had led the young female in just a few moments earlier.
We could only watch as the second priestess, her facecovered with a thin black veil from her nose down, stopped beside the female strapped in the chair and injected something into her veins. The substance in the syringe was clear.
We watched in silence, undetected, as the female was instructed to close her eyes and a mask was settled against her nose and mouth. We heard the deep inhales of her steady breaths, and when I pushed out my affinity, I could detect the moment her breathing shifted.
Within seconds, she was out cold.
I felt Axel twitch beside me, his fist clenching at his side as anger swept through us both.
This wasn’t right.
Even if the syringe was just an injection to protect against the pain of your wings emerging, they shouldn’t be tampering with the process.
Your Marking Day was meant to be a memorable experience, one between the creator and creation of the world. One where your affinities, gifted specifically by the Eternal, emerged so that you could live life the way he intended for you.
Whatever Lucanus was doing in his Quarter, it appeared he was also behind the scenes, stripping the sacrilege of Marking Day.
The priestesses left just as quickly as they came, not even bothering to look at the screens before they departed.
We watched, waiting as the female occasionally jerked on the table, nothing out of the ordinary occurring. The minutes ticked by slowly, and over time, her markings began to emerge faintly on her arm.
Axel and I were just about to step out of the shadows, intending to look at the screens and see what was listed in her charts as her affinities, when the door silently slipped open.
We both froze, watching as an older male moved silently into the room, shutting the door behind him. Turning, we both looked at each other, wondering who this new male was, seeingas in the previous room we’d been in, no one else had entered while we’d been there.
“Come on. Come on. Come on,” the male muttered as he tapped against the screen before him.
What was he looking for?
Better yet, what was he doing?
We watched as his fingers tapped urgently across the screen, and then the machine glowed a bright blue light.
Stars be damned, was he tampering with her results?
Was he making a change in the system?
We knew that all angels in Aurelia were registered through the Astra Tech System upon marking.
However, it didn’t make sense.
There was no logical explanation for what he was doing.
