Daemonium noctis (Halloween in Vicbourne).

Chapter 1: Guess who came to my deathbed.

It was the night of 23rd-24th November 1848, exactly after the second hour of the 24th. That year the winter had been partially advanced, and the cold was very present on the nights of that November in London and in its neighboring regions.

In a sumptuous country residence, Brocket Hall, its owner was agonizing. It is to say that the owner of that country mansion, near the British capital, was William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, who had been Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland on two occasions (for a total of almost seven years governing the country).

The agony of Lord Melbourne had lasted for years, too many years. His public life had been quite successful, but his private life had been a cumulus of painful tragedies. As a child when he discovered that his father was not really his father, later in his adult life the painful scandal made by his wife when she fell in love with another man and left with him and then her be abandoned by his lover ... the terrible condition with who was born his only son condemning him to a life of pain, the death of his unfaithful wife and his poor son ...

But surely the most painful tragedy, the final blow that brought him to the final stage of his life, and condemned him to a slow and unbearably painful agony, was to lose the love of his life. Lord Melbourne had been the mentor, great protector and best friend of the young Queen Victoria during the early years of her reign, and their relationship was very intense ... but the price of that relationship was that Lord Melbourne fell in love with her like never before he had done it with no other woman, not even his wife. In her he found a reason to live and loved her desperately but in silence ... and she also fell in love with him. But Lord Melbourne thought that his impossible love would condemn Victoria to hell and destroy her reign and her own life, and so he renounced her. And it was not long before she found love again in her cousin Albert and married him.

It had been almost 9 years since the marriage of the woman he loved with another man, and more than 7 years since he ceased to be Prime Minister and therefore stopped being next to the Queen and had to move away from her. In those years his health had suffered an accelerating and terrible deterioration, undoubtedly due in large part to his black and constant depression, his painful solitude and the abandonment of the will to live. A cerebral embolism left him in poor condition and his physical and mental conditions continued to wane.

That night Lord Melbourne lay in his bed, suffering, waiting for the arrival of death. His doctors thought there was little to do for him, except to give him some comfort in his physical suffering. They thought it was a matter of hours more than days, and Lord Melbourne's family in pain awaited the final outcome. His sister and brother had stayed close to him until late into the night, and then retired to the guest bedrooms of Brocket Hall. Near Lord Melbourne stood a nurse, a middle-aged woman, a little sturdy and somewhat sweet-looking and kind, who was watching for his evolution.

Lord Melbourne's mind was plunged into a confused dark passage between reality and fiction. He had practically lost his mind, and now both asleep and awake he had dreams and / or hallucinations in which memories of his past were mixed with fictional scenes set in his present. In these vivid and feverish scenes he was again with his mother, his older brother, his wife and his son, all of them dead for many years ... but they were back at his side, he talked to them and listening to them, laughing with them, and sometimes arguing. But the most frequent scenes in the dreams and hallucinations of that desperate agony were with his beloved Queen Victoria. He relived the day he met Victoria at Kensington Palace, that wonderful moment when he fell in love with her at first sight, as he understood later ... their beautiful moment together at the Ball of Coronation when she sought a kiss from him, on her innocent and pure infatuation of a teenager, their amusing and emotional encounter at Dover House, their frequent horseback riding and their laughter in almost all of their encounters, the day he broke her heart at Brocket Hall, the painful day when she married and he knew that her would never be his in that life ... And he imagined that she was beside him in the bedroom, holding his hand and telling him that she loved him and that everything would turn out well, that they would leave and finally be happy together, and that she kissed him on the lips, and he would swear that he felt the touch of her lips on his, as he felt the tears running down his cheeks ...

While this was happening in Brocket Hall, far away, in a dark, dirty alley in a slum of London (a marginal slum where working-class families and marginal beings of all kinds were living in appalling conditions) a very different scene took place ...

It was a horrible and disturbing scene ... a man over 40 years old, tall and robust, dressed more or less elegantly, violently assaulted a girl ...

The girl was a teenager who could not be more than 16 or 17 years old, a girl with white skin, very pale. She was of medium height and very skinny, she was almost in the bones. She had a pretty, childlike face (though her face was a little worsen by the poor state of her teeth, with several teeth that she had lost through cavities and the rest looked yellowish), and despite her thinness her body had a pretty silhouette. The girl dressed very humbly, with a cheap dress and quite old and deteriorated.

At that moment the man had her cornered against a corner and on a pile of wooden boxes had made her bend her body, so that her buttocks protruded. The man was behind her and had lifted her dress, leaving her naked and exposed the girl's body from the waist down. The man had his pants down halfway down, and he has penetrated the girl from behind ...

The man penetrated her without compassion, quite roughly, while she cried and clutched her hands to the box on which she was lying on her stomach.

"Please, sir, it hurts me!" exclaimed the girl in a pleading tone, between tears and her voice broken by pain.

"Shut up, slut! ... I did not pay you for you to complain!" the man retorted angrily as he lunged with more brutality, causing the girl to scream, howling in pain, while he laughed cruelly and perversely.

And at that moment something extraordinary happened ... a shadow moved at a speed so fast that it became almost invisible and rushed over the man. And before realizing, the man was held by that 'invisible' force, and he was projected backwards violently, beating against another wall. The man collapsed to the ground, stunned, but before another moment passed, someone lifted him off the ground, and that someone twisted his arm back so brutally that the man felt his bone creak as his shoulder was dislocated and cried out of pain. But one hand gripped his neck and barely let him breathe.

Surprised first and horrified later, the girl turned to see how the man who had tortured and raped her, was immobilized by another man who was standing behind him. The newcomer held the bastard by the neck and by an arm that had twisted it back ...

The girl's apparent savior was a man more or less tall, handsome, with white skin and dark curly hair. He was dressed very smartly, perhaps a little flashy, in a dark blue jacket and a purple vest.

The unexpected defender of the girl took a relatively small bag, closed by a knot, from a pocket of his suit, and threw it on the floor, near the girl, who was on her knees contemplating the scene with her eyes wide open, in surprise, and still tearful.

"In that bag there is more money than you would earn by selling your body on the street for more than a year ... Take that money and get out of the street, stop prostituting yourself, buy a farm or a small store, or educate yourself and get a decent employment, teacher or maid, or whatever ... Get a man who does not know your past and marry, or enjoy life with as many men as you want, but without having to open your legs for money ... Do what you want , but leave now, I have no time to lose," said the strange savior of the girl.

The girl took the bag and got to her feet, while she adjusted the dirty and broken clothes. The young woman kept the bag with the money and cried talking to the man.

"Thank you very much sir!" exclaimed the girl, trembling with fear, cold and pain.

"It's nothing, little girl! ... but I must warn you, if you tell someone about me or what you have seen here, unfortunately and against my preferences and principles, I will have to find you and kill you," the man said in a sincere and threatening tone.

And then the girl saw something terrible and abnormal in the man's face, something that suddenly appeared, and that frightened her horribly. The girl gave a shriek, an almost animal scream, and ran out in terror, hurrying away from the men in the alley.

"Do not hurt me! ... I can pay you! ... I have a factory and I have money," the man who had mistreated the girl begged, terrified at the man who had him immobilized with extraordinary strength, and that it had already dislocated his arm, causing him great pain.

"Thank you, 'gentle gentleman' ... pity you were not so kind to that unhappy girl ... But I'm afraid it's not money I need from you, it's something else I need," replied the girl's savior sarcastically.

"What thing!" cried the girl's abuser almost hysterically.

"I need you to die," the other man replied with a sinister grin.

Then, that so supernatural and terrifying that the girl had seen for an instant in the face of his apparent savior reappeared in the face of the strange man, causing an infinite and unbearable panic in the other man. The stranger rushed over his victim to whom he had been immobilized by force.

In the distance, the poor girl heard the most frightening cry of terror she would ever hear, a scream that froze her blood and erect her skin when she told (omitting part of the prostitution) the story to her grandchildren decades later ... The cry of the man who had cruelly mistreated her followed an ominous silence, and the girl with a mad fear started to run again without looking back ...

After about three o'clock in the morning, Lord Melbourne was still in his feverish state, sleeping at times and then awakening only to be engulfed by his hallucinations, unable to distinguish when he was sleeping and dreaming or when he was awake but hallucinating. His breathing was a bit difficult, but he had been worse in the previous hours. He scarcely felt his body, a pile of bones and hides that were clearly about to cease that minimal activity that kept him tied to physical existence. To anyone it was obvious that the visit of the grim reaper would not be long awaited.

At a certain moment, Lord Melbourne seemed to perceive with his weakened and waning senses, movements around him. Slowly he emerged from his drowsy state and made an effort to open his eyes, and at first he was a little dazed because apparently someone had brought a small flashlight to the head of his bed, illuminating the side of his head. When he could clear his eyes, he began to distinguish the features of the face of a man who was staring at him, with a gentle smile on his lips, a man sitting on the edge of the bed. That man was the same man who about an hour earlier had saved a teenage prostitute in a London alley ...

Lord Melbourne studied the man's face and it seemed to him to be familiar to him, but his mind was filled with confusion (and almost dementia) in processing the information to reveal who the man was and where he knew him. Finally a light of understanding broke through his tormented conscience and discovered the identity of the visitor, and then a gesture of great surprise and some fear covered Lord Melbourne's emaciated and aged face.

"Byron! ... It's you, Byron! " exclaimed Lord Melbourne, his voice weak and broken by illness.

"Hello, William ... it is a pleasure for me to see you after so long, even in these terrible circumstances," said Lord Byron in a kind, almost affectionate, and a little compassionate manner.

Lord Melbourne was shocked for a moment, and then he smiled wryly at his feverish lips.

"Of all the people I thought would come to my deathbed, I never thought that you would be one of them, and even less so long after your death ... surely this is another damn hallucination, or else you have come to take me with you to hell," said Lord Melbourne, amused and sad, somewhat distressed.

"It hurts me a little that you say that William! But I also understand ... and you're right in part, I came to get you but not to take you to hell, at least not the hell you have in mind ... I came to pay my debt with you," answered Lord Byron sincerely.

"Debt! ... What debt? " Lord Melbourne replied, bewildered and a little agitated, without ever believing that he was in the face of that ghost of his past.

"This is not the right time to talk about it, William. We have very little time, and we must get going ... excuse me for a moment, I have to take care of my companion," said Lord Byron and he got up from the bed.

Lord Melbourne tried to follow him with his eyes, but the light from the lamp dazzled him a little. He could sense that the ghost who appeared to be Lord Byron rake over in the darkness of a corner of the large bedroom, beside the large window that was wide open, letting in an icy wind that bothered the sick Lord Melbourne. Then he saw Lord Byron walking toward the bed carrying a large lump on his shoulder. Lord Byron laid down on the bed the bundle, lying it next to Lord Melbourne ... Lord Melbourne turned to see what it was and with horror he discovered that it was a corpse ...

It was the man who had mistreated the girl in the alley (though that was something Lord Melbourne did not know). The man was rigid and pale, a gesture of terror frostbitten on his face. The man was naked ...

Lord Melbourne shifted startled on the bed, trying to pull away with horror from body, but his own body was very weak and barely moved a little.

"I'm sorry, William ... I know it's very unpleasant and disturbing, but I beg you to be patient, you'll understand everything soon. If it's any consolation he was a bad man who enjoyed abusing and torturing poor girls ... but there will be time to explain everything. Now let me prepare you," said Lord Byron, and effortlessly took Lord Melbourne and pulling him up, he sat him on the bed.

Lord Byron covered Lord Melbourne with a thick blanket and then with great ease carried him over his shoulder, trying not to be brusque. Lord Melbourne was puzzled and frightened, but the rational part of his mind continued to try to convince him that it was a nightmare or a hallucination, but everything was disturbingly physical and real.

"I apologize for this unworthy way of transporting you, but I have no choice, but I promise you that everything will be very fast," Lord Byron said sincerely, but with a wry, mocking smile.

Lord Byron went to another spot in the bedroom and took a bottle from a small table, then returned to the bed to spray its contents on the body of the dead man. He continued pouring the contents onto the bedroom floor, and then Lord Melbourne noticed the strong smell of a substance known to bother his sense of smell.

With Lord Melbourne on his shoulder, Lord Byron went to the window with the lamp with which he had illuminated Lord Melbourne in one hand.

"Do not worry about your nurse ... she's safe, unconscious in a place where they can find her in time ... Well, let the show begin," Lord Byron said, and then threw the lamp down hard on the floor, next to the bed ...

And then it burst into flames ... the fire covered Lord Melbourne's bed voracious and devoured the body of the wicked man murdered by Lord Byron. But the fire sped through the bedroom, and Lord Byron leapt out the open window, Lord Melbourne's body on his shoulder. Lord Byron landed standing, with no apparent effort and no injury, despite the great height of the window from the ground. Then Lord Byron ran at a great speed and hid himself with his valuable cargo behind the trees that surrounded the mansion.

Lord Byron changed Lord Melbourne's body and let him rest in his arms, carrying him as if he were a baby.

"I think it is only fair that you see Brocket Hall for the last time, as you knew it," said Lord Byron, causing a disturbed Lord Melbourne to turn his head to look in the direction of the house.

Surprised and then in horror, Lord Melbourne saw the windows of Brocket Hall light up in ghostly light, and the tongues of fire began to appear on the upper floor of the mansion. Then he saw people running through the exits of the big house, especially through the front door. The people who had fled the fire clustered in front of the mansion, some staring in horror, others struggling to fight the fire with buckets of water.

With his heart racing Lord Melbourne saw his sister, Emily ... she was dressed only in her nightgown and a robe (she had managed to slip into her nightgown in a hurry before fleeing), and she was barefoot in the middle of the cold of that autumn night. Emily was hysterical, shouting to her beloved brother William as she wept bereaved, and tried desperately to go back to the house to look for Lord Melbourne. But William and Emily's brother, Frederick, who was behind her, held her tightly with his arms around her waist, while Emily struggled to get away from him. Frederick, who was also in his nightclothes, cried like a child.

Lord Melbourne felt his heart break as he saw the pain of his sister and brother, and tried to shout, but Lord Byron covered his mouth with one hand and then made Lord Melbourne see it in his eyes.

"Sleep, William ... sleep," whispered Lord Byron, and his intense, hypnotic gaze made William fall asleep, unconscious.

Lord Byron sighed, then took one last look at the dramatic scene of the burning mansion and the people around him.

"William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, has died this evening... You belong to history now, William," Lord Byron said solemnly and sadly.

Lord Byron left, carrying Lord Melbourne, hurrying away from the vicinity of the house, and entering the darkness of the night ...