THE NEW MOTHER

It would be wrong, however, to assert that in that moment Cicero had understood he wanted to kill. In that moment he had understood he wanted to canalize that desire onto human beings. But even before, indeed, he had had a morbid curiosity about death. He saw it everywhere and, the more he noticed it, the more he understood that it was the only real reason for life.

To stay in touch with death, he often went to the crypts, he liked the silence of those places, the heavy air. He also used to stalk dying animals. Once he had followed a staggering pigeon, hoping it would've died. And, when it had died, Cicero had observed it, touched it, feeling its cold body and drawing it in his diary.

It was not long, of course, that Cicero began to want to kill. But not out of malice, no... to do a favor. Life is nothing but the antechamber of emptiness, why suffer if afterwards there is nothing?

His first victims, in fact, were animals he pitied. First a worm, cut in half, writhing. Then a squirrel to which a predator had ripped off a paw. Then a skinny, sick dog in an alley in the city.

Modia didn't know all of this. How could she? She didn't pay attention to anything, she was always inebriated by drugs. But in the end she had to notice it inevitably. After the episode of the party, in fact, Cicero began not only to aspire to bigger preys, but to boast of his ability. He directed death not only on the creatures he considered needy, but also on those he hated or, sometimes, those he met on the street at the wrong time.

Over time, his outbursts were becoming more and more cruel and casual. Cicero always saw it as a blessing, a favor, but now he used this thought to justify the death of those who were perfectly healthy.

The first, true victim, healthy and killed for the sake of doing it, was a rat. He found it in a corner of the pantry, trying to steal some cereal. It was black, but somewhat lovely. Precisely because Cicero adored it, he decided it had to die. Stupid rat... it trusted too much of him, it stood there looking at him, it didn't even try to escape. If it had not been Cicero, it would have been someone else.

He killed it, then, dismembered it and ate its little heart, to taste it. And he felt a pleasant sensation in sending that rat into nothingness. While the other boys were starting to make contact with the other sex, well, he just wanted to kill. There was something mystic in the process... something loving. He was sure that the rat was thanking him, from the nothing it had been sent to.

Meanwhile, Modia had got pregnant. Velleius Nero had never come back from the battlefront, but she was able to hide the truth out in the open: she said she had come to visit him. Actually, she cuddled her lover every night, moaning and keeping the whole house awake. Cicero hated her, and he hated the pleasure he heard. In that moment he began to understand that pleasure and pain are the same thing, since there was not much difference between the cries of his mother and those of the murdered rat.

Nine months later, a blessing for the family: a daughter. There she was, the real Clovia. Born fifteen years after Cassio and twelve after Cicero. Tiny, pink, beautiful.

Cicero hated her immediately.

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.

He began to stay more and more away from home, sometimes he didn't even come back to sleep at night. He stayed in the Waterfront, most of the time, studying some stolen books and cultivating his other passion: writing. He tried to force himself to think of something else, because he really didn't want to kill Clovia. First of all, he didn't esteem her so much as to be his first human victim. And secondly, she was a member of the family… no matter how jealous he was of the loving care Modia reserved for her, loyalty came first of all: killing a sister is always forbidden. A mother yes, a mother can be killed, especially if she deserves it. But not Clovia, too small, too neutral yet to arouse any feeling in Cicero.

"Brother, I'm afraid of you" Cassio told him one day, sitting with him on the edge of the walls watching the fiery sunset, which also lit up the lake Rumare with red and gold sparkles.

"You usually drown in fear, not a great news."

"I'm serious! You like to philosophize, but... I'm really scared. I see you when you kill those animals. I've found the skulls you hold under your bed. You always walk around with that knife, and..."

"And what, brother?"

"And I'm afraid you'll be able to hurt us one day."

Cicero sighed. He closed his eyes, trying to think about a way to explain himself. Growing up, he had understood that the others didn't think like him, and it had become increasingly difficult to explain his code to ordinary people.

"I cannot kill brothers or sisters. I would, but I cannot."

"You want to kill me?" he said almost whimpering, and Cicero felt sorry for him. He was everyone's favorite, but he had no dignity.

"Not you, Clovia. That stupid little bastard."

"Don't blame her. It's our mother's fault."

And at that moment a new thought in Cicero, something that would've changed his life forever.

"She's not my mother."

"You may not like it, but she is. You haven't been adopted, I was there when you were born."

But Cicero didn't mean physically. He intended to disavow her. For him the meaning was deeper: Modia was not his mother. Suddenly, he realized that she was a womb, nothing more. He was the son of someone else, someone who later had used Modia for gestation. He had nothing in common with her, not even physically. Modia... Modia was not his mother. She was a fertilized soil.

"She's not my mother" he repeated, sternly, "she's my parent. My mother, I still have to meet her."

.

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And he met his real mother.

It was like fate had predestined him. He was fifteen and, like most of his life, he was walking on the dock. There was a goat slaughtered on one of the ships, hanging from the mast by its hind legs, dripping blood into a barrel. Cicero looked at it fascinated, thinking that he wanted to do it on someone. Maybe on the blonde, her mother's friend. Domitilla.

Then, however, he began to feel observed. He had someone's eyes on him, he felt it, he was sure. Then, trying to act like a normal person, he turned his gaze away from the goat and started walking again.

But the feeling didn't go away, and eventually he realized he was being followed. At a safe distance from him, in fact, there was a man. He must have been in his forties, he had the neutral look of someone who has seen too many things. He was dressed in red.

Cicero stopped, collecting his ideas and thinking of facing him. Then, he turned around and went to meet him, confident. The man seemed amazed, as if he didn't expect to be noticed.

"Who are you?" asked Cicero, without pleasantries, once reached.

"No one." the man replied enigmatically.

"I'll ask you again: who are you? What do you want from me?"

But the man didn't say anything. He smiled, took off his blood-colored hood and looked at the sky.

"Why were you looking at that goat?" he asked treacherously.

Cicero didn't let himself be intimidated.

"Simple scientific curiosity. I'm interested in the exsanguination method, I'm studying the circulatory system."

The man giggled, shaking his head.

"I don't doubt that you're interested in exsanguination, but I doubt it was for scientific curiosity."

Well, he was underestimating him. There was curiosity, actually. Beyond killing, Cicero also liked to study and learn new things. Of course, there was also the pleasure of admiring dripping blood, but that was another story.

"You are really a son of this age" said Cicero, showing off all his oratorical ability, "arrogant and totally disinterested. It doesn't mean that everyone is like you."

The man had to be amazed at the boy's too adult language. He didn't comment, however, he changed the subject. And what he said immediately caught Cicero's interest:

"I came here specifically for you, because there are rumors about your... nature. And I must admit that you really look like an excellent son of our Mother."

Cicero didn't understand, but somehow felt that it was true. He wanted to know more.

"Your mother?"

"Yours too."

"And who is she?"

"The Night Mother. We are her children, and she loves us all the same way. Look for informations about her and Sithis if you want. One day, perhaps, I'll return to see your progress."

And he left, without adding anything else. Cicero, then, remained there, dissatisfied and immobile, but for the first time with the hope of knowing his true origins.

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He researched, stealing a few books from private libraries and the Arcane University. He didn't like to steal... he considered it disrespectful. But he was also sure that his parent wouldn't have paied for the books he needed. At the moment, she was still busy growing Clovia as a good mother.

And, while Clovia enjoyed the affection of an earthly parent, Cicero discovered the joys of an otherworldly Mother. The more he read, the more he felt fascinated, as if he had suddenly returned home after a long period of absence. He read the descriptions and found himself in every word.

Thus, his true Mother did exist, and she was the Mother of everyone and everything. A loving Mother, who cuddles her children, and sometimes asks for someone to join her in the nothingness. She had been so affectionate and so lovely to her children to kill them. A great, great honor. Modia... Modia was so disinterested that she wouldn't even have wasted time doing such a gesture, not even to have Cicero out of her way. It was paradoxical, Cicero himself realized it, but if she had killed him, at least, she would've given him the importance of someone that has to be eliminated. He wasn't even that. He didn't even exist in her eyes.

How much he wanted to be killed by his mother! And not Modia, that was the parent. He wanted to be a child of the Night Mother, and die for her and her love.

Everything was fitting, even the Void, which Cicero had before called nothingness: the real afterlife, and there were others who knew it and believed in it! He thought he was the only one to consider nothingness as a possible future, and instead he was one of the few chosen ones knowing the truth. Stupid Imperials, they could keep their many Divines... one was enough for him, and his name was Sithis.

Sithis wouldn't have judged him for what he was. On the contrary, Sithis would've appreciated his peculiar killing skills. Sithis had welcomed all the souls that Cicero had sent him, he had listened to their stories, he had observed him, he had measured him. Sithis liked Cicero. The Mother liked Cicero.

He had found a family.

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Clovia grew ever more beautiful, loved and spoiled. Modia Prodice cuddled her day and night. When she was a newborn, she had personally breastfed her. And she was still doing it. Oh, yes, she was still doing it. At the age of six, Clovia still fed of her mother's milk, and both Cassio and Cicero were disgusted.

"She's mentally ill." Cassio concluded one evening as they watched her from a distance, in the vestibule, feeding soft food to an overgrown little girl.

"Cicero hates mental illnesses."

"What? Why do you speak in the third person?"

He hadn't even realized that he did. He didn't know why... it was true that he hated people with mental illnesses. He felt sorry for them, they too were all victims to send to Sithis for their own good.

"Nothing, sorry. My mind is crowded. Very, very confused."

"You scare me when you do like this."

But Cicero smiled and looked at him with piercing eyes.

"Don't worry, brother, you're safe, now like three years ago. Do you know who's not safe instead? The parent."

"What do you want to do?"

He was worried. How could he be worried? Cicero couldn't understand it. She had hated them both, why did Cassio persist in protecting her?

"Don't you see her, brother? Look at her. You said it, she's mentally ill. A merciful son would end her suffering."

"What are you talking about?"

He was saying he was ready. He was eighteen years old, even if he looked younger. He had to do something with his life, he had to make his dream come true. He had spent years improving the technique, thinking in detail about how to take his revenge. It was time to become what everyone wanted him to become. It was time to actualize that widespread sense of fear with which people looked at him.

"Cassio, naive brother..." sighed, dreamy, anticipating his first murder, "I know you cannot, but I will take the responsibility. We have to free her, don't you see? We need to give her peace. And give peace to ourselves."

"I…"

Cicero, with bloodshot eyes, stared at him, smiling, already in ecstasy. He stood in front of him and put his hand on his shoulder. Cassio, higher than him, yet intimidated, began to tremble.

"And do you know what a merciful son would do? He would send Clovia with her. Look, they're so close, to separate them would be... sacrilegious."

Cassio shook his head, scared. He stepped back.

"Cicero, I... I don't know who you are."

Cicero was annoyed. He narrowed his eyes, in a predatory gaze. He smiled slyly. He didn't interrupt eye contact, never even to blink.

"Of course you don't know me, Cassio. Have you ever made a minimum effort to know me? Have you ever tried to talk to me before I talked to you? You're very kind, brother, but very silly. Your mind is slow, most of the time you don't even understand what's around you. You wouldn't even notice a bull intent on sodomizing you."

Cicero extracted the blade that, for many years, had always been on his side. An ebony dagger.

On hearing the sound of the unsheathed dagger, Modia screamed. Cicero heard her leave behind him, but he didn't follow her, he didn't care: he would've found her again.

Cassio at first impact backed away, with the breath cut off. Then he pulled out a sword. He knew how to use it, yes, but it was a legionary technique, not for hand-to-hand combat.

"You said... that you can't kill brothers."

"No, in fact. But I'm not letting you stop me. Be very careful about what you decide at this moment, dear Cassio. Be wise."

Cassio continued to back away, his sword still in his hand, shaking. He reached a column and slammed against it with his back.

"Cassio, Cassio, Cassio... the hourglass empties quickly, the shadow of the sundial turns. Don't make me impatient, Cassio. Cassio, Cassio..."

"Cicero... you... you're better than that. You're a poet, a writer, you're good, and... I know she hurt us, but don't spill her blood!"

Cicero rolled his eyes. It was exasperated that nobody understood him. But he also knew he should've get used to it.

"Brother, you think as if it were only for revenge. No! It's for love. I'll give her all the love she had denied us. I'll be unselfish. I'll be fair. It's time for that depraved woman to find peace in the Void."

"And... what about Clovia?"

"Oh Clovia, poor, little Clovia. She has my name. I'm slightly sorry for her. But she wouldn't survive without the parent, and you know it. Or do you want to breastfeed her yourself, Cassio?"

He shook his head, undecided, scared.

"Get out of here, Cassio. It's not a place for sensitive ladies like you. After tonight, you'll be free to go and make a living, get married to Aldmera. Or do you want to stay here, subjugated, all your life? To see that slut who never loses the chance to get bare breasts?"

Cassio hesitated. He looked around, as if to find an idea in the air, a hold on which to cling and find an answer. He was a very simple young man. He couldn't make decisions lightly.

In the end, however, lowering his sword and passing a hand through his long brown hair, he nodded. Crying, he nodded.

"All right. All right. But let it be fast."

"Oh, don't cry, brother. For her it will be... like letting go to the umpteenth skooma delirium."

Cassio nodded again, sobbing. Then, fast, as if he didn't want to change his mind, he went out, closing the door behind him.

Cicero sighed, satisfied. He smiled and turned: it was time to think about the other two.

As expected, they hadn't gone far. They had taken refuge in the pantry, just like the rat, many years before.

When Cicero opened the door, they were hugging each other, huddled on the sacks of wheat. Modia's curly hair covered her daughter like a blanket, or a shield. For a moment, Cicero liked to see that kind of love. It was real, he didn't doubt it. But he wanted it to be for him... not for that plump, blonde girl.

"Don't worry, soon everything will be over. Get up. I want space for this occasion, and a sumptuous environment. I don't want to kill you here with potatoes."

They wept, sobbing very loudly. Cicero was annoyed. He became impatient and grabbed Clovia, lighter then Modia, so that the other followed him.

He led them into the vestibule, threatening them, and ordered them to sit on the triclinium. He stood in front of them, and was surprised again to see them hugged.

He began to walk, quiet, back and forth.

"Parent! Do you know what day it is today? The day when I send you to my family. The day when you will taste the Void... together with your daughter."

Modia exploded into sobs. She shouted, but Cicero didn't care much. In the neighborhood, they were used to her screaming.

"Cicero!" she whimpered, "why are you doing this to me?"

"Oh, parent, that's hypocritical for you..."

"I... I know... I was cruel! But it wasn't my fault, it was... the skooma. I was horrible, but put yourself in my shoes... alone... abandoned by your father..."

Cicero laughed loudly. He raised an index, theatrically, exaggerating the movements.

"No! By Cassio's father, perhaps. Mine you don't even know who he is."

She swallowed, and like Cassio began to look around for answers.

"Put yourself in my shoes... I was alone..."

Cicero became infuriated. Quick, controlled, he approached her face. The ebony dagger was between them, touching Modia's nose. She was terrified, gasping for air.

"I don't put myself in your shoes, parent. Cicero has... Cicero... I... I've seen worse, you know? Abandoned and poor women, for example. Orphans. You're just a very bad person who likes to play the victim. You were rich, do you realize it? A roof on your head, the servants. Don't blame your husband for something exclusively you did. You've ruined your life by yourself, and I'm fine with that, you're the owner of your person. Just... you shouldn't have taken me with you."

She closed her eyes, squeezed them, and tears rolled down her face.

"I know. I'm sorry."

"If you hadn't been so cruel with me, maybe I... Cicero wouldn't be like that now. Cicero would like to be normal, you know? He'd like to be able to only think about writing, he'd like to be able to feel pleasure with a woman without the desire to bite her head off. And it's all your fault. All, exclusively your fault."

At that point, however, an unexpected event. An answer that Cicero, in his intelligence and foresight, hadn't calculated. He hadn't thought that human victims, unlike animals, could talk... and still hurt, after so many years.

"I was a bad mother, it's true. But only you have become like that. Cassio is a good man. You... you were born rotten. It wasn't my fault, you... you would've become so anyway."

Cicero was stunned by that revelation. She was right.

He swallowed, eager now more than ever to choke her with her red veil. He would've done it, yes, she deserved it. But first... first it would've been better to show her what it feels like to have love taken away.

Cicero grabbed Clovia's arm and pulled her back to the center of the room. Modia began to scream, desperate. She tried to hold back her daughter, to pull her toward herself, but in the end she had to let her go, because she was risking of breaking her arms. Then she got on all fours on the floor, as she had been so often under the influence of drugs.

She begged, and Cicero liked the sound of prayers. Oh, he liked it... animals were very less satisfying, under that point of view.

"I beg you! Stop! I'll do everything! Kill me instead, kill me!"

"Here she is! Modia Prodice is ready to die for her daughter! While Cicero has never even deserved to be him to die for Modia Prodice."

He grabbed the girl by her long curly hair, forced her to stand up. She screamed, cried, and more screamed her mother.

"Look carefully, Modia. Watch your daughter as she reaches Sithis!"

He put the dagger on her neck and...

He stopped.

He did not.

Why? He couldn't wait.

But Clovia... she was young. He always had a weakness for children. And then, she was his sister. Bastard, perhaps, but still out of the same womb. Loyalty had always been strong in Cicero. He had also seen it in animals that protect each other, especially dogs and rats. He couldn't... he couldn't kill her.

He withdrew the dagger. He let her go, and Clovia fell to the ground.

Cicero crouched, to reach his sister on her level.

"You don't deserve to die" he said in a disturbing whisper, "now you have to go, you have to get out of here. Don't come back for any reason. You'll stay with Cassio. Do you understand me?"

The girl, in tears, nodded. Cicero helped her get up and allowed her to farewell her mother. Modia hugged her, kissed her, while she murmured "thank you", perhaps to the Divines, rather than to Cicero.

He, overwhelmed by compassion, took his sister by the hand and led her to the door. He made sure that Cassio was out there, and handed her to him. He saw happiness on his brother's eyes, who was crying with joy.

But for Cicero it wasn't over. He went back inside, returned to the vestibule, and saw Modia abandoned on the triclinium, as she used to do when she was younger, lost in the delirium of skooma.

"Thanks, Cicero. Thank you for saving her."

"It wasn't for you. Remember that."

Modia nodded, sympathetically, for the first time in her life. Death changed people a lot. Cicero wondered, at that point, what was the true version of her.

Cicero sat down on a chair, not far away. He relaxed, stretching his legs. He wached Modia while with holding his own chin with one hand, meditative.

"I want you to take the skooma, parent."

"Why?"

"Because it's right that you embrace death like you've always embraced life. You cannot have the privilege of lucidity now. You won't even understand what's going on, you won't have the time to ask for forgiveness, to pray. You'll die and you won't even realize it. But you will suffer, I promise you. You will suffer without understanding why."

Modia nodded. She was docile now. Another sign of how much her love for Clovia was sincere. She was really ready to die for her. She was really willing to be tortured under skooma, for her.

The woman gulped down the bottles, then. She took at least fifteen of them, while Cicero stared at her, stern. When she was no longer able to stand up, then, Cicero approached her. He looked at her from above, with pity.

"Now I recognize you, parent. As in the good, old days."

She didn't say anything. She tried to mumble something, but she had no control over her lips and a trickle of saliva came down to the side of her mouth.

"Look at you. You're disgusting. You're a horrible woman, inside and outside. Now... since you had so much fun believing me a girl, how about experimenting what it feels like to be transformed into a male?"

He sat next to her, cuddled her forehead.

"Let's start from the simple part, hm?"

He approached the ebony dagger to the hair and cut the curls; all, from the first to the last, with such violence that in some spots he cutted her scalp. As the brown curls remained in his hands, he threw them to the ground. It was as if every hair represented a part of her femininity, lost forever.

She was crying, suffering, as expected. She couldn't understand that it was true, perhaps, and couldn't even rebel in any way. But surely she was suffering.

Cicero cuddled her again, he even kissed her forhead.

"Sh, Modia, hold on. We must finish what has begun. I'm sorry you have to suffer, but see, this is nothing more than what you did me. I feel a lot of love for you, despite everything. All this is to redeem you. For the sake of your soul, do you understand? You'll arrive much lighter in the Void. You have to repay your tremendous debt."

She, unexpectedly, nodded. Perhaps, somewhere, she was still there, deep in the delirium.

"Let's go on, then."

He cut her breasts, while she was convulsing. He didn't like that part at all. It had to be done, though. It was for the good of both.

He let her bleed for a frighteningly long period of time. It wouldn't have been enough to kill her, probably, but it was necessary for her to suffer. Necessary. For everyone.

Finally, the dawn began, illuminating the courtyard, reflecting clearly on the water of the impluvium. It was time to finish it.

"Modia, my dear... your crime is atoned, we are even. Now I can tell you that it is with a light heart that I entrust you to Sithis. Greet the Void on my part and wait for me. We'll meet again, one day. And maybe we can start all over again."

He raised the dagger, without waiting any longer. He sank it firmly into her lower abdomen, in the uterus. She had almost no strength left. All she did was to open her eyes wide and finally immobilize.

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After the first murder, Cicero kept his promise. It was time to settle accounts with all the other women who had humiliated him at that party. They were all part of nobilar families, one even lived in the imperial palace, so it took time and perseverance to reach them all.

Thanks to them, however, Sithis bless them, Cicero could practice both stealth and technique. As promised, he cut the throat of one of them, then he hanged her upside down, to bleed her like the goat. He stabbed another, twenty three times, then he drown another, strangled another, and crucified the last one.

All this until the murders for revenge were over, and those of compassion or pleasure began. Until, soon, the Brotherhood noticed him. He was a cruel serial killer, one of the most methodical, organized and deadly. But he was nothing more than that, he didn't serve a greater purpose.

It was time to make that talent come out, in short. It was time to welcome him to the Bruma Sanctuary. It was time to serve Sithis.

Yes, finally! Now we have a whole view of Cicero's youth. This part concluded this first, big flashback... but as you know I love flashbacks so there will be others xD For now, get ready to find Morrigan back in the next chapter! Thank you as usual and feel free tell me your impressions! See you on friday! *.*