Crossroad

by Nancy Kaminski

Nick is plagued with nightmares of his past crimes, and starts thinking about the only way to end his misery and save the world from his evil. Can a humble parish priest pursuade him not to walk into the sunrise?

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Crossroad
by Nancy Kaminski
(c) January 1998
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This story was inspired by viewing "Near Death" several times last
year. Okay, so I was watching it for the 'see-through nightie' scene,
but I picked up some other stuff along the way.

I started wondering what would happen if Nick started to think about
giving in to his occasional suicidal impulses. What would it take to
really push him over the edge?

While I was pondering this, the very erudite members of FORKNI-L were
carrying on discussions about forgiveness, suicide, sin, and other
weighty and relevant topics. These helped me gather my thoughts, and I
am honored to lurk in such company.

Warning! This is a very, very angsty story. (In fact, for the first
eight months of its existence it was known as "The Angsty Story.") If
you don't like reading about a miserable Nick, stop right now. I've
put him in a terrible spot, and the poor guy suffers for it.

I want to thank my bevy of beta readers, who have faithfully given me
comments over the last nine months or so. "Crossroad" has been a long
time in the making, and they've been very patient. These long-
suffering souls are Jean Graham, Kathy Whelton, Mei Kwong, Linda
Pierce, Cindy Ingram, and Texas Cousin Jules. You all deserve roses
and chocolate; thank you, one and all.

This will be the first time I post a story before it's done. I'll send
out a few parts at a time, another first for me. I'm hoping the
pressure of supplying more words will see me over the hump and get
those last few parts written.

These characters, of course, don't belong to me. My thanks to TPTB for
not enforcing copyright law to prevent us from playing with them. I'm
(almost) certain they'll all be returned in mint condition.

Oh---and about the title. Not only is a crossroad a place where a
person decides which way to go, it is also where suicides were
traditionally buried.

PART ONE

~~~~~

The isolated Toronto warehouse stood shuttered and quiet under the
midday sun, its barricaded windows looking blankly over the deserted
alley. A cat padded swiftly past the brick building intent on its own
purposes, ignoring the scrap of paper that skittered down the alley on
a hot gust of wind.

No light penetrated the converted warehouse. The ticking of a small
clock, the only sound in the gloomy loft, seemed to echo through the
cavernous living area on the second floor.

No, not quite the only sound. A muffled noise, neither words nor gasps
but somehow an eerie combination of both, came from a room on the
upper level.

In that room a figure lay deep in a troubled sleep, his restlessness
betrayed by occasional twitches of hand and face. He must have been
having a nightmare, for he was the source of the eerie sounds.

Nick Knight was having The Dream again...

~~~~~

He was standing in a bleak valley---was it one of the wadis he had
struggled through as a mortal in the Holy Land? He didn't know---
devoid of vegetation and life. The noonday sun blazed down on him, but
somehow it didn't burn, it only warmed him as it had...Before. In The
Dream (and he knew it was a dream, yet he could not stop dreaming) he
accepted this without question or wonder.

He felt compelled to make his way through the ankle-deep sand toward a
small pool in the distance. Was it a mirage, like those that had
deceived him and his fellow Crusaders? It seemed as real as the sky
above and the hills surrounding him.

The scene blurred. Suddenly he was facing a robed figure that spoke in
familiar, honeyed tones. He could recite the words to come by heart.
"Then behold." A graceful gesture towards an anachronistic steel
table. "Here is the soul of the vampire in its true state, deformed by
the evil it has embraced. This is your soul, Nicholas."

As always, his eyes were drawn to the horror on the autopsy table.
Maggot-ridden, blackened, putrefying, his own decomposing body lay
there. Images of the bodies of slain Crusaders and Saracens left in
the unforgiving Palestinian sun to rot swam before his eyes and
superimposed themselves on the corpse---*his* corpse. "No! After all
I've been through trying to become human...you're lying to me! This is
not what I am now!" The same words always fell from his lips, a
useless protest.

The figure smiled gently. "We do not sit in judgment of you---we do
not accuse. The truth is simply the truth. It must be confronted. It
must be accepted." Another graceful gesture, this time turning towards
the field of grave markers that had suddenly appeared, stretching into
the distant heat haze.

"The legacy of your evil has not been purged," the figure continued
remorselessly. "Behold---the souls of the innocents that you have
murdered. They linger here---they persist. They won't forgive you
until your task is completed."

Unwillingly, he looked at the thousands of crosses. He could hear the
muffled cries of the murdered screaming for his death, for revenge,
for his damnation. All those souls down through the ages, all those
lives ended before their proper time---the weight of their
condemnation almost brought him to his knees.

In a small clear place at the back of his mind, he knew The Dream,
this near-death experience, continued on and ended with the faint hope
he could reclaim his soul and earn the forgiveness of his victims and
of God.

But the scene blurred again and he found himself standing in a bleak
valley---was it one of the wadis he had struggled through as a mortal
in the Holy Land? He didn't know---devoid of vegetation and life. And
as he trudged once again through the ankle-deep sand under the blazing
noonday sun, he knew in his despair The Dream would replay the same
scene, over and over, until he awoke.

~~~~~

Nick Knight awoke with a gasp, clutching the sheets in shaking hands.
He fell back on his pillow, waves of exhaustion washing over him. A
glance at the bedside clock told him it was three o'clock---he still
had two and a half hours until he had to get up for work.

Scrubbing his face with his hands, he sat up. He knew he wouldn't get
any more sleep---and he knew that if by some chance he did fall
asleep, The Dream would come again, just as it had every day for the
last two weeks.

It had been six months since he had let---no, had asked---Dr. Diana
Linsman use the synaptic field damper on him. He had desperately
wanted to undo the decision he had made eight hundred years ago, and
her fervent belief in the possibility of undergoing miraculous changes
while experiencing the artificially generated brain death had infected
him. Perhaps the experimental machine would work a miracle on him, and
he would regain what he had lost all those years ago.

But the only thing he had gained from the dangerous experience had
been the knowledge he still had a long way to go in his quest for
forgiveness. That, and The Dream.

Stumbling to the shower, he blearily wondered how much more of this he
could take. He was so tired...The Dream's images haunted even his
waking hours, the screams for revenge and justice echoing through his
mind, the vision of the field of graves reflecting in randomly-
glimpsed windows, even as he tried to go about some semblance of a
normal life.

He began to think about ways to end The Dream once and for all.

~~~~~

PART TWO

~~~~~

Somehow, Nick managed to get through his shift without mishap. His
partner, Don Schanke, was clearly aware something was wrong with him.
He kept his questions to himself, but shot him worried looks every so
often when he thought Nick wasn't looking. And as if to make up for
Nick's silences, he became even more ebullient than usual.

It was with a sense of relief that the shift drew to a close and Nick
finally signed out and went home.

When he got back to the loft shortly before sunrise, exhaustion was
threatening to overcome him. He walked slowly to the refrigerator and
rested his forehead momentarily on the cool door before he removed a
bottle, uncorked it, and took a deep draft of the revitalizing blood.

As usual, the thin bitter taste of cow only marginally satisfied his
hunger. He grimaced and walked over to the still-unshuttered windows,
bottle in hand.

Looking out the window at the bleak warehouse across the alley, he
considered the idea that had been insinuating itself into his
consciousness over the last week.

It was time. Erica had always said he would know when his time had
come, that he would know when he no longer added anything to the
world, but only took from it.

Erica had known her time---and had walked into the sun.

Yes, he thought dully, the weight of the past overshadowed any good he
might be doing in the here and now. It was a delusion to think he
could redeem himself to his countless victims.

The near-death experiment had unblocked the portions of his perfect
memory that he had carefully compartmentalized and hidden away; now,
the details of his crimes had come back to him in one great crashing
blow. The memories of all the evil he had done and all the terror he
had caused seemed to have merged into a continuous nightmare,
reminding him that the fiction of a life he had created for himself
was not his true nature. The bleak predawn hour suited his thoughts.
What difference would it make if he were gone from the world, as he
should have been over seven hundred years ago? If he had not been
selfish, if he had not succumbed to temptation and desire, his bones
would be long turned to dust in some forgotten church crypt, his name
remembered only as a scholar's notation on a minor branch of medieval
genealogy, if at all. His only immortality would have been the kind
granted to humanity by God---children to carry his name forward
through time. And if his name were forgotten, at least some small part
of himself, his blood, would have continued on.

The unnatural immortality he had grasped had indeed given him eternal
life---and a dead name, a dead heart, and a dead soul as well.

He supposed his few mortal friends would mourn his disappearance for a
while. They would wonder where he had gone, for there would be no body
over which to grieve. But mortal memories were short, and they faded
and eased with time. Even Natalie, who would know what he had done,
would eventually forget her anger and pain. She would put aside the
unspoken, unfulfilled love they shared and move on to live her life as
it should be.

Breaking the complex bond with his vampire family would be the hardest
thing to do. Despite the torment he had suffered down through the
centuries, he was intricately bound to both Lacroix and Janette in a
relationship of love and hate, subjugation and freedom, that defied
description.

He knew that both had accepted and savored their lives in the Dark, as
he had never been able to do. Breaking the blood bond would be pain
them, but they were supreme survivors and would continue through
eternity with the certainty and serenity he had never found.

If he walked into the sun he would prevent the future murders he was
certain he would commit, and those deaths he would indirectly cause.
Perhaps this final gesture would appease the souls of those thousands
who cried out against him every night and day. He could do no more
than that to atone for his sins.

And what difference would it make, this final mortal sin of suicide?
He had already subverted God's will by refusing to walk into the Light
that first time he had been given the choice. Was that defiance not a
mortal sin as well? He had so many blackening his soul, one more could
not possibly make a difference. The certainty of his soul's fate---the
agony of eternal damnation---was almost a comfort.

Nick sighed and lowered the shutters against the approaching dawn. He
was tired, so tired. And he knew that when he finally succumbed to
sleep, The Dream would come again.

~~~~~

Don Schanke sat slumped at the kitchen table moodily swirling his
after-dinner mug of coffee. He eyed the near-empty plate of chocolate
chip cookies on the counter speculatively.

Myra, working on her Skin Pretty customer account files, caught his
glance and said without looking up, "Don't even think about it, Don."
She punched a few numbers into her calculator. "Those two cookies are
for Jenny's lunch tomorrow." Smiling, she reached across the table and
poked him in the gut with her pen. "And besides, big fella, you don't
need any more. You had six for dessert."

"Yeah, okay." He was silent for a moment, listening to the soft clicks
from Myra's calculator as she tapped the keys. "Ya know, Myra, I'm
worried about Nick."

"Why?" She looked up from her account book, raising a questioning
brow. "Should I be worried, too? I mean, he's your partner, and he's
supposed to look out for you."

"No, I don't think so. Well, maybe...you know how I've told you he's,
well, he's not your average guy? I mean, he can be downright weird,
but he's always been there for me. So he goes off into Never-Never-
Land every so often, and---did I tell you? I had to drive him home in
the trunk last week, like I did that one time a few years ago? I mean,
give me a break, he can't be that sun-sensitive!---but he's acting
even weirder than usual these last two weeks." Tapping his finger on
the mug thoughtfully, Schanke tried to think of a way to describe
Nick's behavior, or more exactly, his lack of behavior. He sighed.
"It's just sort of spooky. Not normal weird, but, well, weird weird."

Myra put down her pen. Trying to lighten his mood, she said, "Well,
what exactly is he doing? Speaking in tongues? Did he dye his hair
purple and pierce his ears?"

A faint grin tugged at Schanke's mouth. "Not Mister GQ. No, it's more
like he's not doing anything. He's just sort of---there. No joking
around, no giving me a hard time about being late or messing up that
damn pimpmobile of his. I mean, he does the job okay, but it's like
he's on autopilot." He shrugged. "I don't know, maybe it's a phase or
something. You know how he goes through those mood swings. Real
cheerful one minute, gloomy the next. Maybe he's just leveled out in
the middle for a while."

"Well, why don't you ask him if anything's wrong?" Myra asked
reasonably.

Schanke looked mildly horrified. "Guys don't do stuff like that! Geez,
what would I say? 'Hey, Knight, how about them Leafs? And by the way,
have you fallen out of touch with your inner child lately?' Man oh
man, I can't do that."

"Honestly, Don, just ask him if something's bothering him. It's not
such a big deal. He might want to talk."

"No way, honey. Not me." A thought struck him. "I know! I'll ask
Natalie to ask him. She can do it. They're always talking about stuff
like that. It would sound better, coming from her."

Myra smiled and shook her head. "That's my guy, the big brave cop.
Willing to chase down serial killers but completely incapable of
starting a conversation that doesn't involve cars, sporting events
or," she lowered her voice suggestively, "sex."

Schanke groaned. "Aw geez, Myra..."

"Just go talk to Natalie. She probably already knows all about it, and
might even tell you. Now, weren't you going to help Jenny with her
long division? You're good at math. Go. Explain."

Schanke got up and kissed the top of Myra's head. "Yes, ma'am. Do I
get a cookie when I'm done?"

She laughed and said, "I got some of those low-fat ones. You get
exactly one of those if you do a good job." She smirked. "Or maybe we
can think of some other reward, totally calorie-free..."

Schanke snickered. "Forget the cookie, then. This is going to be one
fast tutoring session." He rinsed his mug, deposited it in the drainer
and headed towards Jenny's room. Climbing the stairs, his expression
sobered. Maybe there really was nothing wrong with Nick. He hoped
so---for both their sakes.

~~~~~

PART THREE

~~~~~

Next shift, Schanke was somewhat surprised to find he made it in
before Nick, even though he was his usual ten minutes late. He checked
the window---yup, it was full dark. Nick couldn't use the old "sun
allergy" excuse this time.

Fifteen minutes later, Nick walked into the squad room, barely
acknowledging the desk sergeant's greeting. Damn, Schanke thought,
watching Nick weave his way across the crowded room, Still in the
dumps. I better make a point of seeing Nat this shift. He quickly
busied himself with some reports as Nick took off his suit jacket and
draped it over the back of his chair, sat down and reached for the
papers in his in-basket.

"Hey, Knight, a little late today, aren't ya? I thought that was my
routine. The Caddy giving you some trouble?" Schanke grinned at his
partner and was rewarded with a blank look.

"Huh? Oh, Schank---no, I just overslept." Nick opened the top folder,
the arrest record of a suspect in their latest case, and started
reading. He rested his chin on his fist and turned the page, his face
still and noncommittal.

Schanke thought his partner did look tired and even paler than usual.
With a slight shock, he realized that Nick was actually wearing the
same clothes he had worn the day before, and that they were rumpled.
He couldn't remember Nick ever doing that---he was more meticulous
about his appearance than any guy Schanke had ever known---and the
only reason in Schanke's world for showing up for work in yesterday's
clothes was a hot date. The way Nick had been acting, somehow he
didn't think that was the reason. He added this latest aberration to
his mental list.

The partners dug into the drudgery that got most murders solved: going
through the victim's phone records, bills and appointment book,
looking for someone or something that could connect their prime
suspect to her. It was boring, tedious work, and the two men labored
without much conversation. Occasionally, Schanke would venture a
glance across the desk. Nick was slowly going through a stack of
invoices and credit card receipts; once Schanke caught him staring
unblinkingly at the papers in front of him, so still that Schanke
would have sworn he wasn't even breathing.

After two hours, Schanke pushed his stack of phone logs away,
stretched hugely and announced, "Enough of that for a while! I'm going
over to Forensics to see what they have on the knife. Man oh man, if I
don't get up and move I'm gonna die. Wanna come? Maybe grab a bite to
eat on the way?"

Nick sat back in his chair and looked up at Schanke. "No, I don't
think so, Schank. I'll just finish this stuff."

Another first---Nick wasn't taking the chance to go talk to Natalie. A
snatch of music ran through his mind---'It's the end of the world as
we know it'---as he considered this latest bit of strange behavior.
Forensics was in the Coroner's Building, so when they went there, Nick
always stopped in to schmooze with Nat. Oh, well, Schanke thought as
he put his coat on, I'll have her all to myself for a change. It'll
give me the chance to find out what the hell is going on. Fishing his
car keys out of his pocket, he headed out to the parking lot.

His check-in with Forensics completed (no results yet---they were
backlogged, as usual, and ordinary victims didn't get the priority
treatment), Schanke headed down into the basement and the morgue. "Hi,
Grace," he greeted Natalie's assistant. "Is Nat in?"

Grace smiled warmly at him. "Yes, but she's in the middle of a body.
Still want to go in? And where's your shadow?"

"Nick? Uh, he's busy back at the precinct. For once he's helping out
with the paperwork. I marked my calendar." Schanke glanced uneasily
through the swinging door that led to the autopsy room. God, he hated
it when there were corpses in pieces right out in the open in there.
He didn't mind seeing corpses at the murder scene, but this was so
cold and clinical. He always pictured himself on the steel table
getting sliced and diced. Suppressing a shudder, he pushed through the
door and stuck his head around the corner.

"Nat?"

Natalie looked up from the corpse's abdomen, where she was busy
removing the liver for closer examination. "Schank! Hi! What can I do
for you? Where's Nick?" She severed the last bit of tissue, lifted out
the liver and put it in a specimen bag.

Averting his eyes, Schanke said, "Uh, that's what I wanted to talk to
you about. Could you spare a few minutes?"

Placing the liver in the scale, Nat replied, "Sure. Just let me weigh
this thing." She carefully read the scale, dictated a few notes into
her tape recorder, and finally turned to Schanke. "What's up?"

Plunging right in, he asked, "Have you noticed anything peculiar about
Nick lately? I mean, the way he's acting?"

Her expression became guarded. "What do you mean?"

"Well, he's been real quiet these last couple of weeks. He just
doesn't seem to be his usual weird self." He went on to describe what
he'd observed. "Hell, he's even wearing the same stuff he had on
yesterday! And he was late! When's the last time that happened? Nat,
what's going on?" he asked plaintively.

Natalie thought for a few moments. Yes, she had noticed Nick was
distracted, or at least more distracted than usual. She had assumed
that he was going through one of his periodic bouts of extreme guilt
or having trouble with Lacroix (which she certainly didn't want to get
mixed up in), and had decided to leave him to his thoughts. He usually
bounced back in a few days.

But that had been before she went to the two-day seminar in Ottawa
last Thursday and Friday. She had stayed over until Sunday afternoon
visiting old friends as a little getaway. She hadn't called Nick when
she got back Monday morning, assuming he'd visit her at work that
night. But he hadn't, and she had gotten too busy to call him. Now
here it was Tuesday, and still no Nick. He should have snapped out of
it by now, she thought worriedly. His moods don't usually last this
long.

Nonetheless, she smiled reassuringly at Schanke. "Hey, c'mon,
Schank---you know Nick. The Caddy probably needs a lube job or
something. He'll be okay." Noting Schanke's doubtful expression, she
added, "If it'll make you feel better, I'll ask him what's up. Don't
worry."

"Thanks, Nat. I know it's probably nothing, but still..."

She shooed him towards the door. "So go back to your partner or help
me remove this guy's brain. I'm about to get the saw out."

"Eeuww. I'm outta here." Schanke backed out the swinging door. "I
don't know how such a nice girl can do this stuff..." His voice
trailed off as he exited down the hallway, his mind more at ease now
that he had passed the ball to Natalie. She'd get to the bottom of it.

~~~~~

PART FOUR

~~~~~

"Hey, Knight!"

Nick looked up from the telephone log he was reviewing. Schanke wasn't
back from Forensics yet. Tom, the desk sergeant, was beckoning to him.
In front of the desk was an elderly couple, a tiny sparrow-like woman
with a halo of white hair in a dowdy print dress and a shapeless
sweater, and a stooped, kindly looking man in a black suit---a priest.

Nick stood up and went over to the desk. "What do you want?" he said
rather curtly. Tom flinched at his tone but gestured to the elderly
couple.

"This lady, Mrs. Charbonneau, witnessed a mugging. She only speaks
French---she was scared and went to her parish priest, Father
Delabarre, here. He persuaded her to come in and report what she saw
as soon as possible, but she'd be more comfortable talking to someone
directly. You're fluent, aren't you?" He looked apologetic. "Marcel's
out sick tonight, and Paul's on vacation."

Delabarre! Nick was assaulted with the memories the name stirred. The
name of the noble in whose service he had been on that trip to
Carrog---Before. The man who had arranged for him to go to Jerusalem
to fight in the Crusades instead of being tried for the murder of his
lover, Gwynneth, singer of songs. The man who had actually killed the
singer in order to better bring a pagan realm under the influence of
the Holy Church and, conveniently, win himself a kingdom. The man who
had started his own slide into disillusionment and eventual seduction
into the night.

Nick searched the priest's face for traces of the long-dead noble. No,
there was no resemblance, no sign of the haughty eyes, the world-weary
demeanor. Just an elderly man with a tired, kind face.

Mrs. Charbonneau offered Nick a timid smile. Father Delabarre patted
her hand. Nick shook himself mentally and forced a smile. "How can I
help you?" he asked in French.

The diminutive woman mustered the courage to speak. "I saw two
hoodlums beat a man and steal his money. The police helped the poor
man, but I didn't tell them I had seen the whole thing until Father
told me I should." Her hands nervously twined together. "I was afraid
they would come for me, too."

Nick turned to Tom. "Who's catching the mugging?"

Tom glanced at a paper on the desk. "Uh, Driscoll and Harper took the
report from the victim. If you get Mrs. Charbonneau's statement, I'll
forward it to them. Sorry, Nick. I know it's not exactly a homicide,
but you're the only Francophone on staff tonight."

Nick smiled slightly, a tacit apology for his mood. "Nah, it's okay.
Change of pace and all that." He turned to the elderly couple. "Let's
go in here and you can tell me all about it." He led them through the
squad room to the interview room.

For the next fifteen minutes, Nick patiently listened to Mrs.
Charbonneau's rather excited description of the two teenage boys who
accosted a man in front of her apartment. He took notes for the
patrolmen who were first on the scene and then had some juvenile
offender mug books brought in for the elderly woman to look through.
Mrs. Charbonneau hadn't recognized the youths, but she had a sharp eye
and was sure she could identify them.

Silence fell over the room as she leafed slowly through the pictures.
Nick studied his hands, folded on the table in front of him, lost in
his own thoughts.

After several minutes, Father Delabarre cleared his throat. "I don't
recognize your accent, Detective," he ventured. "I was wondering where
you're from."

Nick regarded the priest's lined face, carefully avoiding the small
silver cross pinned to his lapel. After a moment, he said curtly,
"My...mother was from Belgium. And I have spent a number of years in
Paris."

"Ah." Father Delabarre smiled apologetically. "I was merely curious---
a bad habit. Pardon me for prying."

Silence descended again. The only sounds were of the heavy, plastic-
coated pages of the mug book turning over and the soft tick of the
clock on the wall.

Father Delabarre studied the young man sitting across the table. He
had an open, friendly face, he decided, but was obviously troubled by
something. His features were clouded by some dark emotion he couldn't
define. He had never seen anyone sit so still.

The priest was shaken out of his musings when Mrs. Charbonneau closed
the last mug book with a decisive snap. "They aren't here!" she
exclaimed, disappointed she was unable to point definitively to the
perpetrators of her own little crime drama.

"Don't worry." Nick carefully piled the three books together. "Your
description was most exact, Madame. I'm sure the police who deal with
juveniles will know of them."

He stood up, and Mrs. Charbonneau and Father Delabarre followed suit.
"I'll make sure your statement is sent to the officers in charge of
this case. And we'll let you know if we catch them---you may have to
come in and identify them." Nick held open the door and stepped back
to let them through into the squad room. As he followed them, Father
Delabarre stopped and touched his arm.

"Detective," he said softly, "you look troubled. Can I help you in any
way?"

Nick's dark blue eyes fixed the priest's with an intense look. Father
Delabarre unaccountably felt a sudden frisson of fear. Then the severe
gaze softened. "I don't think so, Father. But my thanks."

"Well, if you decide you need to talk, call me." He pressed a calling
card into Nick's hand. "Any time."

Nick fingered the card, an unreadable expression on his face, and then
put it in his pocket. "Thanks." Father Delabarre ushered Mrs.
Charbonneau towards the exit, leaving Nick standing by his desk
watching their retreating backs. No, there is nothing a well-meaning
priest can do for me, he thought bleakly. Especially one bearing
that name.

He sat heavily in his chair and rested his head on his hands. Only
five more hours, he told himself. He straightened up and pulled the
next file over. He sighed. If only I could sleep.

~~~~~

PART FIVE

~~~~~

Lacroix raised his eyes from the book he was reading and considered
the emotions filtering through his bond with Nicholas. Normally he
shielded himself from his son's mental excesses, maintaining only a
feather-light contact to remind Nicholas he was there. But now---waves
of despair flowed like a turgid black river through their link,
battering at his composure. He grimaced.

Nicholas had been subject to vast mood swings from his very first
night in the Dark, but this felt somehow---different. Deeper. Emptier.
The underlying spark of intensity that had first attracted him to the
disillusioned Crusader knight, the intriguing dichotomy of darkness
and light, had been replaced by a dull nothingness.

The ancient vampire stroked his upper lip thoughtfully and allowed the
link to broaden. His son's misery echoed back to engulf him in a dark
miasma. He closed his eyes against the onslaught and withdrew as
quietly as he had entered.

This would bear watching. A sense of unease crept unbidden into his
mind, and he shook his head to dispel it. Yes, he would watch over his
son more carefully than usual, as was his paternal duty. He hadn't
gone to Nicholas' loft for several months...perhaps it was time to pay
a visit again.

His decision made, Lacroix's face smoothed once again into an
enigmatic mask. He opened his book and resumed reading.

~~~~~

That morning after her shift, Natalie parked her car next to Nick's
loft entrance. She looked up at the second floor windows---the
shutters were down against the lightening sky, as usual.

Sitting behind the wheel listening to the ticking of the cooling
engine, she thought over what Schanke had told her. Nick had been
moody from the day he had sat up on her examining table. He would go
for days enmeshed in guilt and self-loathing, and then eagerly seize
on any little thing that seemed to advance his quest for mortality. He
would glow with optimism and delight for a few days only to retreat
once again into gloom and guilt. Natalie sometimes thought he was more
than a little borderline manic/depressive.

He managed to disguise his inner feelings with a gloss of normalcy
from almost everyone except those closest to him. Natalie always knew.
Schanke knew, too, although he didn't understand the reasons. And
then, of course, there were Janette and Lacroix, who did understand
but responded with either resigned amusement or utter contempt.

But according to Schanke, these last few weeks seemed different. From
what he described to her, there hadn't been an excess of emotion,
either despair or elation, but rather a complete absence of it.
Natalie thought, It's as if all the anger and joy were gone, replaced
by...what? Resignation? She felt a pang of unease. What was he
thinking? And why hadn't he called me?

She reluctantly reviewed the symptoms again. If he were human, she
would have thought instantly of suicide. But he wasn't human...

Nat didn't profess to understand Nick's religious convictions---the
thought of a vampire having any at all seemed ludicrous---but she did
understand that he took them seriously. He was very much the product
of his upbringing, a time when the Church was part of everyday life,
and everything you did either furthered your relationship with God or
took you closer to the fires of Hell. To him, suicide was the ultimate
sin.

But Nick had flirted with it before, when the despair he felt seemed
to overwhelm him. Sometimes it seemed the Church's severe proscription
against it was the only thing keeping him in this world. Nat looked up
at his windows again. She hoped he wasn't thinking of anything
so...final.

She got out of the car and slowly approached the security door. What
could she say that she hadn't said already? She could offer him no
fresh hope, no news of a breakthrough. Just her caring and love---and
that just didn't seem to be enough any more.

She punched in the security code and entered the elevator. She
considered the approach she would take as it slowly ground upward,
seemingly slower than usual. Cheerfulness? No, too fake...Anger? It
had never really worked before, so why should it now? She settled on
just straightforward concern. It was what she felt, and anyway, Nick
could always tell when she dissembled.

When the elevator door opened, she peered into the dark loft. There
were no lights on---no big deal, Nick could see in even the darkest
room, although he usually made the gesture of keeping a light on---and
called his name. "Nick? You here?"

No answer. She felt her way over to a lamp and snapped it on, the
sudden glare making her squint. She saw Nick sprawled on the leather
couch, apparently asleep. He was still wearing his work clothes.

There were two empty bottles on the floor next to him. One of them was
an unlabeled dark green wine bottle, the kind he kept blood in, and
the other was a liquor bottle. She went over, picked up the squat
brown bottle and read the label. Yes, it was cognac---correction,
*had* been cognac. Looking at Nick, she realized with a shock he must
have downed both bottles.

She moved them out of the way and sat down on the coffee table. He
looked so utterly still, so defenseless, so---dead. She had noticed
that he barely breathed when he slept, and now she saw he wasn't
breathing at all. His face was drawn and tired looking, and paler than
usual. She rubbed his arm, and said, "Nick...Nick, wake up." She shook
him gently. "C'mon, wake up."

He remained still, completely unresponsive. Then suddenly he twitched
and drew a deep breath. He moved his hands as if to protect himself
from something. "Non...non..." he muttered and turned his head away.
He groaned, a horrible sound full of despair.

She shook him more roughly. "Nick! Wake up, you're having a bad dream!
Wake up!" Finally she slapped him lightly on the cheek.

He started and gasped "Q'est-ce que ...?" his eyes open but unseeing.
He stared uncomprehendingly straight ahead, then sank back and sighed.
He finally registered her presence. "Nat, what...?"

"Since when have you been drinking yourself to sleep?" she asked,
rather more tartly than she meant to sound.

He lay a moment without answering, then closed his eyes again. "I've
just been having difficulty sleeping. It's nothing."

"What do you mean, 'It's nothing?' A whole bottle of cognac, Nick!
It's obviously something. Even Schanke has noticed you haven't been
yourself for a while." She took his hand, and said more gently,
"C'mon, Nick. Please tell me. Maybe I can help."

Nick eased his hand from her grasp. "It's just something I have to
work out myself." He sat up and rubbed his face. "As for the cognac,
well, I remember drinking myself into oblivion more than a few times.
I guess I thought it might still work." He smiled faintly. "It
obviously doesn't."

Nat looked intently at him for a few moments. "Are you sure you'll be
all right?" she finally asked. "I can stay."

He rubbed his hands over his face again and sighed. "No. Go home and
get some rest, and I'll try to get some, too. I'll be okay, really."

"No, Nick, I *really* think I should stay..." She stood up and put her
hand lightly on his shoulder. "I can prescribe some sleeping pills if
you want. They might help."

He reached up and rested his hand on hers, looked into her eyes and
managed to sketch a smile. "No. Go home to Sydney. I'll let you know
if there's anything you can do." The smile faded and his hand fell
back into his lap.

"You're sure?" she persisted. He nodded without looking at her.

Nat walked slowly over to the elevator, opened the heavy door, and
turned to look at him. He was sitting on the couch, just staring ahead
at nothing. He didn't turn as the door slid closed.

~~~~~

PART SIX

~~~~~

The next evening, Nat called Schanke. "Schank, is Nick there?"

"No. He's late again. Nat, you know that's not like him."

"I know. Schank, listen, I talked to him last night after work. He's
okay, he's just...not sleeping very well right now." She paused,
trying to think of a passable explanation. "You know how he's
secretive about his family. I think he's had some tragedies in the
past, and something's reminded him, or it's an anniversary, or
something. He just needs to rest, take some time to think. Can you get
Cohen to make him take some vacation?"

"Geez, you think he just needs some time off?" Schanke sounded
dubious. "You're right, though, he does look really tired all the
time. Okay, I'll talk to her. Between the two of us, we'll get him out
of here." He felt relieved Nat had found an explanation. Myra was
right, as usual.

"Talk to her real soon, will you, and do it without Nick seeing you,
okay? We don't want him to think we're ganging up on him."

"He won't know what hit him," he assured her. "I'll do it right now,
before he gets here."

Nat sounded relieved. "Thanks, Schank. I owe you big time."

"I'll remember that next time you make me look at some corpse you're
cutting into little pieces. Bye-bye." He chuckled as he hung up.

Schanke glanced over at Captain Cohen's office. She was sitting at her
desk immersed in paperwork. He got up and knocked on her open door.
"Cap, got a minute?"

She looked up. "Yes, Detective?" She nodded at her visitor's chair.

Schanke sat down and cleared his throat, feeling absurdly like a kid
facing the principal. "Cap, uh, I think Nick needs to take some time
off, and you know he's not going to do it voluntarily. I think he's
been having some family problems or something, and he's been no use to
anyone for the last week. Can you get him to take a week or so?"

She tapped her pen on the desk thoughtfully. "I noticed he's been a
bit---subdued. You think some time off will help?"

"Uh-huh. So does Dr. Lambert."

"How's your case load right now?"

"We have six open files, and they're pretty routine. I can handle them
alone for a week. And if I need help, I can borrow one of the other
guys for a few hours."

Cohen thought for a moment and then nodded. "Okay, I'll see what I can
do. He's overdue, anyway, although that's never made any difference to
him in the past." She smiled at Schanke, her stern face suddenly
friendly. "He's lucky he's got a partner who cares that much about
him."

"Care about him, hell. I'm just worried he won't back me up when the
chips are down. I need all of his attention on the job," he protested.

She nodded seriously. "Of course. Silly me."

Four hours later, Captain Cohen summoned Nick into her office. When he
was seated, she frowned at him and, picking up an interoffice memo,
said, "I'm sorry, but you have to take a week's vacation. Starting
tomorrow." She gestured to the memo. "Human Resources has informed me
all personnel have to take at least one week off every year. Something
to do with ensuring mental health, they said. So I've been going
through the time sheets and you're the only one in the division who
hasn't taken any vacation." She put down the memo and pushed a time
sheet towards him. "So sign this and get out. I don't need them
breathing down my neck." She sat back and waited for the arguments to
start.

Nick took the time sheet and looked at it. It was already filled out
with vacation hours indicated for the next week. He shrugged. "Okay."
He took a pen out of his pocket, signed his name and handed it back to
her.

"What, no arguments? I can't believe it." She looked at him more
closely. "Detective, you look beat. Why don't you book off now instead
of finishing out the night? Go home and get some sleep."

Nick sat quietly for a moment, an unreadable expression on his face,
and then shrugged again. "I suppose I'm not much use right now---to
anyone. All right." He got up and left her office without saying
another word.

Cohen watched his retreating back, then looked down at the rather old-
fashioned looking signature on the time sheet. "I never thought I'd
see the day," she said softly to herself, shaking her head.

Nick walked back to his desk to find Schanke looking at him
quizzically. "Cohen's sending me home for a week's vacation." He sat
down and desultorily tidied the papers on his desk.

"Damn! What'd you do to deserve punishment like that?" Schanke asked
in mock horror. "Tell me so I can be sent home, too!"

"It's some new HR regulation. Everyone has to take at least a week
every year, and I'm it right now." He stopped shuffling his papers,
looked intently at his partner and said, "Schank, I'm sorry. I haven't
been much use to you the last couple of weeks."

"Hey, partner, it's no big deal." Schanke waved off the apology. "Say,
you should blow this pop stand for a couple of days. Get out of town
and go look at some different scenery. You'll feel like a new man when
you come back."

"Yeah, maybe." Nick tapped his papers into a neat stack, put them in
his in basket and locked his desk. He sat back and let his gaze roam
around the squad room as if memorizing it, then stood up and went
around their desks to stand next to his partner. "Here, take my desk
key. You might need something in there." He handed the key to Schanke,
paused and said quietly, "Goodbye, Don. Thanks for everything." He
rested his hand on Schanke's shoulder a moment, then turned to go.

Schanke stared at him. "Uh, you're welcome. I don't know what for, but
you're welcome. See you next week, Nick."

"Yeah, next week." Nick raised his hand in farewell, turned and
quietly left the squad room.

~~~~~

Amanda Cohen watched Nick clean up his desk, then stand to leave on
his forced vacation. She saw him hand something to Schanke, rest his
hand on Schanke's shoulder, and then leave. Schanke was staring after
him with a puzzled look on his face. She sighed and shook her head
again. She had never been able to figure that man out. Well, maybe a
week off would snap him out of his blue funk. She could never tell
with Nick. She went back to her paperwork.

~~~~~

PART SEVEN

~~~~~

Nick entered the dark loft, took off his jacket and threw it in the
general direction of the kitchen table. He dropped heavily onto the
sofa, leaned his head backward to rest on the cool leather and closed
his eyes. He was so tired. His thoughts wandered listlessly in
unproductive circles. If he could only sleep without The Dream coming
again...

Five hours later he was still in the same position. The sky outside
the unshuttered windows was lightening into the pale gray of the pre-
dawn, chasing the cobalt and black of the night over the western
horizon.

He rose stiffly and, picking up the remote, went to the window and
leaned his forehead against the cool glass. He watched the sky lighten
further until there were pale pinks streaking the gray. Even this wan
light hurt his eyes.

He tried for the millionth time to remember what it was like to watch
the dawn and to welcome the first warmth of the sun after a chilly
night---what it was like to see the gray fade into pink and pale blue
and then become the fresh, bright blue of a spring day, full of
birdsong and soft breezes. He couldn't. All he could bring to mind was
the electronic re-creations of day on his television.

The first time he had seen a color movie of a sunrise he had wept.

He thumbed the remote. The shutters hummed quietly and blocked out the
coming day. The soft thud of the shutters coming to rest seemed to
solidify his resolve.

He finally knew what he must do. The thought was an island of shining
clarity in the darkness of his mind. But first...

Walking over to an end table, Nick clicked the lamp on to its lowest
setting. He picked up the calling card resting in the pre-Columbian
pottery dish on the table and rubbed his thumb over the black
lettering. It wasn't engraved, just printed---appropriate for a parish
priest.

Perhaps it would help to speak to him. Let a Delabarre finish what a
Delabarre started.

~~~~~

At eleven that morning, Nick called Father Delabarre. "Father, it's
Detective Knight...we spoke the other night," he said in French. "Oh,
yes. Have you caught those young men? Did you want to see Mrs.
Charbonneau again?" The priest replied in the same language, his voice
sounding brisk and businesslike.

"Uh, no, Father. I was wondering if I might..." Nick was suddenly at a
loss for words, unsure of his intentions. His voice trailed off.

"Did you want to see me on a personal matter?" Father Delabarre asked
gently.

"Yes. I have a decision to make---actually, I've made the decision---
but I wonder if I could talk it over with you."

"Of course, Detective. Can you come to the rectory today?"

"Uh, no, that wouldn't be a good idea." Nick cringed at the thought of
spending time on the church grounds, surrounded by holy objects.
"Would it be possible for you to come to my place this evening,
sometime around eight o'clock? It isn't too far."

Father Delabarre was silent a moment. "Very well," he said at last.
"Where do you live?"

Nick gave him the address and directions. "Please don't mention you're
coming to see me. It's a very private matter."

"I would never discuss this with anyone," the priest assured him.
"Until this evening, then. Goodbye, Detective."

"Goodbye, Father." After he hung up the phone, Nick felt strangely
relieved and apprehensive at the same time. He wasn't sure what had
prompted him to seek to confide in this elderly mortal. Was it because
he was guaranteed silence due to the seal of the confessional? Because
of the memories his name evoked? Because just speaking French after so
many years of English suddenly felt so right?

He had been masquerading as an Englishman, then an American, then a
Canadian for more than two hundred years, changing his language and
his accent like a chameleon to suit the time and place. Speaking and
hearing his native tongue, even the modern dialect, was like slipping
into a comfortable suit of clothes. For what he wanted to say, he
needed the comfort of his own language.

He felt too tired to think any more about it...the evening would come
all too soon, and he would face it then.

He trudged up the stairs to his bedroom to attempt sleep, hoping his
past would leave him alone for a few hours. After all, he would face
his victims soon enough---and they could take their just revenge upon
him for all eternity.

~~~~~

PART EIGHT

~~~~~

Father Delabarre rang the buzzer at precisely eight o'clock that
evening. He wondered uneasily why anyone would want to live in this
bleak industrial area. Most of the buildings around the address he had
been given appeared deserted or seldom used. The anonymous steel door
and the security camera mounted over it did nothing to calm his
nerves.

A voice rang tinnily out of the speaker next to the door. "Come up to
the second floor, Father. There's an elevator." An electronic lock
buzzed and he pulled the door open. Inside the dimly lit vestibule, a
battered elevator waited.

He got in and pushed the button marked '2.' The elevator creaked
slowly upward, the sound of its motor echoing loudly in the shaft. It
finally jerked to a stop and the door slid aside. Father Delabarre
peered cautiously out of the door into a large, dimly-lit room.
"Detective?"

"Come in, Father." Nick rose from the chair where he had been sitting
and approached the elevator. "Thank you for coming."

As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, the priest took in the spacious
room. It was sparsely furnished, with vast expanses of bare hardwood
floor and a high ceiling. A living room of sorts was set off by
several arm chairs, small tables, a coffee table and a large sofa
placed on a Persian carpet. One wall was covered in bookshelves with a
huge television screen and an elaborate stereo system. A grand piano
gleamed dully by the windows. An ornately carved gothic-looking mantel
surrounded a fireplace, and at the other end of the room, an easel
covered with a dropcloth stood next to a trestle table laden with
paints and brushes in tin cans. Off to the right, past a cold and
little-used kitchen, stairs led to a balcony and, presumably,
bedrooms. A motorcycle stood in a far corner. The whole room felt
cold.

Nick took him by the elbow and steered him to the living room area.
"Please sit down," he said, and seated himself on the sofa. The priest
sat in one of the leather armchairs and looked at his host. "Well,
Detective, how can I help you? You mentioned a decision..." He looked
inquiringly at the young man sitting across from him.

Nick sat back and said quietly in French, "Father, I have decided to
end my existence." He held up his hand to quell the priest's shocked
exclamations and continued, "I have good reason to do this. I don't
even know why I'm telling you, except perhaps to hear myself explain,
or to gain some solace from an understanding soul. I don't expect
absolution for my multitude of sins---I am far beyond hope of that."
He paused and looked at the floor. "It is a long story, and one you
will no doubt find difficult to believe. But I can no longer justify
remaining in this world."

Father Delabarre protested, "My son, I can't condone suicide---it is a
mortal sin! If you sincerely ask God's forgiveness for your sins, it
will be given to you. Let me hear your confession, and we will pray
for God's mercy."

Nick shook his head. "You don't understand, Father." He looked
directly into his eyes. "What I am about to tell you, you must promise
to keep secret. Do you promise?"

"Of course. It will be under the secrecy of the confessional. But
please, I beg you to consider your immortal soul..."

"Father, my immortal soul was lost centuries ago. Those rules don't
apply to me anymore. I am not human." He saw the confusion on the
priest's face. He continued, "I have not been human for almost eight
hundred years. During that time, I have killed thousands, and God help
me, reveled in their deaths. And now the souls of my victims are
crying out for justice."

Father Delabarre said faintly, "Eight hundred years...thousands of
deaths? How can this be?"

"Yes." The flat statement seemed to echo in the dark loft. "You see,
Father, I am a vampire."

The priest stared at Nick, his thoughts racing. God protect me, I am
alone with a psychotic, or at least a man with severe delusions. He
cleared his throat nervously. "Why do you believe you are a vampire?"
he asked carefully.

Nick's eyes bored into him. "It is only natural you do not believe me.
No sane person would, in this day and age. It isn't rational to
believe in supernatural beings---monsters who stalk the night." He
smiled bitterly. "Behold the monster I really am." Still staring
straight at him, Nick's eyes flared an inhuman gold. He drew back his
lips in a snarl, revealing his sharp elongated canine teeth. He
hissed, "This is what I am."

Father Delabarre sat paralyzed, his heart racing. He felt pinned
beneath that basilisk stare, unable to move, barely able to breath.
Save me, Lord, he prayed silently. "Please don't hurt me," he
whispered.

The gold died and again became deep blue. Nick looked away a moment
and shuddered, and when his gaze returned to the priest there was no
sign of the beast that had been there a moment before. "I won't hurt
you," he said tiredly. "I don't want to hurt anyone ever again. That
is why I must die."

Father Delabarre crossed himself. Nick averted his gaze. "How can this
be?" he whispered again. "Vampires are legends..." His voice trailed
off as he realized the absurdity of contradicting what he had just
witnessed. "But you were an ordinary human being, once." He stated it
as a fact.

"Yes." Nick drew a deep breath. "I am---*was*---Nicolas de Brabant,
second son of Guy de Brabant, cousin to the Duke of Brabant in what is
now known as Belgium. I was born in 1195." He paused as his cold
recitation sank into the priest's consciousness. "In 1228, in Paris, I
made the decision that ripped away my humanity and my soul, and made
me a creature of the dark." He lowered his eyes. "It was a bad
decision, born of disillusion and depression, but it was my decision,
and I bear the responsibility of all the evil that is its result."

Father Delabarre stared at Nick, amazement warring with fear in his
heart. He licked his parched lips and asked, "May I have a glass of
water?" Nick rose silently and went to the kitchen. He returned
shortly with a tall glass of ice water and a wineglass full of---
something.

Father Delabarre accepted the glass and drained it halfway, looking
aslant at Nick's wineglass.

"Yes, it is," Nick answered the unspoken question and sipped the thick
dark red liquid. "Cow blood, that is, cut with wine. At the moment, I
need it."

The priest carefully placed the water glass on the table next to him.
"You say you made a bad decision those many years ago in Paris." He
shook his head in amazement at what he was saying. How could he
counsel a vampire? But the despair writ large on the handsome face...
"I fear you are making an equally bad decision now."

He folded his hands and looked intently at the quiet figure seated
across from him. "I can't believe your soul is lost, or that you are
beyond redemption. God forsakes no one, even those who have committed
great evil. The fact that you are agonizing over this decision---and
it is plain you are, or else you would not have called me---is further
proof you do have an immortal soul and that you are capable of
redemption."

Nick shook his head and whispered, "You cannot realize the things I
have done, and the beast that I am. The desire, the *need* to drink
blood and to kill has been with me every waking moment for eight
hundred years. It is a pleasure so intense and so addictive it is
indescribable in human terms. It is," he paused, groping for words to
describe the indescribable, "the need for survival, for food, for sex,
for *existence*, all combined---and the victim's blood satisfies it
only for a short while." His eyes became flecked with gold at the
thought of it, and he lowered his head in shame. He whispered, "I want
it so much...and yet I know it is so wrong."

He stared out the dark window at the night. "I could kill again at any
moment, even though my past victims' souls haunt my every hour." He
looked back at the priest. "I can't bear this burden any longer. And I
can't think up any more excuses for continuing to exist. There is no
hope of regaining my mortality. It is time to walk into the sunlight
and end this unnatural life."

Father Delabarre said softly, "This is all far beyond my
comprehension. I need to understand how this all came to be before I
can offer you anything. Can you tell me how...?" His voice trailed
off. How do you ask someone how they became a monster?

Nick rotated the glass in his hand. "It was a long road, and it
started when I was a knight, an attache, in the service of the Lord
Delabarre." He smiled at the priest's questioning look. "Yes, perhaps
a relative of yours. A much less holy man, I'm afraid. He murdered a
young woman and blamed it on me, although I didn't discover that until
later. Instead of trying me for murder, he arranged for me to go to
the Holy Land on Crusade, no doubt depending on the Saracens to kill
me for him."

He drank deeply from his glass. "It was a rude awakening to political
expediency. Up until that time, I had actually believed everything my
lords and my bishops told me." He laughed humorlessly. "I learned soon
enough to doubt."

~~~~~

PART NINE

~~~~~

Flashback: The Port of Dover

Nicolas de Brabant sat in the corner of the inn's smoky common room,
moodily drinking a tankard of bitter ale and staring into the fire. It
had been three weeks since he had left Carrog, accompanied by one of
the bishop's priests and two men-at-arms ('for safety,' Lord Delabarre
had said, but Nicolas suspected they were there to make sure he
actually went where he was told to go). They had slipped ignominiously
out the town gates before dawn to avoid the townspeople, and made
their way to Dover to take ship to Calais. It was an uneventful but
wet journey---it had rained nearly every day, and everything he owned
was damp---and they had finally arrived at the port the day before.

"Still brooding over that doxy, Nicolas?" The priest, Father Jean,
shook the rain from his cloak, slung it over the bench and sat down at
Nicolas' table. "There are some comely wenches in this godforsaken
town---why don't you give one of them a tumble? That'll cheer you up,
even if they are English. At least you won't have to listen to their
babble." He gestured to the potboy to bring him some ale. "Good
news---I found a captain willing to take us to Calais. He sails day
after tomorrow on the tide, weather permitting."

Nicolas looked sourly at the priest. He was a few years older than
himself, black-haired, well-fed and ambitious. He came from a wealthy
and high-born family, higher in rank than Nicolas' own, and through
subtle means did not let him forget it. His clothes were expensive and
he wore a jeweled gold crucifix around his neck and several gold
rings. He always made Nicolas uncomfortably aware of his plain but
serviceable tunic and cloak and his one bit of adornment, a gold ring
with his family's sigil on it. He replied tiredly, "Gwynneth was no
doxy. She was gentle-born, and a gifted singer much revered by her
people."

The priest shrugged. "As you like. She was a troublemaker nonetheless.
Those songs of hers only inflamed the paganism in the people's hearts.
It's better she is gone---our Lord Delabarre will be able to persuade
that poxy prince to cooperate with the Church now. It was a sweetly-
done maneuver to get her out of the way."

Nicolas' tankard stilled halfway to his mouth. "What?" he whispered,
staring at the priest. "Delabarre had her killed?"

The priest quirked an eyebrow. "I thought you knew." Nicolas shook his
head mutely. "I see you didn't. Well, no harm telling you now, since
we're leaving this barbaric island in a few days." He rearranged his
tunic and settled himself more comfortably on the bench. "Our noble
lord had a boy take a message to her, asking her to meet you at that
stone circle you two lovebirds favored for your trysts. I assume he
took your place and did the deed while you were slugabed."

He laughed at Nicolas' stricken expression. "You really are as naive
as they say, aren't you? It was only chance that you were found with
her body---Delabarre was counting on her being found dead in your
trysting place to lay the blame at your feet." He shrugged. "You were
lucky he decided to send you away rather than let the locals put you
to the sword. He rather likes you, you know, and he needs your great-
uncle's support at court. At least this way you have the chance to
redeem your name by some stupid, courageous act while on Crusade---
that is, if you survive the experience at all." He swallowed some ale
and shrugged again. "It's just politics, my dear Nicolas, and
unfortunately you became a pawn on our better's chessboard. You lost a
lover, he gained a kingdom. Simple."

Nicolas stood up, his stomach churning. There were a thousand things
he wanted to shout at the complacent face laughing at him across the
table, but his thoughts collided with each other and he couldn't get
anything out. He slammed down his tankard, grabbed his cloak and ran
out of the inn, the priest's laughter trailing behind him.

Nicolas stumbled blindly down the street, his thoughts in a whirl,
heedless of the drizzle and the stares of the townspeople. After a
half hour he found himself outside the town gates on a muddy road
bordering a saltgrass meadow and the distinctive white chalk cliffs of
Dover.

He turned off the road onto a path that wound up the cliff. A half
hour later he was standing at the cliff edge, looking out across the
channel. Below him, the ocean waves crashed and hissed on the narrow,
rocky beach, and the cries of seagulls rent the air. His cloak
streamed behind him in the stiff offshore breeze. All his feeling
suddenly coalesced into a seething ball of hatred for the scheming
noble. "Bastard!" he screamed into the wind. "You bastard!"

He collapsed on a nearby rock and buried his face in his hands, anger
and grief warring in his heart. He wanted to kill Delabarre and avenge
his gentle Gwynneth. God, he could barely believe she was gone---he
could still see in his mind's eye her swift glance and hear her voice
singing one of her haunting songs.

At the same time, he mourned for himself---the loss of his good name
and honor, and the shame he had brought on his family. To be used thus
and cast aside, an unimportant player in a grand game of deceit...he
cursed Delabarre and all his progeny. He could only pray the bastard
would never profit from his actions.

The drizzle had ended, and the sun was showing weakly through the
thinning clouds. Nicolas stared blindly out to sea enmeshed in his
emotions until the sky began to darken and the sun was a dull red ball
in the Western sky.

He finally shook himself out of his reverie and realized he had to get
back to town before it was full dark---it was a dangerous place for a
lone man to be.

He stood and started back across the meadow to the steep, treacherous
pathway down. "Bastard," he whispered again. "I'll have my revenge."
He thought of the prophecy Gwynneth had told him the night before she
died. It was foretold that he would live a long life, she had said. "I
have a long time to seek it," he promised.

And then he thought of the other part of the prophecy---that he would
never find happiness. "Yes, I will," he vowed. "I'll find my happiness
when you are dead and my Gwynneth is avenged."

~~~~~

PART TEN

~~~~~

"I sailed to Calais and traveled back to Brabant, still accompanied by
the priest and the guards," Nick continued, as Father Delabarre
listened in fascination. "They allowed me to see my family before I
left for Jerusalem. I didn't know how I would explain to my parents
what had happened---my father had arranged for me to serve Delabarre
as a means to help me make my own way in the world, because of course
my elder brother, Robert, would inherit the title and the estate." He
smiled bitterly. "As it turns out, during the six months I was gone,
my father had died. At least he never had to find out about how I had
shamed him and the family. It was hard enough telling Mother and my
brother and sister." He fell silent, lost in long-ago memories.

"And then?" Father Delabarre prompted.

"I was to serve Lord Delabarre's brother, Antoine d'Anjou, in the Holy
Land. I went to Paris, met with some other knights who were also
joining the Crusade, and we traveled south. We took ship in Aigues-
Mortes, sailed to Italy, and then to Acre. From there, I found d'Anjou
and entered his service as Delabarre had ordered me."

"Why did you obey---surely the guards didn't accompany you all that
way?"

Nick shook his head, then got up to refill his wineglass. As he poured
the bloodwine from the unlabeled bottle on the kitchen counter, he
answered, "No, they didn't. But I could do nothing else. Society was
very small then, and I had a place in it that was given to me by
birth. I was nothing without my name and honor, and I would have done
all I could to redeem them in the eyes of my peers and betters. So I
went, to vindicate my family's honor and myself. I had no choice."

"And did you? Vindicate yourself, I mean."

"Oh, yes." He drank deeply from the glass. "I did exactly what I was
required to do. I killed women, children, and old men, I burned
villages, and sacked towns---all for the greater glory of the Church
and to reclaim Jerusalem from the Saracens. We were told we would reap
Heaven's reward for these atrocities, and I believed it, until I did a
terrible thing."

Father Delabarre's voice was strained. "What could be more terrible
than this?"

"First, I was almost killed. And then I started to ask why."

~~~~~

Flashback: Somewhere South of Acre

Nicolas de Brabant carefully picked his way through the purposeful
hubbub of the encampment. He felt damnably unsteady, and he pressed
his left arm protectively against his side.

Enough of his strength had returned to allow him to escape the
oppressive heat of his small tent into the cooling evening air. The
fever that had held him in delirium for over a week had finally
broken, leaving him wasted and weak, but the dangerously deep gash in
his side was slowly beginning to heal.

He sat down gingerly on a convenient rock to watch the light gradually
leach from the evening sky. In the distance, one of the Egyptian camp
followers was singing, the alien music ululating eerily through the
blue evening air. The sound reminded him anew that he was a stranger
in a strange land, an outsider who didn't belong in this arid,
desolate place.

Why were they there? Oh, he knew what he had been told---that the
Saracens had taken over the Holy City, and it was their duty before
God to reclaim it for the Christian West.

But the screams of the ordinary people who had the misfortune to live
in the path of their army rang in his ears. What good could possibly
come of slaughtering unarmed villagers? Why did not the commandments
of God apply to them, even though they worshipped a different God?
Wouldn't it be better to save their souls by preaching to them the
True Religion rather than killing them?

Nicolas didn't understand, and he was troubled by his thoughts. He
didn't dare voice them to others, for fear of ridicule or ostracism.

Reflexively fingering the barely formed scar under his tunic, Nicolas
thought back to the pointless minor skirmish that had almost cost him
his life.

It had been a seemingly simple patrol. A party of five knights and
twenty foot soldiers had gone out to scout a half-day's journey down
the road leading away from the besieged Saracen town, looking for any
remnants of opposition in the area. They had seen no one on the road
at all save an old man herding a flock of five goats.

The old man had abandoned his small flock and run off the narrow track
to take refuge behind a stunted tree, shaking in fear. He peered
around the tree at the foreign soldiers marching past, the metal of
their weaponry and chain mail clinking harshly, shining under the
impact of the merciless sun.

Three of the foot soldiers had rounded up the old man's goats as a
welcome addition to the nightly fare. Nicolas glanced at where the man
was sheltering, then spurred his sweating horse forward. "Leave two,"
he ordered, nodding back at the old man, now standing at the side of
the road shaking his fist and swearing in his incomprehensible tongue.

The soldier glanced up at Nicolas with a surly look. Sweat trickled
down his filthy face from underneath his metal helmet. "Why? Who cares
about some ancient heathen?" he asked. "We're starving for some decent
meat." Insolence dripped from his voice. "My lord." It sounded like an
insult.

"Just do it, God damn your eyes, and don't argue!" Nicolas growled.
The soldiers complied reluctantly, grumbling under their breath.

Nicolas dropped back again into his place behind the soldiers. He was
sweating profusely underneath his heavy chain mail hauberk and padded
leather jerkin, and his helmet felt like a vise, his eyes blurred and
burning from the sweat running into them. God, this heat! His horse's
head drooped as it trudged through the shimmering heat haze. Their
feet threw up clouds of pale dust into the still air, where it hung to
clog their lungs and coat them with a fine film head to foot.

It was no wonder tempers were short and what little discipline they
possessed was breaking down. Between the short rations, the
intolerable heat, the boredom, and the ferocity of the infrequent
battles, this land was no fit place for man or beast, holy though it
may be.

They marched on. Nicolas was daydreaming of the cool green fields of
his home when the attack came.

They were halfway through a narrow pass when the screaming Saracen
warriors sprang down on them from among the rocks above, their
scimitars flashing in the cruel noonday sun. Six foot soldiers were
cut down before the scouting party could regroup and start fighting
back. The three scrawny goats bolted bleating into the safety of the
surrounding rocks.

Nicolas cursed himself for his inattentiveness, and spurred his horse
into the confusion, dragging his heavy sword free of its scabbard to
cut and slash at the enemy. His horse bit and kicked anyone within
range of its deadly iron-shod hooves.

A white-robed Saracen hacked at one of the foot soldiers to Nicolas'
right, then whirled towards him screaming imprecations. Nicolas was
dimly aware of the foot soldier shrieking and clutching at his missing
hand as he desperately kneed the horse around while swinging up his
sword to parry the coming blow, the adrenaline singing in his veins.

But his sword was too heavy and unbalanced to move quickly---and the
Saracen was quicker. The keen edge of the Damascus steel scimitar bit
through Nicolas' chain mail and leather as if it were cloth, and sank
deep into his side.

He felt the impact of the blow and then the bright burning pain as the
steel blade slid out of his flesh with a sickening sucking noise. He
barely managed to remain astride, held in the saddle by its tall
pommel and cantle. His sword fell from his suddenly nerveless fingers.

His battle-maddened horse savaged the attacker with its teeth and
struck out with its forelegs; the Saracen screamed and fell to the
stony ground, bloodied and broken. The horse struck at another white-
robed warrior, Nicolas dazedly jerking back and forth in the saddle,
then trampled through the melee and galloped unguided back down the
road towards the encampment.

The animal only went a short distance. Overcome by the heat and
exertion, its mad gallop slowed to a jolting trot and then a walk as
the battle receded behind them. Finally, it stood panting and dripping
sweat in the meager shade of a scrawny bush, its lathered, heaving
flanks stained with blood from its own and Nicolas' wounds.

Nicolas clung weakly to the saddle, his hand clenched to his side. The
blood roared in his ears. Despite the heat, he felt cold and shivery,
and his surroundings wavered and shifted in his narrowing vision. Pain
filled his ebbing consciousness.

He couldn't tell how long he sat there; remotely, he noted the screams
and clashing of the skirmish had faded and then were silenced. High
above him a vulture circled lazily in the merciless blue-white sky.

More time passed. After an eternity he felt a hand on his thigh,
shaking him back to semi-consciousness. "My lord! Sir Nicolas!"

He mumbled in reply, then groaned as his horse stumbled into motion,
someone's hand on the bridle, someone else steadying him in the
saddle. His side was on fire, and a fresh flood of warm wetness soaked
his leg.

The reassuring voices receded as the nightmare journey back to the
encampment began. Fresh jolts of agony ripped through him every time
the weary horse stumbled on the rocky road as the beaten soldiers made
their way back, slowed by the injured.

The next hours were a confused jumble of impressions---rough hands
lifting him, stripping off his mail and bloodstained clothing, someone
propping up his head and urging him to drink a sour mixture of wine
and poppy. He remembered staring blankly at the sunlit interior of his
canvas tent while someone tsked over him and did something to his
side. He was aware of pain, but it seemed to belong to someone else,
not to him.

The wound was crudely stitched and bandaged, and finally Nicolas was
left alone in the stifling tent to sleep off the oblivion mercifully
given by the opium-laced wine.

Miraculously, the ugly slash didn't become gangrenous and claim his
life, as happened to so many of his fellow Crusaders, but the
inevitable infections did set in. The next week passed in a feverish
delirium, nightmare visions of his dead father, Gwynneth, and a
leering Delabarre swimming in and out of his brain.

When the fever finally broke, Nicolas awoke as weak as a child,
entangled in a sweat-soaked blanket. He tried to sit up but his side
was too stiff and painful. He groaned involuntarily as the abused
muscles cramped, and flopped back down.

Jean, the squire who attended him and two other poor knights, thrust
his head through the tent opening. "My lord? Are you well at last?"

Nicolas licked dry lips and croaked, "No, I am not well. In fact, I
feel like hell. Help me up, Jean."

The gangly youth grinned in relief and helped Nicolas sit up, then
propped a pillow and spare bedclothes behind him for support. "We
thought you were dying, my lord," he confided, pouring a cup of wine
and pressing it into his hand. "Would you like something to eat?"

Nicolas' stomach rumbled in reply. Jean grinned again and ducked back
out of the tent to find food.

Nicolas relaxed gingerly against his makeshift cushions and gratefully
drank the watered wine. The cheap sour vintage tasted like the finest
French pressing to his parched throat.

His wandering eyes lit on his ruined chain mail hauberk, stored in its
accustomed place in the corner. It had been carefully cleaned, but the
long gash was plain to see. It would probably cost more of his meager
purse to repair than he could afford, but it would have to be done---
though it had been poor protection against the superior steel of the
enemy's swords. He wondered if anyone had retrieved his own sword.

He sighed and wearily closed his eyes. There would be time enough to
worry about that later.

~~~~~

PART ELEVEN

~~~~~

"Sir Nicolas?"

Jean's voice broke into his reverie. Nicolas turned to find his squire
hurrying towards him. "Yes?"

"My lord, there is a priest asking for you." Jean stopped breathless
before him. "I was told to find you immediately."

"A priest?" Nicolas levered himself painfully to his feet. "What does
he want with me?"

"He did not say. Please come, my lord."

Jean led him to the large tent occupied by Monsignor Francois du Mont,
advisor and chaplain to the small army's commander. Jean held back the
tent flap and stood aside for him to enter.

Monsignor du Mont turned towards Nicolas as he came in and nodded. He
gestured to the travel-worn friar seated next to him. "Nicolas de
Brabant, this is Father Michel of Avignon."

Nicolas bowed stiffly, suppressing a grimace of pain as his side
protested the movement. "Father. I understand you were looking for
me?"

"Yes, my son. I was entrusted with a letter for you when I left Paris
six months ago." He opened a leather pouch and extracted a folded,
sealed and somewhat battered parchment. "Your lady mother sent it to
Paris, and I have been carrying it ever since." He handed the letter
to Nicolas. "I am pleased to find you recovering from your grievous
wound."

After glancing at the Monsignor for permission, Nicolas apprehensively
broke the seal and unfolded the heavy parchment. He recognized the
writing as that of the family manor's clerk, Marius, but the signature
at the bottom was his mother's.

He tilted the letter to catch the lamplight. 'To my beloved son,
Nicolas of Brabant, son of Guy of Brabant, in the service of Lord
Antoine d'Anjou, I send greetings.

'I pray that the Savior has granted you good health and fortune in
your most holy Crusade to Jerusalem.

'It is with a heavy heart that I must tell you your brother, Robert,
of beloved memory, has been taken from us by a most cruel illness. He
died leaving his wife Eleanor childless and our estates without an
heir.

'I beg you, Nicolas, to ask leave of your lord to return to your home
as soon as possible and take up your due inheritance, which is now
yours by right.

'Your sister and I await your safe return, and pray that the merciful
Savior protects your journey.

I remain your loving mother, Marie.'

Nicolas stared at the letter, the black script blurring before his
eyes. Bluff, dependable Robert---dead. It was impossible. Robert, who
truly relished the responsibilities of landholding, the minutia of
farming and meting out of justice. Who had no interest in seeing
anything farther away than the water meadows at the far end of their
holdings. Who was supposed to be safe in the great hall tending their
lands, while Nicolas, the second son consigned to the art of war, was
out courting danger and death. Robert, now dead, and Nicolas, still
living. The world was turned upside down.

The friar asked gently "Ill news, my son?"

Nicolas nodded dumbly. "Yes, Father. My brother Robert has died...my
mother asks that I return home..." Tears pricked his eyes.

"I will say a Mass for his soul."

"Thank you, Father. Please excuse me now. I must ask leave of Lord
d'Anjou to return home." He bowed and abruptly left the tent.

~~~~~

Nick fell silent. Father Delabarre felt as if he were transported to
another time and place. He had read about the Crusades in history
books, had studied the theology behind them, but this man---this
*vampire*---had actually been there, unbelievable as that might seem.
He had fought and killed Muslims at the behest of king and pope, and
suffered greatly in the effort.

It was hard to credit the long-ago participants in the Crusades with
ordinary human emotions, to flesh out the figures in the tapestries
and parchments and stone carvings with wants and desires,
disappointments and pain. He had never pictured them as loving their
families or grieving their losses. They weren't real, just long-dead
actors on history's stage.

But now, instead of flat recitations of facts in history books, the
past had come alive in the unlikely persona of an eight hundred-year-
old Toronto homicide detective.

"You loved your brother very much," Father Delabarre said softly.

"Yes. It wasn't always the case in families with two sons and a title
to inherit---even a minor one---but I never wanted the responsibility
that went with it. I had no patience then for managing the land and
playing the politics necessary to maintain a place in the power
structure. Robert loved it, though, and he was good at it. I was glad
to leave it to him and go out into the world and travel. I always
wanted to see what was over the next hill."

Nick swirled the dregs in his wineglass. He said softly, "I never had
the chance to say goodbye to anyone. They all died without me..."

He got up and went to the bookcase. Drawing out a folio-sized volume,
he brought it over to the priest. The cover was old and worn, and when
he opened it, Delabarre saw the pages were of heavy, glossy paper and
filled with black and white photographs and line drawings. The text
was in German, the type set in the old difficult-to-read black letter
or Fraktur style.

"What is this?" the priest asked curiously.

"It's photographs of a museum collection in Dresden, published in
1910." The book automatically fell open to a page with photographs of
medieval paintings. Nick gently placed a finger next to one. "This is
my family."

The painting depicted five figures kneeling in prayer before an altar.
A man with dark hair and a beard; a woman with her hair covered and
wearing a simple, flowing gown; and then three smaller figures, two
boys, one with dark hair and one with fair, and a small girl. They
were portraits by no means, for the art of the time was highly
stylized and the figures awkwardly drawn. It was hard to tell with the
black and white photograph, but it probably had been brightly colored.
Father Delabarre peered at the caption. He only spoke a bit of German
but he made out the words, 'Unbekannte Familie,' and 'um 1200.'
Unknown Family. About 1200. Nick's finger moved over the figures. "My
father, Guy, my mother, Marie, my brother Robert, my sister, Fleur.
And me." His hand shook slightly and he withdrew it. "My father had it
commissioned when he built our new chapel. I never knew what had
happened to it until I chanced on this book in 1938. I was negotiating
to buy the painting from the museum when the war broke out and I was
forced to leave Germany. The museum was destroyed in a bombing raid in
1944."

"And the painting with it."

Nick sighed and shook his head. "Who knows. Many paintings were put in
hiding or stolen, but the curators considered this one of minor
importance. They might not have bothered to save it." He closed the
book carefully and put it back in its place. "I could have just taken
the painting, I suppose, but I wanted to acquire it legitimately." He
made a regretful noise. "At least I have this."

He sat back down in his chair and resumed his story. "I asked for, and
received permission to go home. Lord Delabarre's brother was a decent
man, and perhaps he knew the real story of why I was there. He didn't
interfere, at any rate. I took passage on the next ship sailing west."

He picked up his wineglass and swirled the dregs around, staring into
its depths. "I was still weak from my injury, and was plagued with
some sort of fever that came and went. Malaria, perhaps...I don't
know, no one did then. It was just a fever, and you died, or you
didn't. I was beset by melancholy...depressed, we would say now,
because of my brother's death, and I had a long time to think on the
voyage home about him, and my life, my prospects, and what I had done.
It was winter, and it was a miserably long journey." He sighed and put
down the glass, clasping his hands in his lap and gazing directly at
the priest.

"I realize this sounds like I'm making excuses for myself, but I want
you to understand. When I finally reached Paris I was ill, despondent,
and feeling my own mortality closing in on me. My loyalty to Delabarre
had been rewarded with false accusations of murder, and although I
escaped the death that Delabarre no doubt had hoped for, I became
disillusioned in my faith. I had done all that I had been expected to
do for the Church's holy cause---and I hated myself for it."

"And then Robert died, and I was forced into a role I could not
refuse. I would perhaps have had to marry my brother's widow---a woman
I disliked---to preserve our lands and alliances. I would have had to
run the estate, mete out justice, worry about politics, and do all the
things I had been glad to run away from." He frowned. "Most men would
have called me fortunate. I now had land, an income, the trappings of
minor nobility, and more comforts than could be dreamed of by most
people alive at the time. But I didn't want it, not that way.

"I had dreamed of winning fortune and favor through brave deeds and
loyal service to a great man. I wanted to be respected as a warrior
and gain the love of a beautiful woman." He smiled faintly. "I guess I
was trying to live up to the chansons de geste I had heard in my
youth, during those long winter nights in the Great Hall.

"But life hadn't turned out like a romantic ballad, and all my
idealistic, lofty ideals had been warped and destroyed by my lords and
bishops. I had been disgraced, then nearly killed in an insignificant
skirmish for an ignoble cause, and was returning home having
accomplished nothing.

"So when a beautiful woman whispered promises of power and immortality
in my ear, I was more than ready to listen..."

~~~~~

PART TWELVE

~~~~~

Flashback: Paris, 1228

"Come, Nicolas, join us in the common room." The knight toed Nicolas'
recumbent form.

Nicolas groaned, then coughed. "Go away, Gerard. I don't feel well."
He shifted on the straw pallet, trying unsuccessfully to find a
comfortable spot. While the mattress left something to be desired, at
least the room was reasonably clean, and a charcoal brazier in the
corner provided a modicum of heat.

Gerard squatted down and said sympathetically, "Has the fever come
back?"

Nicolas nodded. "It's been a fortnight. I thought perhaps it was
finally gone." He pulled his cloak closer around him and tried to
suppress a shiver.

"Still, you should join us, at least for some wine. It will warm you.
And you can tell those ignorant heroes we met this morning the truth
about the glories of battle in the Holy Land." The small party of
returning knights the two friends had been traveling with had met the
eager young men that morning. They were only just embarking on their
Crusade, their Crusader crosses newly-sewn on their tunics and their
weapons unbloodied.

Nicolas rolled onto his back and squinted up at his friend. He had met
Gerard on the long trip back from the Holy Land, and the cheerful
young man had served as an antidote to his black moods many times
over. It looked like he was trying to work his magic again. "God's
bones, Gerard, not them." He groaned. "But I suppose you won't leave
me alone until I join you. You're beginning to look exactly like
Claire, my old nurse."

Gerard grinned and held out a hand to help him to his feet. "If you
think that, my friend, you truly do need to come downstairs. There are
some wenches there who will remind you most definitely of the
difference between men and women."

Nicolas accepted the proffered hand and heaved himself up with a
grunt. "All right, but just for a short time." He made an attempt to
straighten his clothes and ran a hand through his hair, then gave up.
"If I collapse, I expect you to carry me back here."

"Naturally. What are friends for?"

The two friends left the small room they shared in the inn on the Ile
de la Cite and descended the dark, creaking staircase to the smoky
common room. A boy was turning a roast on the spit in the large
fireplace, and the flickering torchlight revealed that most of the
tables were occupied by travelers. The rowdy group of young men they
had met that morning surrounded one table. They were well into their
wine from the looks of things, and the talk centered on women and war,
and what they planned to do with each.

Nicolas grimaced at the sight but followed Gerard to the table.
"Gentlemen! Do you have room for two returned heroes?" Gerard nudged
the closest reveler to make room on the bench, and the man obligingly
moved down, shouting a welcome.

They seated themselves. Trenchers were shoved in their direction, and
the platters of roasted fowl, bread, and cheese passed down. Nicolas
let Gerard do the talking, or rather, storytelling, for the tales he
told bore little resemblance to the grim reality they had both
experienced. He leaned his back against the wall and sipped at the cup
of wine he was given, ignoring the food.

The heat from the fire and smell of all the unwashed bodies in the
room overwhelmed him, as did the noise of conversation and clattering
dishes. He paid no attention to his erstwhile companions or their
toasts to victory; he felt only a remote pity for them. They had no
idea what awaited them at the end of their journey, but then, neither
had he...

He let his eyes roam about the room while he slowly drank the
indifferent wine. His side was aching again, and he felt weary and hot
now rather than cold from his fever. Damn, would he never feel whole
again?

A movement across the room caught his eye. Through the smoky haze, he
could see a woman dressed in a gown of muted browns, her raven hair
modestly covered. The modesty of her attire, however, was belied by
the aura of enticement and sexuality she exuded. Her intense blue eyes
were fixed on him, and her red lips were moving silently.

He felt pinned in her stare, and lust surged through his body. He knew
exactly what she was saying, even though he could not hear the words.

"How badly do you want me?"

Suddenly he found that he *did* want her, very badly indeed. He had
felt no desire since his injury; the combination of the wound, his
recurrent fever, and the strenuous journey across winter-bound
countryside had left him too exhausted to think about that sort of
amusement. It had been all he could do to keep traveling. But now the
mere sight of this compelling woman had awakened his desires in a most
comprehensive way.

Transfixed, he put down the cup and got to his feet. Gerard turned to
him and started to say, "Where are you going, Nicolas?" but then he
caught the direction of his gaze. He caught Nicolas' hand and
whispered loudly, "See? I told you, you would feel better if you came
down here," and slapped him on the back. "Good luck!"

With that he laughed and turned back to his new-found companions.

Nicolas walked slowly across the room as if in a trance. The woman
continued to stare at him, then turned away and walked down a dark
corridor.

He followed.

~~~~~

"I followed her. She led me to a room lit by candles, an amazing
extravagance, and we made love." Nick's voice caught, then continued.
"She was an enchantress, like no one I had ever met before. I could
think of nothing but her, and how much I wanted to possess her
totally.

"And all the while, she asked if I wanted to give in to the darkness
in my soul, if I wanted power, and wealth, and eternal life and youth.
And I said yes, over and over and over." He was trembling, remembering
his descent into the Dark.

"When we were finished, she left me. I lay there in a trance, totally
used, totally exhausted and yet exhilarated." His voice dropped to a
quavering whisper. "I couldn't move...and then she returned with a
tall man, and still I couldn't move...she told me his name, and he
said we would be together for a long, long, time...and I couldn't
move, I didn't *want* to move...and then he bit me and drank my blood,
and I died."

Bloody tears trickled down his face unnoticed. His voice, wracked with
the emotion of eight hundred years, went on relentlessly. "And then I
was in a strange place, a peaceful place. A figure beckoned me into
the Light---the light of God, the light of Heaven. And I refused." A
sob escaped his chest. "I forsook God, and Heaven, for this eternal
Hell on earth. I turned my back on God and returned to---him, because
he promised me eternal life and pleasure, and God merely opened the
door and gave me a choice."

"I awoke consumed by a thirst such as I had never known. They
presented me with a young woman drugged into unconsciousness. All I
could hear was the pounding of her heart, I could smell her blood, and
I knew I wanted it as much as I had wanted my seducer just hours
before. And I tore her throat out, and drank her blood, and I killed
her." He fell silent a moment, his fingers tightening on the stem of
the wineglass. Realizing what he was doing, he carefully set it aside
before he broke it, then the whispered confession continued.

"Hers was the first of the hundreds, no, the thousands of murders I
committed over the centuries. At first I detested what I had become,
but then I accepted it, I relished it. I gloried in the ecstasy of the
blood, in my power, in my eternal youth. But my...sense of
humanity...returned, and I realized what I was---a monster preying on
humanity, anathema to both God and man."

Nick's tenuous control broke at last. Sobs shook his body as he buried
his face in his hands, the sorrow of hundreds of years of killing
pouring out of him in a bloody flood of tears.

Father Delabarre went to sit next to him, drawing him into a
comforting embrace, stroking his hair and murmuring "Shhhh, shhhh,"
over and over, like a father comforting a grieving son. The old
priest's heart was torn apart in the face of such a torrent of sorrow
and pain beyond his comprehension, even as he grieved himself for the
untold victims of the man in his arms.

Nick buried himself into the priest's solid warmth. The arm around his
shoulders brought unbidden memories of his father's embrace when he
was a boy, and hurt or afraid. It enfolded him and gave a comfort he
had thought he would never feel again. Unashamedly he let his tears
flow.

Finally, the storm of tears ebbed and ceased, and he sat up and drew
away. He went to the kitchen and dashed cold water on his face. His
outburst had left him feeling drained and empty, his emotions reduced
to a flat, resigned calm.

"Thank you," he said quietly when he resumed his place. The priest had
moved back to his own chair. They sat for a moment in silence. "I,
I..." He couldn't continue and finally simply repeated, "Thank you."

Father Delabarre asked softly, "Nicolas, have you prayed? Have you
asked for God's forgiveness?"

Nick shook his head mutely. "I, I can't. The act, the mere thought of
speaking to God, causes intense pain." He lifted a hand to his head,
then let it drop. "Even speaking to you causes discomfort. If I make
the Sign of the Cross, I burn." He slumped in his chair. "Surely I am
damned, if even the thought of seeking comfort in God is rewarded with
pain."

"Then I will pray for you, Nicolas. I must have time to compose my
thoughts. Please, allow me a day or two to meditate and pray, and
don't do anything---until I see you again." He reached and took Nick's
folded hands. "Please. A day."

Nick looked into the priest's distressed eyes, and nodded slowly.
"Very well. A day."

~~~~~

PART THIRTEEN

~~~~~ Don Schanke scowled at the man sitting at the desk opposite
his---Nick's desk. For some reason just seeing him there irritated
him. Bill Krantz, his temporary partner, looked up inquiringly.
Schanke quickly averted his gaze to the file on his own desk and
continued to fume silently.

Captain Cohen had stuck Schanke with Krantz because the younger man's
regular partner was on vacation, like Nick---and he was driving
Schanke crazy. He was young, he talked too much, he was
overeager...the list of shortcomings was endless. He drove a Honda
Civic with tree-hugger bumper stickers plastered all over the back. He
wasn't Nick.

Nick had been on his enforced vacation for two days, and Schanke
missed him more than he cared to admit. He missed riding around in the
Caddy. He missed Nick's bizarre flashes of insight that usually ended
up being so annoyingly right. Hell, he even missed watching Nick zone
out when he visited whatever alternate universe existed in his mind.

Schanke glanced at his watch. It was midnight---time for his lunch
break. Good. He hated to admit it, but he was worried about his
partner. No matter what Natalie had said, the blue funk Nick had been
stewing in seemed a little too deep to be cured by a vacation. And if
he knew Nick, he hadn't gone anywhere to relax. He was probably moping
in his 'high-tech dungeon of doom,' throwing paint at a canvas or
something. It was his partnerly obligation to check up on him.

Schanke stood up and shrugged into his suit coat. "I'm going to
lunch," he announced. Krantz started to get up. "Alone," he said
pointedly. Seeing Krantz's hurt puppydog look, he added in
explanation, "I've got errands to run. See you in an hour or so."

However, Once he arrived at the loft, fast-food hamburger and fries in
hand (hey, a guy still had to eat), his resolve began to fail. He
peered upward at the dimly-illuminated windows and debated whether to
ring the bell, or just use the access code Nick had given him a couple
of months ago. He half-suspected that if he rang, Nick wouldn't let
him in. Okay, barge in it would be. Resolutely he punched the four
numbers into the pad next to the door, then set the creaky old
elevator into motion.

On the way up he fidgeted nervously. All the lines he had rehearsed in
the car on the way over suddenly seemed stupid. He didn't know how
Nick would take his little visit---this 'caring stuff' wasn't really
his line, as he had told Myra a couple of days before. Oh, well, he
thought, hopefully Nick will accept my nosiness in the spirit it's
offered.

Man oh man, I really hate this stuff.

The elevator rumbled to a halt, and he slid the door aside and poked
his head into the dimly-lit loft. "Helloooooo? You home, Nicky-boy?"
He sidled in, feeling somewhat foolish.

"Come in, Schanke."

Schanke saw Nick was sitting at his kitchen table, his back to the
elevator door. It looked like he was writing something, although how
the hell he could see what he was doing with only one lamp in the
living room on... He let the elevator door clang shut and went to sit
at the table.

He looked at his friend closely. Nick was unshaven, his features
drawn, and he still looked incredibly tired. "You look like shit," he
observed.

Nick had tried to keep sleep at bay after Father Delabarre had left
the previous evening, but to no avail. In the end he had unwillingly
slipped into the near-catatonic state of unconsciousness to which only
vampires very young or very stressed were subject. And The Dream had
returned with a vengeance, leaving him more exhausted than ever.

Now, he put down his fountain pen, blotted the letter with some
blotting paper and turned it over, then looked at Schanke calmly.
"Thank you. Why are you here?"

Schanke shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "I, uh, well, I just
wanted to know how you're doing. I mean, you looked pretty bad at work
the other day, and I..." He stopped in frustration, then abandoned all
his carefully rehearsed speeches. He slapped his hand on the table and
blurted, "Damn it, Nick, what's wrong with you? I'm your partner, you
should be able to tell me what's on your mind!"

Nick shook his head. "No, I can't."

"What do you mean, 'No, I can't?'"

Nick sighed. "Schank, it's personal. I can't explain it."

Schanke scowled and jabbed his finger at his partner. "Well, your
'personal problem' was affecting your work, and that means my skin! I
hafta be concerned." His irritation died, and his voice softened.
"Nick, I'm not real good at this sort of thing, but if you need to
talk to someone, buddy, well, you can talk to me. Really. And I'm
thinking you need an ear pretty badly, so I'll just sit here until you
do talk." He sat back, folded his arms, and gazed mulishly across the
table.

Nick looked at his partner with resignation mixed with irritation. He
could tell Schanke had decided he wasn't leaving without some sort of
an explanation---it was written all over that plain, honest face.

He fingered the corner of the letter he had been writing; it was his
farewell to his partner. It was an extraordinarily difficult letter
for him to write. He had let so few mortals into his life, accepted so
few as friends, he was still amazed that this bluff, irritating, and
oh-so-human man had somehow become important to him. He owed him more
than a letter, even if everything he said had to be couched in half-
truths and veiled explanations.

"Don," he began slowly, "tell me. Would you be able to forgive someone
who had committed horrendous crimes, someone who had murdered innocent
people, if he was truly sorry and asked for your forgiveness?"

"Huh?" Schanke was startled. This was the last thing he had expected
to hear. "You mean, like that lieutenant whatshisname at My Lai, or
the Serbs and Bosnians? Some war crime kind of thing?"

"Yes, I suppose so. Something like that."

"Geez, Nick, ask an easy question, why don't you? If we're gonna talk
philosophy, I'm sitting somewhere more comfortable." He got up out of
the kitchen chair and went over to the living room area, where he
plunked down into his favored leather armchair. Nick followed and sat
on the couch facing him.

"Well?"

Schanke screwed up his face in thought. "And you say the guy is really
sorry now? That doesn't do the victims too much good, does it? But
still..." He looked sharply at Nick, quietly awaiting his answer. "Is
this what's got you going? Do you have some relative or old friend who
did some bad stuff in Vietnam or something? And you just found out? Is
that it?"

"Something like that," Nick said again, softly. "And no, I didn't just
find out. I've known for a very long time, but the enormity of it all
wasn't clear to me. It is, now."

"And he's asking you to forgive him?"

Nick raised startled eyes. Had he ever tried to forgive himself? Could
he? He had never thought of it. Absolution came from outside oneself,
from God and humanity---and he was certain that particular benison
would never come until he performed adequate penance for his sins, if
then. Forgive himself? No, he could not. In answer to Schanke's
question, he repeated, "Something like that."

"Who is he, this guy?"

Nick shook his head. "Just---a lost soul."

Schanke blew out a breath. "That's a pretty hard question, Nick." He
was silent a moment, trying to formulate an answer. Finally he
replied, "If you're asking if *I* could forgive someone like that, I'd
have to answer 'no.'" His warm brown eyes met Nick's bleak blue ones.
He continued, "Let me tell you about one of my relatives. He was a
distant cousin, my grandfather's brother's son. I'm Polish on my
father's side, even with the German name, and this cousin, Janek,
lived in Poland back in the forties.

"He was a small-time grifter, a con man---you know, he did a little
fencing, he cheated at cards, he conned ladies out of cash---all small
potatoes stuff. Nothing that would get him more than a couple of
months in jail nowadays. But the Nazis were in charge then, and they
caught him and sent him to Treblinka." His face darkened. "Yeah, they
gassed him to death, him along with all those other innocent people,
just like that," he snapped his fingers, "because he fenced a bit of
jewelry. It really tore my grandparents up when they found out after
the war. They could have understood if he had died in the bombing or
something, because lots of my relatives were killed that way. But this
was so---senseless, so vicious, so stupid." He shook his head. "If I
ever ran into the guy that sent him to the camp, or the guy who turned
on the gas, and he said, 'I'm sorry, please forgive me, I was just
following orders,' or some other bullshit, I'd beat the crap out of
him. For my grandparents' sake."

He shook his head again. "I've heard of people who've been tortured,
or who lost their whole family in a concentration camp, say they
forgive their tormenters. I think they're close to saints. Me, I'm no
Mother Teresa, and I think lots of other folks would feel the same
way. I'd want the guy in jail, or punished however they do it wherever
he is. But I don't think I could understand how anyone could do that
stuff, let alone forgive him for it."

He looked at Nick, whose face had grown bleaker and more still as he
spoke. "I'm sorry, Nick, I guess that's not what you wanted to hear,
huh?" Nick just looked at him expressionlessly, then lowered his
head. "No."

Schanke raised his hands helplessly, and let them fall back in his
lap. "I had to tell you how I feel, Nick." He looked around. "Got
anything to drink in this place? Besides refrigerated red wine, that
is."

Nick gestured silently to the cupboard in the kitchen. Schanke heaved
himself out of the armchair and went over to rummage around on the
indicated shelf. He found a dusty bottle of well-aged Scotch, and
poured generous fingers into two mismatched glasses.

Returning to the living room, he handed one to Nick and said, "To hell
with the diet, and to hell with departmental regulations---drink
this." He followed his own advice and took a deep swallow of the fiery
liquor, then sat down.

Nick looked at the glass, then downed the entire contents in one long
convulsive swallow. He shuddered as the acrid liquid burned its way
into his stomach, then relaxed slightly as its false warmth spread
throughout his cold body.

Schanke sipped at his glass more moderately. "You know, if you think
about, uh, forgiveness in the cosmic sense of the word, well, that's
possible."

"What do you mean?"

Schanke put down his glass and leaned forward, hands clasped between
his knees. "It's like Father Frazier talked about in his homily a
couple of Sundays ago. He was talking about God and forgiveness, and
he said that God would even forgive Hitler if he was really penitent.
I mean, he's God, right? And God can do anything, including that. He
has an infinite capacity for love, that's what Father said."

"This person says he is---haunted---by the spirits of the people he
killed."

Schanke snorted. "That's just his conscience talking. It's not like
there're ghosts, or any of that supernatural stuff."

"So all he has to do is ask God for forgiveness?" Nick's voice sounded
skeptical

Schanke picked up his glass and finished his drink. "Well, I'm no God
expert, but what Father said makes sense to me. If anyone can be that
saintly, it has to be God. I guess you just have to have faith, and
believe." He thought a moment. "But the guy has to mean it. None of
this wishy-washy, 'please forgive me' stuff and then run out to rob a
bank. You have to really mean it when you ask God to wipe your slate
clean."

"Have faith..." Nick repeated. He had faith---why couldn't he believe
that what Schanke said was true?

Schanke rose from the chair. "Nick, I've gotta get back to the shop
and keep a leash on your replacement." He paused. "I hope you're okay
with what I said. I know it's not quite what you wanted to hear, but
this is pretty serious stuff. I hope you can work it all out." He
collected his untouched hamburger from the kitchen table. "Get some
rest, okay?"

Nick nodded silently.

As Schanke disappeared behind the closing elevator door, he said,
"Forgive me, Don."

~~~~~

PART FOURTEEN

~~~~~

The clang of the closing elevator door had barely died away when a
voice from above and behind Nick said, "How pathetic---one such as you
asking *that* specimen of humanity for forgiveness. Really, Nicholas,
I *am* disappointed in you."

Nick simultaneously heard the 'whoosh' of displaced air as Lacroix
dropped to the floor in front of him and felt his presence. The elder
vampire had masked his mind as usual, preferring to let his child feel
him only when he chose it. He chose so now, so that his displeasure
was plainly known.

Nick looked up at his master and said nothing.

Lacroix sat in the chair so recently vacated by Schanke, and crossed
his legs. He quirked an eyebrow and asked, "Nothing to say? No
protestations at my invasion of your home, no defense of mortality?
You're off your game, Nicholas."

Nick said tiredly, "How long were you up there, Lacroix?"

"Long enough to be concerned with the direction your life is taking."
He paused. "Feliks told me you changed the disposition of your
fortune."

"Feliks would not betray my confidences..."

Lacroix sighed in exasperation. "You *know* that nothing in the
Community is a secret to me, Nicholas. Feliks and I have a long-
standing agreement. Therefore I am aware that you have set up bequests
for certain mortals and causes, but they are not to go into effect
until certain...conditions...have been met." He waved a hand. "But
that is immaterial. What you do with your money is your concern. More
importantly, I have been disturbed by what I have been feeling from
you. Tell me, Nicholas, what must I do so you understand that all your
ridiculous maunderings about morality and your long-lost soul are
completely unnecessary? That you are far beyond---far above---concerns
of that nature?"

Nick shook his head. "You've said all there is to say a hundred times
over, Lacroix. And I have answered you, a hundred times over. There is
nothing left to say, on either of our parts."

Lacroix regarded his son through narrowed eyes. "You have talked to
others besides your regrettable partner."

Nick remained silent.

"You provoke me, Nicholas." The air was thick with silence. "I *will*
know..." Lacroix was suddenly beside him on the couch, grasping Nick's
wrist in iron fingers. He pushed the sleeve up and sank his fangs into
the cold flesh before Nick could protest or struggle.

The erotic surge of the violation hit Nick and he slumped, gasping,
against the black leather couch, unable to do anything but submit, but
trying his utmost to shield his innermost being from his master. Yes,
Lacroix had neglected those lessons, but he had learned the rudiments
out of necessity. He didn't want to be prevented from carrying out his
final act. Lacroix drank but for a moment, his eyes closed in
concentration or desire, Nick could not tell. When he lifted his head
his eyes were bright, his expression baleful. "A priest! Oh, Nicholas,
that *is* deliciously droll---you're going to confession, aren't you?
Do you think it will help?"

"Leave him alone, Lacroix! I will ensure he remembers nothing of our
talks, when we are done. I swear it!" Nick held his torn wrist to his
chest and glared at his sire, his apprehension for the priest's fate
covering his relief that, for once, he had apparently been able to
conceal his innermost thoughts from his master.

"Perhaps I will, just so you can continue making a fool of yourself."
Lacroix stood up and stared down at his son. "But be warned, Nicholas,
that I am watching you. Do not do anything---foolish."

Does he know? "Don't worry, Lacroix. Whatever I do, it will not be
foolish. It will merely be---right."

"Be sure that it is." With a final meaningful stare, Lacroix leaped up
and disappeared the way he had come.

~~~~~

PART FIFTEEN

~~~~~

Father Delabarre sat on the park bench and stared with unseeing eyes
at the sunset, pondering what he would say to Nicholas Knight---no,
Nicolas de Brabant---the next evening. This whole situation was far
beyond his understanding.

As a priest, he was prepared to listen to the confessions of the
foibles and venalities of humankind, and indeed had extended God's
forgiveness to men and women for some truly terrible sins.

But the tale of murders and cruelties numbering into the thousands
that Nicolas had related to him was soul shattering, inconceivable. If
he hadn't witnessed his transformation from mortal to vampire, he
would have thought the man insane.

How could this non-human monster be forgiven, the elderly priest
wondered, even though he truly seemed contrite and his anguish real?
Non-humam monster? No, he was a man possessed by a demon, a demon of
his own ill-considered choosing.

The evening faded from a riot of glowing red to streaks of purple and
gold, gradually edging into pearly gray, deepening into cobalt blue
and finally the soft velvet black of the warm summer night. The
streetlights quietly blinked on. One of the decorative lights in the
park threw a mellow amber circle of illumination near the troubled
priest.

A figure materialized out of the gloom. Father Delabarre looked up
with some alarm---he could have sworn he hadn't heard anyone
approaching. The stranger was tall, and dressed in a flawlessly
tailored dark gray suit and a pale gray collarless shirt. There was an
odd pin in his lapel---was it a sword? The stranger stood looking at
the priest, hands clasped behind his back, like a scholar examining a
mildly interesting museum exhibit.

"May I sit down?" the stranger inquired in a deep whispery voice.

"Of course---I was just leaving---" Father Delabarre moved as if to
get up.

"Please do not leave on my account." The man paused for a moment, then
smiled slightly. "Permit me to introduce myself. I am known as
Lacroix. I believe we have an acquaintance in common. Perhaps we could
have a...chat...about him."

Father Delabarre stared at the stranger. Lacroix's face was set in a
mildly inquiring expression, but was at the same time menacing---there
was no question about having the 'chat.' He possessed the coldest eyes
the elderly priest had ever seen. They were large, with expressive
brows, but a pale ice blue that held not a bit of human feeling.
Inhuman...

The look on his face must have betrayed his thoughts, because Lacroix
smiled again. "Ah. I see you have made the connection." He settled
himself more comfortably, crossing his legs, minutely adjusting the
crease in his trouser leg.

Father Delabarre's pulse was racing. This...creature...must be another
vampire. But where Knight appeared vulnerable, Lacroix radiated an
aura of age, power, and absolute indifference to humanity.

Delabarre swallowed convulsively and said, "Nicholas."

"Yes, Nicholas. He is my concern. I wish to know your intentions."

Father Delabarre's hands clenched together nervously. "I-I can't speak
about it. What we talked about is under the seal of the confessional."
He was suddenly terrified, hearing himself defy this powerful being,
but he could not go against his vow of silence.

"Oh, my. A priest with convictions." A quiet laugh whispered through
the warm evening air. "In my experience, the promise of a few coins or
a woman was enough to persuade one of your kind to do anything. What
will it take to persuade you, priest?"

They stared at each other for a long moment. Father Delabarre's heart
thudded loudly in his ears. He could think only that he was about to
become the next victim to die because of Nicholas---not at his hands,
but because of him---adding another layer of guilt and remorse to that
unfortunate's soul.

"Unable to speak, priest? How unusual. Surely you have something to
say?"

Father Delabarre cleared his throat nervously and tried to force his
mind into a semblance of coherance. Finally, he said, "It's strange,
isn't it, how one's thoughts run when one is terrified. I---I was
thinking you must have been very tall for your time."

The seeming non sequitur took Lacroix aback. He regarded the priest
with amusement. Looking off into the night, he said, "'My time?' Ah,
yes. Perhaps so---but height has always been an asset in impressing
the masses, don't you agree? I have used it to my advantage in 'my
time.'"

He slanted his eyes towards the priest. "Of course, there was the
problem in obtaining a horse tall enough not to look foolish. But I
digress." He reached out and tilted the priest's face towards him with
an icy finger. "What are your intentions? I *will* not ask again." The
pale blue eyes sparked with gold.

The priest stared unflinchingly into Lacroix's eyes. "My intentions
are to do what is best for Nicholas and his soul."

Again the whispery laugh. "What do you know of what is best for
Nicholas? You have as little understanding of what Nicholas needs as
you do of what he is."

He answered defiantly, "I know he is a tortured soul, no matter what
else he may be, and he has asked for my help. I cannot refuse." He
held very still against the touch of that cool hand. "What is he to
you?"

"Something else you would not be able to understand. Son, protege..."
and then, deliberately provocative, "...lover. A complex relationship,
far beyond your ability to comprehend."

"Perhaps so. However, I do understand one thing---he has asked for my
help, and I will do my utmost to counsel him. Threatening me won't
change that."

"Such bravado. But I remember now, yours is a religion of martyrs." He
lowered his hand and laughed softly, a terrible sound, and raised an
eyebrow. "Perhaps we have a goal in common, after all. We both desire
Nicholas' continued existence. Tell him what he wants to hear, priest,
and give him something to cling to in his delusions. I shall have him
in the end---with or without his supposed soul."

Lacroix stood up and brushed imagined specks of lint from his suit.
"Au revoir, priest. I will be watching."

And then Father Delabarre was alone. The crickets that had fallen
silent with the vampire's arrival began singing again, and an air of
normalcy returned to the evening.

As normal as it could be, the priest thought ruefully, as he felt
his heart cease racing, when hearing the confession of a repentant
vampire while looking over your shoulder to avoid the wrath of a
vengeful one.

He returned to the rectory across the street, intending to pray for
guidance. He felt he would sorely need it.

~~~~~

PART SIXTEEN

~~~~~

Natalie was examining the cross-section of a liver specimen when a
familiar voice interrupted her. She straightened up and greeted her
visitor.

"Hey, Schanke. What's up?"

"Not much, Nat. I left the kid upstairs waiting for a ballistics
report from Steinkraus---let *him* get driven crazy for a while. I'm
tellin' ya, Nat, that kid has more energy than Jenny on a Snickers
high. And talk..." He threw his hands in the air. "I thought I'd stop
in here and see if you had any results from the Keller drug tests
yet---and get a little peace and quiet while I'm at it."

Natalie laughed. "So he's that bad, huh? Reminds me of the sort of
stuff Nick said to me when you got assigned to *him*."

She rummaged through her in-basket until she retrieved the Keller
file."Yup, here it is. Results were all negative." She handed over a
copy of the test results. "Looks like it was a natural death, after
all. One less case for you."

Schanke took a cursory look at the report and then stuffed it into the
file folder he was carrying. But, instead of leaving he stood there,
rocking back and forth on his toes, looking around the lab as if he
had never seen it before.

Natalie turned back to him and raised an eyebrow. "Anything else I can
do for you tonight?"

"Well...." He looked uncomfortable, and fidgeted with the file in his
hands. "Um, have you talked to Nick lately?"

Her smile faded. "No, I haven't. Have you?"

Schanke continued fidgeting. Natalie wished he would sit down---he was
making her nervous. "Well, I visited him yesterday on break, ya know,
just to see how he was doing. He was still in the dumps, and he asked
me some strange questions." He finally sat down on the corner of her
desk. "Really strange questions."

"What did he ask you?"

"Well, he wanted to know if a guy who had committed war crimes, you
know, murdered a lot of civilians, could ever be forgiven. Now, is
that weird, or what?"

Natalie suddenly chilled, asked slowly, "Is that what he said? Someone
who had committed war crimes?"

"Well, not exactly. He said someone who had murdered lots of innocent
people. But that has to be like something that happened in Viet Nam,
don't you think? It's not like there are mass murderers running around
Toronto every day."

How little you know, Schank, she thought. Aloud, she asked, "What
did you say to him?" She held her breath, dreading his answer.

Schanke sighed. "I had to tell him I couldn't do it. I said it would
take a saint to understand and forgive that sort of thing." He looked
down at the file in his hand. "I think he took it kind of hard."

I bet, she thought. That's just what he doesn't need when he's
fighting whatever demons his conscience and his past are throwing at
him.

"Did he say who he was talking about?" She wondered how he had phrased
his question, although she knew his hundreds of years of experience in
dancing around the truth had made him an expert in obliqueness.

Schanke shook his head. "No, he wouldn't tell me, and boy, I was dying
to know. He just said it was a 'lost soul.' Do you suppose it really
is some relative?"

"I don't know, Schank. I just don't know." This was becoming worse and
worse. It sounded like Nick was no longer certain of the core belief
that kept him going---that he could somehow redeem his soul by serving
humanity. He had asked Schanke, his friend, his partner, to validate
that belief. He needed someone to tell him he was right.

But instead of the assurance he craved, he received only rejection,
made all the more bitter because it came from a friend, even though
that friend didn't understand what he was really saying.

With a sudden chill she realized that, in the black mood he was in,
this might be all that was needed to send Nick those last few steps
down the path to self-destruction.

"When did you talk? Yesterday?" she asked, a note of urgency creeping
unbidden into her voice.

"Yeah, last night, about midnight. Lunchtime."

Oh God, he had had all day to do---something.

She didn't want to betray any of the alarm she felt to Schanke. She
knew he would charge right over to the loft, and perhaps find out
something he should never have to know.

Instead, she managed to quell her alarm and said offhandedly, "Well, I
guess I'll stop by on my way home today and see if he's feeling any
better."

"Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. I told him to get some rest, but
you know Nick. And I'm still sort of worried about him." Schanke
heaved himself off her desk. "Sorry about always running to you about
Nick, but you're the only one who can get through to him sometimes. I
tried, but hell, I don't think I did a very good job."

Natalie patted his arm. "At least you tried, Schank. That's what
counts."

Schanke grunted. "Yeah, maybe. I guess I better go rescue Steinkraus.
Say hi to Nick for me, will ya? Tell him I wish he were back. All that
zoning out is beginning to look real good. And I miss the Caddy.
Civics are too damned small for police work---or at least, they're too
damn small for me."

He lifted a hand in farewell and disappeared through the swinging
door.

Natalie sat for a moment, then made up her mind. She quickly got out
of her lab coat, grabbed her purse, and headed out.

She stuck her head briefly into Grace's lab, said "I've gotta go out
for a bit. Call my cell phone if you need me, okay?" and walked
briskly out to her car.

She fervently hoped she wouldn't be too late.

~~~~~

PART SEVENTEEN

~~~~~

As Natalie worked her way through the early evening traffic towards
Nick's loft, she alternately fretted about him and resented how much
of her life had become wrapped up in his.

Damn him! She sometimes felt like she was spending all her time
worrying about him, working on a cure, cajoling him into cooperation,
or covering up for him and his kind. What, she thought resentfully,
did she get out of this so-called relationship?

Fuming, she stomped on the accelerator and swerved around some slower
traffic, pulling back into her lane well ahead of the other cars, then
sped through a yellow light. The momentary burst of aggression somehow
made her feel better, and she let up on the gas until she was going
the speed limit again. She sighed. She knew damn well why she put up
with Nick and his problems. For all his faults---and there were lots
of them---she loved him, and she suspected he loved her, even though
the word was never mentioned. And she hated the thought of a world
without him in it.

The loft's shutters were still down when she pulled into the alley,
but as she got out of the car she saw them slide upward to reveal a
faint light from within. A weight she hadn't realized was there lifted
from her heart.

He was still in the land of the (so to speak) living.

She had almost forgotten her earlier fears when she stepped out of the
elevator into the candlelit loft. "Nick?" she called, looking around
for his familiar presence.

"Natalie." His voice sounded calm.

She spotted him sitting on the leather couch, his hands folded in his
lap. In the flickering candlelight his expression was serene. She
approached him. He was wearing his loose white shirt and black
trousers, and his hair was still damp from the shower. He looked much
better than when she had last seen him, when he had tried to drink
himself into oblivion. She sat down next to him and tentatively put a
hand on his knee.

"How are you? Schanke was by the lab, and he told me you had brought
up some interesting philosophical questions for discussion." She tried
to keep her tone light.

"I'm...okay." He placed his hand on hers, the skin cool against hers,
and squeezed lightly. "Yes, we had a discussion. He...clarified...some
things for me." He looked at her, his eyes untroubled.

She looked searchingly into his eyes. He continued to gaze at her, his
features composed, almost detached. A tiny alarm bell went off in the
back of her mind.

"Why doesn't that make me feel good, Nick? What's really going on
here?"

He merely shook his head slightly, and looked away.

Natalie pulled her hand away from him, stood up and began pacing
restlessly around the loft. All the familiar objects, the souvenirs of
Nick's many lives, suddenly looked strange to her. The candlelight
threw distorted shadows against the brick walls. "Nick, would you
please talk to me? You talked to Schanke, for God's sake. Why won't
you tell me what's bothering you?"

Her pacing took her past the dining table and she stopped cold. She
looked at the items arranged carefully on the table. Nick's gun and
badge. Three envelopes, cream-colored, heavy vellum, with names
carefully written on them in Nick's beautiful, anachronistic hand.

Donald G. Schanke.

Capt. Amanda Cohen.

Natalie.

All the puzzle pieces fell into place with sickening certainty. "No,"
she whispered. "Nick, no."

The door buzzer sounded.

Natalie looked around wildly as Nick went over to the intercom,
pressed the button, and said something in French.

"Nick..."

He stood by the elevator and said nothing.

She went to him and grabbed his arm. "Nick, no," she choked. "You
can't do this...you can't leave...don't do this to yourself...don't do
this to *me*..."

He gently placed his hands on her shoulders, and finally spoke. He
looked deeply into her eyes, his own glistening with emotion.
"Natalie, this is something I must do. I don't want to hurt you, but I
can't continue with this sham of an existence. I'm only lying to you,
to myself, to everyone I touch. I just can't take it any longer. It's
time to go..." He pulled her into an embrace. "Please understand."

The elevator door slid sideways, and Father Delabarre stepped out and
stopped short. A silently weeping woman was enfolded in Nicolas' arms.

Through tear-dimmed eyes, Natalie saw the visitor. A stooped, elderly
man, dressed in black---a priest. She reached out a shaking hand to
him. "Father, make him stop! Tell him he can't do this terrible thing!
This is *wrong*!" She clutched Father Delabarre's hand as desperately
as if she were drowning, and he her only salvation.

Nick stepped back from her embrace. "Natalie...I must do this." He
gestured helplessly, at a loss for words. He repeated, "I just can't
take it any longer."

She rounded on him, her sorrow turned to anger, the priest forgotten.
"You selfish bastard! What about your friends? What about *me*? What
about all the good things you do, your charities, your work? Don't
they mean anything to you? Or are we all just actors in your little
play, and now you're tired of the script, and so you leave? Do you
think we'll all just disappear after you do, or that we won't remember
you?" She glared at him, her face streaked with tears. Nick stood
silently, his face stricken at her outburst..

Drawing a shuddering breath, she continued, "So now you can't stand it
anymore, and you're going to walk into the sun, and then everything
will be solved. Right? That will make up for everything you've ever
done, is that what you think? Well, you're wrong, and you can go to
hell, as you so fervently believe you will!" She burst into tears.

Father Delabarre put his arm around her and drew her away from Nick.
"My dear," he said softly, "I will do my best to convince him he is
wrong. He wouldn't have called me if he were really certain of his
course. Please leave him with me, and his soul with God. Pray for
him."

"Leave? No! He may have given up, but I haven't!" She pulled away from
the priest and turned back to Nick. "Nick..."

"Please go, Natalie. I--I have things to talk about with Father
Delabarre." He looked miserable, his previous calm shattered. "I--I
promise I'll call later. Please, just go."

Natalie dashed the tears from her eyes with a shaking hand and finally
nodded. Her gaze lingered on him. He stood with his back against the
wall, staring at her with an unreadable expression on his face.

The last view she had of Nick as the elevator door slid shut in front
of her was of his dark blue eyes burning into hers, his hand half-
raised in a gesture of farewell.

~~~~~

PART EIGHTEEN

~~~~~

Nick and Father Delabarre stared at the closed elevator door as if
they could watch the car's progress downward to the street. Finally,
the priest turned to Nick and, speaking in French, asked, "She loves
you, doesn't she? And she knows the truth about you, too."

Nick's face was a mixture of longing and despair. "Yes. And if I
could, I would love her, too---but it is impossible. To love her is to
kill her. The only things I can give her are pain and death."

The priest took Nick's arm and said sympathetically, "Come, let's sit
down and talk." He urged him towards the living room.

As they passed the kitchen table, Father Delabarre saw the letters
just as Natalie had, and drew the same conclusion. He stopped and
fingered one of the vellum envelopes. "So you're prepared to die, I
see. Have you ordered all your affairs? Said your final goodbyes?"

Nick kept moving towards the living room. "I'm prepared." He dropped
heavily onto the couch. "As for goodbyes...no. I can't."

"So your young lady is right. You don't care enough about your friends
to say farewell." The priest settled into the same chair he had
occupied two days before, and gazed evenly at the man before him.

Nick's head snapped up, a sudden flare of anger crossing his face.
"No! I'm trying to *avoid* causing them pain." The brief flare of
anger died, and he sighed. He continued bitterly, "What good would it
do to tell another lie? Or should I tell the truth and say that I'm an
ancient mass-murderer, a supernatural monster, and that I'm going to
end it all by spontaneously combusting? Don't look for me, because all
that will be left is a pile of ashes? Somehow I don't think most of my
acquaintances would find this comforting in the least." He shook his
head. "Better that I simply disappear."

Father Delabarre gestured towards the table. "Is that what it says in
those letters?"

Nick looked at the envelopes, his voice distant. "They just say that
I'm not who I appear to be...that I'm leaving. And not to look for
me." He paused. "The one to Natalie tells the truth. I want her to
understand..." His voice trailed off.

"Based on what I witnessed a few minutes ago, Natalie understands you
already. And she is right---what you are contemplating is wrong."

Nick said bitterly, "Natalie believes that what I am can be reduced to
a scientific theory, and that science can cure me. I wanted to believe
her, and we tried and tried for a cure. Oh, how we tried.

"But evil can't be quantified in a test tube, and evil is what I am.
So all her cure attempts were failures." He laughed humorlessly.
"Perhaps I need an exorcism. But wait---that still won't grant me
forgiveness for my crimes, so we'll forego that particular cure, too."
He leaned back against the couch. "I asked my partner if he could
forgive a truly contrite mass murderer. Do you know what he said? He
said he couldn't, that he didn't think many people could. So where
does that leave me?"

The priest regarded him. "Why do you look to humanity and not God for
forgiveness?"

"Because it is humanity that I've preyed upon. It's humans that I've
killed---and God could never forgive me."

"But the humans you've wronged are dead. How can they forgive you?"

Nick stared at the priest. "They can't. Their spirits are tormenting
me, and there is nothing I can to do stop them. Except walk into the
sun and face my damnation."

"Ah," Father Delabarre said, and spread his hands. "But I don't
believe the spirits of the dead can come back to haunt us. They are in
God's care. This is your conscience speaking to you, a conscience that
wouldn't even exist if you were as evil as you claim."

"That's what Don---my partner---said," Nick answered slowly.

"You have wise friends, Nicolas. What else did your partner say?"

Nick was silent. He finally answered, "That God would forgive me, if I
am truly contrite."

The priest nodded. "He's right."

Nick leaped up and began pacing. "But why," he exclaimed, "why can't I
believe this? How can it be so, so *simple*?" He began picking things
up, then putting them back down in agitation.

Father Delabarre allowed him to pace for a moment, watching him as he
roamed through the room. Finally he reached over and patted the seat
of the couch. "Sit down, Nicolas. You're going to break something."

Nick stared at the priest, then at the Victorian ormolu carriage clock
he was holding as if he had forgotten he had picked it up. He replaced
it carefully and walked slowly back to the couch. "I don't
understand," he muttered. "I don't understand how this can be so."

Father Delabarre leaned forward, his hands clasped between his knees.
"You have told me of your many sins. You have committed murder many
times over, and done other things despicable in the eyes of God and
man."

Nick lowered his eyes. "Yes."

The priest continued gently, "But I see before me a man who regrets
these acts, who is truly contrite, and who is striving to do good."

Nick's said bitterly, "I'm not a man. I'm a vampire, a damned
creature."

"A man," Father Delabarre repeated. "Natalie mentioned your charities,
your work. Tell me about them."

Nick's voice was bleak. "Whatever I do now, it can never make up for
what I have done in the past."

"Perhaps so, Nicolas, but tell me. Tell me of the good you have done.
You told me about the bad, now tell me about the good."

Nick's thoughts flitted among the charities his ill-gotten money
supported. Was it really doing good if the fortune he so generously
distributed was the result of killing? Or was it guilt that motivated
him? He answered reluctantly. "I--I have a great deal of money, most
of it gained from my crimes. Over the centuries it has increased, and
I finally had a foundation set up to manage it. It helps support
medical research, clinics, shelters, schools..." He listed more of the
beneficiaries of the De Brabant Foundation's largesse. He shook his
head. "I sometimes think it's to alleviate my guilt that I do these
things, rather than true charity."

Father Delabarre nodded solemnly during the recitation. "Do you seek
fame or self-aggrandizement through these efforts?"

"No, it's all anonymous. No one save the executive staff know I'm
associated with it."

"Then it is a true work of charity. Tell me, why do you work as a
policeman, since you have no need for money? Surely, it must be
difficult for you."

"It is, sometimes. But I wanted to contribute to justice. I wanted to
protect the same people I had victimized before." He gestured
listlessly. "I thought I could do some good."

"And have you? Have you caught criminals, and protected ordinary
people? Have you stayed within the bounds of the justice system, even
though you are capable of meting out your own justice if you so
desire?"

"Yes." The answer was whispered.

Father Delabarre sat back. "And yet you persist in believing yourself
to be evil, and unworthy of life." He regarded Nick thoughtfully. "Let
me tell you what I see, Nicolas de Brabant. I see a man, a good man,
struggling to overcome something dreadful. Something which he allowed
to happen in a moment of weakness, something that can never be undone.

"It would be so easy to let the vampire overcome you, to fall prey to
its pleasures and powers, and allow your human spirit to wither away
and die. But you have kept your spirit close, and never allowed that
to happen. This is a triumph of your soul, Nicolas, something you
should never denigrate or demean.

"Yes, you have fallen, and fallen terribly. No man can resist
temptation all the time---the only man to have done that was our
Savior, and He is God. You are a man, and imperfect.

"The cross that you bear is unspeakably heavy. Perhaps God meant for
you to bear it---who can know His plans for us? It is for you to
accept your burden and carry it as well as you are able."

Nick listened in stony silence, his face set.

The priest continued. "Nicolas, the unforgivable sin you have
committed is not murder, or the suicide you contemplate. It is the sin
of pride. You presume to know God's mind. You have put yourself
outside His mercy and rejected the possibility of receiving His grace.
In your pride you have judged yourself, and it is not your place to do
so.

"Yes, you are contrite, but that is nothing unless you throw yourself
on God's infinite mercy, and believe that He can do anything---even
forgive a sinner such as yourself."

"How---" Nick began, and Father Delabarre interrupted him.

"Not 'how,' Nicolas, but 'why,' is the question that should be on your
lips. Why would God forgive you? And the answer is, 'because He is
God.' It is that simple."

Doubt shattered the calm surety Nick had finally achieved after days
of torment. But now that surety seemed a dull gray despair, and the
doubt was somehow glimmering with hope---the hope that there was a
reason for him to continue on. Perhaps he did have a purpose...

But The Dream... "Father," he asked tentatively, "what about my
dreams?"

Father Delabarre reached out and took his hand, his warmth enveloping
Nick's coolness. "If you can, tell them you will accept God's judgment
when the time comes." He smiled suddenly, his eyes twinkling. "Mind
you, I still don't believe this is anything more than your conscience
speaking to you. But talk back to yourself, by all means. It might
work---who knows? After all, I talk to myself all the time, and I find
myself very convincing." He grew serious. "And Nicolas, if you can,
pray for guidance."

Nick smiled slightly at the small jest, then squeezed the priest's
hand. "I will try." He started to stand, then sat down again. There
was one thing left to do. "Father, what you and I have talked must
remain a secret forever. It's dangerous to you to have even talked to
me---my kind have ways of enforcing our rules of secrecy, and they are
never pleasant."

Father Delabarre thought briefly of his meeting with Lacroix. He could
well imagine what 'unpleasant' things that one would be capable of. "I
think I understand what you mean."

"I can prevent any harm from coming to you. I can take away your
memories of our talks. Will you permit me to do this? It is painless,
I assure you."

The priest said reluctantly, "Must you? You have told me so many
incredible things, you've made the past come alive for me. I *want* to
remember them, and you...no one else will ever know. As a priest, I
cannot tell---and as a man, I will not. I understand your need for
secrecy."

Nick smiled. "I trust you...but others will not. Your vows mean
nothing to them."

Father Delabarre sighed. "I will regret not remembering you and your
story, but...if it is necessary, then, very well. What do I need to
do?"

"Just look into my eyes. But first," Nick drew a deep breath, as if
steeling himself for something difficult, "would you give me your
blessing? I can't ask for absolution---yet---but receiving your
blessing will make the road to come easier to travel."

Father Delabarre said, "Of course, Nicolas, but won't it be painful to
you?"

Nick said, "It doesn't matter," and knelt before the priest.

Father Delabarre gently placed his left hand on the bowed head before
him, and, saying the blessing in Latin, made the Sign of the Cross
over it with his right. Nick flinched with a sharp intake of breath,
then with a shaking hand made the Sign of the Cross himself, blisters
raising where he touched forehead, breast, and shoulders. A bloody
tear escaped one eye.

For a moment all was silent in the dimly-lit loft; then Nick slowly
regained his seat and said simply, "Thank you." He roughly wiped his
eyes, and said, "Now look into my eyes."

And slowly, carefully, he erased Father Delabarre's memories,
replacing them with memories of pleasant drives through town to visit
a friend and of time spent in quiet study.

Finally he was alone again, sitting in a small pool of light in the
darkened loft and feeling somehow relieved of a burden he had carried
for far too long. He felt curiously light, and at the same time
apprehensive about the days to come. He knew the despair would
return---but Father Delabarre had given him a weapon to combat it. His
pride, now---*that* he would have to work on on his own.

A half hour later he reached out and, picking up the phone, dialed a
familiar number.

"Natalie..."

~~~~~

In his study, Lacroix compressed his lips in a slight smile, closed
his eyes, and settled back in his armchair. *I knew you wouldn't do
it, Nicholas. You are so predictable when it comes to important
matters.*

He narrowed the link with his son and resumed reading his book. The
smile lingered a long time into the night.

~~~~~

PART NINETEEN

~~~~~

Natalie had been subdued on the phone, as if she hadn't been able to
process his words, or was unsure of her reactions, especially after
her anger earlier that evening. There had been a long silence, but
finally she had asked hesitantly if she could come over.

"If you want to." Nick was just as hesitant. What their difficult
relationship would be like now, he could only guess. It was as if they
were starting all over again, with new rules, but no one had told them
what the rules were.

He wandered aimlessly around the loft, finally stopping at the table
where his letters lay. He picked them up, shuffled them into a neat
stack and thought about just tearing them up, or throwing them into
the fire. He walked over to the fireplace and stared into the flames.
*That would have been me,* he thought. *Perhaps it is still in my
future. But not now. Not yet.* The gas-fed flames licked greedily at
the artificial logs, trying to but never achieving combustion. The
vellum would burn well...

In the end, he turned away. The flames would have to wait for another
day. Instead, he tucked the letters carefully away in the back of his
desk drawer. He couldn't explain his reasons for saving the lies he
had written; he was simply unwilling to let them go yet.

He resumed his wandering and ended up at his bookshelves, running his
hand over the spines. Leather and cloth, gold leaf and ink, old and
new. He picked one out at random and went over to the couch.

It was a collection of poems by John Clare that he had bought sometime
in the late 1800s. The leather binding was well-worn, the gold
lettering on the cover faded. He opened it at random and read,

I am! yet what I am none cares or knows, My friends forsake
me like a memory lost; I am the self-consumer of my woes,
They rise and vanish in oblivious host, Like shades in love
and death's oblivion lost; And yet I am! and live with
shadows tost

Into the nothingness of scorn and noise, Into the living sea
of waking dreams, Where there is neither sense of life nor
joys, But the vast shipwreck of my life's esteems; And
e'en the dearest---that I love the best--- Are strange---
nay, rather stranger than the rest.

I long for scenes where man has never trod; A place where
woman never smil'd or wept; There to abide with my Creator,
God, And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept;
Untroubling and untroubled where I lie; The grass below---
above the vaulted sky.

A memory rose unbidden and blazed in Nick's mind---himself and his
brother Robert lying on a sunlit riverbank after a morning of rabbit
hunting in their home meadows. It was so vivid---he could smell the
wet earth and the fresh vitality of growing things, and hear the
chuckling of the river as it flowed past on its way to the sea. He
could feel the sun on his face and the grass beneath his back. It was
wonderful.

He examined the memory carefully, handling it with the reverence he
would give to the most fragile of antiquities. His mortal memories
were so rare. Most of them had faded to nothingness, overlaid with the
eidetic perfection of eight hundred years of vampiric life, but now
this one replayed with crystal clarity.

He was eight, his brother, thirteen, and they were speculating with
the optimism of youth about their futures. Robert would become the
wisest and wealthiest of the king's lords, his most trusted advisor.
Nicolas would be the bravest, strongest, and most chivalrous of
knights, and his exploits would be sung by jongleurs throughout the
land. None of it seemed impossible to them on that fair spring day.

"It didn't work out quite the way we planned, did it, Robert?" Nick
asked softly, in the language of his youth. "For either of us."

The sound of the elevator door sliding open brought him regretfully
back to the present. He looked up to see Natalie standing hesitantly
in the open door, her hands twined together nervously. "Nick?"

In response he held out his hand.

She smiled tremulously and walked swiftly to join him on the couch. "I
thought I had lost you," was all she could say. She put her hand on
his shoulder, as if to touch him was to make it real. He was still
here.

Nick looked at her emotion-filled face. "Father Delabarre convinced me
it wasn't such a good idea," he answered simply. "Or at least, that my
reasons were---insufficient."

"I'm glad." She slid her arm around his shoulders, and he leaned into
her light embrace. She stroked his hair. "I'm so very glad."

They sat in companionable silence. Nick listened to Natalie's
heartbeat, its steady, slow rhythm no longer enticing, but simply
comforting, as she continued stroking his hair.

Natalie's eyes roamed around the room, taking in the bits and pieces
of Nick's life, the things that defined him. She was struck again by
the mixture of old and new, so much like Nick himself; distinct in
themselves, but harmonized in the whole. Finally, they lit on the book
he held, taking in the worn leather binding, the faded gold leaf. She
asked, "What are you reading?"

The book of poetry was still in his lap, his finger marking the page.
He straightened a bit and opened the book. "Just a poem."

Natalie craned her head and scanned the lines. "A little bit
depressing, isn't it?"

"A bit, yes." Nick smiled slightly. "You remind me of an Australian I
knew about fifty years ago who made that exact same point. He didn't
have much time for what he called 'frou-frou pommy sentimentality.' He
read that poem and told me he could rewrite it in four lines in plain
English, and then I'd see how pompous and depressing it really was."

Natalie was amused. "Did he?"

"Oh, yes. He came up with

'I'm really depressed. 'My friends are strange. 'God,
I'm so depressed and tired. 'I think I'll have a nap on the
grass here.'"

He snorted softly. "I think some of the more subtle nuances were lost
in the translation, though."

Natalie turned the book over to look at the cover. "John Clare? Who
was he?"

"A nineteenth century agrarian and antiquarian English poet. He died
in a lunatic asylum, and he collected snails." He smiled. "Maybe that
does qualify him as a 'frou-frou pommy.'"

Natalie smiled back. It was good to see a glimmer of humor surfacing,
even for just a moment. "Well, maybe he had a point. Perhaps you
should read some, uh, less depressing poetry, in the light of recent
events."

He asked seriously, "Any suggestions?"

She was at a loss. The last time she had read any poetry, it had been
in school, and she hadn't liked it much. She groped for a name. "Uh,
Robert Frost?"

"Well, he had his moments, too." He looked off into the distance and
quoted,

"'I shall be telling this with a sigh 'Somewhere ages and
ages hence: 'Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--- 'I
took the one less traveled by, 'And that has made all the
difference.'

"I know exactly what he means." He smiled sadly.

Natalie rubbed his arm. "Oh, Nick, I think you could find something
depressing in Dr. Seuss." She looked at him carefully, examining his
face. It was still drawn, but the remoteness she had seen before was
gone. "Are you really all right?"

He looked away. "I don't know. I think so. Maybe I have a few more
ways to face down my demons, and The Dream."

"Your dream?" She thought back to the terrible nightmare she had
witnessed. "Is that what I...?"

He nodded. "Yes, you woke me out of it. But it comes to me every day."

"Tell me."

He shook his head. "I can't---not yet." He took her hand and squeezed
it gently. "Maybe someday, but not yet." He glanced at the windows,
where the sky was lightening with dawn. Time to face his demons. He
stood up. "I think I need to sleep, now."

Natalie searched his face. "I know I said it before, but---I can stay,
if you like."

And just as he had before, he shook his head. "Thank you, but I'll be
all right. And I really mean it, this time." He pulled her to her feet
and kissed her forehead. "Go home, dear Natalie. I think this night
has been hard on both of us, and our beds are calling." He shooed her
towards the elevator.

She complied, saying, "I'll call tomorrow."

"And I'll answer."

She smiled.

After Natalie was gone, Nick looked up the stairs at his bedroom.
There was one more thing to put away before he could rest. He headed
up the stairs, and once in his room, opened the wooden box on the foot
of the bed. The box was made of aromatic cedar, and lined with red
silk, now faded to a dull purple.

He lifted the contents carefully and laid it out on the bed. The
coarse linen, though thinned and yellowed with age, unfolded easily.
He touched the brown stains that marred the neck.

He had been wearing this chemise, woven by his mother, on that night
in Paris long ago---the night he had died the First Death. The stains
were his mortal blood. He had intended to wear it when he died the
True Death. It would have burned to ashes with him.

*Not now. Not yet.*

He refolded it, replaced it in its box, and put it away.

~~~~~

Credits: "I Am!" by John Clare. Satiric summary of "I Am!" by Stuart
Burnfield, from the TECHWR-L posting entitled "Poetic Justice, or Tech
Writing from Bad to Verse," dated 12/23/97. "The Road Not Taken" by
Robert Frost.

PART TWENTY

~~~~~

Nick methodically prepared for bed, automatically following the same
routine he had for years. He stripped and carefully folded his clothes
over the chair in the corner. He then took the bathrobe from his
closet, wrapped it around himself, and padded quietly to the bathroom.

He stood under the shower a long time, letting the hot water stream
down his body. He felt exhausted, but it was not the same kind of
exhaustion that had been plaguing him for the last month. That had
held a feeling of desperation, of helplessness, of hopelessness.

No, this exhaustion was different. It was the tiredness after a just
and hard-fought battle, or at the end of a long journey.

It was clean. It was pure.

He finally turned off the water and dried off, staring into the mirror
while he ran the towel over himself. His body had remained unchanged
for almost eight hundred years, caught like a fly in amber for all
eternity. He traced the long ugly scar in his left side, the reminder
of his first brush with death. Even after the Change, that had
remained, together with the others he had collected in an all too
short and violent life.

But the real scars were on his heart, acquired after it was impossible
to mark his body. They had remained open all these years, scraped raw
by his refined skills of self-hatred and remorse, and he wasn't sure
he would be able to let them heal.

*Perhaps it's time to try,* he thought. *Perhaps now I have the
strength to let go.* But he knew that breaking the habits of eight
hundred years would not be so easy.

He put on the bathrobe and returned to his bedroom. He neatly turned
down the bedclothes and retrieved his pajamas from the dresser. He
quickly put them on, allowing himself to appreciate the feel of the
silk on his skin, and slid into bed.

He turned off the light and composed himself for sleep, mentally
steeling himself for the inevitable appearance of The Dream. His
tiredness weighed him down, dragging at his limbs with a pleasurable
heaviness. The utter silence of his home filled his ears.

His thoughts became incoherent and disjointed as he felt himself
spiral down into the black depths. One of his last conscious thoughts
was of a quotation from Hamlet: "To die, to sleep; to sleep: perchance
to dream: ay, there's the rub; for in that sleep of death what dreams
may come..." and a mocking little voice whispered that sleep was
death, and death was sleep, and his dreams were death, and all was
death, and *he* was death...

And he was there.

~~~~~

The sun beat down upon his pale skin, and again he accepted this
miracle without question or wonder. He looked at the windblown barren
hills and eroded cliffs surrounding him, and the blue-white sky above,
then down at himself. He was naked save for the chemise he had worn
the night he had died the First Death, and it looked as new as if his
mother had just given it to him.

He set off towards the pool in the distance, his bare feet sinking
ankle-deep in the hot, gritty sand. He could see a tall, robed figure
standing near the pool, and he knew this was the Guide. He angled his
steps toward him.

Somehow he felt free of the compulsions that had dictated the course
of The Dream in the past. He no longer knew what he would say, or what
he would do; it was as if he were a puppet whose strings had been cut.
He was no longer controlled, and he both welcomed it and was
frightened by the prospect.

The Guide had his back turned as Nick approached, but faced him as he
drew near. Nick squinted against the glare of the sun, expecting to
see Lacroix's mocking features. But...

"Robert!"

Nick's brother smiled broadly. "Not really, Nicolas. This is a dream,
remember---not a true event. I am a manifestation of your mind,
nothing more." He put his hands on Nick's shoulders. "Manifestation or
not, brother, I am glad to see you. You haven't thought of me for a
good long while."

Nick drew him into a rough embrace. "I missed you, too." He stepped
back and gazed at the face so like his own: brown hair, not fair, but
the same blue eyes and the same generous mouth. His smile faded. "I'm
sorry I wasn't there when you fell sick, Robert. If only..."

Robert shook him gently. "There you go again, Nicolas, assuming
responsibility for everything that ever happened. It wasn't your
fault. It was God's plan for both of us. Accept that and move on."

Nick sighed. "I know that, but I can't help the way I feel." He looked
around at the empty landscape. "Why isn't The Dream the same as
always? By now I know I would be looking at my rotting corpse." He
shuddered. "It's not that I miss it, but I don't understand what's
happening."

"There's no need to look at the state of your soul. You know that all
too well, don't you? It's what you plan on doing about it that's
important, and tonight you made your first steps on that journey."
Robert took Nick's arm and pointed to the left. "This, however, is the
same as always."

Nick turned and looked where his brother---the Guide?---was pointing.
The field of grave markers rose into view, the crosses representing
his victims disappearing into the heat haze. He could hear the
victims' cries raised against him.

Involuntarily Nick took a step backward. He repeated what the Guide
had told him in every Dream. "They won't forgive me until my task is
completed." A sense of futility swept over him.

Robert asked gently, "But does that matter to your soul?"

Nick thought back to what Father Delabarre had told him---that he
erred in seeking forgiveness from humanity rather than from God. He
looked again at the field of crosses. It seemed he could see the
wraiths of his victims materializing out of the shimmering air, their
faces contorted in hate as they shouted their condemnation. How could
he ignore them?

Nick looked at his brother, or rather at the manifestation of his own
mind that resembled his long-deceased brother. Robert gazed
steadfastly back but offered no help.

Nick realized that this was his own self, trying to tell him something
important. He understood that he needed to ask God for forgiveness, to
forget his pride and his hubris. But he needed to do something for his
victims, too...

He faced them; they seemed to be coming closer. The pressure of their
hatred was a wave rolling inexorably towards him; soon it would engulf
him and he would drown.

He suddenly understood what he needed to do.

Nick said loudly, "I'm sorry." He dropped to his knees before them. In
a quieter voice he continued, "I'm sorry, and I know what I've done is
unforgivable in your eyes." He bowed his head. "I will submit to God's
justice and mercy when I face the True Death. I beg you, leave me to
His judgment." The sincerity he suddenly felt in his heart rang out
like a great bronze bell, true and strong.

He looked straight ahead and faced his accusers unflinchingly, mutely
asking them to accept, to understand. And miraculously the shouts
began to diminish, died back to a murmur and then became silent. The
vast field of graves vanished, and with it the first portion of his
despair.

He felt a hand on his shoulder, and looked up. Robert was smiling down
at him. "They needed to hear that, as did your own soul. It is a
beginning." He raised Nick to his feet and continued.

"There is a long road ahead of you, brother," he said sadly. "You
chose a difficult path, one with many pitfalls and dead ends. Have
faith and listen to your heart as you travel along it. And listen to
and trust those you love, and who love you, and they will help you."

Nick could only say, "I'll try."

Robert quickly embraced him again, then grinned crookedly. "I must go
now. Think of us now and again, won't you? We all want to be
remembered, even if it's only to let you have a conversation with
yourself, like Father Delabarre said."

Nick laughed, then choked as his laugh threatened to turn into a sob.
"I promise." He raised a hand in farewell as the Robert's image faded
into nothingness, then reached out to try to touch him one last time.

"Farewell, brother."

He was left standing alone amid the dry hills, a warm wind fluttering
the chemise around his legs. And then he, too, was gone.

So was The Dream.

~~~~~

Nick awoke with a peaceful mind. The spectres of his victims had gone,
leaving not a painful emptiness, but a quiet one. It was a void he
could fill with his future, not his past. He felt eager to try.

As he dressed, he realized he still had three days of his enforced
leave left to fill. Time to think, time to play music, time to
paint...

He knew what he would do.

First, he made a phone call to the Foundation. His directive was met
with the usual discreet, unquestioned compliance. A small, poor local
parish would receive an anonymous check once a year, a sum neither too
large nor too small, to be used at the discretion of the pastor, a
certain Father Delabarre. Nick wished he could express his gratitude
more directly to the elderly priest for his help, but that was
impossible. Money, shallow as that was, was the least he could do.

And then he readied a canvas. The image that filled his imagination
wasn't a tortured face, a futilely glowing sun, or a wild despairing
slash of dark colors.

Rather, it was the image of his family that he had kept locked in his
heart, the one he had been afraid to call to mind because it reminded
him of all he had lost and the bitter course his life had taken.

In his dream, Robert had asked him to think of his family more often;
and while Nick knew the dream was only the outpourings of his own
mind, he knew this was something he should do.

After the blank canvas was set upon his easel, he retrieved the book
that contained the photographs of the Dresden museum collection and
opened it to the page with his family's portrait. He stared at the
black and white photograph, remembering the people pictured as they
actually had been. While he desperately wished he could possess that
painting as a mememto of his family, the awkward figures weren't
right. The picture he wanted to paint would be. He closed the book and
picked up a stick of charcoal and began to sketch the outlines of the
scene in his mind.

They were in the dimly-lit Great Hall after the evening meal. A fire
blazed on the huge hearth and cast a warm light over the stone walls
and tapestries. His father sat in his chair at the table discussing
some estate matter with his brother over a cup of wine. His mother sat
close to the fire, the ever-present needlework in her hands as she
listened to her husband and son and smiled her secret smile. His
sister sat at the other end of the table, a candle at her elbow, deep
into one of the few books they owned, her eyes alight with the desire
to learn. And off to the side there was himself, readying his weapons
for the journey he would be undertaking in just a few days.

It was one of the last times they were together as a family. It had
been a time when the world was full of unknowable possibilities. They
had all been content in their lives, and happy together.

As he worked late into the night, Nick knew that this painting was yet
another step away from the latest crossroad in his long life. It
represented a step towards his final destination, wherever that might
be, and a step away from self-destruction and despair.

He *would* think of his family and the bright times more often, and
lean on them for strength when his steps faltered.

He would pray to God for forgiveness.

And he would edge ever closer to his goal; whether that included
mortality or salvation, or both, or neither, he didn't know, but he
would keep trying.

In his mind, the crossroad receded into the distance and disappeared,
and the road ahead of him was indistinct; but he smiled to himself and
painted into the night.

~~~~~

Finis

Nancy E. Kaminski nancykam@mediaone.net

~~~~~