Chapter 20

After dinner, Monroe called Nick, and he was already at the trailer. We headed back out. The knots were forming in my stomach again along the drive. What was going to be in there to answer all these questions? I softly hummed 'Who are You' on the way to the seedy parking lot as a myriad of thoughts passed through my brain.

"Who are you?
Who, who, who, who?"

"Hopefully we'll get you an answer to that song," Monroe said, startling me from my thoughts. He glanced over at me with a small smile.

"Yeah, hopefully," I replied with a sigh. "So are you sure you're feeling okay?"

"Yeah." He sniffled. "Better than yesterday. The stew helped. I should be fine by Wednesday. Blutbaden don't stay sick for long. We're a hardy bunch."

I rubbed his arm. "Perhaps we should've postponed for another day."

"No, no. I'm fine, really." He sneezed again, and I whimpered at him. "The worst thing is that my senses are all off. I can barely smell your vanilla, and I'm, like, right next to you. It's brutal."

"Aww, Honey."

"Like I said, I'll be back to normal by Wednesday… Probably."

Monroe parked the VW, and we quickly walked up. I held my breath as he knocked on the door of the Little Trailer of Wesen Horrors. Nick motioned us to come inside and have a seat. I resumed the spot on the trailer bed, but Monroe chose to stand instead.

As I sat down, I pulled out my manila envelope. After hours and hours of research, Chloe had recently found more on my Mom's side. I'd printed out the e-mail she'd sent me with additional surnames. My dad's side was still a mystery. Chloe said she'd scoured for any hint of a birth record and had come up empty-handed. It was frustrating her to no end.

"What's that?" asked Nick as I began to remove the papers.

"Just what I have so far on my biological parents. It's not much." I passed him the article on their death. "So, as a detective, how much pull do you have to get information about cases in other states?"

"Well, it depends. Sometimes if there's a link to a case we're working on here, I can request files from other areas." He looked up at me. "Why do you ask?"

"My parents' murder was a cold case," I said. "They never found who killed them."

Nick nodded. "Mine were the same way. It looked like a car accident, but my aunt said they were murdered." Nick skimmed through the article. "I'll check into it. Maybe I can get some details. Most times the newspapers won't have specifics for a case like this. The reports from the Medical Examiner and the incident reports will tell us better what really happened."

"You can get that?"

"Maybe. I can't promise anything."

I nodded as I shared the rest of the contents of the envelope with Nick.

"Okay. So, we have your dad's last name as Archer, and your mom's maiden name as—"

"Whoa, is this an Akeley?" Monroe excitedly asked, and I turned as he edged his way to the corner of the trailer to retrieve an antique looking camera. He held it up, grinning like a kid who'd just told Santa what he wanted for Christmas. "Oh, my God. It is!" He grinned wildly as he examined the camera, but Nick looked tense when I turned back toward him.

"Be careful with that," Nick warned, and Monroe jolted his eyes up. He didn't seem to practice what he preached on the 'no touch' rule.

Monroe carefully set down the camera, but then his eyes lit up again as he noticed another camera sitting close by. "No way! Dude, a Kineclair projector? My great-uncle on my mother's side, Olaf... that's my uncle's name, not my mother's... he had a camera shop on—" Monroe paused as he looked back up at Nick, who had gone from tense to downright irritated. "Right. Sorry. I just haven't seen one of these cameras in forever. Like I was saying, my Great-Uncle Olaf ran a—"

"Monroe," Nick stopped him, "we're kinda busy here," he said brusquely, turning back to me.

I gave Nick a scowl and turned to Monroe, who now looked like a kid whom Santa had told was getting a lump of coal. "Well, I want to know about this Akeley and Kineclair," I said matter-of-factly. "The Grimm information isn't going anywhere." I loved Monroe's sexy brain, and no one, not even Nick, needed to stop him like that.

"Nah, it's fine," Monroe conceded with a sigh and moved toward the trailer bed, sitting down. "I'll tell you about it later."

I turned back to Nick and refrained from jumping all over him. He was helping me, after all. I could hold in my frustrations and rant in the car later. Right now I'd focus on the task at hand… finding out how I fit into this world I'd lived in all my life.

"Okay, so your mom's maiden name is Morder," Nick continued.

"I have a few more last names to check, too." I passed him the e-mail from Chloe.

Nick looked up from the paper after he scanned it. "There's eight different names on here."

I nodded. "That's three generations back."

"Let me see what we have in here that has a lineage of Grimms." Nick stood and moved to his collection of books. "Well, there's one here on Bauerschwein, Mauzhertz, Tranks… Whatever kind of Wesen that is."

Monroe let out a snort, and Nick jerked back.

"What?" he asked Monroe.

"Nothing." Monroe gestured with his hands with a smug grin. "Never mind. Carry on."

Nick shook his head and went back to the reading through the spines. "Okay, here's one that says, 'Grimm.' And there's another one." He lifted the two books to the desk. Nick opened up the first one, turning the pages, and then he did the same for the other one.

Monroe and I sat quietly while he examined them.

"So these books have the entire Grimm lineage, going as far back as the early 1900s from what I can tell." Nick grinned at me. "If you're a Grimm, then one of these names ought to be in the lineage, and then we'll know for sure." He looked back at the other books on the shelf. "If not, then there's always the non-human, human Wesen idea to fall back on."

I sized up the books. "We've got our work cut out for us then."

Nick passed one over to me. "One for each of us."

"Nick, I can go through one of them," said Monroe as he stood up.

"I don't mind, Monroe," Nick replied.

Monroe sat back down and let out a short sigh. "I guess I can just sit here and twiddle my thumbs instead."

"Here." Nick reached for another journal and a notepad. "See how much German you can translate from this one. Just write down the translation, and stick the notepaper in the book."

Monroe's eyes brightened. He nodded eagerly as Nick handed him the journal like a parent giving their kid a coloring book with a box of new crayons.

I smiled at Monroe, but he was already too engrossed in the journal to notice.

(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)

Time passed slowly as we scoured the pages. The words were beginning to run together while I scanned though name upon name. The sheer number of Grimms was overwhelming. Who knew there could be so many? Granted, most of these countless people were dead and long gone, but still it was massive. The names filled up this entire book, and it was quite hefty. I looked up at the equally large book Nick was scanning and shook my head. With so many names from the list to check, this was a daunting task.

As I turned my next page, I paused. Scribbled on the branch of one of the trees was the name Morder. I quickly reached for my ancestry page from what Chloe had gathered and traced back a few generations. The furthest back she'd found was Franz Mörder, my great-grandfather. (The umlaut must have dropped off down the lineage) I re-read the name from the book, matching Franz and his son, Lukas, on the tree.

I almost leapt out of my seat as I exclaimed, "Found it!"

Both Nick and Monroe perked up, leaning in as I pointed out the name. I traced the lineage back with my finger to the top branch. It wasn't Jacob or Wilhelm as I had assumed to find, but their sister, Charlotte, who was linked to an H.C. Anderson. Monroe and I looked at each other as we both deduced the initials rather quickly.

"Oh, wow... Hans Christian Anderson?!" Monroe exclaimed aloud, and I was right there with him.

"Didn't Anderson write fairy tales, too?" Nick asked as he watched us intently.

"Uh, yeah. Ever heard of The Little Mermaid?" Monroe asked with a dash of sarcasm. "That's Hans Christian Anderson. He wrote many others, too. Back in 1835, Anderson—"

"Okay, I get it, Monroe," Nick interjected. "He wrote fairy tales like the Grimms did." I held in a scowl. No wonder Monroe was afraid to finish his sentences. "So what do these words mean?" Nick asked, pointing to the German. The word 'ehestand' was written beside their names, and 'uneheliches kind' was written beside the child below them.

"So, you don't want to hear about ol' Hans, but you want me to help you translate? I see how it is."

Nick stared at him. "Monroe."

"Okay, fine." Monroe scoffed. "So, this Grimm sister and Hans Christian Anderson had a child out of wedlock," Monroe noted, pointing at the word 'ehestand.' "And so the child was... Well, not to be rude, but he was a bastard." He pointed to the German words 'uneheliches kind.'

"Well, then that settles it." Nick looked pretty satisfied as he leaned back in his desk chair with a smile on his face. "Renée, you're a Grimm."

"Yeah, it would seem I'm part of the Grimm family." I nodded slowly, tracing the names again with my finger. "Illegitimate by their standards back then, but a Grimm nonetheless." I shook my head in disbelief. I was floored. Absolutely floored. I was the progeny of the Grimms and of Hans Christian Anderson... just amazing.

Monroe's hands rested on my shoulders and he gave them a squeeze. "What a lineage though."

As I read further, my eyes shifted to more German off to the left of Anderson's name. Underlined were the words, 'Fähigkeit Sehen die Wahrheit.'

Monroe saw where I was looking and made a slight gasp. "Uh, maybe I'm not reading that correctly, but… Umm, no. I'm reading that correctly." Monroe's eyes were wide as I turned to him. I wasn't getting the translation.

"You wanna share, Monroe?" Nick asked expectantly.

"'Fähigkeit Sehen die Wahrheit' loosely translates to 'the ability to see the truth.' So, I mean, it sounds like that maybe—"

Nick broke in. "Hans Christian Anderson could see Wesen, too?"

Monroe ran a hand through his wild, curly hair and let out a short breath. "I guess that's how a Grimm would refer to someone else who could… Well, who could see us." He looked at me quickly due to the separation, but I didn't mind.

"Seeing the truth could mean he just saw a woge, right?" I asked. "Average humans can see Wesen when they want to be seen." My ex, Jack, saw the truth at Phoenix Hill Tavern when Monroe showed him his true Blutbad form.

"Yeah, I see your point there, but I don't think they would write 'ability' if he just saw one of us, you know? That would be something like 'Erblickte die Wahrheit,' to mean he saw the truth."

"So, there are more than just Grimms that can see you guys?" Nick edged up out of his chair. He could care less about separation. "So then the Andersons had a line, too?'

"Well, if you had let me finish before, Anderson never married nor did he have any kids… Well, except for this new discovery," Monroe said. "But he did have a step-sister, and I'm sure there could be cousins. But we've never heard of anything but Grimms, so if they were from another line, we wouldn't have known the difference."

I skimmed though the next few pages, searching for more on Anderson, but wasn't seeing anything else. I went back to the page, counting up the branches. Charlotte would be my eighth great-grandmother. So then Nick and I were cousins. Extremely distant cousins, but family nonetheless. I turned to the dark-headed Grimm as he and Monroe talked back and forth about the history of Hans Christian Anderson. I had family.

"Do you mind if I document this?" I asked Nick, trying to speak while there was a small gap in their conversation.

Nick smiled that toothy grin at me. "Help yourself."

I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and took a few photos of the page. I would transcribe it later and then delete the photo. It wasn't safe to carry around this kind of information. I had to tell Chloe. I'd call her tonight and let her know what I'd found.

As I closed the book, I let out a deep breath. My dad came to mind, and I imagined him smiling at me. I did my research, so now I could honestly say I was a Grimm. But was I happy with knowing the answer?

I turned to Monroe. "So, Morder translating to Murder and Slayer… Just a coincidence?"

"Yeah, well, ya never know with those kinds of names," Monroe answered with a shrug. "They may have adopted it, you know, given their situation and all. But, one does not simply choose the name Morder." He smirked.

I rolled my eyes slightly.

"Oh, come on," he teased. "You were thinking it, too."

"Actually, I was thinking that it took you long enough to make a Lord of the Rings joke out of that name."

"Hey, I was trying to be polite."

Nick stood up and cleared his throat, halting our banter. "It's getting kinda late. I still have to head back into the precinct to work on some things."

Monroe and I stood as well. "Thank you again for your help," I said, giving Nick a smile.

"I'm glad you found what you were looking for."

As Monroe and I left the trailer, I was still uncertain how I ought to feel. I wanted to be happy; happy that I knew the truth and understood why I could see what I could see, but unfortunately, I was feeling more melancholy than anything.

"You okay?" Monroe asked as we got into the VW.

"Yeah, I'm good," I replied, feigning a smile.

"You sure? 'Cause that's not much of a happy face you've got going on right now."

I leaned back into the seat. "I'm just trying to process everything."

"Yeah, I get it. Honestly, I thought we'd be going the non-human, human Wesen route."

"Really?" I turned toward him. "Why?"

"Well, you and Nick… I mean, there are just differences."

"Yeah," I said. "Maybe I take after the Anderson-side."

"Well, there's something different, but the branches don't lie."

I glanced back at the road. "I suppose they don't."

"This is what you wanted though, right?" Monroe asked. "You wanted to know who you were. And I must admit, your ancestry is its own literary romance." He always knew the right thing to say.

"I'm a descendant of the love child of Hans Christian Anderson and the Grimm's sister. It almost seems dirty." I laughed in spite of myself.

"And if Anderson could see what they could, then it makes more sense why those guys met up so often. It had to do with more than fairy tales, I'm sure."

"So, I want to hear about those cameras you found," I said, changing the subject. "Nick really pissed me off, cutting you short like that."

"Eh, he was focused on helping you," Monroe reasoned, but it still upset me. "I got excited, and, you know, I tend to want to share when I get excited."

"But it wasn't just the cameras," I said hotly. "You were trying to tell him about Anderson and he cut you short there, too. Does he do that often?"

"Yeah, well… Nick is a 'just the facts' kinda guy. That's his job, Renée. He cuts right to the chase. I, on the other hand, like the details."

I leaned against his arm. "Well, I like the details, too."

"That's why we work so well together." Monroe gave a short chuckle, and I genuinely smiled this time.

"So Akeleys and Kineclairs. I'm all ears."

"Kineclairs I don't know much about except they were produced by the Eclair Company in the early 1900s. But Akeleys, now those I'm well versed on." Monroe smiled like he had before. "Now you need to know that Carl Akeley, the inventor, was a man of many firsts. Aside from developing the 35 mm motion picture camera, like the one in the trailer, he also invented the cement spray gun and one of the earlier searchlights, which was used in the First World War. Akeley also helped revolutionize taxidermy by using clay, which in my opinion, taxidermy is disturbing, and it kinda creeps me out." Monroe shook his head. "Anyway, back to cameras. Akeleys were originally the standard for many naturalists during field research in the '20s through the '40s. But the shutter mechanism was the camera's, you know, real 'claim-to-fame.' Standard 'box style' motion picture cameras only had an 180 degree shutter, whereas Akeley was able to extend his to 230 degrees, which was totally unique since the faster shutter speed allowed for filming when light was scarce. Just real neat cameras, man."

I listened to Monroe intently. How hard was it for Nick to do the same? I shook my head. "Where did such an interest in old cameras stem from?" I asked.

"You see, my great-uncle, Olaf, worked as a newsreel cameraman in Berlin back in the '20s. He had a camera shop on the Leitung Strasse… Well, actually my great-grandfather owned the shop first, then my great-uncle. But anyway, when he died, my mother got all of his old stuff. Then they got passed down to me along with all the stories."

I didn't know much about his family. I'd tried not to pry. Sometimes I'd get a tale like this one, and I'd gain a little insight into his family tree.

"There must be a lot of history, too."

"There is," he agreed. "But just seeing those old vintage cameras, man, got me thinking, and now I want to find those cameras. I know they're in the attic somewhere, I just gotta rummage through those boxes and figure out where I put them."

"Sounds like an adventure to me," I grinned. There had to be all sorts of treasures stashed away in Monroe's attic. His house was already its own museum. Who knew what else he had stored up there? I was curious, I had to admit.

"If you wanna help me look that would be great."

"I'd like that, sure."

"Good, 'cause I have a tendency to get sidetracked." Oh, I bet he did.

A/N: She's a Grimm! Some interesting revelations here! But now that she knows, what does it mean? Guess we'll find out soon.

I did my own RetCon on the Great-Uncle Olaf story... In Episode 1x13 (Three Coins in a Fuchsbau) Monroe says the camera shop was owned by his great-uncle. Then in episode 2x04 (Quills) he tells Rosalee that his great-grandfather owned the camera shop. So this was was my way to merge the two. (:

STAY TUNED!