The three of them sat there very politely. They all sat up straight and proper, very aristocratic-like. Hannibal's strong features still peered through his large wineglass as he sipped the sangria. Bedelia sat there eating her salad tentatively, yet had hidden determination chewing the radishes from it. Serephina sat across the table opposite Hannibal at the other head end of the table, eating the rare, juicy, bloody steak on her plate with a smile. The side salad that sat in its sad little bowl to her right hand remained untouched, and her wine was almost empty.
Serephina is the daughter of the widowed Bedelia. Her father was killed in a car wreck on the highway during an avalanche when Serephina was a mere child. Bedelia hardly raised her, but sent her to private schools from start to finish, which she excelled at, graduating early from her master's just shy of her twenty-third birthday. Coming immediately and directly from Harvard, she came to Italy to see her mother and her "husband."
The most intriguing thing about Sere was her gift of empathy and accurate, logical prediction. That is what made her great. Not good, not evil, but great at what she did. Everything she did was with purpose, and her intention was not always of the faint-hearted and innocent.
Since she could read people very well upon first meeting them, she knew who Hannibal really was…but that was when the accident happened…and her entire world changed…
"Hannibal…who am I enjoying today?" Serephina asked politely with a small, delicate, devilish smile upon her face. Her obsidian hair fell in long black waves down her back, her eyes flicked to him with eager interest as she sipped the wine, not breaking eye contact. This young girl was bold and daring, and she challenged Hannibal on a regular basis. That is why unbeknownst to the oblivious and naive, she is the perfect protégé for Hannibal. He knew it too.
"Oh just a curator. No one important." Hannibal replied with a gentle predatory smile. Her mother's blonde head snapped to her direction, sitting closer to Hannibal on the long table but on Sere's left hand side.
"Oh come now mother, I need to know so I can at least have a cohesive story. For all I know it could've been a cow." Sere responded with an eyebrow raised eyes half closed, satisfied that she frightened her mother. Sere and Hannibal though knew full well that Bedelia was not someone to trifle with either. People were antelopes and Hannibal and Sere are lions, but Bedelia was a hyena. Bedelia, without Hannibal and Sere, would be the top of the chain like a hyena would because they are intelligent and lethal; the only thing she feared was her own love and her own daughter, and she was right too.
"You dare speak to me that way?" Bedelia's tone whispered with parental authority and discipline. Normally, Sere would've been afraid and respected her mother, but she was old and dangerous enough now to push boundaries set long ago.
"Oh do take a joke mamá. Your humor over the years has become frightfully dull. I fear we might die of insanity here if there's no laughter." Sere giggled. Bedelia just looked at her jaw slighty open from shock. Hannibal grinned but chastised, "Sere, respect your mother. You know I don't tolerate improper manners."
"Yes Hannibal." Sere submitted unwillingly. "Apologies mamá." Sere tipped her head slightly to the right and bowed her head as a lady would, submitting to her mother. "Thank you." Bedelia replied, lifting an eyebrow just as Sere does, gulping white wine unlike her two companions.
Sere was very and fully aware of everything her mother and Hannibal went through while she was in school. She read all about it on her tablet, watching and reading the news by a Miss Freddie Lowndes. Sere hardly ever went to the parties that Bedelia and Hannibal attended there, and their friends from America were strangers to her. They didn't know her, but she vicariously knew almost everything about them. She was indeed intrigued by Will Graham. Sere supposed it was due to the fact that she was a licensed (though since she came from old money, she had no real need for a career in therapy. She did six months just for the fun of it) psychologist. Her curiosity was like that of Hannibal's and her intellect was just as high as her mother's.
"I went to Mass earlier today…" Sere said instigating conversation. "Oh?" Hannibal inquired. Her mother hardly ever spoke to her these days; then again she hardly spoke to anyone anymore unless she needed to.
"I saw your friend, Will Graham." Sere said with a seductive glare directed at Hannibal, analyzing each microemotion on his face. He was processing how to answer, calculating each thing to control the conversation. Naturally he'd fail, because Sere was better at persuasion, perhaps it was a female gene to easily manipulate weak men to become stronger and better, or get weeded out by natural selection. Sere's influence was the only rival that even Hannibal couldn't surpass. Bedelia was intelligent, Hannibal was calculating and philosophical, while Sere was the ultimate manipulator.
"What did he do?" He put down his knife, dabbing at the corners of his mouth with a cloth golden embroidered napkin.
"He sat there contemplating something with his eyes closed during Mass. Possibly trying to find you. You should give him more clues; I'm eager to meet him." Sere implanted the idea.
Bedelia cut in before Hannibal could ask, "Why do you want to meet him?"
"Is that wrong to want to meet someone like us? As I recall that's how you make friends. Social development of healthy people requires finding understanding, empathetic, accepting, loving, and supporting friends and family. You wouldn't want to impede my social development as a young woman now would you, mother?" Sere gave false puppy eyes through thickly mascaraed noir lashes.
"No, I suppose not. But I warn you though…" Bedelia briefly flitted her eyes to Hannibal then back to her daughter, "Be careful who you become friends with. Some are not…what they seem." Both Hannibal and Sere noticed, which was a fatal move.
Before Sere could reply, "That is why Serephina is lucky to have you as a mother and me around. I'll make sure no one hurts her." Hannibal placed his right hand on Bedelia's left, clasping, while Bedelia unconsciously gripped it lovingly. As if they really were married.
To their surprise, Sere laughed in quiet music of the room. Hannibal cocked his head, "What, pray tell, is so amusing, my darling Sere?" Hannibal curiously implored.
"We all know that last part is a lie, Hannibal." Sere laughed darkly, eyes all of a sudden went from a light chocolate brown to black marbles with only the chandeliers bouncing some glimmer of light. Even those lights got lost in the oblivion of her eyes. They were the empty void of where her soul once was…
"How so?" Hannibal inquired, still holding Bedelia's hand. Bedelia's blonde head was sweating, and through her crème colored retro 40's blouse.
"Well I could bring up what happened a few years ago, or you can hear my story." Sere prompted, leaning back in her ornamented chair, sipping the sangria with delight.
Hannibal let go of Bedelia's hand, folded his own together in front of him, and leaned forward to listen. Bedelia was already breathing shakily. "Go on with your story. I'm listening." Hannibal politely asked.
Sere leaned forward eagerly, her coal-diamond eyes unchanging.
Images in Hannibal's mind was that of the most beautiful predatory animals in the world as she spoke. Hannibal never feared much considering he knew the life he led always made himself a target. He felt like a snake among rats, but just because he had no legs from a traumatic past did not make him weak…it made him far more lethal; he was always changing his defenses and offenses, like how evolution gave some snakes constriction or venom. Sere was one of the few people he actually feared. The Indian King cobra had two enemies above him: humans and mongooses. Everything else was under his domain of power, but he knew full well that Sere was no cobra like him, she was the mongoose. Sleek, powerful, stealthy, strong, tactful, beautifully intelligent, and lethal. She was the only one other than the law, the humans, which he feared. He never showed it though. He could easily smell the sweat of fear from people, so he thought Sere's "superpower" must've been the art of reading people so accurately it mimicked telepathy.
"Let me begin with something I overheard the other day. You mentioned how you and Will mutually betrayed you, and I know by your body language, you platonically love him. I can only presume he is like Misha is some way, which is why you've changed him into something he isn't so you can fill the void of the thing you once held dear and lost. You keep filling that void, because your hunger is insatiable. Someone once said that forgiveness is the ultimate sign of love, and you even mentioned before you left your home over in the US that you forgave him. You said when he almost found you in the church catacombs, he called out to you, almost begging, that he forgives you. You know this to be true. But when dear mother asked if you forgave him, you know you still are recovering from the fact that he will never truly be like you. Yet the ultimate way you can forgive him and was indeed genuine this time was, 'I have to eat Will Graham.'" Sere paused summarizing the things she silently observed and heard from afar. Her mother's poker face was breaking at the eyes, revealing horror of how much Sere really knew. Sere continued, "I've noticed a trend with you Hannibal Lecter. The people you are indifferent towards, if they get in your way, they're simply maimed or killed. The people you hate, you kill them and eat them like an Aztec warrior gaining power from his enemies. I can only imagine that the people you truly whole-heartedly love, like your dear sister, you eat…probably with fava beans and a very nice Chianti. Let's face it you would too, because it would be impolite not to; you have too many manners unlike some." Sere grinned toward Hannibal. To Bedelia, Hannibal was unreadable, but to Sere she saw that Hannibal knew Sere is right.
"I know that the three of us are a motley crew of a 'family' but I can still sense the genuine love in the air. You say no one will hurt us, and for the most part that would be true. However, no doubt, the two of you have already played the scenarios of which one of us would die first. I imagine that one day mother will be frightened enough to kill us both; if she succeeds, she lives with the idea that she has become exactly like us, and Hannibal wins in making the ultimate companion for himself. If she fails, you either kill her, or better yet just me."
Sere paused to look at her horrified and gagging mother, "Because sometimes the best way to kill someone is to kill their loved one, just as you did in isolating Will Graham from his potential friends, family, and even his own child. Now here's the part that will puzzle your minds, which one of you would I dispose of first? Both? One or the other? Perhaps neither at all, because the anticipation is torture, which I find to be worse than death. Here's the fun part to contemplate: Hannibal could allow us to live as beloved pets, eat us both, or just the one…if mother ate me, she'd be just like you Hannibal. If I ate mother…well then that just gets complicated fast now doesn't it?" Sere giggled.
"Enough!" Bedelia hissed quietly, slamming her hands on the table, shaking the glass and silverwares. "You are a malicious, sadistic, sick child. I should've known better than to bring you here, but I had to keep an eye on you. You have a disturbed mind and imagination, and I suggest you take a good look in the mirror, and then drown yourself in the sink." Bedelia firmly asserted in a quiet tone. Sere grinned even bigger, knowing full well that her words frightened her mother to the core.
She took one look at Hannibal, knowing that she piqued his hungry interest in her, and started giggling wildly. Her laughter grew louder, as she got up from the table walking away confidently. "That's my girl." Hannibal mumbled. Bedelia looked at him with a 'are you serious' expression. Hannibal returned her shock with a 'shit happens' shrug, while finishing his sangria. Bedelia gulped the rest of her white dry wine and bolted from the table heading towards the open lounge room behind Hannibal. Sere walked to the archway with double doors that were behind Sere's side of the table. She entered the ballroom, headed toward the grand piano, and started playing Moonlit Sonata by Beethoven.
Sere played her favorite baroque classic, the haunting melody filling the void of silence in the mansion. It gave her disturbing dreams and images of dark fantasies that would frighten criminals and the insane alike. Bedelia heard the music and went to the large powder room to throw up in the sink, shaking as she white-knuckled gripped the edges. Hannibal sat back into his chair, leaned his head back, and closed his eyes. He was at peace with the evening, for him, it was like heaven.