by Damian Serbu
Thomas ignored the last question, not wanting to foul his good mood.
“It’s not about Xavier—at least not directly—but it’s serious,” Thomas said.
“What? If not about him, what other common interest could we have?”
“Catherine.”
“Catherine?”
“Xavier’s sister. I’m afraid that she’s in a bit of trouble that only you can solve.” Thomas kept his arms crossed, prepared to argue his case.
“You’re doing it again, trying to put me in the middle. Maybe I want to stay out of more trouble, especially when it comes to rich folks. They don’t like my kind.”
“Please, listen to me. For Xavier’s sake.”
She pondered then smiled. “For him, not for you. You—we can be friends, but you can handle yourself just fine. Now Xavier, I’ve no problem giving him some help.” She sat in a pile of clothes and gazed into the fire. “Well, I’m waiting. I may die before you tell me.”
Thomas sighed. This Anne was an odd one, but he knew she cared about Xavier. He relaxed a bit into his story. “Catherine’s under a spell and totally unaware of it. She’s engaged to an insufferable man, who’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants. He’s even sent men after Michel and Xavier, and I saw him putting something in her drink. She changes around him and becomes giddy and almost blind to reality. I don’t know anything else but that the wine fizzes from the medicine and soon after, she swoons.”
“Yes, yes, I see.” Anne stroked her chin. “And the night you came storming in here and shoved the chicken bones in my face but left without another word, those came from him, too?”
“I believe so. What do you know about this?”
“Only what you’ve told me, but it’s plenty. Very obvious. Voodoo, or some deranged form of it, I’d say. Definitely New World. You don’t see much of that around here, except maybe in this room.” She winked at him. “Oh, yes, he’s in tune with it all right, but sounds manipulative, using evil to get what he wants.”
Thomas waited, but she said nothing further. “Is that it?”
“What do you want me to say? This is no good, nothing positive comes from his kind and interfering is dangerous. The quicker he’s gone, the better. So I’d recommend you get rid of him. Why did you need me to tell you that?”
“I can’t.”
She looked at him, clearly skeptical. “Can’t or won’t?”
“Do I look like I have trouble killing parasites?” he scoffed.
“So what’s different about this time?”
“I know you’ll laugh, but there’s a vampiric ethic I must follow, a protocol that protects us and conceals our identities. So I can pursue Xavier, but I promised to stay away from his family, at least insofar as it concerns interfering with their daily lives.”
Anne laughed again, a deep, guttural cackle. If only Thomas found it this funny. “Now this is too much,” she said. “You’re my introduction to the undead, and what you teach is funny. With all that strength, I expect you to storm around the earth, taking what you want, when and where you want it. Instead, you have some rigid code of ethics. Who would have guessed such a thing? Not even me. First, you’re madly in love with a priest but can’t bring him over. That’s funny enough. But now we’ve a fiend on our hands, yet you can’t do anything about it because of some ethic. And you can’t figure out why I think it’s funny?”
“There’s more. Marcel may have a spell on Xavier and others that would endanger them if I killed him. I can’t be sure and don’t know how to determine it. I need you.”
What would you have me do?”
“Anything to protect her. I care for her. She’s a dear person and doesn’t deserve this evil fate. More than that, it’s Xavier. It would crush him if anything happened to her.”
“Just wait a minute. I’m not sure what I can do. I refuse, absolutely refuse, to get into black magic. There’s enough evil in this world, enough people spreading that vile nonsense, that I’ll not contribute to more pernicious forces haunting us. I never use my knowledge for evil purposes. I simply won’t. There’s enough death and destruction.”
“Surely you can do something positive with regard to this matter?” Thomas pressed. He would have left her if not for wanting this for Xavier.
She was quiet for a while before responding. “Well, maybe.” She avoided his gaze, sat staring at the fire.
“For Xavier.”
Another long silence. Until finally, “I’ll look in on her. I promise nothing else. But give me some time and don’t show up tomorrow night expecting results.”
“Oh, thank you,” Thomas said, hugging her.
“Take your hands off me. I promised nothing. Now get going.”
Thomas kissed her lightly on the cheek. “You’ve no idea how much this means.”
“I think I can guess what it means, and I hope you never ask anything more personal of me or I fear the consequences.” Another hearty chuckle. “You got what you want, now be gone.” She shooed him out the door and into the night air.
The breeze whipped at his coat as he headed back to the Seine and away from this area’s stench. Euphoria swept over him when he saw Xavier standing alone, watching the waves hit the shore. People shouted nearby but out of sight. Quickly, he grabbed Xavier from behind and spun him in the air. The priest’s soft hair whisked across his face.
Xavier shouted in astonishment before Thomas put him down but maintained his hold.
“Thomas, good Lord, you scared me to death. What are you doing? What if someone sees us?”
“Abbé, what if I refuse to let go? What if I decided to steal you away under my arm?”
Xavier closed his eyes and his muscles relaxed. Thomas almost picked him up and fled, going nowhere but out of Paris and away.
Thomas lightly brushed his lips along Xavier’s neckline and let go.
“Can you forgive me?” Thomas asked.
“Every time. I mean yes, I mean—” Xavier suddenly understood what had happened and blushed. He hugged himself and turned back to the river. “Isn’t it beautiful?”
Part V: Storming the Bastille
Thomas: Loving Men
12 July 1789 Night
THEY HAD FIRMLY established their routine by now, and neither wondered whether the other would show up. Thomas and Xavier spent every night together, talking at the Saint-Laurent Salon as they did tonight on the grand porch, or meandering through Paris, as they had the night before. Thomas understood the spirit of revolution better than most of the French because he had seen it in America. As an observer of human society it intrigued him, but as a lover it terrified him. Each night he awoke to news about more rioting or attacks against the clergy, only finding comfort after he saw Xavier alive and well. Tonight, Thomas had feared something different when he met Xavier: exposure, because Xavier had asked him once again as they walked along the Seine last night to visit him during the day. Thomas became quiet when Xavier posed the question again tonight, which apparently unnerved Xavier.
“Never mind,” Xavier said abruptly.
“Tell me why you ask that of me.”
“Maria—do you remember her, the nun? She thinks it’s strange that you come only at night. She believes in ghosts and goblins. Anyway, none of that concerned me, but it did make me wonder if you were telling me everything.”
“What do you want me to say?” Thomas asked tersely.
“Nothing. I’m sorry. Never mind.”
Thomas, angry at himself, paused, clenched his fists, and took a deep breath.
“I’m not angry with you,” Thomas said. He walked to the priest and put one hand on each of Xavier’s shoulders. “I’m not angry. I come whenever I can, trust me. I’ll explain everything as soon as I can.”
“I’m sorry. Don’t hate me. I’m just jealous.”
“Xavier, for God’s sake, now you’re apologizing. I could never hate you.”
“Then may I ask you a question about your safety?”
“
Of course,” he said.
“Your clothing.”
“My clothes?”
“You wear black. Always black. Have you considered that you need to wear the tricolours? Parisians are coming to expect it.”
Thomas laughed despite himself. The revolution hardly frightened him. Besides, these Parisians dressed like bad American flags, with blue, white, and red draped across their bodies.
“Did you forget that I’m an American? I’m the embodiment of everything that they want. All I need to do is reveal my nationality.”
“I didn’t think of that,” Xavier answered, visibly relieved.
”Do you like how I look in black?” Thomas asked to change the subject.
“Yes,” Xavier said and smiled at Thomas.
“You’re cute when you blush.”
“Someone might overhear.”
“Do you think it’s wrong for two men to compliment one another?”
“No. Of course not. You know what I mean.”
“Is it okay if they kiss?” Thomas pressed.
“Stop.”
“Pretend I’m not talking about us. What if it was one of your parishioners?”
“You know already that I hate the church’s condemnations.”
“So is sodomy permissible?”
Xavier fidgeted with his cross and looked around nervously. “I think that all sorts of sexual practices take place, and so long as they don’t harm anyone it’s not a problem. I can’t imagine castigating one of my parishioners because they did something with someone of the same sex, if that’s what you mean. I know that the Church condemns it, but I interpret things differently.”
Thomas sighed. Of course Xavier thought of his flock first. Here, again, was Xavier’s odd dualism. For others, he demanded respect and love. All moral precepts came after and were situationally based. But none of this applied to him as a person.
“What about yourself?” Thomas asked.
“Myself?” Xavier nervously moved farther away from Thomas.
“Yes, yourself. Would you castrate yourself for sexual impulses?”
“You know that we’re celibate,” Xavier said curtly. He scrambled into the house and backed away from Thomas, shaking.
“Relax,” Thomas said once in Xavier’s private room. Xavier always guided them here or to his room at the church when their relationship scared him. “I’m sorry. You’re safe with me.”
“I know.”
Xavier flinched when Thomas put his hand on his shoulder. Thomas felt the tension in his muscles through the black robe. He squeezed gently as Xavier slumped into a chair, then leaned over and kissed the top of Xavier’s head.
“What do you want me to say?” Xavier whispered.
“Only what you want to say.”
“Then you know what I feel?”
“I think so,” Thomas answered.
“I know that my actions betray my real feelings. I never pretended that they didn’t. I love you. I desperately love you. But I made an oath to the church and these people. It can’t be as you wish.” Xavier was crying and shaking, his agony more evident than ever. “Thomas, it’s not you. Forgive me for leading you to this. But I do love you.”
Xavier collapsed into Thomas’s arms and buried his hands in his black coat. He clutched at Thomas, drawing him near. Thomas held him tightly without saying a word with tears of blood running down his cheeks. When Xavier went limp, Thomas wiped hurriedly at his face, then looked into Xavier’s eyes. He wanted to say a million things and a thousand arguments waited for release, but he knew their futility.
Instead, he held Xavier’s face tightly and leaned forward as Xavier trembled in his arms, closing his eyes as Thomas’s face came closer and closer. Gently, Thomas kissed Xavier’s eyelids, the right and then the left. He moved his mouth across Xavier’s nose, pecked the tip of it, and lightly brushed their lips together, not a full, passionate kiss, but enough to make his point. Then he let go with his heart in complete turmoil.
Xavier swayed back and forth.
“Get some rest,” Thomas said. “I’ll return tomorrow and you’ll dictate the terms of our conversation and interaction. I promised from the beginning to respect what you needed.”
Thomas glanced into those pleading eyes. Xavier finally shook his head and smiled weakly.
“Good night, Thomas,” he said.
“Good night, my abbé.”
As he reached the door, he turned and saw Xavier leaning over the back of a chair, watching him heave like a distressed lover. Yet, even in this saddest of moments, Thomas swooned at Xavier’s beauty, perhaps even more so in his sorrow.
“I love you, too,” Thomas said.
Thomas: Anthony the Spy
12 July 1789
THOMAS CLOSED XAVIER’S door and raced outside the salon after telling Xavier he loved him and leaned against the stone wall—no, he fell into it, unable to support himself or think clearly. His head drooped to his chest and he grabbed at his hair. So this was love. This is what it meant to cherish someone desperately. This was the pounding people described in their hearts.
He knew now that infatuation had blossomed into a pure love. True, passion remained and sexual longing blinded him, but if he could suffer through this twisted courtship, then he really loved the priest. Anyone else, in any other situation, would have garnered Thomas’s scorn, especially if the other man’s expectations differed so drastically from his. With Xavier, it only revealed the passion for humanity that so endeared him to Thomas. Blood flowed anew from Thomas’s eyes, onto his shirt and all over his hands as he wept.
In his mourning, he didn’t see the person who approached. By the time he reacted, Anthony’s fragrance practically surrounded him and when his friend pulled him away from the wall and into his arms, Thomas yielded completely.
They walked silently back to Thomas’s flat. Once there, they sat opposite each other. The tears had stopped and Thomas felt stronger, more himself, though confused. His feelings were knotted. He truly was not angry, yet a pit in his stomach ached with dread even as his determination to overcome the obstacles increased despite the frustration that it took so long. Then why the tears?
Thomas remembered when he twirled Xavier in the air near the Seine, when he had wanted to capture the priest and run. The abbé’s beautiful smile burned into his mind. Then he flashed back to Xavier in the chair earlier that night, his eyes closed and his body yielding.
As he reveled in this anguish, he suddenly realized that Anthony had watched, concealed in the room. It irritated Thomas. It was impossible that Anthony happened by chance upon him, which meant that Anthony had peered from the darkness during this most private moment with Xavier.
“You spied on me,” Thomas accused him, voice rising in anger.
“Your incessant temper won’t help anything.”
“You came to Paris to help me, not lurk in the shadows.”
“And was I to assume that you told me everything? Was I to trust that your emotions, clouded with love, revealed all that I needed to know? You still lose control of your anger, we both know that. I wanted to see Xavier with you, and you with him.”
“So you spied.” Thomas lowered his gaze, sullen.
“Yes. I concealed myself in the salon. How was I to know what was about to occur? I assumed that I’d merely see one of the many nights that you described to me.”
Point taken. But still, Thomas remained irritated about Anthony’s actions.
“Are you done brooding?” Anthony asked after a few more minutes of silence.
“You should’ve warned me.”
“I didn’t. I apologize. But I can’t help you if I don’t know. Now can we forget this?”
“You won’t do it again?” Thomas asked.
“If you want my assistance, then accept unconditional terms. Besides, if you can move beyond being offended, you’ll appreciate what I have to say.”
“Well, tell me.”
“First, you’ve described the situat
ion to me accurately, remarkably so. I’d feared that you were blinded by your passion for Xavier. But it’s obvious that he loves you.”
“Then you see it. You know that it’s true, our love?”
“Calm down. I said that I know you love each other. But there are other considerations because I also know that you stop thinking at that point. Let me finish. I was also pleasantly surprised, and again shocked, that you didn’t try to force the issue. You’re amazingly patient with him. In anything else you’d force the situation.”
“But?” Thomas asked testily.
“But you think that these things guarantee success, and they don’t.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You need acceptance, of one’s self and the situation around him.”
Thomas fought to control himself. Since the day he met Xavier, he worked diligently to acknowledge reality and stay patient, waiting for Xavier. Anthony even said that he was doing an admirable job, yet he badgered him about acceptance.
He launched out of the chair and paced in front of the window. Paris at night, such a perfect setting for this complete wretchedness. It was damp and misty. Darkness consumed everything. Even the lanterns were lost in fog. Yet underneath lay an indescribable beauty. He loved cities, with their tall buildings and masses of humanity, the constant energy and persistent bustle of activity. A perfect analogy for the potential for love buried beneath a miserable façade.
He rapped his hand against the window, his torment mounting. Finally, at the bursting point, he smashed his fist into a table. It shattered. The top broke into a million fragments that flew across the room, its lamp burst into pieces as the oil leaked everywhere. More maddening, Anthony sat motionless and ever more composed.
“Acceptance?” he bellowed. “Patience? Everything you tell me, everything that these damned rules dictate, relates to controlling me, for me to understand the reality of being a vampire. It’s all about the collective good of vampires and humans. What about me?” Thomas pounded his chest. “What about me? What about my suffering?” He glared at Anthony. “Fuck society. You and all of these rules can go to hell. Look at what the constraints have done to Xavier. He’s the most delicate man I’ve ever known, but he suffers because the things that he feels inside are forbidden by society, the church, the government, by everyone. And why? For nothing, that’s why. There’s nothing that men loving men harms. There’s nothing that vampires threaten! Yet all these men who seek to control and to expand forevermore their grip on people refuse to act rationally and instead proclaim inspiration from God, that somehow they know more about faith and truth than everyone else. This is preposterous, yet it’s poisoning my existence and stifles my love. And what advice do I get? Be patient, be calm, wait for things to change.”