Rising to darkness

by Lucia Guglielminetti

  The current did what it wanted to do with me, dragging me around at will. I let it, allowing her to push me unpredictably to or under the surface like one of its children. I was lulled, embraced, protected: a wonderful feeling after all the unbearable heat that had devoured me. Water was a friend to me, she could keep me with her, I wanted her to; but, on a bad day, she could realize that I didn't belong to her and hand me back to the Earth. I begged her not to struggling to stay with her, hanging on with my nails to the muddy bottom, knowing that as long as I stayed down there, nobody would try to hurt me so badly; but, she was stronger and drove me away, albeit gently, easing me down on the muddy shores where she flowed unaltered for centuries.

  I cried and despaired, then surrendered and sought refuge in her sister, the Earth. She had been kind to me too in the past. She had welcomed me, warmed me, and protected me. I didn't know if she could recognize me, nothing was left in me of what I had been, but my true nature didn’t slip away from her and she called out to me like before.

  Sleep. Oblivion. Darkness. Darkness. Darkness.

  When the Earth turned warm from the cold, I felt that it was time to leave as well. I emerged as a dreadful figure lacerated with horrible scars, with the bones of my face and body pressing under my skin, under which there was nothing left. I crawled on the ground, blood as my only goal, leaving an endless trail of drained animals of any kind along the way. At night I advanced forward, during the day, I stayed grounded. For some time, my thoughts were clearing. At least I started to realize I was thinking, that there was a precise point of myself where thoughts were coming from. If you had asked me the name of the things I encountered during my tenacious crawl, or even my own, I'd have looked at you surprised by the mere fact that they ought to have one, unaware of its usefulness. I knew that there was an "I" and that there were "things". The things were divided between the good like the earth, food, and darkness, and the Others, those that scared me like the voices I sometimes heard as I crawled, dreams in which I never stopped burning, the thirst, and the strong light which hammered like a burning nail where my thoughts came from and tore impetuous groans. I learned that silence was my ally and that I could not afford to emit any sound when I was out because the noise attracted the Others and I didn’t want any of the Others to see me. It happened one night when I was illuminated by a floating fireball straight from one of the Others. Even the fire was Bad, it meant pain and visibility. I wanted to put it out but I couldn’t because the Other held it above my head and my skeletal arm was not able to reach it. I was beginning to descend into the Earth to escape when the Thing, the Supreme Thing, overwhelmed my senses like a wave; I had finally detected, after a long time had passed, the smell of human blood and was transfixed, realizing immediately that this was the goal of my toil. There were screams, oh, so annoying; there was fighting; and there was, above all, the hot delicious gush that filled my mouth and satisfied my every fiber of my being after so long. That night, I learned my name and those of the things for the second time, and I began to really climb back to the top to go back to being what I was, even though the journey would be endless.

  Summer passed too.

  Rain came back and with it the cold which, for the first time, I felt as if I had been human. I was forced to curl up against the trunk of the trees, wrapped in my bare arms, blackened with dirt, shivering and lost. I couldn't remember where my home was. I was almost certain to have one, there, in the City, but I was terrified to go into the maze of streets and of getting lost inside when dawn announced itself. Sometimes, when the call of blood became too unbearable, I ambushed my victims just to feed and steal some of their garments. I had realized that those strange clothes people put on their body provided them with some warmth. After having satisfied my needs, I would escape back into the safety of my woods and swamps, feeling better for a while.

  When I observed my reflection in the water of a stream in the moonlight, I was seized by a strange melancholy. I kept somewhere within me a vague memory of another face and another body. Where had they gone? Who was this dreadful stranger with shriveled skin staring at me every time?

  Hands caressing me, I often saw them, but the skin that touched me was smooth, clear, and silky. Who had reduced me so? Why couldn't I remember? Why, above all, couldn’t I remember how my life was before the Evil? There had been an Evil; that I knew. But if there had been an Evil, at some point, there must also have been a Good, right? Or maybe my Good had always been there, in the woods, shivering and feeding from animals?

  Then, one night, something happened.

  She came.

  She wasn't like the Others.

  I didn't wish to feed from her but I didn't want her to disappear. I wanted her to stay, to talk gently to me the way she was doing even though I didn't understand a thing of what she was saying. Five men appeared behind her. I wasn't hungry for them either, it was so unfair! I hadn't seen so many people all at once in months, or perhaps in years, who could know, and I didn't feel like draining any of them...

  It was a strange encounter because I didn’t hear them coming like I used to with the Others. I just smelled something strange in the air, something I had never smelled before but found familiar and comforting. Then, they were before me suddenly, so tall, so beautiful, and so different from me and from any other being I had ever seen.

  My first reaction was shame. I tried to slip deep into the earth to hide from their gazes, finding it unbearable that they could compare my monstrosity to their beauty, but strong arms tore me from my hiding place and held me, and they didn't prevent me from lowering my head down and closing my eyes to protect myself from their attention. She was staring at me with frightening intensity which I wouldn’t have endured much longer. She took a step towards me and held out a hand slowly, moving away from my face the hair caked with dirt.

  I knew she didn't want to hurt me as the tone of her voice was soothing and calm, yet at the touch of her hand I winced and tried to escape into the ground again even though her escorts didn't allow me to do so. She kept repeating a word that sounded very familiar. It made me think of my time in water, who knows why: Raistan. Between short phrases and others said in a language that I didn’t understand, this word came out quite often... Then something strange happened to her eyes; red drops gushed out of them and started to roll down her cheeks, catching my eye. Before I could process what I was doing, my hand was drawn towards her as well. I withdrew it immediately for it was too filthy and disgusting. How could I allow such obscenity lay a hand on something so pure and perfect? At the end, she was the one to draw me to her, winning over my resistance and placing my hand on her face while those awful red beads continued to flow, staining her dress. Eventually she hugged me, terrifying me and making me stiffen, while she kept on talking to me in that language so soft which she seemed to take for granted that I knew. She had to bend down to do it, because months of a gait as close as possible to the ground had arched my back.

  Motioning, as they had realized I didn’t understand a word they said, they invited me to follow them, but they were leading me to the City, the place I had feared most. Now I knew it was there that the Evil had taken me. If I didn't want it to happen again, I shouldn’t go across its walls, never. I started to shake my head and put my foot down; what until then had seemed like a nice dream had just turned into a nightmare. They just wanted to offer me as a sacrifice to the City, that's why they came! I swiftly turned towards the one who was holding me and sank my teeth in his hand. When he let go of his hold, I turned and started to run, but my legs were weak and after a few steps, they were upon me again, determined to drag me to that dreadful place. I screamed, I kicked, I grasped at anything I found with my strength but it was useless: they had some sort of covered carriage which they wanted me to get in. In the back, the carriage contained a kind of big box which they tried to force me inside, but they had to tear my hands away from its edge and tie them with a rope in order to succeed in getting me in. She continued to
cry, she did nothing but, during the whole time, as well as talk to me and caress my forehead in an attempt to calm me down. I was crying too and begged her in my own language not to take me back from where the Evil had taken me, but her companions pushed me down horizontal in the narrow and wood-smelling box which they brought to imprison me and closed its lid over me, suffocating my screams and my hopes for clemency.

  My dark box was being moved, I could feel it, but where were they taking me? Not to the fire again... oh please, God, not the fire! I just want to disappear, to go back to my Earth. What do these people want from me? Why don't they leave me alone?

  When they opened my box, I sprang out of it and looked for a hiding place in the unknown place where I was, but it was small compared to my forest. I crawled under something flat and soft and pressed myself against the wall behind me, full of terror. I could see my kidnappers' feet tuning towards my hideout, their hands groping blindly to grab me, but soon they got tired of it and left the room.

  After some time, I ventured to peek through between the colored curtains covering my location to look around. I was alone, in a warm place, with the ground covered with strange soft and thick fabrics on which I liked to walk or lay. If I began to observe more intensely at their pattern, I would completely get lost in it. The light was very dim and didn't hurt my eyes, so I was able to tolerate it. There was silence. It was enough that those terrible yet, at the same time, wonderful people no longer returned to scare or touch me. If only... Oh God, how could I quench my thirst in this place? I looked around, but there was no animal of any kind, not even a tiny mouse, how could I make it? What if Evil, this time, meant a thirst without end? That thought was even more frightening than fire and led me to pound on the door in a vain attempt to open it. There, outside, were my woods and, in my woods, there was food... I pounded the door with my fists until they became numb, then I slipped to the ground and curled up like a hedgehog on one of those soft fabrics covering the floor, desperate, howling like a wounded animal, believing that no one would listen or attempt to comfort me because nobody cared.

  The door must have been opened without me noticing.

  Maybe I had fallen asleep.

  She was bending over me and was looking at me with the same sad expression like before with those red drops flowing from her eyes. I jumped back and crawled back to my hiding place, fearing that she might have prevented me. She didn't. She just sat on an armchair and seemed to do nothing but wait. She spoke and I liked the tone of her voice but still I couldn't understand a single word for some reason. Suddenly she got up and left in such a hurried pace that I could hardly follow her short course to the door. When she came back a few hours later, she was no longer alone. A guy with black hair, green cat-like eyes, and a long black coat made of a thick and warm fabric, similar to the way the woman was dressed, accompanied her. As he spoke, he showed very long and sharp canines, fangs. I didn't know who this man was, but she seemed to trust him, given the way she was holding on to his arm and looking at him.

  I didn't like him. I didn't trust him without knowing why. Something unexpected occurred, though: when he bent down to talk to me, spying me from under the bed, he spoke words that I understood and to which I could not resist.

  It was enough just to look into his eyes and I was mesmerized like a cobra with a charmer’s flute. I felt the fear drifting away along with the thirst and pain. I felt good for the first time in who knows how long and the credit belonged to those eyes.

  What a fool I had been! Now, I found them really wonderful and just wanted to lose myself in them, maybe forever.

  The man wanted something from me. He wanted me to come out of my hiding place and sit somewhere. I complied. I didn't want him to stop looking at me.

  "Raistan Van Hoeck, these people don't want to hurt you, they're here to help you and make you feel better. You will not run away from them and will allow them to take care of you, do you understand? I command you."

  I lowered my head in submission.

  "Raistan, can you understand the language spoken by these people?"

  "No, I can't. I feel I should, but I don’t remember anything. I understand you, my Lord, how is it possible?" My voice came out of me like a stream, independent of my will.

  "I'm using your native language, the only one your mind has decided it will retain. You know your saviors’ language, Raistan; you learnt it a long time ago. Remember that. Remember it now, open your mind, look inside you, remember the people who taught it to you. Remember ... Ambrosine and Roger, the coal store. Remember, Raistan.”

  Violent flashes crowded my mind, terrifying me. I took my hands to my face and slid to the floor, shocked by what was going on in my head. It was a jumble of voices, faces, places in the light and in the dark, overpowering me, destroying me... oh, God...

  "Look at me, Raistan. Look at me. Don't be scared, nothing can hurt you, they are just your memories. Listen to the lady, now. Can you understand her words?"

  He turned to the woman and asked her to talk to me.

  "Hi, Raistan. You'll be fine again, I promise."

  "I understand, my Lord. She says I will be fine again. Am I ill?"

  "Yes, Raistan, you have been very ill and you have not yet healed completely. You must obey the woman and her brothers, whatever they ask you to do. Do not shake your head, you must obey. To me, Lord of the Diurnals, and to your maker. Say it."

  "I'll obey the Lord of Diurnals and my maker."

  "Very good. Now that you understand her language you can speak it, you know how. You'll preserve the knowledge of your own, but you'll speak English to her and to her brothers, not Dutch."

  "English. Not Dutch."

  "Good. Now, Raistan, we want you to tell us what happened to you. No, do not panic, you do not have to be afraid. Go down deep in your memory and pull the memories back to the surface. Who burned you?"

  I was not able to. Just not that. I started to rock in the armchair clenching its arms, unconscious of a squawk coming from my throat that I couldn't control. The man's voice was powerful, but terror was much more.

  "Did the lycans do this to you, Raistan? Were you captured by the werewolves?"

  I shook my head vigorously in denial and refusal.

  "Why don’t you just read his mind, Vincent? It'd be easier," the woman said.

  "I cannot, I told you. The block is too powerful. He must want to remember by himself."

  "I don't want to. Please, my Lord, I do not want to. It hurts. It hurts too much, please..."

  "It does not hurt, not anymore. It is in the past. Respond, vampire, I command you. Who burnt you?”

  "Vincent, leave him alone, it doesn't matter now. Give him time, please."

  "Answer me now. Who burnt you?"

  I saw their faces again, heard their voices. I was back in that filthy cellar with my wrists tormented by silver chains. The pain was back again and helplessness and light...

  Now she was hugging me, holding my hands tightly to prevent me from tearing my eyes out with my broken nails. Make him stop, make him stop, please; don't make me relive it...

  "Shhh, I'm here with you, no one will ever harm you again, I'm here. I won't allow it."

  "Answer, vampire, who burnt you?!"

  "Them! They did it, those humans, those of the brothel... That woman, Madame Lescaut and her two assistants. Punish me... punish me for Isabelle... the absinth... Enough. Please, enough!"

  "Yes, enough. Good. Now you can rest and feed. It will get better, Raistan Van Hoeck. I will come back to see you soon."

  The vampire named Vincent turned to her, moving towards her so quickly as to give the impression he was slipping on the floor. After a while, I'd remember him and his walk and I'd get mad at her for having called that monster to take care of me.

  "That monster saved your mind, my love, don't ever forget that," she would remind me.

  They talked to each other for a few minutes, then he kissed her hand and left the room. I was still sitting on th
e floor, curled up, but I no longer had fear and could finally think. Getting my memory and my physical and mental faculties back would take many more months. I felt as if I had just woken up from a long sleep filled with terrible nightmares. A sickening sleep which gave me no rest.

  It was already nice to be able to understand what they were saying and to answer if I had felt like it. Still, I didn't recognize who this person was and why she was taking care of me. Vincent had called her Shibeen, defining her as my maker. What did he mean? Was she maybe... my mother? It wasn't possible, she was too young. Moreover, what was I? Vampire, he had called me. What was a vampire? Wasn't I a person?

  "Would you like to have a bath, Raistan?"

  I nodded and stood up, but I avoided the hand she was stretching out to me so as not to contaminate it with my filth.

  I followed her into a wonderful warm room where a huge tub was already filled with hot water and fragrance.

  I tried to climb over the edge while still fully clothed, but she stopped me with a smile and undressed me.

  As she examined the pitiful state of my body, her smile faded. Again, the sense of shame along with the desire to hide...