"The Mirror Crack'd”
Aliset
Rating: PG-13 for angst,
violence, language and some mature themes.
Classic
A/N: My special thanks to
Carole and Vicky, for their gut checks and encouragement,
and the ladies (and
gents) of the BBTV list, who helped me
with the research on one aspect of this
story. My hat’s off to all of you.
Summary: The aftermath of
the scene in the Great Hall from “Arabesque”
Out flew the web and
floated by
The mirror crack'd from
side to side
“The curse has come upon
me,” cried
The Lady
of Shallot
“The Lady of Shallot,”
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Chapter One
Father was never able to
say, then or later, what had drawn him to the Great Hall that night. Perhaps it
was some chore of Vincent's left undone, though Vincent was usually careful
about such things and at the age of 15 was more than aware that some tasks
could not be shirked. More likely it was something Lisa had left undone or done
incorrectly. Not a few of the tunnel adults were put out with her; even as they
acknowledged and were proud of her dancing talent, the fact remained that
depending on Lisa for anything else was like looking to find the bottom of the
Abyss. Impossible, and ultimately, a great waste of time.
He couldn't have said
what drew him there, but he was glad he had gone. Father arrived just in time
to see the desperate, clenching embrace of his son as he held Lisa tight, and
the blood that welled from the scratches on her shoulder as she tried---and
failed---to free herself. The fact that Vincent had nearly used those same
claws on him as he called out his name was the most minor of the horrors
welling from that night, and one that Father quickly disregarded as Vincent's
sobbing mingled with Lisa's as she fled.
"It's all
right," he murmured to his distraught son. But even then, he couldn't have
said how anything would ever be all right again.
***
He met Mary in the hospital chamber as she was putting the iodine back in the
cabinet. "Severe?" he asked, knowing who Mary had been treating.
"No," she
replied. "Just some surface abrasions. I doubt she'll even scar." She
finished folding the gauze, replaced that next to the iodine. "She's in
her chamber, quite upset. What happened between her and Vincent?"
Father clenched his
fists, upset that he hadn't seen this coming. The flirtation between Vincent
and Lisa had been obvious for months and most of the tunnel dwellers had been
amused by it, in the way of adults watching the teenagers they care for grow
up, but Father had always been of two minds on the subject of Lisa. She had
certainly needed them as a child but even then, there was something about her
which had made him wary. Now, he dearly
wished she'd found someone else, anyone else, to flirt with, instead of his
son. "They argued," Father said curtly.
Mary ignored his tone,
knowing him far too well to take it personally. "I see," she said,
though she had yet to see the argument that would create that sort of wound
pattern. Her heart hurt for both Lisa and Vincent. "Where is
Vincent?"
"In his
chamber," Father replied. "I wouldn't go in there just now."
Mary raised her eyebrows.
"He's not...injured?"
Father shook his head.
"Not physically. Emotionally, though..."
"But you'll talk to
him?" Mary asked.
Father sighed. "Yes.
For all the good that will do."
***
After some deliberation,
Father set out for Lisa's chamber first. He found her sitting on the bed,
staring out into space, and looking quite pale. "Lisa," he said.
She turned to look at him
then, a singularly beautiful girl of perhaps 16 or 17--even Lisa didn't know
for sure. "I came to check your wound," Father said, as evenly as he
could.
Lisa vaulted off the bed
and stood with her back against the wall. “It's fine. There's nothing to look
at.”
“Why don't you tell me
what happened, then?” Father said gently.
Lisa shrugged, rubbing
her arms as if she were cold. “It's nothing. If you don't mind, I'd like to go
back to practicing my dancing.”
Father thought of
Vincent, who quite clearly loved---or thought he did---this chit of a girl. Who
hadn't once expressed any concern for him, who was far more interested in her
dance than she was in the well-being of her “dearest friend.”
“I see,” Father replied,
seeing all too clearly and liking none of it. “I'd avoid any arm extensions for
a few days, until it heals,” he continued. If she wanted her dance, he'd do his
level best to make sure she got it. The sooner she left the tunnels, the better
for all of them. “Has Madame Delacroix spoken to you?”
Lisa nodded. “She says I
may come above and live with her while I train. But I really couldn't leave
everyone.”
Leave your club of
admirers, you mean. Including my son, my wounded and wounding son. “Indeed
you can, Lisa. In fact, I insist upon it.”
Her brown eyes darkened.
“You...do? You're making me leave?”
Father laughed, a sound
with no humor in it. “Hardly, child. Madame Delacroix has told us many times
how talented you are, that with more formal training you could perform on stage
before the world. And she's asked us
many times to let you go. Before, you were too young but now....we've grown too
small for you, Lisa.”
“When am I to leave?”
“Tomorrow morning. Madame
Delacroix will come for you.”
With that, he left. In
the years to come, he was to turn this conversation over and over in his mind,
wondering if he'd been too harsh on a young woman who'd been through a
shattering experience of her own. But at the time, with Vincent's emotional
well-being foremost on his mind, he couldn't bring himself to care. She was
injured, but Vincent was hemorrhaging from wounds far less visible.
Chapter
Two
Vincent's chamber was
dark when he arrived. That, in itself, was not unusual; Vincent could see
perfectly well in what looked like pitch darkness to anyone else. But it was
unlike him not
to
leave at least a candle burning. “Vincent?” he called, stepping into the
chamber. He couldn't see a thing except a glitter in the corner; the
reflection, he realized, of Vincent's eyes.
He was crouched in a
narrow corner that should have been impossible for him to crawl into, as tall
as he'd become. Yet Vincent had done it and as his eyes adjusted to the dark,
he could just barely see Vincent, cross-legged and staring into nothing.
“Vincent,” he said again, lighting a candle to see better and hobbling closer
to kneel in front of his son.
“Yes, Father?” Vincent
said distantly. Father didn't like that tone; it was the sound of shame and
isolation and utter dejection. He hadn't heard it since Devin's disappearance
and could have gone a full lifetime without ever hearing it again.
“Are you...well?” Father
tilted the candle closer and the candlelight reflected off the tear tracks on
the sharp planes of his son's face.
“I hurt her, Father. Is
she....?” Vincent asked quietly.
“She's fine,” Father
replied. “Just a few scratches. What happened?”
Vincent scrubbed at his
face with the back of one hand. “Leave me alone,” he said desperately. “I
can't...I don't want to talk about it.”
There were a few
constants Father had learned over the years in raising Vincent. When he wanted
to talk, he would. When he didn't want to, he wouldn't...and nothing and no one
would make him speak. And when Vincent wanted to be left alone, it was best to
listen. “Very well,” Father said calmly, reassuringly. “If you want to talk,
you know where to find me.” He stood up
and backed away slowly as he would with any wild creature in so much pain. Though Father longed to take his son in his
arms, these were no wounds he could heal.
***
The next morning was
taken up with the minutiae of Lisa's move Above; Madame Delacroix being not
quite as prepared for Lisa as Father had led Lisa to believe, but welcoming of
her new boarder just the same. She had taken Lisa's arm and her one suitcase
and as the door slid shut behind them, Father was conscious only of a immense
sense of relief. Lisa hadn't looked back, not once, as she'd left, and now,
perhaps Vincent would heal and return from his silences.
Vincent didn't appear for
breakfast, nor lunch either. When he didn't appear for dinner, Father went to
find him in his chambers. “Lisa's gone,” Vincent said flatly, angrily.
“Yes,” Father said,
conscious only that he must protect Vincent from further hurt. “She went Above
this morning, for her dance. Remember? There was talk of it.”
Abruptly, Vincent's anger
collapsed on itself and his voice grew rougher. “It's because of me,” he said
haltingly.
“No, Vincent,” Father
said. “She went to dance, to her new life Above. It had nothing to do with
you.”
Vincent gazed at him then
as if he didn't quite believe him, and in another whiplash of mood change,
stalked to the other side of the chamber and began pacing. “I hurt her!”
Father didn't know quite
what to say. What words could he use, after all? “She's gone, Vincent. Nothing
like that will ever happen again.”
It was the wrong thing to
say. Vincent whirled on him, his words biting in the cool, still air. “Why?
Because no one will love a beast like me? I loved her, Father, and I hurt her!”
Father was struck, suddenly, by how big Vincent had gotten, how imposing his presence
had become.
Heavily, Father sat down
on the bed. Vincent and his hurts had always wounded Father to the quick; even
as a small child, it had been near impossible for Father to see him hurt. “Lisa
had her own path to follow, Vincent. She will not be back. Your path is always,
will always, be here. You know that.”
He turned his head, then
realized he'd spoken to empty air. Vincent had fled.
Father refused to worry.
Vincent went to ground when he was hurting; after Devin's disappearance, he'd
fled into one of the caves lining the Maze and holed up there for a few days.
Surely Vincent would return, under his own power and if not precisely healed,
then at least more at peace. It was nothing he needed other people for, only
time and solitude.
***
Vincent sat in the
shelter of a dark cave and closed his eyes, letting the darkness cover him like
a warm blanket. Lisa is gone,
he thought, dully, but the images, the rages at that simple statement burned
through him like lightening. She left. She left me. The
scene had replayed over and over in his head: Lisa's feather-light touches, the
softness of her skirts around his legs as she twirled, her scent increasing as
she perspired. Then when he had taken her in his arms, she had brought her face
up to his and his hands had held her and....Vincent buried his face in his
hands and felt the guilt wash over him. Not since Devin had he hurt someone
with his hateful claws. And to have hurt Lisa, of all people....
She fought us. That
was an odd thought, a whisper of darkness at the edge of his consciousness. “I'm
going mad,” he said aloud.
And nearly jumped out of
his skin when his own voice answered back, though his lips hadn't moved. “No,
you're not.”
“Who...who are you?”
Vincent asked the apparition, which was emerging from the shadows of the cave.
It perched on a rocky outcropping just to the left of him and looked for all
the world like him, just...darker. Somehow, more lethal, more intent. And dark.
Very dark. “I am
losing my mind.”
The apparition smiled,
evilly. “Think that if you want. But I'm you. And you're not insane.” He
climbed down from the outcropping and
sat down on his haunches. “We hurt her. So she left us.”
“I didn't want to hurt
her,” Vincent muttered, wondering how he'd ever explain this conversation to
Father. Perhaps he wouldn't, then.
“Lisa offered herself to
us,” that malevolent voice continued, as if they were discussing the weather,
no particular emotional impact beyond the bare facts. “We do not like it when prey struggles. Or
changes her mind.”
This was all so horribly
askew, Father's instructions about you must be careful now,
gentle contorting and clashing
with the instinct to hold on tightly to who and what he loved. “You could go
find her,” his dark counterpart said.
It was possible too---he
knew where she'd be. But this parting was final, and for the greater good and
he couldn't do that. He couldn't love her, couldn't have her, wasn't fit,
wasn't right... Vincent clenched his fists, feeling the hated claws biting into
his skin. There would be blood, he knew, but didn't care. “Leave me,” he rasped.
“I'm a part of you,” the
creature said, mockingly.
“No!” Vincent howled.
This primal demon, a part of him? The instinct to harm instead of heal, hurt
instead of care? A part of him? It couldn't be.
“I'm going now,” his
darker self said. “But I'm not leaving. Not ever.”
And he was gone. Vincent
rubbed his face, and wept. But was unable to drown out the sound of the
creature's laughter.
Chapter
Three
Vincent returned to his
chamber early the next morning before anyone else was stirring. He hoped,
without much optimism, for a few hours of sleep, but found them interrupted by
red-hazed dreams where he searched for Lisa but was turned away again, and
other, darker dreams that left him aching and sweating and sticky when he
awoke. Horrified by the residue of those dreams, he balled up his stained
sheets and clothing and tossed them in a basket in a corner; he'd launder them
when no one was around.
After a few hours tossing
and turning, he gave up, and got dressed, just in time to see Father hobbling
in. There was no mistaking the relief on his father's face. “Ah, Vincent, I'm
glad to see you're back.” Father tilted his head, and Vincent sighed inwardly.
He knew that look, and had never been able to hide anything from Father
anyway. “Would you like some breakfast?”
Father asked.
His stomach rebelled
instantly at the thought of food. “No, I'm not hungry.”
Father came closer then
and pressed a cool hand to Vincent's forehead. Before he was even aware of the
touch, Vincent felt a low snarl building up in his chest. It was instinct,
nothing more, but Vincent reeled backwards, horrified. “Father, I....”
Very carefully, Father
sat down in the chair opposite side of the bed. Vincent noted that the chair
was out of swinging range, and his shame rose to burn his face. “Vincent,
you're running a fever,” Father said, as if nothing at all unnatural had
happened.
Shows you what he knows, his
inner demon mocked. We are
unnatural. Vincent ignored it. “Why
don't you come down to the baths?” Father continued. “I can't give you any
medication for the fever, but the water should make you feel better.”
The thought of climbing
into the bathing pool naked now, with so many people soon to be about and able
to stare at his misshapen, ugly body was horrifying. “Perhaps later, Father,”
Vincent managed.
Father didn't leave as
Vincent thought he would. Nor did he maintain his careful distance. Instead,
Father took his hand. “Vincent, I know you're going through a rough time right
now. But there's no sense in making yourself sick.”
“Sick” was too little
a word to describe this
feeling, with the demon clawing inside him and fever burning at the corner of
his eyes. Nevertheless, it would do. “Yes, Father,” he said, as obediently as
he could. The creature inside him snickered, the roiling distaste churning his
stomach further.
Father did stand then and
Vincent found he had no energy at all, either to continue the conversation with
Father or to argue with the beast inside him. “Rest,” Father said. “I'll take
you off the chore list for now, but I want you to eat something when you wake
up.” He brushed aside Vincent's bangs, as he hadn't since Vincent was a small
child, and left.
Vincent stretched out on
his bed, closing his eyes. He was unable to close his mind to the insistent
chant. Go to her. You know you
want her. She is ours.
***
Vincent awoke to the
still, quiet darkness of the tunnels at night. Restless, he kicked off his
sheets, noticing again that they were soaked and sticky. A subway train roared
nearby as he tore the sheets off the bed and threw them in the laundry basket.
He remembered only the feel of Lisa's thighs in the dream as he---
“Oh, I just bet you did,”
his dark half drawled, leering down at him from the upper alcove. “I bet you
were too busy dancing with her to notice the way her leotard was so tight right
there.” The voice was oily,
mocking and Vincent felt the harsh fury rise within him.
“Enough,” Vincent
snarled, and the creature laughed. “You think you're the only one who's ever
felt this way for a woman?” The beast jumped down to stand next to him. “'Tua
pulchra facies me planszer milies, pectus habet glacies.'”(1)
Vincent rocked back on
his heels in shock. The Latin was a language he'd learned literally at his
father's knee, along with the other children, and the translation came easily
to him. “'Your beautiful face makes me weep a thousand times, your heart is of
ice.'”
“Or if that doesn't do it
for you, how about this?” The beast circled him in a rough mockery of Lisa's
last dance. “'Vellet deus, vallent dii, quod mente propusui: ut eius virginea
reserassem vincula”
(2)
The words were obscene,
and the red haze of rage came roiling over Vincent in a wave more powerful than
anything he had ever known. “I cannot!” he snarled, shoving his dark twin up
against a wall hard enough to rattle the statue of Lady Justice.
The apparition seemed
unmoved. “Sure you could have. Except you're not man enough. You could have had
her at any time. All those times spent watching her dance, by yourselves. You
could have taken her and---”
It was too much. Vincent
slapped the apparition hard, not bothering to pull his claws in. Blood dripped
from the corner of the creature's mouth. “So you can
be moved to passion, eh?” he said, not bothering to wipe the blood off his
face. “But you know what the real problem is? Lisa wouldn't want you, because
she wants a real man, not some furry, half-beast thing
who won't even come for her.”
Vincent sank down onto
the cold floor, shaking, torn asunder with the force of his emotions. He sat
there for a long time, and did not notice when the creature disappeared again.
“'Estuans interius ira vehementi in amaritudine loquor mee menti: factus de
materia, cinis elementi, similis sum folio,de quo ludunt venti
he murmured to the shadows, and was left alone with the echo of his voice.
Chapter
Four
The next morning, Vincent
found Father waiting for him in Commons, clearly planning to haul him off for a
whole battery of tests if Vincent didn't try to eat something. His temperature
was down, the likely result of his cold baths earlier that morning. He had no
real hunger and no particular desire to eat, but if the choice was between
eating and being poked and prodded in the hospital chamber, he'd take eating
any day.
Good, you're eating,
his inner voice muttered as he picked up the toast.
You
need strength to hunt.
Shut up, Vincent
thought and concentrated on ignoring the creature's laughter. I
am not a beast. I do not hunt.
He looked up from his toast and found eyes as blue as his own staring
malevolently at him from across the table. His dark half, come to life again,
here, in front of all these people. Vincent just barely managed to avoid
rearing back in shock and concentrated on the mechanical motions of eating:
chewing, swallowing, eating again.
Then Father came to sit
down. For the first time in his life, Vincent didn't want Father to be there.
Not so close to this dark phantom.
I could strike him down
with one swat. And you couldn't
stop me, could you?
"No," Vincent
muttered softly, feeling the growl rising in his throat at this threat to his
family.
You
are
the threat. I live in you, the beast responded,
amused.
Where do you think I come
from, after all?
"Vincent, what is
it?" Father asked.
Vincent had a swift
awareness of how odd this must look: himself, staring and growling at the empty
space in front of him. Father touched his arm, and the sense of concern washed
through him and over him.
I have made him worry.
Again.
Regrets are for humans.
You're not.
The
creature's words pounded with the sick, burning rhythm of his blood and Vincent
closed his eyes and clenched his fists, trying desperately not to hear.
“Vincent?”
Father said again, and the hand that touched his forehead was ice cold. “You're
burning up again. You should be in bed. Come,” he said softly.
Vincent
felt the urge to flee from this man and the sharp grey eyes that missed
nothing, and the dark apparition across from him heartily agreed. Flee. Run to her. Leave this
man. She is ours.
Fighting
down the snarling part of him, the part that would never agree to anyone's care
or consent, Vincent left with Father.
***
He
awoke some hours later to a wet, chilling feeling washing over his body.
Vincent opened his eyes and realized that his sheets were soaked again and
there were bags of ice under his armpits and in his groin. Ice? The
sheets must be soaked from the melting water then, he thought, relieved.
The demon had not come to him in his sleep again.
Vincent
turned his head and saw Father watching him. The pipes were quiet so it must be
early yet. Or late. “Father?” he murmured.
“Oh,
Vincent,” Father said in relief. “Your temperature went quite high. How do you
feel now?”
He
considered. “Tired, Father.”
“Well,
I suppose that's to be expected.” A pause, then, “You were delirious. Do you
remember anything?”
Vincent
shook his head. “No.”
“I
suppose it's just as well,” Father said. “You must have caught a bug, dear boy.
Rest now and hopefully, you'll be feeling better soon.”
Vincent
closed his eyes, feeling the dark weight of his exhaustion pressing him
downwards into the depths where the Beast lurked and waited, biding its time.
***
“I want you to talk to
him,” Father said uncomfortably. “Please.”
Winslow wiped the back of
his sweaty forehead with a rag. It was hot here in the forge, hotter than it
was Above in the height of midsummer, but Winslow had long since gotten used to
it. And what he couldn't get used to, he endured. It had always been that way.
“Why me? Because I got all this romantic experience?” Winslow asked.
“No,” Father replied,
gripping the handle of his cane. “Because I
don't. I don't know what to say to him. And he's
more at ease with you than with anyone else.”
“How about 'there are
other fish in the sea'?” Winslow said. “That was your line when I got entangled
with...oh, hell, what was her name again?”
Despite himself, Father
found himself returning Winslow's smile. “It was Rebecca.. And as I know you
remember, I said that after she wouldn't dance the first dance of Winterfest
with you. And you were 17 at the time.”
Winslow poured a cup of
water and handed it to Father, then poured one for himself. “And this isn't the
same thing, I take it.”
“It isn't.” Their eyes
met and Father frowned. “I don't know what to say to him. How can I tell him
I'm sorry she's gone, when I sent her away? When I wasn't sorry to see her go?
Vincent will see through that in an instant.”
“Then don't say that,”
Winslow said. “Look, I'm not used to being asked for my romantic advice, but
since you asked---”
Father sighed. “What do
you suggest?”
“Look, I can go up top
and meet any girl I want. I haven't yet, but I could. Vincent doesn't have that
option. So skip the line about the fish in the sea, 'cause it does him no good
if he can't swim in the ocean.” Winslow drank some water. “It should be Devin
talking to him, you know.”
“I know,” Father agreed.
“If only I knew where he'd run off to...”
“You don't think he's
dead, then?” Winslow asked curiously.
“Vincent doesn't. And I'm
inclined to trust him on this point. He knew Devin better than anyone.” Father
sighed again. “Will you talk to him?”
“Father, I'm twenty years
old. Just what do you think I can tell him?”
“You're his friend, and
he trusts you. I was hoping you could tell him, reassure him, that his sorrow
is normal, but it will pass.”
Winslow frowned a bit,
considering. “I'll talk to him. But Father...he might not want to listen to me.
Or to anyone. So don't be surprised if this isn't over yet.”
Chapter
Five
A
few days of rest found Vincent, if not entirely well, at least well enough to
resume his normal duties. Vincent had discovered early on that he enjoyed
heights and he enjoyed climbing, and once he was sufficiently old enough that
Father judged it was time for him to start learning the work of the repair
crews, he had been assigned to the crew which repaired the pipes and monitored
them for leakage.
Today
was the first time since his fever began that Father had decided he was well
enough to return. “Now, see here, Vincent,” Father said, his accent becoming
more clipped as it did when he was worried, “you will tell me, won't you, if
you're feeling unwell?”
“Of
course, Father,” Vincent said, and immediately regretted it. He felt unwell
each and every time his apparition appeared but maybe it was gone now and he
wouldn't have to tell Father anything. He leaned forward and kissed Father on
the forehead. “I'll be fine.”
“Go
on, then,” Father said, brushing his bangs and barely, just barely, touching
his forehead.
“I'm
not sick,” Vincent said.
“I
know you're not,” Father replied. “But be careful anyway.”
Vincent
nodded, picked up his satchel of food supplies and headed out to meet Winslow
in the corridor. “You up to this?” Winslow asked gruffly.
Vincent
grinned up at him, noticing that the difference in their heights was a lot less
than it had been. “Are you going to go up there by yourself if I'm not?” he
asked wryly.
Winslow
chuckled. “Now, that'd be fun to explain to Father. The pipe burst because my
fat ass sat on it. No, I'll leave that to skinny types like you and David.”
Winslow called ahead to David, who was zipping up the bag of tools. “Which
one's causing problems this time, David?”
Tall,
lanky David scratched his head. “The elder Pascal says it's the one in the
linkage that leads near the storage room. If that one goes....” He didn't have
to complete the thought; the storage room held all of their bulk foods,
preserves and emergency rations.
“Where
do the pipes link?” Vincent asked. He had an excellent memory for the physical
locations of this world, but the pipes were Elder Pascal's pride and joy and no
one knew them better.
“Elder
says the linkage is above the Mirror Pool, about twenty feet up,” David
replied.
And
therein was the problem in pipe maintenance. David knew how to fix pipes, but
he had no head for heights. Winslow didn't mind heights and had no problems
making whatever tools were needed, but couldn't climb up to fix the pipes. This left Vincent, who could climb and who
was light enough to sit on the highest pipes and fix them if he was walked
through it. It was an imperfect system but had worked several times before;
Winslow just hoped it continued to work until Vincent was as fully trained as
David.
They
reached the Mirror Pool and began laying out the tools, the rappelling ropes
and the pipe diagrams. Winslow watched uneasily as Vincent suited up in their
make-shift safety harness. If anything happened to him, Father would have his
guts for breakfast. “Are you sure you're up for this?” he asked again, quietly,
so David couldn't hear. David was new to the tunnels and Winslow was uncertain
of how much he'd heard of the incident
with Lisa.
Vincent's
hands stopped fiddling with the safety knot in the ropes. “Winslow,” he said
seriously. “I need to work. And this needs to be done.”
Remembering
his own teenage tribulations, and recognizing that Vincent was doing his best
to take up a man's part in this world, Winslow nodded. “Just be careful,” he
said. “If you can't fix the pipe, come back down. We can always find another
way.”
The
glance Vincent threw him was darkly amused. “Right. I'm sure we'll get a
plumber down here. I can just hear the instructions now: 'take the sewer tunnel
all the way to the left, and straight on 'til morning.'”
Winslow
chuckled. “Just get it done, Vincent.” He watched as the boy---no, young
man---skittered up the sheer walls. Blindingly fast, it seemed he went up the
walls without any searching for toeholds or hesitation in his path. “How does
he do that?” David asked. “I've never seen anything like it.”
Winslow
shrugged. “You want to know, you ask him. Let's get this job going; the sooner
it's done, the sooner we can get back home.”
***
Vincent
caught one of Winslow's makeshift wrenches in his left hand. “Got it,” he
called down to them. One part of his
concentration was on David's instructions; the other was split on the sheer joy
of being able to climb openly. Father had always worried that Vincent might
fall and hurt himself climbing, but Vincent never fell, and had been climbing
for years without Father's permission or knowledge. It was a joy, and a
pleasure, to be able to do it openly. I
can help us and I can be...me.
For the first time in days, the pain of Lisa was forgotten. She was in her
world and he was needed in his. If he was no kind of man that a girl might
willingly touch, he was at least useful here.
He
crossed his legs under him as he shimmied further down the pipe, tightening
down bolts that had come loose with the change of seasons and replacing others
that needed replacing. He made a mental note to let David know the entire pipe
would have to be replaced; it would hold with the repairs but one more season
would see it leaking again. Father
won't like that, not at all. But it has to be
done.
“Forget
about me, have you?” the silky voice said out of nowhere and Vincent felt the
sick, crawling nausea again. Oh,
no, not here. Not now. Please.
“I
thought you'd forgotten. But I kept thinking that you wouldn't do that to us.”
The apparition perched precariously on a nearby pipe.
“Why
are you here?” Vincent demanded, hoping that the acoustics of this place
wouldn't carry his voice to Winslow and David, twenty feet below.
“To
remind you that she's still out there. Wanting us.”
Vincent
shook his head. “She doesn't want us...me.”
His
dark half smiled, showing all his fangs in a way Vincent never would. “Oh, but
you're wrong. She dreams of us at night. You know...those
kind
of dreams.”
“What
of it?” Vincent hissed softly. “I am here and she is there. So there is nothing
to be done.”
“Vincent,
you okay up there?” Winslow called.
Vincent
cursed, softly and fluently, in words Father didn't know he knew. What if
Winslow had heard? “I'm fine,” he called back. “I'll be down shortly.” He made
a great fuss of tightening a bolt that was already pretty tight to begin with.
Without looking at his dark alter, he muttered, “Look, is that all you ever
have to say? That I should go after her? She left. I would have explained---”
His
ears caught the unmistakable sound of a snicker from the creature across from
him. “Explained what? That she'd taunted and teased us, that her scent was full
of wanting, that even as she said no, her body was saying yes? Oh, I can
certainly see how that explanation would have
gone.” The dark one folded his arms. “If you want her to understand, then we
must go Above. Find her and make her see.”
Vincent
closed his eyes. Above was forbidden, Above was dark and dangerous and
treacherous. Above was....
...where
Lisa was. “I cannot,” he hissed.
Winslow's
voice, urgent, now, called up from below him. “Vincent, David's hearing
something on the pipes that he doesn't like. Get down, now!”
Vincent
never ignored Winslow in That Tone of voice. Fleeing the dark creature, he
scampered back down the pipes, just before a smaller, non-critical pipe
ruptured in a hiss of hot steam.
***
“Boy,
that was a close one,” Winslow muttered, once they were safely done. Elder
Pascal had located where the smaller pipe linked in and had managed to shut it
off before much damage was done. When it was cooler, Vincent and the others
would repair it too, but now the main damage of the leaking pipe was fixed for
the time being and they relaxed, knowing another disaster had been averted.
David
had left already to get a meal from the Commons. “Hey, Vincent,” Winslow began.
“Yes?”
Vincent said, throwing small stones into the Mirror Pool.
“I
heard you up there, talking to someone. You okay?”
Vincent's
heart skipped one beat, then two, then resumed its normal rhythm. Yes,
why don't you explain that one?
“I'm fine,” he said tersely.
“Uh-huh,”
Winslow said, unconvinced. “Look, Vincent, I know what happened with Lisa. I
know you two quarreled and she left. I've been there. If you want to talk---”
“We
did not quarrel,” Vincent hissed, in a voice that was not entirely his own.
“She teased. She left. That is all.”
Winslow
felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. This was not the Vincent he
knew, the child he'd seen grow up, the young man so eager to learn. This was
someone much more...alien. And dangerous. The eyes were a darker blue, lacking
their usual warmth, and in that sharp and feral gaze, Winslow saw nothing of
his friend, nothing at all.
“Okay,”
Winslow said, wondering how he'd explain this to Father. This
is a lot more than a broken heart.
“Okay.”
***
The
hard part, as always, was finding Father alone long enough to have a private
conversation. Every trouble, every minor detail, trounced its way through
Father's chamber at one time or another, and Winslow was getting frustrated.
He
finally managed to secure some private time by dint of ambushing Father after
dinner, with some excuse of a matter in the forge. “So I talked to him,”
Winslow said, not wasting time with preliminaries.
Father
sat down heavily in Winslow's lone chair. “And?”
Winslow
leaned up against the wall. “He's not well, Father.” And he related the events
of the pipe repair, the conversation he'd heard Vincent having with someone who
wasn't there.
“I
saw something like that at breakfast last week,” Father admitted. “I had hoped
it was merely the fever. But he was well when I sent him out this morning.”
“Yeah,
he seemed fine to me too,” Winslow agreed. “Until I heard him arguing with
shadows. What do we do now, Father?”
Father
rubbed his eyes. “Keep an eye on him, Winslow. I'll see if I can get in contact
with Peter Alcott. If you see anything more dangerous than a hallucination,
please find me immediately.”
Winslow
eyed him. “Vincent...you know how strong he's gotten?”
Father
nodded wearily. “Yes. Anything more dangerous than a hallucination could be
harmful...and not just to him.”
Chapter Six
Courtesy
of a late-night message to a helper who knew an emergency when he saw one,
Father was able to locate Peter Alcott at home, after being switched back and
forth between the front desks of three different hospitals. When the doctor's beleaguered receptionist
told Father that the doctor had finally gone home, Father felt no small amount
of relief. Peter's wife had died some years previously and his daughter, Susan,
had just started college on the west coast. Peter would be alone in the house
and able to talk.
When
Peter answered the phone, he sounded a bit groggy, but alert. Such were the
hazards of being not only an on-call physician Above, but below as well. Father
related the story of Lisa's leaving, Vincent's fevers and hallucinations, and
Peter's voice grew progressively more concerned. “Will he submit to an
examination, Jacob?” Peter asked and Father started briefly, wondering who this
“Jacob” was. Then he relaxed, knowing that as long as he and Peter had known
each other, the title of “Father” must still be strange on Peter's ear.
Father
sighed into the phone. “I don't know. Yesterday, I would have said yes.
Today...”
“All
right. I'll be down shortly. Is he exhibiting any other strange behavior?”
“No,
not now. When I last saw him, he was sleeping in his chambers.”
***
Vincent
was sleeping, but not peacefully. He was in the Great Hall again, where Lisa
danced for him in garments of a filmy pink substance that was nearly the color
of her skin. She came near him and her scent rose higher and stronger the
longer she danced. He had never smelled it before, but his body knew, had
always known, what it was: arousal. She
wants me.
Lisa circled him, planted feathery kisses on his cheekbones and he watched as
she pirouetted away....
...to
dance with someone else. His dark half, dark where he was fair, kissing Lisa
and his hands roaming all over her body, in the places where the leotard was
tightest. Vincent clenched his fists.
“This cannot be real,” he muttered.
The
beast looked up from where he was nuzzling Lisa's shoulder. “It can be. If you
have the guts to find her. She still wants us.” Lisa's dark eyes smiled and
turned back to her lover.
Vincent's
eyes snapped open and he smelled, impossibly, Lisa's scent, hot in the still
air around him. He would find her. He would find her this night and make her
his.
He
brushed by the sentries as he rushed towards the entrance. She was his. Nothing
could stand in his way. Nothing.
***
“His
temperature was 103 degrees last night,” Father began as he escorted Peter from
his basement threshold.
“Did
you give him anything?” Peter asked.
“No,”
Father replied. “You know about his unusual drug reactions. I didn't dare.”
“Well,
I hope that we won't need them this time either, but---” Abruptly, a fury of
clanking burst on the pipes. Peter knew the code well enough to know it was an
emergency but any other nuance escaped him.
Father
paled. “Dear God, it's Vincent. Quickly, Peter, we must go to the main
entrance!” They rushed as fast as they could with Father's injured hip, but
they heard the danger a long time before they saw it. A roaring, harsh and
painful and furious.
As
they rounded the corner, they saw Vincent, haloed in the glow of the sunrise
through the light that entered into the main entrance tunnel. Father's heart
sank as he noticed how dark the hair was around Vincent's hairline. Perspiration. He's
burning up. Again.
Vincent roared his
desperation as
he threw his body against the gate, only to find that it still held firm.The blue eyes were wild
with fury and there was no recognition in that feral gaze.
Father
stepped forward. “Jacob,” Peter began, but Father waved him off. “He's my son,
Peter.”
“Vincent,”
Father said firmly. “Come with me.” He was very careful to make no sudden
movements, for fear of startling his son into some even more reckless action.
Vincent
crouched down as if to attack, blue eyes dark and angry. The growling
continued. Father took one more step forward. “It's time to come home,
Vincent.”
His
son crouched lower, leaning up against the gate and the growling came to a slow
stop. “Father?” he rasped weakly. “What....?”
Father
rushed forward to hold Vincent in his arms. “Vincent, it's all right. Do you
feel up to walking?” He looked down at his son and smoothed the sweat-dark hair
back from his flushed face. Fine tremors ran through Vincent's body.
Fever,
and now chills, and hallucinations. What are we
dealing with here?
Vincent
nodded. Clambering up on unsteady legs, with Peter on one side and Father on
the other, they made their way back home.
***
Vincent
had fallen into a deep sleep almost as soon as they reached his chamber. Believing
he would sleep now that the adrenaline of the flight towards Lisa had
dissipated, Father blew out the one remaining candle and led Peter down into
the library.
“You
were lucky tonight, Jacob,” Peter said, holding the cup of tea in his hands but
not really aware of it.. “How long has he been like this?”
“He's
had the fevers off and on since Lisa left last week. The hallucinations are
something new, so far as I know.” Father rubbed his eyes. It was just dumb luck
that no one had gotten hurt; a sentry had seen Vincent rushing the gate but
hadn't confronted him. If the sentry had tried to interfere, the consequences
could have been disastrous. Vincent, enraged, was nothing to fool with.
“You'll
have to sedate him,” Peter said quietly “Because that gate won't hold forever.”
Drugs.
The one thing they tried to avoid using on Vincent ever since he was a small
child, when a reaction to aspirin---aspirin!---had nearly cost him his life.
They'd been lucky; Vincent was rarely sick and healed very quickly when he was
injured, so drugs hadn't really been necessary since then. But now....
“I
know,” Father said, defeated. He got up and walked unsteadily towards the
locked cabinet in his study, the one that contained their emergency supplies of
sedatives and anesthetics. He closed his eyes briefly. In rendering his son
unconscious, even for a few hours, would he truly be helping him? Or would he
be surrendering Vincent to the beast that clearly held him in his grasp?
And if he manages to hurt
himself or someone else, what will you do
then, Jacob?
Father
shook his head. He knew, he had always known, that Vincent's place among them
had been bought by a large amount of willing ignorance. People were comfortable
around Vincent largely because he acted and spoke and thought as they did,
because he did so few obvious things that were foreign to what they knew as
“normal.” The beast inside Vincent, the beast which Father suspected was
fueling the rages and the fevers, was another matter entirely. Rarely seen
since Vincent was a toddler and surfacing only in moments of terrible
provocation since, Father had never forgotten his brief encounters with the
darker side of Vincent's nature.
He
unlocked the cabinet and withdrew his largest gauge syringe and a bottle of a
strong sedative he used when setting broken bones. Perhaps this would give his
son a few hours of rest while they tried to figure out what to do next.
Peter
followed him as he crossed to Vincent's chamber and watched in astonishment as
Father gently woke his son up. “Jacob, why...?”
“I've
never lied to him, Peter,” the man now called Father replied. “If I'm going to
make him unconscious, he should at least know why.”
Vincent's
blue eyes opened, fever-bright in that pale face. “Father?”
“I
want to give you something to make you sleep for a few hours. Is that all
right?”
Vincent
nodded weakly. “Before you do...did I hurt anyone?”
Father
shook his head. “You've been very ill, Vincent. But no one was hurt.”
Vincent
nearly sobbed in relief. “I just remember working on the pipes and---”
“I
know,” he said gently. “Winslow told me. It's all right. Soon, you'll be well.”
Uncovering one lightly furred arm, Father rinsed off a clean site and injected
the sedative. “Sleep well, my son.”
Chapter Seven
Father
was dozing over a worn-out copy of Great
Expectations
when he heard the slow step behind him and came almost instantly awake. Peter
had departed some hours earlier, promising to return with research and
treatment alternatives, and Vincent was still sleeping soundly. So who was
entering his chamber?
He
turned his head and nearly dropped the book. It was Vincent.
I
gave him enough sedative to put him under for six or seven hours. What on
earth?
“Vincent?”
he managed. “Are you all right?”
The
change in the tread of those booted feet as they came towards him sent his
instincts clanking. Vincent was
sometimes awkward with his sudden growth spurt and he walked slower to keep
from tripping over his feet. He wasn't walking that way now; his footsteps were
even and quick, and, as he came to stand in front of Father, Father understood
what his instincts were trying to tell him.
This
was Vincent. Except that it
wasn't. This was the Other, who moved with a feline grace and power that was
strangely hypnotic to watch. “Why, hello Father,” the Other purred. “It's time
we had a chat, don't you think?”
“What
do you want to talk about, Vincent?” Father asked calmly. He would not treat
this...personality as anything other than his son's delusion.
Oh,
Vincent, I wish I knew what to do for you now.
“I'm
not Vincent. He's weak,” the Other replied savagely. “He couldn't even make it
to Lisa, though she wants us.”
Father
felt chilled as Lisa's name was mentioned. Did
he know? How could he?
“You are Vincent,” he insisted.
“You're not weak. Just very...ill.”
Vincent
came close to him suddenly, nearly nose to nose. The Other's breath stirred the
hair on Father's face as he spoke. “I smell her scent on you. Where is she?”
Her...scent? Oh, dear
God. The letters.
“She's
not here, Vincent.”
“Then
why do I smell her scent on you?” One clawed hand gripped his shoulder and
Father fought the tremor of fear.
He
can smell her scent on the letters she sent down, the letters I burned without
reading. And I can't tell him that she's been trying to contact
him.
“I
touched some of her things, Vincent. Truly, she's not here.”
The
creature---Vincent---sniffed the air and released him suddenly. “It doesn't
matter. She will be ours soon enough.”
“I see,” Father said quietly. There would be
other lunges at the gate, other tries at escaping and clearly, sedation wasn't
the answer anymore.
“You
sent her away,” Vincent said accusingly.
There
was no point in lying. “Yes, I did. She was----”
“She
wanted us, so you sent her away.”
Father
got up from the chair, unnerved by the sight of those feral dark eyes staring
down at him. “No, I sent her away because it was time for her to go. It had
nothing to do with your...relationship.”
Oh, didn't it?
The little niggling voice
that sounded like his own father muttered. She
was a threat to your son, so you removed her. May I suggest that
now
is not the time to lie to Vincent?
He needed---and
needs---protection, so I sent her away,
Father said to his
internal voice, then chuckled humorlessly. Here
am I, having a debate with my son's
delusion, while I'm debating with myself over whether it was all right to lie
to him. Kafka couldn't have come up with a better scenario.
Aloud, he said, “Vincent,
it was time for Lisa to go.” He made himself walk across the chamber and face
his son.
“It
was not!” the creature hissed.
“She wanted us!”
Which
told Father that his suspicions were true; just prior to that last, devastating
incident in the Great Hall, there had been some teasing on
Lisa's part, of the sort that he'd witnessed for years between teenaged couples
in the tunnels. It was normal, if awkward and painful to watch at times. But
this kind of teasing from Lisa had scalded his son and driven him to madness. That
little....did she know she was playing with fire?
“She
hasn't written you, Vincent, not once. She doesn't want you, “ Father said.
“She's gone Above, and she will not be coming back.” It hurt to say the words,
but if this delusion could be turned from his plan of going Above.....
“So
you say,” the Other snarled. “But why should I believe you?” And he was gone,
black cloak flying after him like some malignant ghost.
Father
sat down heavily in the chair, hands shaking from delayed shock. He'd seen
madness and delusion before, but this was his son.
Oh,
dear God. What have I done?
***
The
search parties had gone and come back, each more disheartened than the last.
The main gate had been reinforced and strengthened, but there were no signs of
Vincent anywhere. “Probably went to ground,” Winslow said, remembering
Vincent's disappearance after Devin left.
“Which
brings up another...concern,” Father said uneasily. “When Vincent is found, he
must not be allowed to leave the tunnels. It's for his safety and our own.”
Winslow
folded his arms. The alternatives were bad, and growing worse by the hour.
Sedation hadn't worked, nor could they count on simple exhaustion to confine
Vincent, not for long; even worn out by fever and delusion, he was still
stronger than many of them. And rumor had flown faster than Father knew. People
were scared, afraid that Vincent might surface from nowhere and attack them.
“Preposterous,”
Father had said, when Winslow informed him of this. “The only person he's been
attacking is himself. It's himself he battles.”
“Try
telling Lisa that,” Winslow said, and Father threw him a sharp look. “Look,
Father, rumors are flying faster than the facts right now and maybe you should,
I don't know, tell everyone what's really going on. Or tell them something, if
you can't tell them everything. It's gonna get ugly if you don't, because people are damned jumpy right now.”
His voice softened. “What exactly did happen between them? I know they
quarreled and she left, but there's something else going on. ”
And
Father told him everything. When he finished, Winslow shook his head. “She's
lucky she only got away with a few scratches. And this is why Vincent's so
sick? Because he blames himself for hurting her?”
“Yes,
I believe so,” Father said. “But without any sort of testing, there's no way to
know the cause of his illness.” He rubbed his eyes. “In any event, I will call
a general council meeting to try and put these fears of Vincent to rest.”
The
meeting, much as Father feared it would be, was less a gathering of rational
people than a mob on the verge of panic, worried about this new, erratic
element in their lives. As much as they
knew and liked Vincent, the fact was that he'd never acted this way among them.
“Vincent is very ill,” Father said for what felt like the umpteenth time. “He
poses no danger to anyone so long as he is not confronted.”
“Jeremy
saw him at the gate,” a woman spoke. Father recalled her name as Andrea; she
had been in the tunnels only a few weeks. “How can you say he poses no threat?”
Father
turned, looking for Jeremy, and found him sitting on the banister. “Jeremy,
did Vincent hurt you?”
The
man shook his head. “No. I ain't fool enough to get near him when he's like
that.”
“Common
sense is a remarkable thing,” Father stated dryly. “I've heard the rumors that
have been spreading, some foolishness of Vincent leaping out of the shadows to
attack you all.” Various people in the crowd ducked their heads, trying
desperately not to be the target of that sharp-eyed gaze. “Vincent is very,
very ill. He's battling some force within him that only acts out when
confronted. So don't confront him. If you see him, send out a message on the
pipes and stay out of his way. And if you have any questions about what's
really going on, may I suggest asking me instead of starting these rumors?”
After the crowd left, more subdued than when
they arrived, Father saw Winslow and gestured him forward. “You think that
settled matters?” Father asked.
“Well, if it didn't, it should slow them down
some.” Winslow folded his arms, looking grimly determined. “And if it doesn't,
I'll take care of them. Vincent's a good guy, and he doesn't deserve to have
people whispering about him.”
The pipes erupted in a burst of sound. It was
from young Pascal, who'd joined one of the search parties looking for Vincent. V
found. Ninth Street
entrance. In shock. Help needed.
***
It
was some six hours later when the searchers managed to get an unconscious
Vincent back to his chamber. The Ninth Street entrance was so far away, so seldom used, that Father
speculated that Vincent must have roamed all hours of the night to find it. He
was cold and clammy as they laid him in his bed, despite the blankets the
search party had piled around him, and his pulse, to Father's horror, could
barely be felt. Shock, he thought.
Or
the lingering effects of the
sedative. Either way, I dare not use a tranquilizer on him.
He
rubbed his eyes wearily, casting through his mind for options and finding none.
Peter had sent a note that only reinforced how utterly out of their depths they
both were:
Nothing in research. Call
if emergency. P. So that, apparently, was
that---Vincent was ill, delusional, perhaps near a nervous breakdown, and there
was nothing at all that anyone could do.
A
low growling brought him abruptly out of his thoughts. Vincent, restless on the
bed and shivering so violently that Father could feel the vibrations through
the layers of bedclothes. He flailed about, searching, hunting for something
that wasn't there. Or someone. Father came to sit beside him on the narrow bed.
“Vincent,” he said softly, capturing one of the cold hands between his own.
“It's all right. I'm here.”
The
restless reaching calmed somewhat. Father's eye fell on a book he'd read to
Vincent often, because of its depictions of sun and savannah and places and
things that Vincent could never, would never see. Would the sound of his voice
reading the book help now?
He
released Vincent's hands, and watched as they settled, motionless, on the
covers, and picked up the book. Opening it, Father began to read. “'There is a
lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered
and singing and they are lovely beyond any singing of it. The road climbs seven miles into them, into
Carisbrooke; and from there, if there is no mist, you look down on one of the
fairest valleys in Africa....'”(4)
Father
looked over at his son, and was pleased to see that Vincent was starting to
relax, as if the murmur of words was reaching through the madness and anchoring
him, somehow.
I would read every book
in this library twice, if it kept
you whole and sane, my son.
Father
continued to read through the night and into morning, until his eyes blurred
and the text grew wavy and his voice grew hoarse. He finally stopped when his
voice gave out completely, but by then, it didn't matter. Vincent was asleep
and closing his eyes, finally, so was Father.
Chapter Eight
“So
reading to him helped?” Peter asked the next afternoon, when his schedule had
finally lightened up enough for him to come down. They were sitting in the
library where Father, after a brief nap, had agreed to meet Peter.
“Yes,”
Father replied hoarsely. “But it's not a permanent solution. His fever is
rising again. I've sent for some more ice bags.” He sat down heavily, weary to
his soul as he hadn't been since his internship. “I have two of our strongest
men standing guard at his chamber, and we are making...arrangements to isolate
him further should he become violent. I fear there is nothing more to be done.”
“There
is,” Peter said. “There must be. Do you think he'll let me touch him?”
Father
shrugged. “When I'm not in the room with him, he becomes more restless. His
reactions are...very erratic, Peter.”
“I'd
like to take a blood sample,” Peter said.
“A
blood sample? Peter, the risks---”
Peter
nodded. “I know. But we're stumbling in the dark here; even if this illness is
primarily psychological, there may be a physical cause we can treat, but I
won't know unless I can get a blood sample.”
“Very
well,” Father replied. “But Peter---be careful. Whatever is going on, it is
extremely volatile.”
They
walked towards Vincent's chamber. Father
nodded at Winslow and stolid Elijah, both of whom had volunteered to stand
guard over their friend. “How has he been?” he asked Winslow.
Winslow's
eyes flickered towards the interior of the chamber. “Some growling, a lot of
muttering, nothing that makes any sense. No sounds at all for the past few
minutes.”
Vincent
was sitting up in bed as they entered, the tell-tale red flush to his skin and
the perspiration at his hairline giving evidence of the increasing fever. “How
are you feeling?” Peter asked.
The
words, when he spoke, were forced out over a voice gone raspy with fever and
fatigue. “I shouldn't be here. I need to go Above.”
“Sure,
of course,” Peter said, not mentioning that it was full daylight and Vincent
wouldn't be going Above anytime soon. “Can I get a blood sample?” he asked,
pulling out his syringe in a quick, efficient motion.
It
was a mistake. Vincent caught the hand holding the syringe and his eyes dilated
until there was hardly any blue left at all. Fight
or flight reaction
one part of Father's mind remarked. It
was the one thing, aside from his outside appearance, that was the most feline
about Vincent. Like any number of domestic cats Father had known, he did not
take kindly to sudden movements.
“Peter,” Father said softly. “Drop the syringe.” Peter did so with
difficulty, because Vincent was holding his wrist tightly, but he managed.
“Vincent, release Peter. He means you no harm.”
Vincent
blinked as if not quite sure where he was or what he had been doing. His eyes,
still fever-bright, glanced at the hand holding Peter's wrist and back again at
Father's face. He released the wrist slowly and his eyes regained some of their
awareness. “I'm...sorry,” he said roughly.
Peter
smiled. “No harm done. Can I get a blood sample?”
Vincent
shook his head and Father noticed how tangled and dull his mane looked. “I'm
not sick,” he protested. “I just need to go Above.”
“Vincent,
you're running a high fever,” Father said, trying to distract him from yet
another mention of needing to go Above.
“You've been very sick.”
It
was subtle, but the shift in the body language was unmistakable. This was the
Other. “We are not...a lab animal,” the Other hissed.
“No
one said you were,” Father replied evenly. “But you have not been well,
Vincent. Peter needs a blood sample so we can figure out how to help you.”
“You
do not want to help us,” the Other replied. “You made Lisa leave. You will not
let us leave.” With one quick movement, startling in someone weakened by fever
and fatigue, he lurched out of bed and ran for the chamber entrance.
Winslow
caught him, just barely. Vincent swung around, ready to attack but Winslow
caught his arm and twisted it behind his back, shoving Vincent against the wall
while Elijah kept him there, despite his struggles to break free. Had he been
at anywhere near his full strength, they would never have caught him. “What
now, Father?” Winslow asked, gasping.
“Are
you either of you hurt?” Father glanced at the two of them; no blood, but there
would be some nasty bruising.
“No,”
they answered. “You got him?” Winslow asked Elijah.
Elijah
nodded, not trying to make his voice heard over Vincent's furious roaring.
Winslow stepped back a bit. “Look, Father, that room you asked about? Young
Pascal sent word. It's ready.”
“What
room?” Peter asked, looking shaken.
Father
rubbed his eyes. He was not crying; it was the dust in his eyes, the dust
Vincent had stirred up in his enraged flight. “The storage room. Where we're
going to have to confine Vincent until this passes.”
***
The
storage room was a large chamber with one unique feature: it had a door, a
thick door of mahogany and iron that wouldn't have looked out of place in a
medieval dungeon. No one knew who had put it there or why but it would serve
very well. Vincent was strong, but the door should hold should he try to
escape.
Father
was pleased, and saddened, to find that his instructions had been carried out
to the letter. There was nothing sharp in the chamber, nothing that could be
used as a weapon. There was only a rough pallet with some blankets. Strong
hooks had been driven into the rock walls; if they had to restrain Vincent,
those would be where the ropes and harness would be attached.
It
was a prison and a dungeon and Father knew that any sight of his son there
would haunt him until the end of his days. But they couldn't risk him escaping
Above in daylight, couldn't risk Vincent's health or anyone else's. And so,
Vincent would go into this chamber and he would not leave it until he either
recovered or he died. There was no longer any other option.
Winslow
had prepared the makeshift harness, made of strong leather and iron lengths of
chain that he had forged long ago for some other purpose. Even then, it might
not be enough to hold Vincent, but it was the best they could do. Father
watched as Winslow and Elijah frog-marched Vincent into the storage room; it
was as if they held some wild, furious animal between them. Vincent twisted and
turned and snarled; his face dark and flushed with rage. His roars echoed off
the rock walls and drove themselves into Father's heart. If
he survives, he may never forgive me for this,
Father thought.
It
occurred to him then, with a terrible sinking weight on his heart, that Vincent
might die from his illness. He'd fought tooth and nail to banish even the
shadow of such a suspicion from his mind, but looking at his son, gone gaunt
and feral in his fever and hallucinations, Father felt death shadowing his
footsteps.
Not this time, Father swore. I
saved him once. You will not have him now.
He turned then and walked
towards the struggling figure of his son, trying to break free from Elijah and
Winslow's firm grasp. “Vincent,” he said, resting his hands on the straining
shoulders of his son and raising his voice to be heard over the roaring, “you
must fight this and come back to us. You're going to be all right.”
The
roaring dimmed to a faint growling and as the blue eyes gained some distant
glimmer of recognition, Father just barely caught his son as he slumped forward
bonelessly.
***
Leaving
the unconscious Vincent temporarily in the hands of Peter and Winslow, Father
made his way back to his chamber. In the library, he grabbed two of the thickest
books he could find and some blankets of his own. Whatever Vincent was
fighting, he would not fight it alone.
When
he returned, Peter took the bundle from him. “I managed to get an IV started,”
Peter said, “and he's at least gotten some fluids into him.”
“An
IV...very good, Peter. He's been so dehydrated. Is he sleeping now?”
“If
you can call it that,” Peter replied. “I doubt he's really slept much at all in
the last few days. For right now, he's not tossing and turning, but if you want
to keep that IV in...” Peter didn't finish the thought because he didn't have
to. One summer when they had both been struggling medical students, he and
Peter had taken jobs as orderlies at a local insane asylum. It had been a
harrowing experience that neither of them had ever forgotten.
“Winslow
has...everything ready,” Father said. “I pray it won't be necessary.”
Peter
nodded, knowing there was nothing else to say. “Do you want me to stay down
here tonight?”
Father
shook his head. “No. Go home, get some rest, and I'll try to do the same.”
“Are
you sure?” Peter asked. “Vincent could be--”
“Dangerous?
Yes, I know. But I am his father and whatever we have to face now, we'll face
together.”
“If
you say so,” Peter said, unconvinced, but getting up to leave nonetheless. “If
you need anything, call me.”
Winslow
stood outside the entrance to the storage room, gazing into the room every so
often. “He's settled down some since Peter left,” Winslow said, answering the
unasked question. “He's not all that fond of strangers, you noticed?”
Despite
himself, Father smiled. It had always been that way with Vincent; he was wary
and nearly silent among people he didn't know. Peter wasn't entirely a
stranger, but also wasn't someone Vincent saw every day either. “Yes, I noticed.”
Winslow
noticed the bundle Father carried. “You mean to be here alone with him? Like
that?”
Father
nodded, not acknowledging Winslow's unspoken Are
you completely insane?
“Come back in a couple of hours. And leave the...equipment outside the door.”
Winslow ambled off, and Father was at last alone with his son.
Vincent
was quiet, still, and Father was stunned by the changes the last few days had
made in him. There were deeper lines on his forehead and around his muzzle,
lines of sorrow that seemed far too old on a boy who was only 15.
If
I could have protected you from this hurt, I would have.
Picking
up one of the books, and dragging Winslow's chair from the entrance inside the
room for his throbbing hip, Father began to read: “Arma virumque cano, Troiae
qui primus ab oris...”(5)
Chapter Nine
Dawn
came, the time announced on the pipes, and Vincent was still, miraculously,
alive. Winslow had returned, replacing the bags of ice that had melted
overnight. Vincent's fever had declined a bare two degrees, but was still far
too high for him. Father changed the IV a couple of times, but then he went
back to his book and read on, finally finishing with Aeneas' defeat of Turnus
at about the same time that Elijah and the younger Pascal brought him his
fourth---or was it fifth?---cup of tea and a light lunch. Vincent had stirred
restlessly at their presence but still, did not awaken.
“Will
he be okay?” the younger Pascal asked. He and Vincent were almost of an age;
the younger Pascal had been a toddler when Vincent came to the tunnels and
they'd been nearly instant friends.
Father
had answered in the only way possible. “I don't know. I hope so.”
Vincent,
for his part, was aware of their words, but on a distant level that seemed far
removed from the warm, dark place he now drifted. There was a person who
touched him, but he was known and nothing to fear, so Vincent didn't even
respond at his presence. There were others who came, friends that he knew, but
their fear---of him? for him? he didn't know---flared sourly in the darkness
and he tried to flee from them.
It
seemed he was traveling down a long, dark tunnel, bare of sound and the mental
presences he'd sensed since his earliest days, the sensation of other minds
surrounding his own. For the first time in days, or weeks, there was no more
pain, no fever, no nightmarish visions to be dealt with. At length, Vincent
came to an empty space and stopped, weighted down by the sudden need to stop
and rest. Another presence announced itself, a female presence that was both
foreign and familiar. She was a tall column of light and Vincent felt nothing
but calm in her presence. “You have a
choice,” she said, kneeling beside him where he slouched on the ground.
“What
choice is that?” Vincent asked, looking at the presence, but the light
shimmered exactly where he tried to focus and so, he could not see her clearly.
“I hurt Lisa.”
The
presence nodded. “You did. But no more than she hurt herself. She ran from you
as she will run from everything until she, too, finally finds a need to rest.”
The presence shimmered slightly. “Your choice is to stay here or go on.”
“Go
on?” Vincent asked. “Go on to where?”
“If
you go on, you will suffer much pain, much sorrow, but there will also be much
joy, in a form which you cannot even dream of now. Or you can stay here, and
exist where there is no pain, no sorrow. It's your choice.”
“Is
it? Really?” Vincent asked. Choices were like what option you got for
breakfast, like between William's oatmeal or toast. It wasn't all that often,
or at all, that you got to choose whether to live or die.
The
presence seemed amused. “Yes. Really.”
It
was warm here, and safe, and it was nice not to have his dark apparition
clinging to his every shadow, but it also was without Father and Pascal and
Winslow and the chess game he'd begun with Father just before he became so ill.
Vincent feared the illness, which he knew, in some deep unnamed way, had not
yet run its final, horrifying course, but he feared the lack of life more. “Let
me go on. Please.”
He
had the distinct impression the presence was pleased. “You'll see me again,”
she said, “when you need me the most. Goodbye, young Vincent.”
And
Vincent was released back into the confined horror of the dungeon where he'd
been trapped, listening to Father read—was it Homer?---and closing his eyes in
the darkness, he slept.
***
The
sounds of snarling rage shocked Father out of a deep sleep. Vincent had torn
out the IV and was now crouched in the corner, glaring ferally. Blood welled
and dripped from the IV site as Vincent howled his fury. His eyes darted for
the door a bare instant before Father realized what he was going to do.
“Winslow, grab him!” Father called and watched in mute horror as Winslow caught
the struggling Vincent, but not before Vincent landed a wicked blow that send
Elijah crashing into the rock walls.
This
time, there would be no reprieve, no soothing. The Beast had fully surfaced;
Vincent was lost in his madness and until it passed, they were all in danger.
Father rushed towards Elijah and was relieved to find no serious damage; the
young man was just stunned. Father helped Elijah outside, then banged an
emergency message on the pipes. The makeshift harness and the chains were just
outside the door, but they were more than any one person could handle alone.
Winslow's
struggles with Vincent ended briefly when Vincent saw the chains and the
harness. A ghastly look of utter terror crossed his face as he saw the younger
Pascal, Allen, David and the elder Pascal coming near him to force him into the
chains. The growls intensified, then, and the struggles began anew. Vincent did
not intend to go easily; he turned and snarled and hissed and made even the
simple act of grabbing one of his wrists to fit them into the manacle nearly
impossible.
“Winslow,
can you---” the younger Pascal said, trying to reach an arm that was twisting
out of his reach.
“Just
what do you think I'm trying to do here?” Winslow gasped, only barely holding
onto Vincent.
Father
stepped into the chaos. I hope he forgives
me, one day.
With
his own hands, he snapped the edge of the manacle around his son's flailing
wrist. Startled, Vincent stilled for few seconds and that was enough for the
other men to attach the rest of the restraints. Father stepped back and watched
as they carried his son to the bed and attached the chains to the hooks in the
walls. Vincent's back arched in fury but the chains held firm.
Vincent's
eyes turned and met his own. They were mute, anguished, pleading. Free
me,
they said, and Father knew his own eyes said,
Forgive
me.
Chapter
Ten
Father
leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. A full day had passed since
Vincent had been placed in restraints, and although his wound from the IV site
had been bandaged and the abrasions around his wrists had been treated, there
was a new and ominous symptom. Vincent's heart was beginning to fail.
In
one of
his son's few quiet periods,
when he'd worn himself out roaring and the
chills were beginning to descend, Father had been able to get some basic
vitals. His son's heartbeat, which was already a slow twenty-one beats per
minute, was slowing. His breathing was labored, with long pauses between each
one. They'd given him oxygen to help his breathing, but the wildness in Vincent
didn't tolerate the mask.
Vincent
was dying, and there was nothing he, or anyone else, could do.
Peter
had come down, concerned. “He's not better, then,” Peter had said as he took in
Father's white, anguished face and reddened eyes. “What are his symptoms now?”
“Delirium,”
Father said as they walked back from the main entrance. “High fever, then
chills. He's become violent and we had to restrain him.” The words were simple
but the rough tone of pain and guilt was hanging in the open air, like a knife.
“His heart is under...considerable strain.”
“Cardiac
arrest?” Peter asked.
“No,
not yet. But...soon, I think.” Father looked down, clasped his cane. “I don't
know if I'll be able to bring him back.” His voice dropped until it was barely
louder than the pipes around them. “And I don't know if I should.”
Peter
stopped, aghast. “What are you saying?”
“I
look at my son,” Father said softly, “and I see that the beast has overtaken
him. What kind of life would I bring him back to?”
Dropping
his medical bag on the ground, he grabbed Father by the shoulders. “While there
is life, there is hope. You taught Vincent that---don't make yourself a liar
now.”
Father
nodded, chastened. “I'm sorry, Peter. It's just---”
Peter
nodded. “I know. But you can't give up hope now. Remember when he came to you
and he was so tiny and no one---including me---thought he would live? We were
all wrong then and we'll be wrong again. You just have to have hope.”
And
hope, Father mused, was all they had. Vincent's voice had gone hoarse with his
howling and was now just muted, but the howls tore at his heart for all that.
He strained at the restraints and had come close, even in his weakened state,
to breaking them. Had he been completely well, they would never have held.
After
a while, even Peter had left. He’d left behind some epinephrine and a large
bore syringe if…when…Vincent’s heart
should finally stop, but there wasn’t anything else he could do. Winslow had come by, and
the younger Pascal, and Rebecca. Father knew their purpose, to say goodbye to a
childhood friend, and was touched by it. Whether Vincent knew of their
presence, as far gone as he was, Father did not know.
Mary
had come too, gentle Mary who had lost her only child in the weeks prior to
coming to the tunnels. She was all the mother Vincent had ever known. “It's
near the end,
isn't it?” she asked softly, wiping Vincent’s face with a damp cloth during one
of his few quiet moments.
Father
nodded. “He's struggling so much now, even to breathe.” When she left, when Peter had left, Father sat
in the gathering dark and thought about his son.
There
were so many memories crowding now, as he listened in a state of panic for that
ragged breath to continue or fail. There was Vincent the
infant kitten-child, and Anna’s white, frightened face as she handed him to
Father and begged him to do something, anything, to heal this child. There was
John Pater’s possessive madness over that same child and the first splintering
of their community, a splintering which Vincent’s very existence had helped to
heal. There was Vincent chasing Devin down the tunnels and climbing on rocks
and learning to read and never failing to ask “Why?” There was breathy kitten
laughter and blue eyes that trusted, always trusted, that Father could somehow
make everything all right.
And somehow, Father always had, though he’d
frequently felt unequal and unqualified for the task of being a father.
The pauses between
Vincent’s breaths were growing longer. Father came over to the pallet and undid
his son’s restraints. If this was the end, Vincent would not die restrained.
When the last strap was undone, he gathered Vincent in his arms---how light,
how fragile he felt!---and pressed the tangled mane to his heart, as once he’d
done when Vincent had been an infant and had cried for hours on end.
The ragged breaths
hitched and slowed, hitched and slowed. At 3am, when life is at its lowest
point, the breathing finally ceased and the only sound was Father’s weeping.
Forgive me, my son. I
failed you.
He fell to his knees and
couldn’t have said, then or later, how long he sat like that. It
might have been minutes or seconds. His hip throbbed but it
was nothing. Vincent was dead. He had failed, as a father and as a doctor. And
the penalty for his failure was life without the child who meant more to him
than anything, anyone ever had.
Father rose and staggered
back over to the pallet, filling the syringe Peter had left. Just as he was
preparing to push its contents directly into Vincent’s heart, there was sharp
intake of breath. He held his breath and the
sound repeated, and a
dawning hope caused him to pull
back the blanket. “Vincent?” he muttered, and a low groan greeted his ears.
Alive. He’s
alive. Ohmygodmysonisalivehowisthispossible?
The thoughts ran over each other like water careening
down a waterfall, and with
just as much force. Dragging his stethoscope from around his neck, he placed it
against Vincent’s heart, and there it was, the steady rhythm it had always had,
save for these last few desperate days.
“Father?” Vincent asked,
voice worn to a bare rumble. “Am I alive?”
Father managed to keep
from sobbing at that first, tentative question. “Yes, my boy, you’re alive. How
do you feel?”
There was a pause as
Vincent thought that one over. “I need a bath,” he said finally. “And I’m
starving.” And Father laughed, a deep laugh of relief and joy and hope.
Whatever else might happen now, Vincent would at least be alive to face it.
Dawn came and the news
rang out on the pipes, the first news of the new day. Vincent is alive.
THE END
ENDNOTES: