by D B Nielsen
Off the well-travelled route now, the trail meandered, the ground beneath us uneven and slippery. St. John’s hand, wrapped tightly around my arm, saved me from stumbling on the uneven bumpy surface a number of times. As always, he moved gracefully through the darkness of the Crypt with the fine senses of a nocturnal animal.
Eventually the trail tapered off and we reached a dead end. The artefact was cleverly tucked into a niche in the crumbling stone wall, looking as if it belonged there. Under normal circumstances we may have passed it by, even ignoring it, if it weren’t for the luminous glow emanating from it.
Even from this distance, the force it exerted over me was magnetic. Its deep amber casing swirled restlessly as if lit from within, the lettering writhing in ecstasy or agony across its teeming frame. I stepped forward involuntarily but, managing to control the irresistible lure of the Seed, turned hesitantly back to St. John in concern.
Somehow he managed to read my mind as he assured me, ‘It is safe here, Sage. What happened on the plane is unlikely to occur again – at least, not at this moment.’
Reaching out, St. John took my hand in his, rubbing his thumb gently over the traces of fine scarring left by the symbol I’d evoked in the air.
‘Trust me.’
I nodded in response, quieted.
Then, taking a shuddering breath, I turned away from him and Père Henri, letting his hand drop from mine and made my way forward, seductively enticed by the artefact in front of me.
And everything around me, above me, beneath me, within me fell away – the shape of the path, the broken stones, the derelict buildings with their partially remaining slanted slats, the Nephilim, the clergyman, the darkness, my entire being, even my name – all fell away into a churning mass from whence the Word came.
The only thing anchoring me to this moment in time and space and the core of my being was the symbol branded onto my palm. It too was pulsating on my flesh. And now I could feel every molecule ripple around me in the night air; could feel the strong and steady heartbeat of the man that I loved and the more feeble heartbeat of the man he called “Father”; could feel time itself press against me with its centuries, its millennia of mutability and mortality. But none of it mattered; only the Seed mattered.
There was only the Seed.
And then a montage of images assailed me as the symbols danced before my eyes.
I stand at the crossroads. Thick snow muffles the air. It is dusk, and cold. The plumes from the chimney of the Manor House whirl pale vapour like an apparition. Before me, stretches an act of betrayal and grief. I still might escape. I sense the Fallen Angel’s timeless patience as the Game is set in motion.
The moment hangs in the balance.
I stand in a barren burning field. A serpent’s coil of smoke slithers through the sky and fiery the Angels fall. I look down at my feet. I stand upon their charred remains. Burnt feathers. Blistered flesh.
I stand before Paradise. I stand before the Angels. Their seraph blades raised high. A blaze of light along the blade. A guillotine ready to fall.
I found myself on my knees on the cold dirt floor of the Crypt as if in prayer; the Seed now silent in front of me, returned to its dormant state.
And then I remembered what had called me back to myself – St. John had spoken my name. Not with any words. But as a pure note. And I felt it as a demand, as a question, as an arrow darting into my very soul. Felt its insistence, the subtle strength of it as it flung the Seed’s hold from the calmness of eternity and my fledgling power.
‘Sage,’ he had said, ever so softly.
That was all.
But it was enough.
It was enough to return me to my true being.
I turned my tear-stained face towards him now and reached out a hand in supplication. And he was there. Lifting me up and carrying me towards the entrance of the Crypt, as swift as an eagle in flight, until we were engulfed in the cool night air. I buried my face in his shirt and inhaled his scent which had a soothing effect upon me.
‘Sage,’ he said, ‘do you remember anything? The vision you saw? You were speaking in the Old Tongue, the first language. But we could understand you.’
I looked up at him then. Looked at the unyielding line of his jaw, the smooth curve of his lip and sighed. ‘What did I say?’
‘You spoke of things yet to come,’ he replied, ‘You spoke of battle, of death, of the Garden of Eden and its guardians.’
Père Henri mumbled something low in French not meant for my ears, but the night wind carried it to me, so that I heard it with all the clarity as if it had been shouted from the very rooftops.
‘No,’ I said, shaking my head in denial, the zip of St. John’s leather jacket scratching my face.
But I barely noticed the pain.
Again, I said more firmly, ‘No.’
‘Sage–’ Père Henri began in an appeasing tone, but I cut him off.
‘No, I won’t believe it. I refuse to believe it. Never. It’s not true.’ My voice climbed an octave in anger and disbelief as St. John continued to hold me fast.
I needed the comfort and warmth that his embrace provided.
I turned to him then, fear in my voice and in my eyes, and whispered, ‘What did I say?’
St. John held me tighter still and spoke the words I dreaded to hear.
‘You said,’ St. John’s voice was soft and low, but firm and authoritative for all that. ‘The Woods are not to be trusted. Do not trust the Woods.’
BLACK FRIDAY
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘No, there must be another explanation,’ I said, my voice thick with denial, ‘I won’t believe it. My family would never betray me.’
Père Henri put a gentle hand to mine, ‘I’m so very sorry.’
‘No,’ I told them both again, pulling my hand away as if burnt by the priest’s touch, ‘You don’t know them. They’re not like that. They wouldn’t do that. They would never hurt me or betray me.’
I wanted to scream or rage or put my fist into something. But there was nothing I could do. And I felt so helpless in the face of Père Henri’s certainty.
I jerked my head angrily, looking up at St. John, ‘Maybe I interpreted it wrong. It can’t be right. It just can’t be.’
St. John said nothing for a long moment, his eyes fixed on my distraught face as he turned the matter over in his mind.
‘I can offer you no reassurance, Sage, as much as I want to. Your words were very clear,’ he said finally, his eyes filled with a deep pity.
With a Herculean effort, I pulled myself together, not allowing him to see how his words affected me. I had been counting on him to refute Père Henri’s assumptions, not my own protests.
As if sensing this, he said, ‘But we must wait and see, Sage. Prophecies are confusing and often cryptic. And things are not always how we expect them to be.’
I just stared at him then. I couldn’t think of a thing to say. I had never even imagined that somehow my family would get caught up in all of this; embroiled in something that was beyond their fleeting concerns. Only Fi knew what I was involved in and for me to not trust her – my identical twin sister – would be like cutting off my right hand.
‘Come, Sage,’ St. John said. He sounded very tired, as if the burden of dealing with my roiling emotions and his acceptance of the Seed’s revelation had drained the last of his energy. ‘I’ll take you home.’
I allowed him to manoeuvre me like a puppet – nothing mattered, no words came. I leant on him for support, absorbing some of his strength and stood shakily on my own two feet. Père Henri moved to let me pass. He would not look at me directly; he stared off into the distance at the cathedral looming on top of us, his expression filled with embarrassment and pity.
It might have been a pleasant walk under normal circumstances but, like the previous time when we’d returned from the Louvre, a tension rippled between St. John and me. The romance of the City of Lights dulled beneath my oppressive thoughts as thick
black shadows within the Jardin des Tuileries that lined the shrubbery on either side seemed to be crawling with barely visible horrors conjured by my own imagination. The air had grown cold with the onset of darkness and I trudged along, hunched, shivering, my hands thrust deep into the pockets of my overcoat. But even knowing the cause of my fears, knowing what awaited me and my family, even all that would have been bearable if only St. John had been talking to me.
But he hadn’t said a word since we’d left the plaza.
It was me who broke the silence.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ I began, my voice rough with unshed tears, ‘that maybe I can change things. Maybe I’m meant to change things. Maybe that’s why I’ve been given these visions.’
St. John looked at me soberly. ‘You can’t change things, Sage.’
‘Why not?’ I asked angrily, not bothering to brush away a salty trickle escaping from the corner of my eye.
He sighed. ‘Because it is written.’
I looked at him then as his image swam in front of me. ‘So, it’s prophetic?’
‘Something like that,’ he agreed, the ghost of a smile touching the corner of his lips.
We moved slowly through the gate of the Tuileries, side by side, but not touching. I was as aware of him as ever, but felt more distant than we had ever been as if something, some wedge, had been driven between us.
‘What do you mean it’s prophetic?’ My voice was sharper than I’d intended.
‘You won’t want to hear it,’ St. John warned me. ‘Two thousand years ago, Jesus was betrayed by Judas Iscariot. If it hadn’t been Judas it would have been someone else. The point is that it was preordained.’
‘So, if Judas betrayed Jesus,’ I clarified, ‘but Jesus knew that Judas was going to betray him and allowed it to happen anyway, leading to both their deaths, then who betrayed whom?’
‘My point exactly,’ St. John murmured.
I didn’t want to talk about betrayals and broken trust but still I questioned, ‘Should I be warning them then?’
‘Warn them about what? What could you possibly say to them, Sage?’ St. John asked wearily, ‘We don’t even know when this will happen or what’s meant to happen. As I said before, things aren’t always how we expect them to be.’
‘So, then what?’ I asked him, feeling helpless, ‘I do nothing? Just wait?’
‘And what’s wrong with waiting?’ St. John asked.
‘Because it’s so ... so...’ I didn’t know how to phrase it.
‘Tiresome?’ he supplied. Looking at me grimly, he said, ‘Sage, whether you believe in religion or in science, things don’t just happen overnight. The Christians have waited over two thousand years for the return of their Messiah, whilst the evolution of human beings is even longer still.’
I sighed, feeling young for the very first time. ‘I’m sorry, but I just don’t believe it. I don’t believe my family will betray me. I would stake my life on it.’
St. John gave me a penetrating look. ‘All right, you don’t have to if you don’t want to. It doesn’t change the fact that there are things to be done, and we’re the ones who have to do them. That’s what matters.’ Then he said, quietly, ‘If it makes you feel any better, I shall look out for your family – especially your sister, Saffron.’
I gave him a grateful, slightly teary smile. St. John finally threw an arm about my shoulders, pulling me close against his side. I immediately felt his warmth and was grateful for it.
‘Whatever happens, Sage,’ he said, looking at me in the dim glow of the streetlamps, ‘trust me. Stay with me. You understand?’
He held my gaze; his eyes, still incredibly light in the darkness, demanding a promise from me. The memory of my own demands that he trust me welled up. It seemed like so long ago. But I knew now what kind of pressure I’d placed him under.
‘I trust you,’ I repeated, looking up at him. ‘I’ll stay with you.’
He briefly tightened his grip on my shoulders, closing his eyes in relief, and I realised with some surprise that he hadn’t expected me to agree. A moment later he caught me to him and hugged me, his face buried in my hair. ‘Sage...’
There was silence again now, only the faint sounds of the city in the distance and the thrumming of St. John’s heart against my ear.
I didn’t need to tell him, though he must have known, that I also trusted my family. Like Juliet on hearing the news of her cousin’s death at the hands of her husband, I now felt torn between my loyalties and feelings for both my family and St. John. But, if it came down to it, I knew there was no contest. If I was St. John’s destiny, so was he mine.
We walked past the Place de la Concorde with its impressive Egyptian obelisk and continued west onto the Avenue des Champs-Élysées till we finally reached the street where St. John’s apartment block was located. Looking up at his building, I could see the warm glow emanating from the apartment’s windows as Gabriel awaited our return.
I sighed in relief. It was as if the apartment itself was welcoming me back.
My fanciful thoughts must have been recognised by St. John who gave my shoulders a squeeze.
‘Let’s get you inside. You’re frozen,’ he said, concerned, ‘And if I know Gabriel, he’ll be cooking up a storm.’
True to St. John’s pronouncement, when he unlocked the front door of the apartment, the delicate aroma of beef bourguignon wafted past my nose, making my mouth water. Gabriel was in the dining room, pouring red wine from a crystal decanter into wine glasses.
‘Not too much for me,’ I told him as he was filling a third glass, ‘Technically, I’m underage.’
‘Bah, Sage,’ Gabriel protested, ‘you’re in Paris now! Red wine runs in our veins!’
‘What a pity! I thought it was champagne!’ I returned, making him laugh.
Shrugging out of my jacket, I asked St. John if I could use the phone to call my mother before we sat down to dine. He gave me permission to use the extension in his study for more privacy and I left them to discuss the recent developments between them.
Dialling the number of the Manor House, my eyes drifted across the framed artworks and photographs hanging on the walls in St. John’s study, coming to rest on a recent image of an archaeological survey where St. John stood next to my father pointing something out in the distance beyond the photo’s frame. The site was located in the war zone of southern Iraq; in the background British military troops patrolled the area. I had been unaware that St. John had been part of my father’s team to the Middle East but then I had shown little interest at the time in my father’s work as I’d been concentrating on passing my Finals.
Mum finally answered the phone and I had a very brief conversation with her; she sounded tired and harried as she was nursing both Jasmine and Alex who had caught the flu from walking Indy in the rain. It all sounded so surprisingly normal that I once again doubted the prophetic words I’d been told I’d unconsciously uttered earlier. But thrusting that knowledge to the back of my mind, I assured her I was well and sent my love to everyone at home before hanging up.
I found myself examining the sepia-toned and black and white photographic images taken sometime in the nineteenth century of people whom St. John must have known and perhaps even loved; now merely ghosts from the past, distant memories whispering down time’s alleyways. It wasn’t the same as looking at someone’s ancestors that were far removed from them. Instead, looking at these figures, I couldn’t help but feel St. John’s sense of loss and grief as time had stolen from him something precious with the deaths of each of these individuals who he once might have called his friend or lover.
Watercolours and oil paintings of places where St. John had visited, maybe even lived, continued to tell the story of his life. I had not understood before what it meant for him to have lived over three thousand years. It wasn’t that St. John had experienced history; he was history.
As I gazed upon the images, I had forgotten dinner, forgotten that Gabriel and St. John were wait
ing for me, forgotten myself. And then something penetrated through my reverie; a prickling sensation at the back of my neck.
I was being watched.
I studiously ignored my observer and continued to view the paintings hanging on the wall, moving along to a portrait of a young man in profile, head bent over a book of psalms, his golden curls brushing the stiff lace collar he wore and providing a contrast against the darker background. The canvas, an oil painting, cracked with age in a heavy tarnished gilt frame hung in a corner.
‘It’s by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. See the signature at the bottom? No “h”. Though, as you can see, it’s not his usual style.’ His deep melodious voice floated towards me.
‘It’s you, isn’t it?’ I asked, ‘The young man in the painting?’
‘Unfortunately, yes,’ St. John replied, coming to stand next to me to survey the painting, ‘I have tried very hard to avoid being captured in photos or artworks. It raises too many questions. But Pieter accidentally drew me unawares when I was reading.’
‘What happened?’ I asked intrigued.
‘I was living in Brussels for a while during the sixteenth century. I kept to myself mostly. In the early days, Pieter was influenced by the older Dutch masters such as Bosch and painted demonological works such as The Triumph of Death and The Fall of the Rebel Angels. Yes, ironic, isn’t it?’ There was an underlying mockery in St. John’s voice. ‘Though I must admit I quite liked his rather fanciful representation of the Tower of Babel.’
‘So, why paint you if he was interested in other subjects?’
‘Because I piqued his interest, accidental as it was. I have an unfortunate tendency to stand out in a crowd.’ St. John’s tone was self-deprecating.
‘What did you do?’ I asked, looking at his flawless profile which mirrored the one in the oil painting on the wall of the study.
‘I offered to buy the painting off him but he refused,’ St. John said ruefully, shrugging his shoulders. ‘So instead I bribed him.’
