The Dormant Queen of the Hybrid

Book 1, Chapter 10 Asterids

If not on her authoritative facade as an Arch Mage, she is a gentle, pony-tailed-perky old lady with black hair and brown eyes full of wisdom of her past, but with a mind thinking about a bright future for her people and love ones. Asterids noticed Imelda Baltazar stir her lemon tea, as she smiled and stared at her, through her thick eyeglass. It’s as if she’s trying to double check if she’s just seeing a ghost of her dead best friend or not.

After the witch is done with her tea stirring, she waved her little wooden spoon and it magically flew away to the sink, few meters away from them, to literally wash itself, then fly again to its proper place in a small dish cabinet. The power of curse command or programming that Mr. Jo mention. The office is full of wooden framed pictures of Imelda’s cats, and people Asterids doesn’t know about. Except those people are friends with her beloved Maruha. She can see some of them smiling as they interact with her young mother in the pictures. Asterids realized that she doesn’t know anything much about her mother and she felt lonely because of it.

“You really have the same eyes.” The old lady giggled. Two hours had past since her boss left for a meeting. Asterids felt that Dook is just giving her some space and alone time with the old witch to respect their privacy. Meeting the best friend of her dead mother for the first time and talking to her about the pasts, seems like a personal stuff that is not related to the murder case after all. Asterids would definitely use this opportunity, though, to have the access to the biography of Hamorabi.

“Except hers was green. She’s a natural redhead, but she likes to dye her hair. More tea?”

“I’m good thank you. How long have you’ve been friends with my mom?”

“We’re childhood friends, orphans. From the very same orphanage where you are currently residing.”

“Oh yes, Ms. Minchin told me about the good heart witch who referred me to the orphanage, after my son and I—I didn’t know it was you! Thank you Ma’am.”

“I know—I heard about your son. I’m really sorry that I was not able to visit you there. I should’ve been there for you, but I was outside the country then. I just got back here more than one day ago.”

“Oh no, you’ve help me a lot.” Asterids held Imelda’s hand.

“You know.. visiting her has been part of my everyday here in the church—” Imelda looked at the window as she points to Maruha’s grave just east from her office. Her eyes is moist as she hold back her tears.

“Your mother.. I really love her. She’s a family to me. Your father though. He hid you from me, I was not able visit you freely in the shifter’s district,” Imelda was not able to hide her tears and she tried to wipe it by using her long sleeves. Asterids squeezed the old lady’s hands to console her.

“I would really love to catch up with you more often. I didn’t have any relative from my mother’s side. I’m glad that I am able to meet you today.”

“Thank you my dear! Please call me aunt from now on.”

“Okay, I will,” Asterids said awkwardly, as if she’s her seven year old self again. Her heart felt warm from the love of the old witch.

“Please child, I will do anything to help you with anything. Please don’t hesitate to tell me if you need my help.”

“Actually about that—"

*** *** ***

A few days after spending her time with her aunt, Asterids is full of good and warm memories about her mother. Though most of them are through pictures and brunch conversation, it’s as if she lived the childhood of her mother Maruha, because of how vivid Imelda’s stories are. Her mother went to college and was a Dean’s Lister. She was able to achieve a lot of things before she met Edward, her father.

Your mother likes to visit the Litany Section of the ground floor Library. Asterids remembered her aunt Imelda, was telling her more about her mother’s hobby to review the thesis of the other students, when someone called her name from behind. 

“Hey, Asterids. Are you okay?”

“Never been better, Boss.”

“You sure?” Dook asked again. His voice is low and soothing, as if trying walk on thin ice.

“Yes. By the way, thank you for giving me time to speak to her alone.” Dook smiled at her as a way to say; You’re welcome assistant.

“I can’t believe I have an arch mage aunt! Plus she gave us legit access to the church. VIP guests.” Asterids grinned, while Dook looked impressed.

“Looks like we’re not going to the biography section?”

“Yes I already went back there boss. It was useless. They only have the paintings of him for the public access. But any other information and items related to him is privately owned by another influential old rich family. Here’s your VIP access.” Asterids hands her boss his black card.

“This is the side entrance,” Dook mentioned.

“Yes. The local students use this way to get to the litany section.”

“Litany?”

“It’s the informal section of the library. Tons of indie published books and thesis are displayed there for everyone to access. Here were are! Are you ready?” Asterids asked Dook as she start opening the door.

“Okay, show me the way, assistant,” the boss responded. As soon as they went inside the room, the duo felt like they are on an entire different building. The Litany section is a noisy mess full of chatty youngsters wearing bright-colored-clothe, unlike the regular Makati city outside that is full of black dressed individuals. The room itself is as lofty as the basement one, divided into four section: The Books & other Reference materials, the Reading section, Thesis section and the local history section. Ironically, the place doesn’t use the integrated classification systems, nor computers, to organize the books on the shelves. It still use card catalogues. Asterids noticed the boy in the reception area as she tried to brows the Books and Reference material section index papers. She’s definitely sure the boy is a shifter. A wolf. Smelled like one.

“I can’t believe it.” Dook got Asterids’ attention.

“This is a four page summary of Hamorabi Absul’s profile. Look at the reference. They copied the information from the biography section.”

“Check the author boss. The student who made this profiling, is a member of that old rich family who owned the biography books.”

“Perfect. Let’s gather all the works of this young individual.”

*** *** ***

A few minutes passed and their reading table is already full of the books they needed. Most of it are amateur works but as long as it’s quoting a legit reference material, they are good to go.

“The Azrael curse uses a command that will remove the sentiency of a soul. Without any consciousness or awareness, that lump of dead essence is basically just an ether or mana, “ Asterids read the article she’s holding.

“It will require a huge and constant supply of mana from the caster.” Dook added.

“Boss, I don’t think the specter alone have the capability to store such great amount of mana, being it doesn’t have any physical body. The summoner must be a heck of a strong witch,” the blue eyed lady whispered.

“What if he’s getting the mana supply from his previous victims?”

“Gods.”

“Mrs. Madrigal said that Mr. Sandro is the first victim with the evidence of the thick black ether.”

“The specter was able to gather enough mana from his previous victims. Now he’s super strong!” Asterids pointed out. Shoot!

“Possibly,” the young alpha agreed with her with a grim expression.

“Still. If the victims are just fuels. What is the real motive of the summoner to shatter someone’s soul? Mr. Sandro’s soul?”

“I’m starting to think that Mr. Sandro is still a fuel. Or Possibly a test run. The main event is yet to come,” her boss declared.

“Fath—Mr. Edward,” Asterids said weakly.

“Any idea why him?”

“I would really like to know as well,” she answered.

“Anyway, now that we know more about the curse. We’ll have to figure out who kept summoning the specter Hamorabi.”

“I agree, Boss. Tia said, the specter only responds to a descendant or a family member.”

“We’ll have to trace the family tree of the ghost bastard.”

“Got that right, Boss. For starter, I will gather the names of the individual who’s doing a research on Hamorabi and his curse. We might find a clue about the identity of the summoner.”

*** *** ***

It was six pm when her boss split with Asterids, trying to meet one of the supplier for a new construction project. The young lady was able to focus on her compilations about the people who recently made researches on Hamorabi. If the library is the only option for the source material about the ghost specter within the district of Makati and Pasig City, there’s a big chance that the suspect is also using this same facility, giving her a way to identify or track his whereabouts. Most likely the summoner is one of those old rich family members.

Using her charm, Asterids was able to get the old book logs from the receptionist. She’s trying to check the list of names who borrowed the biography books on Hamorabi.

“Hey, Rex. It seems that the logs from February 2007 to December 2008 is missing on your records.”

“Oh they don’t have any hard copy of those anymore. They usually store the older logs in the cloud server,” The shifter wolf receptionist replied.

“Hey, you’re the receptionist! I’m sure you have access to that server. Come on help a fellow shifter in need.”

“Not too loud! No one knows I’m a shifter here. I’m using a charm to hide it from the witches.”

“Okay, okay. But please help?”

“I-I don’t know, Miss Asterids.”

“Pretty please?” Asterids tried to open one button of her Chambray shirt for a sexy attack, but failed miserably because she doesn’t have any cleavage.

“Oh my!” The lad face is beat red. “Okay! I will do it..b-but only because you’re pretty.” It seems that the Rex bought it after all. Asterids took note of this naiveté for future bamboozling. According to officer Gerdo’s leaked documents, the Madrigal killings started around the year 2007 to 2008 and so she had to check the oldest logs she can find. The most recent researches about the five hundred year old wizard was made on the year 2011. By the same person who made the Hamorabi profile summary. He is a graduate student from Polytechnic University of Makati, now a psychiatrist, Dr. Alexander Cruz. Mr. Alexander is the son of the Mall tycoon Lucio Cruz, the owner of the Biography Vault 368. Asterids also wrote down the address and other contact information of the Cruz family. She might need to contact them later to personally ask for their permission to access the vault 368, which might seem impossible to achieve. Last option!

As she continue to list down all the names of people, academe or students alike, who made the same research on Hamorabi, the young lady noticed that most of them are family member of witches who have direct connection to the leaders of the Coven, Makati Branch. It might be just a coincidence though. According to aunt Imelda, the are three arch mages in the country including her. Across the globe, there are only 100 of them. Above arch mage rank are the twelve grandmasters who lead the Coven internationally. They are the one next to the Monarch of the witches. The Monarch, or the Sorcerer Supreme is an immortal witch who is the center of the whole witch/wizard community. She is currently residing in U.K. The Queen Elizabeth—.

“Hey, Ms. Asterids! Are you still with me?” Rex the receptionist interrupted the young lady with her self absorption. It seems that he was able to gather all the files that Asterids is needed.

“Ah—yes, Rex. Thanks,” she replied.

“Here we go! The files that you need.” The blue eyed lady examine the papers. It’s only three pages, but the information that she saw is enough to make her feel uneasy and worried.

“Are you sure that this is all of it? No missing page?”

“Yes, Ma’am! Now about setting our romantic date—” the young receptionist started his bargain to set a date with Asterids, but she’s no longer listening. She is more concerned about the incriminating name on the list. There is one person who’s been borrowing all the books about the curse of Azrael and about the wizard dictator Hamorabi since 2006 up to 2007. Maruha Contrera. The maiden name of Asterids birth mother.