The private archives of the Holy See were a labyrinth of cold stone and parchment that smelled of ancient decay. Dust motes danced in the thin beams of moonlight filtering through the high, slit windows. It was the one place in Veridia where the whispers of spies couldn't reach—and the perfect place for a neurologist to conduct an unsanctioned examination.
Priscilla was tracing the spine of a book on ancient metallurgy when the sound of a cane striking the stone floor echoed behind her.
Click. Clack.
She didn't turn. "You're late, Alistair. I expected you to corner me three hallways ago."
"The layout of this cathedral provides excellent acoustic dampening," Alistair said, stepping into the light. He didn't have his usual medical bag, but his leather-bound notebook was tucked firmly under his arm. "I waited until the guards rotated. I prefer our... consultation... to be private."
Priscilla turned, leaning against a heavy oak bookshelf. She crossed her arms, the fabric of her sleeves pulling tight against the new muscle definition in her shoulders.
"Consultation? Am I a patient again, or are we skipping the formalities and going straight to the autopsy?"
Alistair didn't smile. He took a step forward, his eyes narrowing behind his spectacles. "Three weeks ago, you couldn't complete a sentence without looking at the floor. Your heart rate sat at a resting ninety beats per minute. You had a chronic tremor in your right hand—a psychosomatic manifestation of extreme anxiety."
He took another step, closing the distance. "Today, you dismantled three mercenaries with the efficiency of a high-end combat automaton. You stared down the Crown Prince of the West without a single micro-expression of fear. And your tremor?" He reached out, grabbing her hand with a grip like a vice.
He held her hand up into the moonlight. It was perfectly still. Solid as the iron she claimed to love.
"Tell me, Priscilla," he whispered, his voice dropping into a dangerous, clinical tone.
"How does a brain rewrite its own amygdala in twenty-one days? How does a girl who never stepped foot in a dojo learn to leverage the weight of a man twice her size? It's neurologically impossible. Personality is a hardwired circuit. You haven't just changed; you've been replaced."
Priscilla didn't pull her hand away. Instead, she tightened her grip on his, matching his strength. "The mind is like any other machine, Brother. If the old gears are stripping, you replace them. If the steam pressure is too low, you reinforce the boiler."
"Don't give me your industrial metaphors," Alistair snapped. He pulled a small, silver-tipped hammer from his pocket—a reflex tool—and swung it toward her face.
Priscilla's head didn't even flinch. Her free hand came up, catching the head of the hammer an inch from her eye. The speed was so fast the air hissed.
"Reflex arc: zero latency," Alistair noted, his voice trembling—not with fear, but with a terrifying, scientific euphoria. "You didn't even blink. That's not a human response. That's a predatory one."
"Maybe the 'Old Priscilla' was just a cocoon, Alistair," she said, her voice dropping to a low, lethal growl. She twisted his wrist just enough to make him let go of the hammer. "Maybe the girl you studied for years was the hallucination, and this is the reality. Or maybe..." She leaned in, her lips inches from his ear. "...you should stop looking for the girl who died and start worrying about the woman who survived."
She shoved him back. Alistair stumbled, his back hitting a shelf of scrolls. He looked at her, his breathing heavy, his mind clearly racing through a thousand medical theories—transmigration, demonic possession, ancient artifact resonance.
"I'm going to find out," Alistair said, straightening his coat. He opened his notebook and began to write, his hand moving with a feverish intensity. "I will map every new synapse in your head. I will find the 'glitch' that made you this way."
"Do what you want, Alistair," Priscilla said, walking toward the exit. She stopped at the door, her silhouette framed by the Gothic arch. "But while you're busy mapping my brain, try to remember that I'm the only one in this family who knows how to build the weapons that will keep us from being erased by the West. Study me all you want. Just don't get in my way."
The door slammed shut, leaving Alistair in the dark.
He looked down at his notes. Under the heading Subject: Priscilla, he had crossed out "Patient" and written a single word in bold, jagged ink:
Anomaly.