"I suppose there is a reason why you have called me?" Ella's obnoxious tone came out of Hazel's mouth and Annabeth sighed, not really liking that she had to talk to her. She preferred talking to Will even when he had the curse. At least he put her on her toes, Ella just annoyed her. They were sitting in the study, Hazel on the other side of the desk whilst Annabeth was behind the desk. It had taken a few minutes for Annabeth to convince Hazel to actually try for Ella to possess her but yet it took a couple of hours to figure out how to make Ella possess Hazel. But they finally did it and now Ella was staring right at Annabeth with the same smug look she had when she first appeared to them.
"I have a few questions for you, Ella. Things that have been bothering me, you see, right now you're our only information source. Yes I know we could always sneak into the mortal cult but right now that doesn't seem the best option right now because the group is divided a bit. So you're my only choice for information right now, the others have lost inspiration for the quest. Sure Will might come back to bringing down the cult but with the others…after her death, I don't see them coming back to defeat them like they did with the Giants. That's the difference between the quest, this quest is a bit laidback but my theory is that the cult is trying to keep out of sight, they know we're checking them out but we still don't know much about them, so at the end, when we're going to attack…their going to come out with a bang. We know the basics of their power, but to the extent of that power? I don't know. I don't know what the children of him have; surely they have something that puts them above normal demigods, George Darkwood experimented on them so surely it did something?" Annabeth theorised though she looked more frustrated than anything and Ella gazed at her frowning.
"You say it like Will is not one of them." She observed fiddling with a spoon. "Know your enemies. Will was also…experimented on, as you put it, but if he went through the same thing I did then I would not call it experiments. You say the facts Ms. Chase, nothing more. The children of the Darkwoods, my siblings, are people, they have feelings and emotions. You actually met the son of Ares; he was the man that led the attack a couple of days ago, though each child has their specific expectations, like I, a daughter of Poseidon, has like swimming and be carefree and loyal blah, blah, blah."
Annabeth nods at this pulling her blonde hair back into a pony tail, she knew it was a fault of Athena; you made everything more facts than anything. She guessed she sounded a bit cold to the children of the Darkwood's, but she's barely met them so how would she know what to say about them?
"But enough about that, the questions?" Ella asked her, her blue eyes raking over Annabeth and Annabeth stared at her not sure what quite to think of Ella at the moment, on one hand she knew the way she acted was like Will, so that must mean that all of the Darkwood's were like this, even Will. But yet, something held her back when sorting Will into the Darkwood category, deep down, Will was nothing like Ella. Piper told her about the piano scene, and told her that he was actually pretty funny; it was nice for her to be with him, she felt happy. That was when Annabeth had begun to suspect that Piper's feelings for Will had begun to grow into something bigger, though she is incredibly faithful to Jason Annabeth knows it is hard to not have feelings for someone else as well as have feelings for the same person. Luke for example, though Annabeth had feelings for Percy she still had a crush on Luke; even Percy had two different love interests, it was bound that someone else of the seven was going to find someone to love. But Will? Even without the curse Annabeth would never have guessed the two, it was too outrageous.
"I have a couple of questions, my first question is what the Darkwood's are planning, and surely you must know something?" Annabeth finally asked shifting in her seat her grey eyes darting around the room, the study was a Victorian age styled room, the rug was a royal red and the fireplace had no flames inside it but at sunset it blazed automatically. On the walls there were bookshelves lined with thick volumes of Dickens and Shakespeare and other books on mythology but not one piece of technology was in sight. Ella had took a second to think through this question.
"I do not know much about what they are planning, I believe it will be a full on attack, therefore be ready for a war. But when they plan to do it…." Ella trailed off looking down and Annabeth waited a few minutes before pressing for her to continue. "Will's birthday, they're doing it on Will's birthday. The day his illness kills him, well if you call it an illness."
Annabeth jerked back. Will's illness, how could she be so stupid, she got so caught up in everything else she forgot about the illness, who knows if Will remembered it. He hasn't had any attacks lately so it slipped her mind. But then something hit her and she glanced up, "Kills him?"
"Oh the illness was always killing him, if he had stayed back with the Darkwood's, he would have been healed, but only when his powers come out." Ella said tapping her fingers against the hand rest and Annabeth stared at her frowning and Ella sighed. "The experiments, they were not experiments, they gave us…a unique power, I never knew my power, I died to early but with the right training our powers usually came out at the age of fourteen, fifteen at the latest, but Will's came out at seventeen due to him not having that training and he was desperate enough that the powers came through, though I do not know what his power is, maybe better fighting looking at the fight with the children of Ares, but I sense that it could be something more. The illness could only be healed when the powers have fully developed, and that takes at least six months and since Will's only started…I doubt his illness will pass."
"But why would the powers heal Will?"
"The injection was this sort of DNA thingy and it was broken until our powers developed, the powers wove our DNA back together you might say, think the lines of the DNA not weaving around each other but two parallel lines, when our powers fully develop our DNA weaves itself back together." Ella explained and Annabeth nodded not as confused as she was before but she was still confused about the injection.
"The injection though, what was in it?"
"I do not know, our father created it himself, but I gathered that it took him years to make it." Ella said and Annabeth nodded at this, alright she got the injection part mostly, but then something slipped into her mind. Even if we succeed at defeating the Darkwood's, even if Will stays on our side, he's still going to die. She shook her head quickly not wanting to think about this.
"But there's something else, something that has been bothering me, and that is since you're adopted siblings, you and Will that is, you should look nothing like each other but black hair, blue eyes? You two look exactly like each other but how can that be if you two are not blood related?" Annabeth asked and Ella just stared at her obviously taken by surprise to the question and Annabeth huffed smugly remembering her comment about Annabeth not being smart.
"The injection of course, the experiment made our features change to blue and black, some had it the other way, blue hair black eyes and the rest of us had black hair and blue eyes. Strange I know, but it is another genetic thing." Ella said twirling a small ruby through her fingers, Annabeth hadn't noticed it before and Annabeth paused, this would surely be a sign that Hazel was conscious unlike last time, where Ella forced control over Hazel's body.
She wondered how it felt, to be controlled that is, horrible probably, to watch your every moves taken away by force, to see your body doing things which you would never had done if you were the one controlling your body. "I see…and do you know how many children of the Darkwood are there are?"
"Well…there is around fifty or so, I wouldn't know, it's not something I cared about when I was alive, so my estimation is fifty. But only the twelve of us were raised by George, the other thirty two children were raised by the mortals in the cult, Piper for example, she was one of the backup demigods for Aphrodite, but since Sophie is still alive, as well as the rest of the Aphrodite children under the cults ruling, Piper was never needed." Ella said thinking aloud and Annabeth choked on her water.
"What?"
"Oh…you don't know." Ella frowned and leant back throwing the blood red ruby onto the table. "But go to him, go to Tristan Mclean, he'll tell you the story. I do not think it is right for me to say it." She said waving her hand, dismissing the thought to tell the story. Annabeth was lost for words, Piper involved with the cult? Did Piper know? Is she a spy for George? After a couple of minutes of silence Ella reached for a piece of paper and wrote down some stuff. "Look, after you talked with him, go to this place. It will place you right in the middle of the cult. You'll never get far of course; they'll catch you then torture you for information in the most deadly ways, not the usual modern ways but their own special way. And you do not want that. But you'll be fine if you have the right connections." She said with a smile, a mischievous look in her dark blue eyes and suddenly Annabeth saw the difference between Ella and Will.
Ella was darker, whilst Will can be dark there was always something light there, everyone could agree to that, no matter how much they hated him there was something else in him, it was obvious, something there in him that made people want to trust him. But Ella, she was dark, like she was planning something that every word she said was just for some ulterior motive. The exact type of person that Annabeth hates, manipulative people like her.
"Will."
"Keep an eye on him when you're there, he'll lead you to your answers." Ella instructed then she slumped down and when she sat up, her eyes were solid gold. Hazel is back. The interrogation is over.