Eden

by Eden (lit)

  “Because I’m a werewolf?”

  “No. Because you’re a werewolf … and he’s the master of the city.”

  Catrina held her breath waiting for his reaction. She expected him to erupt at any moment, but he didn’t. In fact, after a minute he began to laugh.

  “You’re dating Viktor Van Helsing?” he asked, still laughing.

  “Yes.”

  “Well,” he said with a smile, “we all make mistakes.”

  While she finished her coffee and doughnut, Alexander informed her that he saw no reason they could not be friends.

  “I like you,” he said, flashing her that winning smile again. “You’re intelligent and you’re beautiful. That’s a rare combination.”

  “Is that a line?” she teased.

  “That’s the truth.”

  “That was a line.”

  “Maybe,” he admitted.

  A short while later Catrina glanced at the clock above the door and said, “I’m afraid our time is up.”

  “You sound like my therapist.” He laughed at the look she gave him and said, “I’m just kidding. I’m not in therapy.”

  “Well,” she said, sliding back into her jacket, “I’m not sure if that’s a comfort or not.”

  While he drove her home, Catrina learned that Alexander was also a scholar. He had a degree in philosophy and theatre. “Which qualifies me to quote Shakespeare at random and work at most any fast food restaurant,” he said.

  She smiled at his comment, but Alexander caught on to the distant look in her eyes.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “I was just thinking that you and Viktor have a very similar sense of humor.”

  “I assure you, that’s where the similarities end.”

  When they pulled back onto the narrow street in front of her apartment Catrina noticed that the werewolf they had left lying in the alley was gone. She assumed that’s what Max had been instructed to pick up. Alexander opened her door and handed her a business card.

  “What’s this?” she asked.

  “The university where I teach theatre. Stop by my class sometime, you might enjoy it.”

  He waited until she was safely upstairs and waving to him out the window before driving away. While she walked toward the bedroom Catrina examined the card more closely. It read, “Dr. Alexander Anderson, Ph.D.” On the opposite side was the address to Eden University as well as his office number and extension.

  “What am I doing?” she asked herself again as she placed the card on the dresser.

  Catrina undressed quickly and crawled into bed. She needed to get at least a few more hours sleep before visiting Father Marion to have her blades cleansed. She closed her eyes tight and tried hard. But no matter how much her body ached or how hard she tried, she couldn’t push them from her mind. One minute she saw the vampire, reaching out to her in all of his tall dark glory, the next she saw the werewolf smiling at her kindly over a cup of coffee.

  “What the fuck am I doing?” she asked herself again.

  After about an hour she gave up and started looking for something to wear downtown. She pulled on a pair of faded old jeans and a comfortable blue sweater. Not only were they comfortable, but they both went well with her boots. Catrina had become accustomed to the heavy boots. Though they weren’t entirely unfashionable, they were mostly a necessity more than a fashion statement. She had started selecting her footwear more for the weight than the style while learning the French art of Savate. In order to get the maximum effect of the high-flying kicks, the weight of the boots really packed a punch. Not that she planned on starting a fight with the priest.

  She took a moment to put on a little makeup, having washed off all she was wearing in the tub with Viktor the night before. Then it occurred to her that she had gone with Alexander for coffee without makeup. It’s not like she was hideous or anything, Catrina didn’t have a bad complexion. She just couldn’t believe that a detail like that had escaped her notice before. Obviously, Alexander didn’t mind. Especially not since he wanted to see her again.

  “As friends,” she reminded herself mentally. “Maybe, but he still wanted to see me again.”

  She tried not to focus too hard on how Alexander’s jeans had fit the curve of his ass, or how great Viktor looked naked while packing up her blades. It took her a few minutes to gather up what she needed before placing the duffle bag full of blessed blades on the back of her Harley.

  Catrina rubbed the side of the gas tank as she pulled into the lift, making a promise to her bike that she would have the scratches repaired next week.

  * * * *

  Her first impression of Father Marion had been that he was not very “priestly.” As she drove up to the old cathedral she found him working in the garden, tending his garlic. Father Marion was nearly as tall as Viktor and just as darkly attractive in his own way. He looked to be in his early fifties, though still very much full of life. His long black robes flapped in the cool breeze as he walked forward to greet her.

  “My child,” he said.

  His voice was smooth and deep and as always she couldn’t help but think he would have made a very good vampire. It was a strange thought to have about a priest, but the same one that always crossed her mind when she saw him.

  “To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, his thick Irish accent becoming more evident as he spoke.

  “I need my blades cleansed,” she explained.

  But there was no need for explanation. Marion was used to the routine. He stepped through the gate and reached for her duffle bag.

  “I hope you don’t mind,” she said. “I brought almost all of them.”

  He raised an eyebrow before throwing the bag over his shoulder.

  “Been keeping busy, I see.”

  “You don’t even want to go there,” she said with a laugh.

  “Something tells me you’ll be needing confession,” he teased.

  Catrina stepped forward and opened the door for him as she replied, “I could tell you things that would make you renounce your vows.”

  “Really?” He smiled. “Which ones?”

  “Yes,” she thought, at his purely carnal smile. “Not very priestly at all.”

  She had known Father Marion for the last six years. As a matter of fact, it was he who had convinced her to take up monster hunting. She was following someone downtown, watching them to see if they were working deals behind their boss’s back. She ended up face to face with a vampire in the alley behind the cathedral.

  To her surprise, the priest had come to her rescue. He had been very impressed with the way she had managed to hold her own, but suggested that she needed different weapons. Their relationship had progressed from there. Marion was very much her friend, more so than anyone else she knew. Maybe it was the robes that made her feel safe in telling him her secrets. Or maybe it was because he didn’t try to hide the fact that he wasn’t perfect.

  “There’s still a lot about me you don’t know,” he said as he began to lay out her weapons across the table.

  Catrina walked over and sat down on the end of the table rather than in the chair.

  “I know you’re more than just a priest. I keep hoping that one day you’ll tell me the rest.”

  “Perhaps,” he answered thoughtfully. “Be a sweetheart and go get me that bucket of rain water, will you?”

  He pointed back through the open door into the garden. When Catrina returned with the water, he had placed a large silver basin beside the table. He emptied the water, along with a few more buckets from around the room, into the container. Next, he crossed himself and began the process of cleansing her blades. She’d watched him do this dozens of times before, but never tired of hearing him pray. No matter what Father Marion may or may not have been his belief in God was undeniable when he prayed. Catrina felt refreshed and empowered by his words.

  She watched quietly as he dipped each blade into the water, all the while continuing to pr
ay over them. When he was finished and had started to wipe down and oil her blades she approached him again and placed her hand on his arm.

  “Jacob,” she said softly.

  Though they had long since dispatched with formalities, she rarely called him by his first name. Since they were friends, their relationship was much different than that of priest and parishioner. He put down the blade he was holding and held Catrina instead.

  “You haven’t had that tone to your voice since you first told me about your sister,” he said softly, stroking her hair.

  Catrina took a deep breath and buried her face against his chest.

  “No one has held me since I was a child and now you’re the second one to reach out to me in the past two days.”

  “The second?”

  She looked up into his blue eyes and said, “There’s something I want you to know about me before you hear it anywhere else. I can’t imagine what you’ll think of me once I’ve said it and I can’t tell you all of the reasons why--”

  “I’m your friend,” he said, cutting her off, “not your judge.”

  She pulled back from him and blurted out, “I’m dating the master of the city. It’s a cover story mostly but I can’t tell you why.”

  “Mostly?” he asked. Father Marion propped against the table and ran a hand through his dark chin length hair. “Is this about one of your confounded agreements?”

  “Yes. I can’t tell you all of the details … but I didn’t want you to see me with him and think that …”

  “That you’re havin’ feelings for a monster?” he asked softly. When she didn’t answer he asked, “Are you havin’ feelings for a monster?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But I can tell you that he’s not a monster to me.”

  Jacob smiled sadly. “The fact that you don’t know means that you are feeling something. You’re just not sure what it is yet. I don’t know what you want me to say,” he admitted. “I’ll never turn my back on you. I’m not here to condemn you, I’m here to help you. But I’m thinking there’s nothing I can do in this situation.”

  “You can listen.”

  And for the next hour that’s what he did. Though it was far from a traditional confession, Catrina did feel better after talking to him. By the time she was finished, Father Marion had led her into his quarters at the back of the cathedral and made them both a cup of tea. As soon as she stopped speaking he stood up and began to close the windows. She watched as he checked to be sure the doors were locked.

  “Jacob?” she said nervously. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m about to tell you something,” he said. “Something that goes no further, understand?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  He sat back down across from her as he said, “I’m not what you think I am.”

  “You’re not a priest?” she asked.

  “Yes, but not as defined by the traditional laws of the church.”

  “What are you trying to say, Jacob? As long as we’ve known each other and as much as you know about me I think it’s safe to say that I’m trustworthy.”

  “You’re right,” he said, with a sigh. “You’ve been a good friend to me and you deserve to know the truth.” He leaned forward and took her hand. “As you know, I came here from Ireland. But what you don’t know is why I left. I was once a weapon of the church, commissioned by The Vatican to seek out and destroy all those thought to be unholy. The undead,” he said to clarify.

  “You were a vampire hunter,” she said breathlessly. “I admit I had suspected something along those lines.”

  “I was more than that,” he said. “I was the top vampire hunter. I was the one that masters warned their followers against. The one who struck fear into their immortal hearts.”

  “The Vindicator,” she gasped.

  Father Marion sat back again and ran a hand through his hair.

  “I haven’t been called by that name in a long time.”

  They were both silent for a moment before Catrina reached over and took his hand back.

  “But, that doesn’t change who you are,” she insisted. “You’re the one who managed to reach my sister when no one else could. You helped me to become who I am. I’ve never known anyone to show more compassion to people than you do. If that doesn’t qualify you as a man of God, then I don’t know what does.”

  “I’ve developed an allergy to the garlic,” he said softly. Jacob withdrew his hand from her grip and rolled up his sleeve. She walked around the table to get a better look. Small red whelps ran up his forearm.

  “That doesn’t mean anything,” she said firmly.

  “Perhaps not. But what I’m about to tell you does.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Sit down, Catrina,” he said softly.

  “But I don’t--”

  “You’ll need to be sitting down to hear what I have to say.”

  She sat back down and waited for him to continue. Though they had been close over the years, she had never seen him like this before. Jacob had always been a bit secretive, and she’d always teased him about it. She had never expected him to confess his past to her.

  “There’s a reason I left Ireland,” he said finally. “I had been called in on a job. It was the middle of the night and I was fast asleep. I was given directions where to locate the vampire and was told not to ask questions, not that I ever did. I found her in a village, not far from where I grew up. She was in the pub. No one was there, it was a Sunday night … the place was closed. I’m not sure why she was there or where she’d come from, but she was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. I was used to dealing with monsters. Most of them were distasteful to say the least. No matter how hard I tried I could not find anything distasteful about this woman. She had long dark hair, about the length of yours but smooth and straight. And her eyes … they were dark and seemed to be looking right into my soul.”

  He paused for several minutes and Catrina was unsure of how to react.

  “You don’t have to tell me this,” she said softly. “It won’t change how I see you. The past is gone, as you used to tell me. We cannot change what has already happened.”

  “And that’s why someone needs to know,” he said. “Please, hear me out.” He took a sip of his now cold tea before continuing. “She beguiled me. Before I knew it I was under her spell. She made me drink her blood.” Catrina gasped. “Then she sank her teeth into my wrist. The pain was enough to break her spell, but the damage had been done.”

  “But you’re not …”

  “No. I’m not. That was over twenty years ago.”

  “How did you keep from turning?” she asked.

  “First, I killed her and ran from the pub. I went straight back to my room and drank all the holy water I could find. Then I spread myself out naked on the ground as the sun came up.”

  “Were you trying to kill yourself?” she asked incredulously.

  “I was trying to cleanse myself,” he corrected.

  “What happened?”

  “It hurt,” he answered simply. “For a while I thought I had died. But … somehow I still lived. I was different after that. I figured it was only a matter of time before someone found me out, so I left. I ran out in the middle of the night and ended up here.”

  “Why are you telling me this now?” she asked.

  “Because ever since that night I have drank a pint of holy water a day. I let the first light of dawn touch my face each morning and wonder if I’m going to burst into flames …”

  “And?”

  “And this morning … I did.”

  “Jacob,” she gasped.

  “It was only for a moment, and not enough to do serious damage,” he assured her. “And it has already healed.”

  “Do you mean to tell me that you’re--”

  “Becoming a vampire,” he finished. “I’m afraid so. Look, I’m not just telling you this because I needed to tell someone. I’m telling you because you’re my friend. I want you to k
now that when I change … you can still count on me. If there’s one person in this world I wouldn’t expect to be driving a stake through my heart, it’s you.” He squeezed her hand again as he said, “What I’m trying to tell you is that I’m truly in no position to judge. All the rules that I used to think were hard and fast have changed. The lines have blurred. But more than anything, I believe that our choices determine whether or not we are monsters … not what’s in our blood.”

  “How long do you think you have?” she asked, still not really believing what she had heard.

  “I don’t know. But like you said, I wanted you to hear it from me before you heard it from someone else.”

  She was torn between laughing and crying and ended up doing a little of both.

  “I’m sorry,” Jacob said. He walked around the table and knelt down, putting his arm around her shoulders. “I know you came to me for comfort. I’m sorry that I don’t have much to offer these days.”

  “It’s the strangest thing,” she said. “I’ve always thought you would have made a good vampire.”

  To her surprise he laughed as he rose back to his feet.

  “Well, that’s a heck of a thing to be thinking and not telling anybody. Have you really thought this the whole time we’ve been knowing each other?”

  Catrina wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve as she answered, “Yes. Actually, that first night when you showed up in the alley, I thought you were a vampire.”

  Jacob was in the middle of refilling the tea kettle when she spoke and her words made him pause.

  “I thought the changes had been more gradual than that, but you’re not the first to have mistaken me.” He put the kettle back on the stove and adjusted the burner before turning back to Catrina.

  “What other changes have you noticed?” she asked.

  “I don’t look at things the same way,” he said softly. “And it frightens me.”

  To hear those words from him frightened Catrina. She had never known him to show the slightest twinge of fear, let alone openly admit to it. But he had always been there for her and she was determined not to let him down, especially since he had trusted her enough to confide his terrible secret.