Chapter 28

I knew it was really late and that everyone was already in bed but I still rushed to the Conference Hall. I kept knocking on the door until Hellen opened it.

“Annabelle, are you alright?” she asked and then noticed the oversized Star Stone in my hand.

“Help” is all I could say. She let me in and I set the stone in the centre of the table. Alfred’s head snapped up, he was half asleep but he became hyper when he looked at the stone.

“What is that?” he asked.

“That’s my Star Stone from Ophiuchus,”

“What happened to it?” Hellen wondered.

I told them what I had found out. “I think that...there’s a serpent growing inside that. It’s been there ever since I got it but I didn’t know that until recently.”

“How is that possible?” Hellen looked at Alfred who was deep in thought but he looked like he knew something.

“I don’t know but....” I trailed off. “But I know it’s there. It looked me right in the eye.” I shuddered at the thought.

“Should we break it open?” Hellen suggested.

“No!” Alfred said instantly. “It will hatch open on it’s own.”

“Hatch?” Hellen and I chorused.

“Yes, it’s an egg and...that is a serpent.” Alfred confirmed. Overgrown egg, I could hear Tristan saying in my head.

“So, it’s actually a serpent?” I sighed. “But how and why?”

Alfred sat back down and I took a seat next to him. “The snake belongs to the descendants of Ophiuchus,” Alfred explained. “I cannot believe that I didn’t think of this before. I should’ve told you, I forgot. It was in your mother’s family for years. Passed down to each generation. It’s like a servant to the Ophiuchus. It’s born from the brightest Star in Ophiuchus, named after it too.”

“Rasalhague,” I remembered. “Head of the snake charmer.”

“Yes,” Alfred confirmed. “It’s controlled by any descendant of Ophiuchus. You can tell it what to do and it will obey. He was really close to your mom.”

“He?” I repeated.

“Pet?” Hellen shuddered.

I remembered hearing rumours that some of the descendants of the Twelve Major had Celestial Creatures which represented their Constellation. I had no clue that Ophiuchus would gift me with a Celestial Serpent. Ophiuchus represented a man grasping a serpent. Now I was just confused.

“Yes, it is male and it’s about to hatch,” Alfred told. I looked at the stone, it was cracking, its fissures were oozing slime. I gagged.

“I have to keep it?” I groaned. “Can’t we just send it back?” I felt guilty calling him an “No,” Alfred said. “It turned into Stardust when all the Ophiuchus died, it’s life is tethered to yours now. If something happens to you it will affect the serpent. It may have sensed your presence when you went to Celestial Gardens and the Star, Rasalhaugue rebirthed it. It knew there was still one more Ophiuchus left, The Last Star of Ophiuchus, that’s you. He was just waiting for the right time.”

“This is freaky,” I said.

“Not really,” Alfred said. “You’ll like him when he awakes.”

I shivered at awakes. It sounded eerie.

“It’s already starting to break open,” Hellen pointed out.

“What should I do with it?”

“Leave it here overnight and we’ll see what to do about it in the morning,” Alfred said.

“Maybe it would’ve hatched by then,” Hellen offered.

I barely slept that night. I kept getting images of an oversized snake slithering up my leg and resting around my waist. I woke up screaming.

“Annabelle,” Amara said groggily. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah...yeah...I’m fine. It was just a dream, I’m sorry.” I stammered. I couldn’t go back to sleep. I felt something crawling up my leg, leaving a trail of slime. I jerked up. I prayed that I was just hallucinating.

Rasalhague, it hissed every time I closed my eyes.

I got up and ran outside, it was early morning. I glanced at Ophiuchus. One of it’s Stars, no doubt the brightest was green and bigger than the rest. I went to the Conference Hall to check on the egg or stone. The door was locked. I walked around the training area, staring at Ophiuchus.

Head of the snake charmer, those words played in my head on repeat. I’m the snake charmer or serpent bearer and the snake will be under my control.

I saw Alfred go into the building from the boys’ room. Hellen slept in her office so she was probably already there. I followed him into the Conference Hall. The door was open but I still knocked.

Alfred turned to face me, “It’s still rudimentary, it’ll hatch in a few days.”

I nodded, at a loss of words.

“It’ll be okay,” he comforted. “You’ll do great with a pet snake.”

I snorted. “I don’t think so, Gramps.”

A smile crept up on his face, mine to. “Annabelle...”

“You can call me Belle.”

I was trying to force myself to call him in the hope of eventually forming a habbit.

“Alright, Belle,” he started. “You need to know that this snake won’t harm you, it will be your friend and you’ll like him.”

I groaned. “But, I’ve never had a pet before. How come I didn’t know about this before?”

“Because you grew up among two people who hate the Ophiuchus. But now the serpent has awaken once more after many, many years.”

“I hope it doesn’t scare my friends,” I joked.

I trained all day, it was a good distraction. Amara tried to talk to me but after that didn’t work she sent Lewis. I shooed him away. I didn’t take any of my meals, I wasn’t famished even after all that training.

“Belle,” Tristan said as I was walking to the girls’ room. I huffed and stopped.

“What?”

“We need to talk,” he told.

“Maybe later,”

“No, it’s important. You need to see this.” he said.

“I’m tired and dirty. I’m not in the mood for this.” I said.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

I almost told him about the serpent but decided to keep it a secret. “Nothing, I’m fine.”

“Then will you please listen to me?”

“Listening . . .”

“Lewis and Amara found something about Lyra. You have to...”

I interrupted. “I don’t care,”

I hid in the bathroom and took a shower, rubbing all the sweat and dirt off. My piercings didn’t sting anymore. I was starting to regret the nose one but I could only take it out after the holes became permanent.

I found Amara waiting for me outside. She had her arms crossed and she looked furious. “We’ve been trying to talk to you all day,”

“I know,” I said casually.

“Why aren’t you listening?”

“Oh, I’m listening. I’m just not paying attention,” I snapped. I lay on my back with my eyes closed.

“Me and Lewis figured out what’s wrong with Lyra,” she said.

“I have other things to worry about.” I turned on my side.

“Like, what?” Amara raged. “Your worn out Ophiuchus Sign?”

I sat up, shocked. “How do you know about that?” I demanded. “Did Tristan tell you?”

“No, I saw it a few nights ago while you were sleeping. It’s why you went into a coma,” she answered.

“That’s all a lie,” I snorted, now on my feet. “I feel no different than I did before.”

“I think it’s got to do with Jaxon and how he’s stealing Stars,” she suggested.

“Huh?”

“What is he’s targeting Ophiuchus?”

I huffed. “If he wanted to take Ophiuchus I think he would’ve done it by now.”

“I’m serious,” she pressed. “What if he is?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I muttered.

“That’s exactly what Lyra said and look what’s happening to her,” Amara said.

“What is it?”

Amara sighed, as if she was about to deliver bad news. “You know what the Geminis think? That if twins aren’t born in their family it’s bad luck because there’d be problems in the future.”

“I know that, but what does that have to do with Lyra?”

“Gemini twins have opposite personalities. Lyra didn’t split into two people. So, she has two people trapped in one body. Now, they’re splitting up. Both of them are trying to take over the body.”

“Oh no...” my insides turned.

“Lyra and Lyla are opposite personalities,” she continued. “And they’re fighting over the body so she’s going to switch each day. One day as Lyra and the other as Lyla. Lyra won’t remember what Lyla did. And vice versa.”

“I talked to Lyra a few hours ago, before she changed into Lyla. Lyra says she’s heard a voice in her head for her entire life telling her to do the opposite of everything she does. Threatening to come out.”

“And she didn’t tell us.”

“She thought she was going mad. Her family knew what it was but it’s not like they could do anything about it. They think it’s an aberration. Lyra was supposed to have a twin but in the Gemini family it’s a rarity when a person doesn’t split into twins.”

“What now?” I asked, worried.

“Lewis showed me some pictures of what happens to Geminis with split-personality disorder and...” she shuddered. “It’s bad, Belle. It’s awful and frightening.”

I was at a loss for words. I ran out of the girls’ quarters and out to the training area where Tristan was. He said Lewis was in the cafeteria. I sat next to him, he was reading a book about Geminis.

He showed me some notes and diagrams. I couldn’t focus, my breathing fastened. I rearranged the words in my head but no matter what I did, they always had the same meaning. The pictures in his books were of another body coming out of one body and people with opposite personalities. They weren’t scary but they looked like something that would definitely give me nightmares.

Suddenly, a snake hatching from a Star Stone wasn’t the most freakish thing in the world. I realized that Lyla was the determined, confident and the type of girl who doesn’t mind getting her hands dirty, the one who doesn’t care about clothes or hair or shoes. Lyra was the girly, stylish and fancy gowns type of girl with a bubbly and friendly personality. I could hear my heart beating in my chest as I read about split personality. It only happened to Geminis and Lyra was the first Gemini in ten years to suffer from it.

This is why her family called it bad luck, because she’d morph into two people. Which is unnatural.

“What happened to them? All of these Geminis?” I asked, shaking terribly.

“They survived, don’t worry.” Lewis comforted. “But, the process of Lyla coming out of Lyra is agonizing. Lyla will be born from Lyra’s flesh.”

Bile rose in my throat, even though my stomach was empty I felt like throwing up. I ran to the girl’s room with those morbid images flashing in front of my eyes.