Jenkins P.O.V.
Ezekiel had taken Jade to Paris for lunch, prodded on by Stone who insisted that after being locked up for so long she ought to see the world in all it's beauty, he wanted him to take her to a museum and feed her at an overpriced cafe within, but Cassie told him Paris was more "romantic". I saw my opportunity and I took it. As soon as the door slammed behind them I gathered the group and spoke my mind.
"You need to be careful around Jade." I said gravely.
"Why?" Cassie asked.
"Tell me, what do you know about Jade?" I questioned her.
"She's half-siren, she's really pretty, she's Ezekiel's soulmate. The library chose her to stay here but she's clearly not a librarian and certainly not a guardian so we still don't know why the library chose her." She babbled off the things she knew.
"Is that all?" I prodded further.
"She's Dulaque's daughter." Stone chimed in.
"You're not saying she's dangerous?!" Baird asked.
"Jade was born from a mistake. She was a victim of circumstance. But she was still raised by a monster." I explained.
"She isn't anything like her father.." Cassie said clearly upset.
"Are you sure? Ezekiel said she stabbed her father in order for them to escape. Her father. Maybe he was a horrible father, maybe she hated him. He locked her away and never let her out to even stretch her legs. I wouldn't be surprised if she hated him. But he raised her, he cared for her, he protected her. Even if he didn't do a good job of it. He is all she ever knew, her whole world revolved around him. She then stabbed him and left with Ezekiel as if none of that had happened. Does that sound right to you?" I asked them.
"A father is still a father. Tell me now, is she anything like him?" Baird demanded.
"He did raise her. Anything she knows she learned from him. I'm not saying that makes her just like him, I'm not saying if she is like him we can't influence her, change her. I'm saying, for now, she can't be trusted. Don't let her away from Ezekiel. Being her soulmate he should be able to change her the most. And don't give her a situation where betraying you or hurting you would be in her best intrest, we don't know yet how she would react. As Dulaque's daughter, she could be capable of anything. What I'm saying is, be careful."
Ezekiel P.O.V.
Jade and I sat in a cafe in Paris with a wonderful view of the Eiffel Tower. I ordered a bunch of bready type things Stone had told me were good. Jade had ordered fish, snails, and more fish. After we finished eating I wasn't quite sure what to do... I'd never been on a date before... But I had been to Paris.
"Jade? Would you like to steal something with me?" There were thousands of expensive things to steal in Paris. Jade looked up from fiddling with her empty snail shells.
"Steal?" She asked. "What is steal?"
How to explain this?
"It's a game. Where you take something of someone's, but you don't tell them what you're going to take or when you're going to take it. Then you never give it back. And sometimes you sell it to someone else so it's harder to find." Yeah, that explanation sucked.
"What if they find out you took it?" She asked tilting her head at me.
"Then you lose the game, lose what you took, go to prison and possibly die... It has it's risks.." This is not going well.
The waitress came by and took our empty plates. I was getting more nervous. A theif is what I am, it just is.. What if she didn't like who I was?
"Do you... want to play?" My heart beat grew faster as the seconds slowly ticked by.
She held up her hand. In it was a heart necklace with the name "Sasha" engraved on it. Our waitress was a Sasha.
"Let the games begin." She said with a soft smile.
I pulled out her chair and took her hand, happily leading her to a nearby museum. Time for a little shopping trip.
Baird P.O.V.
After we discussed possibilities for Jade, containing her or changing her or returning her to her father, all keeping in mind how any decision would impact Ezekiel, we still didn't have an answer. If we knew why she was here, what the library was thinking, that might be a start. I was getting a headache. Then a familar voice rang out from the front of the annex.
"Honey, I'm home!" The voice was followed by rushed footsteps and a smiling face popping around the corner. Flynn.
"And what hour do you call this?" I joked. We were only sort of a couple, it was a shaky start but it was getting better.
"The perfect one." He came around the corner to be seen holding a large, old, black box. Something was glowing inside it like it would burst.
We all crowded around to look at it.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Is it... A magical, secret thing, nobody knew existed but you?" Cassie wondered.
"Is it a bomb?" Stone asked nervously examining the edges.
"Is it a box?" Jenkins joked, uninterested. We all glared at him.
"It's a triple-locked magic box. And I have no idea what's inside." Flynn stated like he'd just revealed a fabulous treasure we could all share.
"Triple-locked?" I asked, knowing he was dying to explain.
"Time, location, person." He said excited.
"Care to expand?" I said, playing into his excitement.
"It cannot be opened until a certain amount of time had passed, in this case one-thousand years. Which will be in just a few minutes. It must be opened within the vincinity of a certain area, which just happens to include the annex. So I thought we could all open it together! And it has to be opened by a specific person. The person must have a particular pre-determined chariteristic. In this case that person must be named "Jade". You have no idea how long that took me to figure out. So... I have legal paperwork, who wants to be a "Jade" for the next few minutes?Cassandra? Eve?" He looked between the two of us excitedly.
No one quite knew what to say. How to tell him. I had sent a letter, that he obviously hadn't received, and he'd been out of cell range. Luckily, no one needed to speak, because the doors to the annex opened. Ezekiel and Jade had returned. Flynn looked up and saw Ezekiel first.
"I knew I was missing something! Where were you kid?" Flynn greeted Ezekiel warmly then noticed Jade hovering by his side.
"Who is this? You know we don't bring outsiders here. Unless the library calls them, no one should come from the normal population." He put his head in his hands then looked up, the excitement returning.
"Wait! Let me guess! You had no choice. You were forced to bring her by some magical force. She was in great peril or something like that and you saved her! Of course! It all fits!"
He walked up to Jade and took her hand.
"You must be Jade!" He told her his excitement bubbling over.
"Yes..." She said nervously, unwillingly leaving Ezekiel's side as Flynn led her to the box he'd placed on the table.
"This could not have worked out better. Just place your hands on the box."
Jade looked at the box, then at Ezekiel, and carefully placed her hands on the box. The shining light got brighter until the lid burst, splintering in all directions. Out flew an eel that had a randomly occurring electric shock pulsating down its back. Flynn followed it amazed as it flew about the room circling our heads one by one.
"What is it doing?" I asked, nervously.
"It's trying to find the one who opened its box. Maybe because it's looking for its master, or maybe it wants to kill her.. We won't know until it reaches her! How fascinating!" He held still as the eel circled his head.
Finally it settled on Jade, circling her head round and round. It made contact, just barely, with her head and slithered down to her arm. We watched it carefully but nothing seemed to happen. Then it bit down hard on her wrist. She let out a peircing scream and fell backward. Ezekiel caught her before she hit the floor. As her eyes closed she whispered something to Ezekiel.
"Jade! Jade!" He cried. "What is it doing?!" He yelled at Flynn.
"It's trying to bond with her. With her being human her chances of survival are slim. If she doesn't live it will probably continue to try and bond with someone, killing everyone not strong enough until it finds it's master. We should probably kill her now, when it's trying to bond it's at its weakest, killing her will destroy it and spare the rest of us." He pulled a small knife from his belt and headed towards Jade.
"Stop." Ezekiel said in a commanding tone that shocked even The Librarian.
"What happens if she lives?" He demanded.
"The eel will be her servant. It should do whatever she asks of it without question. But she's going to die, Ezekiel. She's mortal. And since we all are also mortal we will only have to kill someone else when she dies, to prevent our deaths!" He tried to reach Jade with the knife.
Ezekiel grabbed his hand and twisted it until Flynn was forced to release the knife to clatter on the floor.
"First, she's not mortal. She's half-siren. Second, if she dies I will be next. None of you have to die, kill me when it bites me, and then it will be over, but you must give her a chance." Ezekiel looked Flynn directly in the eyes as he said this.
"Ezekiel, there is no way to know if it will choose you. You're a librarian, who is she, you have responsibilities. You can't sacrafice yourself for a random person off the street! And you certainly can't make that sacrafice for anyone else! It's unfortunate that it turned out this way, but in the end people die every day. She's not one of us! We are running out of time. We need to kill her before it moves on." Flynn sounded frustrated. He didn't understand.
"I'll take her into Jenkins study. If it looks for anyone else it will find me. She deserves a chance." Ezekiel picked her up and carried her into the study.
"She's not one of us! You have responsibilities!" Flynn yelled after him.
"Actually, she is." I told him showing him the letter she got from the library. He held it and sat in a chair. He looked around at each of us.
"You, have a lot of explaining to do." He said pointedly looking at each of us. It was going to be a long conversation