Free The Blood Line by Ben Yallop

couldn’t quite touch. Sometimes it would come to the surface. I could stare hard at the back of someone’s head and they would turn round. Like they could feel me there. Nothing big, just lots of little things. I never spoke about it because it made me sound weird, but you have this power too so I don’t feel strange to tell you.’
    Sam nodded. ‘I felt similar things.’
    ‘Well, I never paid it much attention. Then one day I was underground, as I said, working on the Circle Line. I sensed somebody there. I thought it was a ghost. I had thought I had felt ghosts before. But then suddenly I found myself pushed through a black doorway. I lost consciousness. I don’t remember much but I understand now that I was abducted. I was brought here to work as a slave. Before long I found that these Riven were controlling me with their minds, forcing me into the mines which run under the Complex looking for a kind of crystal which the King craves. Only, I was not as easily controlled as the others. I think this presence was able to help me resist a little and over time I was able to push back. Eventually, I broke it. I think that is when the King became aware of me. I was taken from the mine and brought into the sunlight for the first time in a long time. That’s when the King approached me. I think he was curious as to how I had broken the control. But it was just a game to him. I did not know who he was. How could I? Even those few who were around me when he spoke to me did not know him. The other slaves had never seen him. He offered me the chance to get into the throne room to see the king. I thought I might get the chance to attack him. But when I got there it was him sitting in the throne. He laughed and laughed. He thought he had played this great joke. He had a whirlwind of this crystal that I had been mining and…’
    Aleksy took a breath.
    ‘…and he used it like flying knives. It ripped through me.’
    ‘How did you survive?’ asked Sam softly
    ‘Because of this,’ Aleksy turned his head and put a finger on a lump of scar tissue at the back of his head. ‘The King tried to destroy me but a piece of his crystal became stuck in my skull. I think this is what has fully opened the powers I felt as a child.’
    Aleksy was quiet for a moment. Sam looked at the lump. There wasn’t much to see, although he fancied he could see the tiniest glimmer of crystal. Aleksy turned back.
    ‘Many cultures have regarded crystals as having mystical properties, particularly with healing. It seems there was some truth in it although I think this crystal is perhaps unique to this place and perhaps not even of this world. Anyway, the Riven, they thought I was dead. I may even have been dead for a while. I do not remember leaving that room. But I awoke on a pile of garbage where they had thrown my torn body. I was in so much pain for the longest time. I crawled away. Hid inside the walls of the Complex, only coming out in my misery to steal food. Over time my wounds healed, more quickly than usual I think, and I began to live again. I moved around the Complex unseen. Sometimes I was even able to walk around as if I were one of the Riven, clad in black. They never suspected who I was. I even found a place inside the walls to spy on the King himself. I have learnt much about what that maniac plans.’
    ‘And Aleksy,’ said Sam ‘Will you tell me what he plans? I know people who are trying to hold the resistance against him. If I can find them again whatever you can tell me might be useful.’
    ‘Okay. I’ll tell you what I know of the Riven King. You are the first person I have been able to speak to in a very long time. I do not want the knowledge I have gained to be for nothing. I want to stop Allende. I hate him. If you know someone who can end this evil then I will help. Some of what I know I learnt in the mines but some I have picked up by watching him in the throne room. Sometimes he talks to himself. Sometimes he talks to