“They’re both more than capable,” I said. “They passed their qualifications. They’re agents of GASP now. I trust that Tristan and Esme will be instrumental to our mission.”
“Speaking of, where are they?” Rose asked, glancing around.
We saw Nethissis coming in, joined by Kailani. Nethissis had insisted on coming with us, and I didn’t see any reason as to why she shouldn’t. A swamp witch would always come in handy, especially in situations such as ours. She looked nervous, her gaze wandering across the beach until it met Lumi’s, close to the shuttle.
There was tension there. I could almost feel it. Lumi had objected to Nethissis’s decision to join us, but she hadn’t insisted on changing the young Lamia’s mind. There had been some mention of Nethissis needing some more time to recover from the Hermessi incident, but that had not been enough to keep her out of the crew. On the contrary, it had made Nethissis want to go out with us even more.
As the night cast its pearlescent moon rays over the sandy beach, I found myself entranced, watching Nethissis and Kailani practically glide toward the shuttle. There was something about the swamp witches that made them seem almost otherworldly. Their movements were delicate, barely noticeable. Their white eyes scanned everything, including my soul it seemed, whenever they looked at me. Their voices were soft and low… and they knew things. Secrets of the Word, magic that could make the difference between life and death in any circumstance. I had great respect for their kind.
“Tristan and Esme are late, as usual.” Julian rolled his eyes. “They might not be twins, but, by the stars, they’re cut from the same cloth.”
Esme was a year older than Tristan, and she never let him forget it. Their personalities were remarkably different, as well, but there were other aspects that made them resemble one another more than anything else. Among them was this ability to run late to pretty much anything—even basic training. Time simply wasn’t their friend, for a variety of reasons.
“How much do you want to bet they didn’t hear the alarm this time?” Ariana giggled. Looking at her now, I could see a piece of Anna in the way she crinkled her eyes when she laughed. The shape of her lips, however, reminded me of Kyle. No wonder Julian had fallen in love with her. Ariana was the best of both her parents.
Sadness nudged me discreetly, as I regretted not being able to see Kyle and Anna again. As an immune, Anna could never become a vampire. While my circumstances had led to my abduction to Cruor and the removal of my immunity, the same could not be done with Anna. Kyle had had the option to become a vampire, but his love for her had held him back. They’d both lived full and beautiful lives as humans, and I missed them dearly.
Seeing Ariana here, however, had made me smile more. Most of her family had stayed away from GASP action. Tristan and Esme had spent the majority of their formative years on Earth, studying anthropology and various cultures across the globe.
The siblings came out of the dark forest, carrying their backpacks, weapons, and instruments, cool as cucumbers and not at all fazed when their father cajoled them. “You’re late! Again!” he said.
Tristan and Esme glanced at one another and chuckled as they approached us. “His alarm didn’t go off,” Esme said, nodding at her brother.
“And yours?” Julian asked, one eyebrow raised.
“I spent the night in his room,” Esme replied. “I didn’t think I’d need my alarm working, too.”
“Way to blame me,” Tristan muttered. “Miss I-Sleep-At-Least-Nine-Hours-To-Feel-Normal. And that’s a direct quote.”
Esme shushed him, then shot us a grin. “We’re not actually late, are we?”
I shook my head, trying not to laugh. “Not at all. The shuttle is still being checked.”
“Still, you said you’d be here at eight,” Julian insisted.
Tristan checked his watch. “It’s eight fifteen. You can’t possibly be miffed about a fifteen-minute delay, Dad. West Point isn’t as strict as you.”
“Actually, they kind of are,” Esme whispered, eyeing her father’s satisfied grin. “My two years there did not fix my tardiness problem, though not for lack of trying.”
Esme had become a vampire at the age of twenty-one, the same day as Tristan, who’d been twenty at the time. With Earth now fully aware of supernaturals’ existence, they’d spent the past decade earning Harvard and West Point degrees, before they moved on to study various tribes of Earth. After that, they’d even done several trips to the In-Between and the Supernatural Dimension during periods of peace—specifically, after Azazel had been defeated, and after we’d gotten rid of Ta’Zan.
Ariana and Julian had occasionally entertained us with stories from their trips, often aided by photos and videos sent via satellite and email servers. Most recently, Tristan and Esme had been living with the Amazonian tribes, including the one discovered by Taeral and his crew—the strange combination of humans and werewolves, not far from Earth’s pink water cave.
“Do you need us to do anything?” Tristan asked, looking at Derek and me. We both shook our heads.
“Nethissis is doing her thing. So is Amal. We’re just patiently waiting,” I replied.
Esme smirked. There was a devilishness about her, an aura she’d inherited from Ariana, whenever she smiled. It reminded me of Kyle. Esme’s hair was long, dark, and curly, much like her mother’s. Tristan fell within the same physiognomy, his shorter curls occasionally falling over his forehead. They both had deep green eyes. Sometimes, I felt as though I was looking into Anna’s eyes, not theirs.
Character-wise, however, Tristan and Esme were polar opposites.
“Okay, so, it’s you and Derek, Tristan and me, Amal and Nethissis, right?” Esme said, recapping yesterday’s discussion. During that GASP meeting, we’d made our selection, insisting that the team be kept small. As expected, most of the officers present, including my father, had not been too happy about it.
“Yes. Few but mighty.” Derek chuckled.
“I still think you should at least take a dragon with you.” Julian sighed. “And a sentry.”
“And a white witch. And a werewolf. And a Perfect. And I could keep going,” Derek shot back, slightly irritated. It was nothing against Julian, but rather against the mindset. “We’re going to visit a new world. We’re not going to invade it.”
“They might mean you harm,” Julian insisted.
“Dad, not everyone is out to get us,” Esme replied. “Besides, Nethissis is more than capable of holding them off, should things get rough. But we’re not giving them any reason to behave aggressively toward us.”
“Ta’Zan got the day-walking protein from them somehow. I don’t think we’ll have issues communicating with them,” I said. Julian looked at me, his brow furrowed.
“You don’t even know what they are. What species. What kind of people. What culture they have.”
“But that’s the beauty of it!” Tristan replied, smiling. “We’re exploring. We’re going over there to meet them. We’re making contact with a new civilization, and the last thing we want is to appear threatening. We want them to consider us benign, perhaps even friendly.”
Derek cleared his throat, his attention briefly drawn by Lumi, Nethissis, and Kailani talking, somewhere at the back of the shuttle. “Julian, I don’t want us to go there, guns blazing, demanding their blood. The Hermessi ritual has taught me a valuable lesson about the universe and its natural balance. I don’t want GASP to become some kind of world police, where we consider ourselves entitled enough to just walk into a new civilization and ask them to give us things—especially blood, the very life force that allows us to exist.”
“As we explained yesterday, we’re going for a more cultural and diplomatic approach. We want to meet them,” I said. “We want to get to know them, to understand them, and most importantly, to figure out what made their day-walking protein stick so well to Derek’s DNA.”
“You think they might be some kind of vampire,” Ariana replied, reminding me of a theory we’d floated during yesterday’s meeting.
I nodded briefly. “It’s a possibility, yes. Either way, we want them to give us what we need, willingly. Unless there’s a direct threat to our planet, we’ve decided not to consider any kind of armed or supernatural interference.”
“That means your asses are on the line,” Julian said, scowling at Tristan and Esme. “Did you both get that part during yesterday’s briefing?”
