I watched her through the window. Her black hair’s sheen had created a halo over her head. Her plain robes fell to the floor at her feet. Never had she looked so much like Keeza. Her skin glowed in the candlelight, as the shadow of her naked form danced on the walls.
“A lesser being could easily love this woman.” I thought.
Her skin had taken on a mocha color over the summer months, which seemed impossible considering the clothing she wore. Yet from head to toe her tan skin showed no variations in shade. There were no blemishes to be seen. She was flawless.
She sat at her table looking into a small mirror and proceeded to brush through her halo and down her back. She held the strands of hair in one hand and pulled the brush in long strokes down its length, which fell past her breasts almost to her navel. She seemed to take pleasure from the simple task. Her lips parted into a smile as she gazed at her reflection.
“I thought I had lost you,” Manuela said into the mirror.
“The woman talks to herself. She truly is mad.” I thought.
I hadn’t seen the sister since the night I had taken the priest. Well, that is not exactly true. I had seen her. That she hadn’t seen me is more accurate. There were nights that I smelled her in the air and went to her without her knowing. I would follow her from shop to shop, street vendor to street vendor. There were times I could have sworn she had seen me, but she gave no impression that she had. So, I would just follow and watch.
“Our Archbishop has gone missing. We assumed that he had returned to Rome. That was until the cardinal sent word asking about his progress in the investigation of the murder of his bastard son. You haven’t seen him, have you?” she asked coyly.
Only then did I realize she had been talking to me when she had spoken before. Recognizing that there was no more need to conceal myself, I stepped from the dark night into the room. “The Archbishop is missing you say. Is this the same Archbishop that claimed to be able to kill me?”
“Yes, the very same,” she said looking at me with those familiar black eyes. “The Bishop has received word that the Pope believes that De la Iglesia was killed in the execution of his duties. They think you may have killed him and are now sending back the men who they had sent before. The men had arrived months before to find the Archbishop gone and returned to their respective post.” She explained.
“Oh, I’m sure they will find him eventually.” I said.
Of course, I was sure they would find him.
“Your archbishop is, in fact, dead and deservingly so. His attempt to kill me failed, and he paid for it with his life.”
“And the traveling sisters?” she asked.
“They are also dead.” I informed her.
“I thought as much when they didn’t return last night.” She replied.
She rose from the table and walked towards me showing no sign of modesty regarding her nakedness. I didn’t mind her nudity either. As I stated earlier, she had never looked more like my long-dead love, than she did then in her barest form.
I must admit a stirring rose as she stood before me.
“You look upon me as if I would be your next meal,” she said suspiciously. “Is that why you have come to me now, to finally undo the gracious deed that you performed in saving my life?” “No, like I told you before when you asked, I will not take your life. I feel a connection to you that I have not felt with anyone in many years.”
“I assume you have De La Iglesias’ journals and books or have you destroyed them?” she asked.
“Yes, I still have them all.” I confirmed.
“No, you do not have them all. He left quite a few in my care to read while he was questioning me. I have read them cover to cover in your absence. I would like to read the others if you would allow it.”
The thought of her reading the materials that the father had acquired didn’t disturb me in the least. She had already learned of who I was from the stories the father had told and the literature he had left for her to peruse.
“I have no problem with that. It is not as if these would be the only journals that speak of my existence. I’m sure the Vatican wouldn’t have sent him out with the only copies. If they did, then they are nothing like the powerful enemy he has made them out to be.” I said.
“Oh, they are!” She exclaimed. “Their arms stretch throughout Europe with king and queens following the path they set for them. The Papal wields the strength of an army of crusaders that dwarf those of many kingdoms. In fact, many of the officers in numerous king’s armies report directly to the Pope.” She said matter-of-factly.
This was information De La Iglesia had omitted for reasons unknown to me. I was glad I had killed him. It wasn’t until then I realized that death had always been his fate, from the moment I first saw him. As much as Manuela had been a surrogate Keeza, even though he looked nothing like the man, he had become Typhon’s.
The man was destined to die at my hand, to pay for a crime the other priest had committed over a thousand years before De La Iglesia had ever been born. Subconsciously my mind saw him as a threat to Manuela as the other had been to Keeza.
“They should arrive within the week.” She said.
“Who will?” I asked.
“The men the Pope is sending. The squadron has been multiplied tenfold” she replied. I had been lost in thought and had somehow tuned out Manuela as she had tried to convey the peril she thought waited for me.
“Oh yes, them,” I remembered.
“Are you never afraid?” She asked.
It was true. It had been many years since I had felt the tinge of fear creeping down my spine. The last time I remembered was with Typhon as he threatened the life of Keeza and before that my capture by the slave traders. I hadn’t felt fear in this lifetime. Even when Irisi and I made our escape through the horde of men who had come seeking our deaths, fear had been an absent foe. I felt the pain of the swords and blows of the weapons that crashed into my body, but not fear.
“What is there to fear?” I asked.
“Have you lived so long that you have forgotten the creeping hand of mortality as it ticks away the moments of your life?”
“I guess I have. I have faced death many times, and each time he bowed his head before me.” “As I said before, I have read all the books the late father had left me, and I want to read the others you now have. Even more than that I would like to hear the story of your life, in your own words if I could.”
I spent the rest of the night telling her as much of my life as I could, only getting as far as Old Mother, Kanoni and Skull-face. About thirty minutes before sunrise I stopped.
“What is it?” She asked. “Why have you stopped?”
“I regret that we must finish this tale later tonight.” I answered.
“You have only just begun your story,” she said.” What happened to the Old Mother? Did she beg for mercy while on her knees? Did she save the village?”
“We will continue tonight after I have fed.” I said.
I carefully scanned her face for any signs of disgust at the mention of my feeding. I saw none as she agreed to our meeting time.
“Will you bring his papers back with you when you come?”
“No, not just yet” I replied. “My tale is a long one, and I think you should see only one side of the coin at a time. When I am done telling you my story and have answered all your questions. Then and only then will I relinquish the priests’ things to you.”
“Yes, that way I can see the events from all accounts from your eyes and then through the eyes that have seen you, or claim they have.” She agreed.
“Then until tonight,” she said softly kissing my cheek before turning away.
As the day turned into night, I thought about the Pope and his army, the dead Archbishop and of Manuela.
I took the bodies of the young traveling sisters to
the home of one of the mayor’s guards, that had accompanied him the first night I had met Manuela. Using my nails like a knife, I erased any evidence of my feed.
I carefully placed them in the guard’s yard after manipulating the bodies and tearing their clothing.
I watched from the cover of trees as the women were discovered an hour later. The guard protested his innocence as he was taken away at the point of a sword. I followed as he pled his case to the mayor and as his head was chopped off in the middle of the street for all to see. The priest’s limbless body, I hung upside down from the steeple of the monastery with his throat torn out. I had done this as a warning. I wanted the church to know that I knew they were looking and that this would happen to all who found me. Satisfied that the warning would not go unnoticed, I slipped into the window of Manuela’s room.
Again, I found her in front of the mirror naked, brushing her hair. Standing up to meet me as I entered her room she said, “What happened to the Old Mother and the other pygmies?”
She sat on the bed brushing her hair with her knees pulled into her chest.
I continued my tale of the murders of Auta, Skull-face and the rest of the tribe. Tears streamed from her eyes upon learning of my abandonment by Kanoni. Her laughter filled the room at the story of the meerkat whose presence had shaken me to my bones. She gasped as I told her of the man’s loss of limb as he attempted to protect the young girl in the slave trader’s camp.
Right before sunrise I stopped and bid her farewell. I warned her about the body of the priest that would be found in the morning sun. I explained to her its significance as a warning to others. Showing no signs of revulsion or contempt at what she had learned, she kissed me. This time the kiss wasn’t on the cheek but on the lips. Her bottom lip brushing against the little points that had been exposed by the kiss.
“Tonight?” She asked.
“Tonight,” I said and left as the first set of the sun’s rays lit up the land.
I had decided that I would allow Manuela to learn about me in stages, saving the sunlight’s effects on my skin for last.
The story continued night after night. She devoured every word as a large man would the pieces of a pie. She learned of Keeza the second night and let out a noise of shocked surprise when I described Keeza and explained how they could have been doppelgangers of one another.
“That is why you saved me that night?” She questioned.
“In part probably, maybe in whole, I don’t know. I do admit you remind me so much of her, but the connection we have is starting to become yours and yours alone.”
This last part seemed to please her a great deal. I guess that after hearing of how Keeza had met her demise at my hands, she preferred to distance herself from her ancient twin.
On the fourth night, she learned the story of Irisi. She seemed to take an extra interest in this tale, asking questions after question and absorbing each detail like a sponge.
As I was about to make my leave, she stopped me.
“A mudslide three cities away had slowed the procession of the Pope’s men considerably. The Bishop says that Cardinal Murrieta is furious at the fact his still unacknowledged off-springs’ death hadn’t been avenged. Before you took the Archbishop, he sent many sealed messages back to the Cardinal and his Holiness. We are just getting back correspondence on some of these. It seems the Cardinal thinks the Bishop should take up arms against you himself.” My eyebrows rose upon hearing this.
“I could tell by the fear in the Bishop’s eyes after seeing the body of De La Iglesia that is not an option to him. He would rather deal with the Cardinal than you.” She said.
“You do not seem disturbed at all by my actions, might I ask why?” I asked.
“I have spent months learning about you while you were away. I do believe the stories in their entirety. I do not question one witness account. But, I also know that you saved me when you didn’t have to.
A small, almost invisible smile appeared on her face as she said the last part.
“I love you for what and who you are,” she said to me softly as she took my hand in hers. “Angel or Devil it matters not. When I prayed for help, you saved me. I believe you were sent by God.” “You and my father both,” I said with a wink.
It took a moment, then she smiled as she remembered the meaning of “Manzili.”
“Your father was a prophetic man.” She said returning my wink.
I moved towards the window to take my leave.
“Where do you go?” She asked.
I stopped and looked at her not understanding the question.
“When you leave me in the mornings, where do you go?”
“To rest,” I replied.
“Do you sleep?” she asked.
“No, I have no need for it.”
“Then why do you leave every morning?”
“The sun doesn’t care for my kind.” I answered.
“Ah yes, I read that in one of the books. Some of the others have been destroyed in the sunlight.” She said.
“I do not share the limitations of my children. Always remember I am The First, the sunlight is nothing more than a minor annoyance. I believe that the further the grape grows from the vine the weaker its potency. In other words, the more my blood is diluted through the generations, the weaker its power will be. Many of the things that supposedly have destroyed others are nothing to me. De La Iglesia learned this after driving a wooden stake through my chest in his attempt to kill me.” “I assumed as much. One of the books speaks of you being stabbed multiple times with swords and spears. It also said that the two of you escaped in the morning’s light.”
Three nights later, the highlights of my tale had been told, and we spent hours of her asking questions and me trying to answer them. Unlike De La Iglesia, she never once challenged my right to live.
“You are a higher being, which is not subject to the laws of man and are not culpable, any more than the lion is for feeding on the antelope.”
The hours passed fast that night as she marveled in the tale, like a child hearing of dragons. “The dawn is coming. You will be leaving me soon, and the Pope’s men will surely arrive today.” She said with a pang of sadness I hadn’t previously heard in her voice.
“It won’t be safe for you to return to me. Not for you and not for me.” Before you leave me, tell me how I should remember you. Will it be as Manzili, the cast out child, who was taken in by pygmies? Will it be Ammon, the vampire of Egypt, who found love twice, even though he has not realized it in all his years? Maybe you are Alejandro, the killer of Catholics. I regret I will never know how your story ends or where you will go from here.”
“There is one you have forgotten.” I said to her as sunlight from her windows lit up the room. My diseased figure standing before her startled her. She staggered two or three steps backward. In an instant, I had changed from the marvelous creature to a creature even a leper would shun.
I looked into her eyes and raised my hands. Her eyes quickly darted to the appendages that reached out to her. Her eyes scanned my body, and I could see the full realization of what I was becoming clear to her.
I had never shown the Archbishop this form. Even though we talked, by daylight, it was with the shutters closed, and curtains pulled. The only people that have ever seen me in this form died soon after.
I watched her mouth for a scream. None came, her mouth had opened in the initial shock but nothing, but silence had come out. I looked towards the window at the rising dawn. That was when I felt her hands on mine. I quickly turned my gaze to her, and I felt her soft lips on mine.
“Angel or Devil it matters not. I have known for a while you were both. Now I just know what the Devil looks like.”
She embraced me as the door opened and the Bishop stepped in looking at the floor. I assume this was in case Manuela hadn’t been decent.
/> “Sister Manuela I’m sorry to just barge in, but I swore I heard a man’s voice,” He said, his head still bowed. His eyes locked onto the two sets of feet and his head rose. His eyes exploded with fear, and he opened his mouth to scream.
The blade cut off all noise as she pulled it across his throat. His hands clutched at his neck as the blood poured forth. Moving against my will, I flew to him and latched on to his already open throat. Soon another voice from outside the room spoke.
“Sister Manuela?” the voice asked.
I looked to her, still drinking from the now seizing body.
“Yes, Sister?” Manuela replied, her eyes never leaving the bloody scene in front of her. “Are you well Manuela?” asked the voice outside the door.
“Yes, I overslept I’ll be down in a second, I need to wash up first.” Manuela replied. “I will see you downstairs then.” The voice said before her footsteps moved down the hall. “You have to leave,” she said to me as the Bishops head hit the floor.
Her trembling figure had been spattered with the Bishop’s blood. The knife finally fell from her hands, and she dropped to her knees, folded her hands and looked toward the crucifix on the wall. “Heavenly Father, please forgive me.” She started.
“I have to leave? You killed him,” I stated, stepping out of the sunlight offering my hand to the kneeling woman.
“We have to leave.” I said softly.
Her eyes became narrow slits, and a smile crossed her lips as she looked at her Angel once more.
“Fine, we have to leave.” She said.
She donned her habit and placed her crucifix around her neck. With her bible pressed to her chest, she looked at the ground.
“I’m not her. I’m not Keeza.”
“I know, you are Sister Manuela, and I am your Angel Manzili.
Once again, I stepped into the sunlight. For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t alone.
Chapter 11
The First Page 11