VROLOK

by Nolene-Patricia Dougan

  Isabella climbed the stairs that led to the top of the house. His bedroom occupied the top floor of the house. Inside his room was a chest of clothes. Isabella opened it. It was filled with fine garments made from assortment of delicate expensive fabrics. These clothes were a bit too grand for this man, Isabella thought. The man himself was handsome and young, and she could tell by the way he carried himself that he was proud and confident. He obviously thought a lot of himself. Isabella rummaged through the chest to see if she could find anything of any value.

  A box was wedged in the bottom. She took it out and looked at the contents inside. It was filled with jewellery, expensive trinkets and gold pieces. Some of the jewellery was inscribed with phrases like always yours, forever mine and they were not all from the same woman.

  There was some water and a wash basin on a bedside table. Isabella decided to clean herself. She wanted to wash away the grime that covered her true beauty. She was a little nervous; she wondered if she had changed, had aged. She could see that her long hair was still the same raven colour it had always been. After she had washed she felt the skin on her face to check that it was still smooth and supple. She was relieved to feel that nothing had changed; she could not feel any lines around her eyes, no indentations that were not there before. As far as she could tell by touch she was still as beautiful as she ever was.

  Isabella, during her life, had never been too concerned with her outward appearance, but now that she was a Vampire it had become increasingly important to her. It was the only thing that had not been marred by the experiences of the previous years and it was the one thing that she still possessed and that she now valued above all others.

  The sun was starting to stream in through the open window where Isabella was sitting. She was tired so she opened her own chest, climbed in, and went to sleep. She was awakened that night by the heavy, scattered footsteps of an inebriated man climbing up the stairs to the door of the outside entrance. It was the young man returning to what he thought was still his home.

  Isabella opened her resting place and stepped out of it quietly. She waited for the arrogant youth to make his way up to his bedroom.

  He entered the room and staggered towards his bed and threw himself on top of it face down. He turned his face to the side and caught his first glimpse of Isabella. She was sitting on her chest in the corner of the room, smiling. Needless to say he did not return her smile; instead he leaped off the bed and started shouting at her. Isabella did not catch all of what he was saying, for his speech was slurred and broken, but she knew he was angry at seeing her in his home. A woman, although beautiful, who was dressed in rags was not to his taste.

  Isabella, using the Italian she knew, looked him straight in the eyes. “You are going to die. You can make your death the most pleasurable experience of your life or the most painful; you choose.”

  He became enraged; Isabella knew he was screaming profanities at her, but she did not appreciate such vulgarity. Isabella drew out her approach, languorously lingering on every step. When her advance was complete Isabella lashed out with her arm and clasped his neck with her hand. She pushed his body down so that he was on his knees; she pulled him in close to her so that she could feel his heart beating.

  Isabella began to whisper in his ear. “You didn’t make the right choice.”

  She saw that the young man now was very nervous; his heartbeat had quickened. His nervousness was turning rapidly into fear. He could now feel how strong this woman was. Isabella let go of him and he just managed to remain standing. He threw out his fist to defend himself, but Isabella quickly grabbed his clenched fist with her own hand before he could strike her face. She twisted back his arm until it snapped and her latest victim fell to the floor writhing in agony. The fractured bone of his arm had forced its way through his skin. Isabella noticed he had another wound which she had not inflicted but thought nothing of it at the time. He started to scream for help; it was a loud shrill scream that painfully resonated through Isabella’s head. She placed her foot on his broken arm and softly said, “Be quiet!”

  He continued to scream.

  Isabella now shouted at the top of her voice and the whole room shook, “Be quiet!”

  This terrified him and his screams quickly softened to muffled whimpers.

  “That’s better!” said Isabella. “Does anyone live here with you?” she asked.

  “My servant.”

  “Oh, yes, I have a message from her. She says with great regret she has left your employ.”

  “My wife,” he answered, trying to think quickly.

  “Don’t lie to me. Where are her clothes?”

  The man panicked. “If I tell you the truth, will you let me go?”

  Isabella smiled and shook her head. “I am not going to mislead you. My grandfather taught me never to lie. You will die tonight, but if you tell me the truth I will take away your pain.”

  The man spat at Isabella and cursed her. Isabella slammed her foot down on his leg, breaking that limb as well.

  “You’ll be damned for what you have done to me!” he said, struggling to get free.

  Isabella leaned in and whispered to him, “Too late, I already am….” She lifted the man off the ground by his clothes and held him in front of her. He dangled in her grasp, scratching at the floor with the tips of his toes trying frantically to find his footing. “Apart from your servant, does anyone else live here?” she asked again.

  “No!” screamed the man.

  “I told you to lower your voice,” Isabella uttered through clenched teeth. The young man now understood he was going to die and burst out with one last attempt to save his own life.

  “You are a beautiful woman. I can introduce you into Florentine society. With my help you could accrue great wealth.”

  “I have no desire to have great wealth; at this moment all I want is this house, but I am happy to know that I am still beautiful. Thank you for that.” And with this she hurled the young man up against the wall. This action bashed his skull open and he fell to the floor, never to awaken.

  Isabella opened the window and looked outside; she wanted to look at her new view. It was dark so Isabella could see perfectly. She heard a noise and her attention was drawn to the steps leading up to the door of Isabella’s new home.

  A woman was climbing these steps. She was trying to be quiet and hide in the shadows, and her actions would have been hidden from everyone but Isabella. The woman opened the door and entered the house. She crept towards the young man’s bedroom; clearly she was concealing something in between the pleats of her skirt. This young woman intrigued Isabella and she stayed silent and let her come in.

  The young man’s bed was unmade and, to a human eye in this darkness it looked as if someone was still sleeping in it. The woman uncovered the object that she was concealing, a knife. She started to stab at the bed with every inch of her might. She soon realised that there was nothing on the bed but scattered sheets. She dropped the knife to her side and slumped on to the bed banging down her hand and sighing in exasperation.

  “If you wanted him dead, I have done it for you,” Isabella said making her presence known. The woman was startled by the voice from the darkness and jumped up onto her feet. She started to blindly look around for Isabella, holding the knife in front of her, trying frantically to make an attempt at defending herself.

  Isabella stepped into the moonlight that was streaming in through the window so that she could be seen by the girl.

  “Who are you?” the anxious girl asked.

  “Who are you?” retorted Isabella.

  “This is my sister’s home.”

  “You are mistaken. This is my home.” Isabella said firmly.

  “Your home,”

  “Yes.”

  “Can I light a candle so that I can see you more clearly?”

  Isabella nodded. She wanted to see her reaction to the dead body.

  When she lit the candle and saw him lying bloodied on the fl
oor she did not flinch. “Did he suffer?” she asked.

  Isabella smiled and said, “He did.”

  “Good,” replied the woman.

  Isabella smiled again. She liked this girl.

  “What did he do to you?” she asked Isabella.

  “He overstayed his welcome,” Isabella answered.

  “I can’t believe this is your house,” the girl swore and spat on the corpse.

  “Why did you want him dead? What did he do to you?” Isabella inquired.

  “It is not only what he did to me. He shamed my sister and drove her to suicide.” There was a loud noise that came from outside. The girl jumped in fright. “We have to get rid of the body.”

  Isabella too wanted to get rid of it. The two women wrapped up the body and started to carry him down the stairs. Isabella only helped a little. If truth be known she could have easily carried the body herself, but she did not want to give all her secrets away to her fellow conspirator; at least not yet.

  They walked to the river. No one was on the streets this early in the morning so no one saw them. Isabella was imperturbable, for she had killed many times before, but the girl she was helping was frightened for her life. Isabella would have simply killed any one who came across the two women. But the slightest sound was making the girl jump in fright. They reached the river after a little while and pushed the body under the water.

  “He’ll rise in a few days but it will give us time to get out of here,” said the girl nervously.

  “I have no intention of leaving,” said Isabella. “I’ll weigh him down with something.” Isabella dived in after the body and dragged it two the middle of the river. In the darkness of the river Isabella’s sight was nearly perfect. She could see that the riverbed was like quicksand. She slit his stomach open with her nails so that the body would fill with water and could not easily float back up to the surface. She pushed the body down with her feet and the riverbed encapsulated him. It would be months before he surfaced, if he ever did.

  Isabella emerged from the water to see the girl smile at her. Still a nervous sort of a smile, but a smile nevertheless.

  “I’m glad to see you are all right.”

  “You are?” Isabella answered.

  “Of course!”

  Isabella was quite touched that this stranger was glad to see her alive. No one had felt any compassion towards her in such a long time, but then she reminded herself that this young woman did not know the sort of creature Isabella really was.

  “We have to leave Florence,” said Isabella’s companion, still nervous and agitated.

  “Why?” Isabella asked.

  “Because we have killed a Medici.”

  “A Medici?”

  “Yes, and we have to go.”

  “Not yet,” said Isabella. “Come back with me to the house.” The girl did not want to go but Isabella’s will was her bidding and she didn’t know or realise why.

  The two women entered the house as the dawn of the next day was breaking and sunlight started to stream in through the windows. Isabella closed the shutters and sat down on the bed. She was curious about this woman. Isabella wanted to know more about the man who was dead and why he had inspired so much enmity.

  “Sit down,” Isabella said. The girl reluctantly sat. “You said he was a Medici, What did you mean?”

  “The Medici family rules Florence. He was Alessandro de Medici’s bastard son.”

  “Surely they would not care anything for him,” Isabella said.

  “Heaven knows who or what they would care for. Alessandro, like his worthless son, was a tyrant. Alessandro was killed before he was thirty, but he was duke at the time. The man who killed Alessandro, even though he was praised for his actions and was a Medici himself, was eventually hunted down and slaughtered like an animal.”

  “I don’t think anyone cared for this man, not really,” Isabella interrupted her.

  “You obviously are not from Florence; you know nothing of what you speak….” The woman looked into the distance; she was remembering something. Isabella was curious as to what. Isabella gave her a drink to steady her nerves and as she did so she brushed her hand to see the memory that was running through her mind.

  It was a story her grandfather used to tell her when she younger. He was a child when it happened. He was playing, not bothering anyone, just a child whiling the hours in playful innocence. His activities were suddenly interrupted by shouts and cries about murder and conspiracy. He heard the names Pazzi and Medici ringing through the air. His mother grabbed his hand and held it tight. People rushed into the Piazza from all sides. He was now completely surrounded by the suffocating crowd. When he looked up all he could see where the heads of the people that surrounded him. The sky was now completely hidden from the child; it had been totally obscured by the crushing crowd that engulfed him. He was getting jostled and he tried to pull away from his mother, but her hand remained tightly clasped around his own as if to let to go was to lose him forever.

  The child began to cry. He wanted away from all these people. He wanted to be out into the open air; he could hardly breathe in this tiny claustrophobic space that he had been pushed into. He let go of his mother’s hand and without his assistance she could not hold onto him any longer.

  The boy headed through the crowd towards the front. His mother tried to frantically grab him back stretching out her hand, grasping for him, but he was too far away. The child made it out of the crowd; he was relieved he could breathe the fresh air again. He took a deep breath. The cool fresh air caressed his face. A cool droplet of liquid struck his forehead. The child thought it was starting to rain. He closed his eyes and looked up, his mouth open, waiting for the rain to cover and refresh him. But whatever was raining down on him, tasted strange and it was not cool and refreshing as rain was.

  The child opened his eyes and realised to his horror that it was blood that was pouring into his open mouth. He looked up to see dead eyes staring down at him. This was a memory that he would never forget. He ran back to his mother, who carried him away.

  These men had been tortured and killed and their only crime was they had witnessed the assassination of Giovanni Medici and their last name was Pazzi. The crowd was cheering as these men were dying. They were enjoying watching these men in their death throes. They killed hundreds that day in retribution for just one man’s death.

  “I think that they would care that Giulio had been killed. He is still one of them,” the woman answered.

  “If you know this, why did you take such a risk?” Isabella now understood why this woman was so afraid because she had been involved in the death of a Medici. It seemed in this city that this was the worst crime anyone could commit.

  “It’s a long story.”

  “We have time,” Isabella answered.

  “No, we don’t.”

  “You’re too tired to go anywhere; I guarantee you will be safe with me,” Isabella answered.

  For some reason that was not yet apparent to the girl, she believed that she would be safe with Isabella. She settled down into a chair and started to recite her story.

  “I haven’t even told you my name,” she began. “It’s Lia Filarete. I met Guilio a year ago; my sister introduced him to me. He was introduced as my sister’s fiancé. I knew from the start that he was not the man she thought him to be. Everyone in our family did but my sister. She looked at him with nothing but love and adoration. In her eyes he could do no wrong. We tried to convince her that she should not esteem him so highly, but she did not listen, she would not listen.

  “We came from a family of painters. My father had no sons and he wanted to pass on his legacy to his daughters, so he taught us to paint. We both were quite good and had inherited my father’s talent. He, as you can see by his efforts, was not good at all. I always wondered why he was so attracted, or at least pretended to be attracted, to my sister. She had no money and I suspected he was the type to only like insecure woman with money. My sister wa
s neither of these. My sister used to give him presents of portraits we both had done. One day I saw him in the market; he was passing our sketches off as his own. I went straight home and told my sister and our father. My father told my sister never to see him again, that he was taking us all for fools. My sister said she wouldn’t, but I knew she would. She loved him too much to just end the relationship at my father’s request. However, my father’s health was declining rapidly and this extra worry was making him worse.

  “I knew I had to do something because if my father found out that his daughter had not only lied to him but was continually deceiving him every day, the shock would kill him. I thought I could give Guilio money to leave my sister alone or promise to paint him a picture every once in awhile for him to sell. So I made up my mind to visit him. I banged on the door but no one answered. I heard voices inside and the door was open so I went in and climbed the stairs.

  “He must have heard me. He opened the door to his bedroom and leered at me. I started to get nervous. Something wasn’t right; this man was worse than I had even realised. There was another man in his bedroom with him, a bigger, stronger-looking man. He was drunk. Guilio was completely sober, completely lucid. He knew what he was doing. He called to his friend that the entertainment had arrived. I tried to turn and run but it was too late.

  “Both men started to chase after me. I tripped at the bottom of the stairs and the pair dragged me back up to the bedroom. My sister arrived ten minutes later but her fiancé had already raped me. She had thankfully arrived in just enough time before the other man had a chance to.” As Lia spoke the words, a single tear rolled down her cheek. She stopped a moment and then continued.

  “My sister had heard a ruckus from outside and had grabbed a knife from the kitchen on her way up to the bedroom. Not in her worst imaginings could she have envisioned what was going on upstairs. When she came into the bedroom she was horrified by what she saw. Not only had her sister been attacked, but also the man she loved and trusted had been responsible for it.