“Yeah,” he said as he lifted a magnifying glass to his eye and studied the pictures. The already blown up image was now magnified ten or twenty times more to his eyes as he looked at every detail of the blade. “I could hear a slight whistle as he breathed in, most probably from a deviated septum, I had the same thing when I was a young man, had to have surgery for it, but the sound was something that never left my mind.
He sat the magnifying glass back onto his desk and looked up. “Where did you get these pictures?”
“Found them,” I said, interrupting whatever Maggie was planning on telling him.
“Right, well the blade is not a knife, it is the tip of a spear, otherwise known as a lance. The blade was formed by Romans around the beginning of the common era, or the first century possibly. The engraving on the blade indicates something, but I don’t recognize all of the characters in order to translate it. That’s about all I have,” he finished.
“Have you ever seen something like this?” Maggie asked.
“Once, many years ago. There was a man and woman at the auction house in New Orleans where I used to go and buy antiques when I was about forty years old. I had made him an offer for it, I had simply never seen a blade like that so well preserved. He turned down the offer, which to be honest I would have too. It was beautiful, to say the least. Most blades from that era are tarnished and deteriorate dot the point that the luster of it can never be restored. His looked like it had been carried and was well taken care of since it was created.”
“Do you remember what he looked like?” she asked again.
He thought for a moment. “I don’t have to,” he said. “I have a picture of him holding it. Would you like to see it?”
Maggie and I both exchanged a glance at one another. He didn’t even need to ask.
“Yes,” we both said simultaneously.
He smirked and began typing away on his computer, trying to find the picture he had taken almost forty years in the past.
Chapter 33
“He won’t believe you,” Cerene said as she placed her hand on his bare forearm. The muscles flexed at her touch, but not in a fearful way, it was something like appreciation by her act. It was a hard reaction to place with words.
“I need to tell him, so he understands.”
“I know, but his faith is gone, there is no hope for him,” she damned me with her words, but she was right. My faith was nothing, not a speck of existence dwelt in me whatsoever.
He turned to me and eyed me warily, accepting her words for truth but still he pressed on. “Do you remember the death of Christ?”
I shook my head yes, unwilling to put the answer in words.
“I was there,” he said. “I stood on that hillside and watched this Jewish man struggle under the weight of the cross that he bared and I could see chunks of flesh that were torn from his body and the blood that bathed his body from the lashings. The crown of thorns was not resting on his head, they were buried into his brow, I remember see the thorns pushing the flesh away from his body where they penetrated his skin.
“He looked in a daze from all of his agony, the other Jews followed him and mocked him while others cried out for him. Some telling him to save himself, others telling him to call for his Father. I remember my heart broke as his mother fell at his feet as they laid his body on the wooden cross. I can still hear the duet of screams from him and his mother as the nails was driven into his hands and feet. It was more than any man could take, yet he was still breathing.
“I had seen hundreds of crucifixions before this one. None of them affected me in this way. Most of them had been murderers who deserved the pain of reciprocity. This man was not one of those, but I had my orders and I stood guard over his punishment, keeping the family away, preserving the justice of the Roman law. This was, after all, what His people wanted.
“Several hours past under the heat of the desert sun, he moaned quietly, accepting his fate for what it was and I watched the blood drip from his feet and hands onto the stony ground beneath him. It pooled in dark hues of red mixed with the dirt and rock. I looked up at him many times, hoping that he was expired, I only wished his death to be quick because I could not justify his punishment. I dared not mention this fact aloud, but if there was a God then this man did not deserve this punishment.
“I heard him pray to his Father and ultimately he cried out in agony. I thought his cry fell on deaf ears because that was his last breath. To verify his death, I raised my spear and punctured his side. There was no blood left in him, only the water of his body flowed down the shaft of my spear and ran onto my bare hands. I remember looking at my hands and knowing what I had done. I had just killed the son of God. The Messiah that the Jews believed would come.
“That was the moment I accepted the truth, and in response, the ground shook and rocks broke in a great quake. The clouds blotted out the sun and I felt God speak to me. He told me that in the darkness of the world I would be His witness. That the burden of punishment would be mine to dispense, and that for some I would be a great sinner, and for others I would be a saint. For him, though, I would be called His child, Longinus.”
The studious expression on Robert’s face as he scrolled through his archived files was something to behold. He swept the screen with his hand and it divided the files based on year groups. The touch screen on his monitor gave him an impressive amount of control and he worked it flawlessly. Still, it took close to forty-five minutes for him to find the lone image among thousands that put a face to the owner of the blade.
“Here we go,” he said, drawing our attention to the large computer monitor. The image was close to half of what would be considered life-sized on the expansive screen. This made the face of the man easier to recognize by showing more detail to be able to identify him by. His features were blemish free, and that might pose a problem as far as finding an easily identifiable mark on him, I thought.
“Holy shit,” I said. “It’s the same guy from my visions.” Maggie looked at me with surprise on her face. I had assumed that the visions were fairly fictitious as far as identifying a man by his actual looks were concerned. It looked like I was wrong about that.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“Positive,” I answered. I looked at him long and hard, taking in every detail. “Do you know his name?” I asked, wondering if he had identified himself as Longinus.
“He never gave me his name, but he did have a rather thick accent. European I gathered at the time. He had a girlfriend too, she was a looker. Pretty sure she was of eastern European descent based on her dark hair and eyes. I wish I would have caught her in the picture, but she refused to sit still if I remember right.”
“Is there anything about them that struck you odd?” Maggie asked, looking away from the screen and directly at Robert, her elderly son looked like he could have been her grandfather.
“Not in particular. I could tell that he knew his history based on a brief conversation I had with him. She seemed to be a bit of a history buff too, but she was a little less eager to discuss some of the topics we brought up. I thought that was odd, but some people shy away when you bring things like slavery and genocide into a conversation.”
“Anything else?” Maggie asked.
“Just one other small detail,” he said. “She was a vampire too.”
“How do you know this?” I asked.
“Easy. It’s in the eyes. Every vampire I have encountered has the same luster in their eyes, almost like they reflect your soul back at you. I guess I’m more accustomed to it being related to one and all,” he said jokingly, Maggie didn’t seem to appreciate the light-hearted tone of it.
I wondered if there was anything to go on as far as a lead went with this bit of information. “I don’t see how this is going to help us find him,” I said to Maggie.
She looked up at the clock on the wall that showed it was approaching midnight. She looked back at Robert who showed visible signs of weariness, most like
ly it was a bit past his bedtime. “I know how we can track him,” she said as she placed a hand on Robert’s shoulder and looked at him with a sign of concern.
He felt her gaze and looked back up at her. “Really? You know that it was illegal when I did it then, things haven’t changed much since then, unless of course, you are keeping track of how violators are punished. If that’s the case then things have changed a lot,” he barked, clearly a bit pissed by what she was insinuating.
“What are we talking about?” I asked, trying to cut the tension between them without having it flash back and blow up in my face.
The silence was deafening, I was afraid that we had come and barked up the wrong tree. Whatever history had broken between them, it was apparently still alive and aflame to this day. I tried to imagine what could cause such a rift between a mother and a son. It wasn’t hard to imagine such things based on the relationship I had with my own mother, or the lack thereof. Still, not every relationship was built on resentment.
“Fine,” he said as he broke eye contact with her. It was a kind of surrender, but it was different, almost as if he had been willing to go that extra mile deep inside his heart. His brain just hadn’t been ready to admit it until that moment. He typed away on his keyboard and brought up information on the State of Mississippi website. He clicked through a series of links that required government official access. He finally rested on a page that had ties to the State Bureau of Investigations. Another series of clicks brought the image of the man with the blade, whom I assumed was named Longinus onto the screen. The left-hand side of it showed the anonymous figure, the right side of the screen fluttered like a deck of cards being shuffled.
“What’s going on?” I asked again.
“Facial recognition software, I’m scanning the entire state and even parts of Louisiana and Alabama trying to find a match in the last twenty-four hours.”
“And this is illegal?”
“Only a little bit, nothing more than the death penalty can solve if you get caught,” he shot me a glance. The youthfulness behind his eyes defied his age. I could see the same kind of fire in his eyes as I could see in Maggie’s. Two peas in a pod.
“Then I suggest we not get caught,” she said coyly. Her all-business attitude was a far cry from her typically playful side. I wondered if the pictures we found had broken something inside of her that could only be fixed by finding the truth.
I knew that I could at least relate to that sentiment.
Chapter 34
I could not believe my ears. This man claimed to be alive when Jesus has put to death over two thousand years ago. The conviction in his voice told me that there was at least some truth to it, but I struggled with grasping the concept of his truth. I sat there and looked at him, looking at the blade that he claimed pierced the side of Christ. It truly did see more history than I could imagine.
“So, in the darkness, you will serve Him. What does that mean?”
“I struggled with that for years,” he said. “It was about twenty years later that the truth was revealed to me. I had not aged since that day and I had been long removed from the service of Rome, refusing to continue the killing of men for a puppet kind and tyrannical governor.
“I was at a large feast in Ephesus by this time and I saw the first one. She was beautiful, beyond any natural woman I had ever seen. Her eyes flashed a silvery sheen like the moonlight, almost like looking into a cat’s eye, but it was not entirely the same. I followed her around the party, keeping my distance, but knowing that there was something evil inside of her.
“I thought that she might be a demon, but what I discovered was much worse. I followed her to a dark alley where she led a young man into the quiet darkness. I was too far away to act as I saw her fangs flash a reflective light and dig into his neck. She smirked at me as I looked on in horror. She had known I was there, buried in darkness the whole time. I still carried the lance that I had used to confirm Christ’s death and I drew it as a way to protect myself.
“It was the holiness etched into the blade that saved my life. She was repulsed by it, she fled from it. That was when I knew my purpose. I had to find these monsters and put an end to them.”
I swallowed hard at his words, knowing that I fit the description of a monster in his eyes. “So, you kill every vampire that you find?” I asked as I looked over to Cerene. She looked at me without a facade of authority.
“No,” he answered. “The monsters prey on the lives of humanity. Stealing the souls with the blood that they use for nourishment. Salvation from the darkness lies in consuming the blood of animals and refusing to allow the darkness to drive you to sin.”
“So that’s it? You just want to make all the vampires drink animal blood?” I asked with a laugh. It was ridiculous to me that God’s great mission for this man was to have vampires drink blood that did not belong to humans.
“God’s will is to preserve the souls of his children, not to have them stripped away in the night by the children of the first one. Salvation may not seem like much to you, but damnation will if you do not turn from the darkness, from her grip on you, her fangs are the ones that lead you to human blood. It is not biology that makes you what you are, it is her.”
“Who is this first one?”
He leaned back in his seat, resolute in his truth. “Jewish lore calls her Lilith, the first woman. The one who made your maker, Pietro.”
“How long is this going to take?” I asked as the hour hand touched the one o’clock position on the wall clock. Over an hour of a flashing screen was bothering my eyes and I was losing patience. “This guy could be dead already.”
“You want a coffee?” Robert asked sarcastically.
“We don’t drink coffee,” I retorted, expecting the last laugh on that one.
“That’s fine, maybe you can go fetch me a coffee then, what do you say?” he turned a smiled. I returned the smile and then he spoke again, “Not kidding, I’d like a coffee, and since I’m the only one who can access this stuff without triggering alarms then I guess that makes you errand boy.”
My smile faded, but Maggie’s finally appeared. It seemed that the stress of this trip and this situation were easing up on her a bit. “I think I will take care of the coffee, Robbie. Noah will catch your house on fire, he’s too used to primitive devices for such luxuries,” she laughed while she pushed her nose in the air like a snobby aristocrat. I couldn’t help but laugh.
“I think I’ll join you, maybe an old dog can learn new tricks,” I raised my eyebrows at her jokingly and she curled her lips into a smile and waited for me to approach before turning around.
“Yeah, you kids behave, I don’t want my kitchen turned into something unspeakable,” Robert said with only a slight nod of humor. His face was glued to the screen watching it like a hawk. I didn’t know how long he would have to keep watch on it, but I was quite sure that he would stick to it until the end.
I followed Maggie through Robert’s lovely home, it was the kind of house that I had dreamed of as a kid. Growing up in rural Mississippi with only the television to show you what laid beyond your normal life tended to draw me into that dream world quite often. Couple that with my desire to live outside of my parental confines, an absent father, a mother who I wished was more so, and I had a recipe for living most of my day in the clouds.
The walls were painted a cream color and all of the furniture was dark stained and made of heavy woods like oak. The detailed craftsmanship seemed to be handmade by a skilled artisan. The draperies of the home were thick and medieval looking. He obviously had an attraction to history, but the newer electronic devices that scattered the home showed that he liked some of the finer things in life. Much more so than any I had seen until now.
She led me into the kitchen and it was magnificent. The appliances seemed to be state of the art and were black. The cabinets were the same dark woods as the furniture and the counter tops were a dark granite, polished like glass. His home felt like a muse
um that you could live in. She walked over to one of the cabinets and retrieved a porcelain coffee mug that looked like it was in the running for ‘biggest coffee mug in existence’. She placed it under what I assumed was an automatic coffee maker and pressed one of the buttons. A grinding noise erupted from the machine and I could hear the water begin to steam creating a kind of coffee duet that sang to us with the smell of a rich aroma wafting in the air.
“What do you think?” she asked.
“Looks like a pretty bad ass coffee machine to me,” I answered.
“Not about this, about my son,” she said, her serious expression had returned. I took it as a sign that she was ready to defend him if need be. I had no intention of that being necessary.
“Seems like a good man, well educated, driven,” I said with a nod for each point adjective used to describe him.
“He is a good man,” she said quietly, almost sadly.
“But?” I asked, feeling as if there was more that she wanted to say.
“But, it’s hard to look at him grow older, aged the way he has. I still feel like he is my baby boy, and nothing could ever change that. At least until I look at him and see how few years we will have together before the last man I ever loved is gone.” Tears welled in her eyes and I could see now why this trip was so hard for her. He was the last thing she had that remained from her human life, and he was fading away with time. I was thankful that I did not have those attachments, but my heart still broke for her.
“I understand,” I said as I brought her into my own arms and held her there, trying to comfort her heartache. The pressed her moist eyes into my shirt as the coffee machine sputtered its hot fluid into the large mug.
That would have to wait, I knew as she trembled lightly in my arms, she did not want to show this side of herself to Robert. She did not want him to know the dread of loss the way she felt it. She wanted to protect him as only a mother would, as fully and completely as she could manage.
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