“Read the scroll,” Cole demanded. “I’m tired of the stalling.”
Jack looked around at all of us, then cleared his throat. “It’s in French. At the top it says, Transcription of writings discovered in the tomb of Alexander the Great, in his own city, within the thirteenth at the center of twelve. This is the treasure for which I’d searched half my life. There is more—a remedy—but I fear it will only make matters worse, so that I left buried. I warn you out of duty to the Circle. Were this to fall into enemy hands, it would mean nothing but ruin. It’s signed Napoleon Bonaparte, 1801.”
We glanced at each other, confused. That made it sound like Napoleon was going to tell us what he found in the tomb, not where the tomb actually was.
“Is that all?” Lydia said.
Jack shook his head and read, “Dearest Helena, I hope you are safe and have not discovered this too late to rid the—traitors . . . no, usurpers,” he said. “Rid the usurpers of their power and take back what is rightfully yours.” We all stole confused looks at one another. Usurpers? “Since the moment you were born,” Jack continued, “I knew I’d do anything to protect you the way I couldn’t protect my son, the ruler of the world as far as you can see, or his son after him—your father.”
Lydia drew in a sharp breath. “My son,” she murmured. “And his son after him. The person writing this is—”
“Olympias,” Elodie croaked. Stellan was tying the arms of his tuxedo shirt around her torso. “Alexander the Great’s mother.”
“Alexander’s son died young, though,” I thought out loud.
“He was a teenager,” Jack said. “Not necessarily too young to have a child.”
“That’s who she’s writing to,” I breathed. “That child. Helena. Olympias’s great-granddaughter.”
We all got quiet, and Jack kept reading. “After they stole my son’s dynasty, the Diadochi wished to be linked in such a way that they’d be truly blood. Brothers.”
“Stole?” I said.
“And usurpers,” Stellan agreed. “Keep going.”
“But they had underestimated a woman for the last time. The Order of Olympias and I—”
“The Order,” Lydia whispered. “Do you think—”
“Yes,” Colette said shortly. “It has to be.”
Jack started again. “The Order of Olympias and I linked them as they demanded, but they could not know I’d planted the seed of their destruction.”
Goose bumps rose on my arms, and we all looked at one another silently. There was no denying it now. Olympias wasn’t talking about the Diadochi as Alexander’s chosen heirs, as the Circle always believed. She was talking about them as thieves—of power, of her line’s birthright as kings.
Jack held up the scroll. “That’s all on this one.”
Everyone looked at the other bracelet, then at me and Stellan. He had just finished wrapping Elodie up, and now sat in just a white T-shirt. Lydia jumped up from the ottoman, unceremoniously wiped more blood from his arm, then my chest, and swiped it onto the lock on the second bracelet. Minutes later, we pulled out the second scroll, and Jack started reading again.
“All you’ll need to fulfill the Diadochi’s destiny is a female of the line. Be sure she has the violet eyes—that will ensure she has enough of the blood, in the correct configuration.” Jack looked up at me before he continued. “Her blood, together with yours, will create”—his voice wavered—“will create a plague.”
“A plague?” Stellan said. Cole laughed, harsh and ugly. Everyone else just looked stunned.
“Keep reading,” I said.
“Repeat the Bacchic rites performed when they were linked, with the united blood in their cups. Only the barest drop of the virus is necessary, and the kingdom shall be yours, to the ends of the world.”
We were all quiet for a long moment. Finally, Elodie broke the silence. “The curse of Olympias,” she murmured. Her eyes were closed, but it was a huge relief that she was with it enough to understand what was going on. “I’ve heard of it. I never thought . . .”
“Does that mean this was the weapon in the tomb?” said Cole. “I thought it was supposed to be a weapon against the Order.”
Lydia curled her lip at him. “You still care about the Order? According to this, the Order were ineffectual even two thousand years ago. This has to be what the mandate meant the whole time. We thought it meant the Order because it was talking about the greatest enemies. But it’s the Circle who have always been one another’s enemies.”
Next to me, my mom shuddered.
“Were you guys listening?” I said. “Anyone in the Circle could get this virus if they ingested our blood. You wouldn’t even be immune.”
“Nobody lick Avery or Stellan,” Elodie said weakly. I gawked at my bloodied hands, which had suddenly turned into weapons.
Lydia looked at her own hands, too, holding them farther away from her body. “Napoleon said on that scroll that there’s a remedy in the tomb. We can still find it. And if not, we’ll figure it out. Modern medicine has plenty on whatever scientific advances this woman thought she discovered.”
Cole cut her off. “So all we need is to mix their blood and have someone drink it?”
“Not even drink it,” Lydia said. “From the sound of this, it’d take just a drop. We might not even have to infect anyone. Just the fact that we have this . . .” I could see the wheels turning in her head. “I don’t know what we can do with it, but we can do something.”
“Not without our blood, you can’t,” Stellan piped up.
Lydia looked down at her hands again, and at the knife on the ottoman, and I could see in that second what she was thinking.