A/N: Just as a warning, I do discuss religion later in this chapter. My views, which I have been told by someone who would know, are humanistic and are expressed in the way I view certain situations and the answers to certain questions. I do not apologize for them; I simply thought you should be warned. If anyone has an alternate opinion, I am open to discussion. Email me.
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"Come, sirs! Regale us with a song or tale from home!" the man urged. "We would like to hear more of our people's great fight, our true battles and victories!"
It was their last night in Boxborough, and for the first time, they were meeting with the people of the town free of the Hastings' influence.
Gabriel sat back and looked at Carl. "Me?" the friar asked him, a note of panic in his voice.
"I do not sing," Gabriel told him definitively, holding back a smile.
"So there's no truth to the rumors?" Carl sniped agitatedly, mindless of the many people of Boxborough who were watching the exchange with amusement. "Choirs of angels, and all that?"
A few of the men around them laughed wholeheartedly. The hunter glared.
"I couldn't carry a tune in a bucket," Lamar said without a hint of shame, raising his hands defensively as Carl turned to him with a gleam in his eye.
"Besides, Lamar's still not well," Gabriel grinned wickedly at him, maintaining the story Carl had spun to gloss over the more unbelievable facets of their tale. "And I've heard you sing. Mostly drinking songs, but I have heard you sing."
It was Carl's turn to glare, fighting off a blush at the gleeful chortling that statement evoked, but his anger bounced uselessly off the hunter.
"All right," he sighed, giving way before the voices clamoring for a song. The friar thought for a moment, searching for something appropriate. When he next opened his mouth, the tale fell easily from his lips in a lilting tenor. It was a poem put to song some generations ago, by a member of the Order who had been musically inclined. The words described one day in his life, enumerating chores and duties, with an undertone of darkness and triumph. The story told in Carl's clear voice was spellbinding, and long enough to satisfy even the most avid of their American brethren.
"Magnificent," the man breathed. He sat back contentedly, and slowly, conversation began to flow around them once more.
The last few days had been less troublesome than Gabriel had hoped, which came as a relief. Hastings had been removed to the local lockup, and was left mostly alone. Lamar had journeyed into Acton to secure passage from Boston back to Rome, and had been successful. Carl's notes on the current work going on in the town were complete. As for the hunter, he had been able to spend time with Ben. He'd needed to speak with the youth about what he'd seen, what had been happening in the clearing. Also, the way Pardoe had grabbed the towheaded lad and forced him along the path had infuriated Gabriel. After a few hours of instruction, Ben knew about nerve points and their uses as defensive weapons. The boy was a quick study, and the trio of man, youth and dog spent several pleasant hours together.
Ben's time in Boxborough was over. It had been a safe haven for him, for awhile, a place for him to rest and recover. But ultimately, the town had also been a source of some of the worst evil the boy had ever seen in his life. The place would forever be a font of nightmares, lurking in the back of his mind. It was past time for Ben and Ned to leave. They would be going with Gabriel, Carl, Lamar and Hastings to England, but no further, not yet.
Hastings. Gabriel frowned. He had no control over the man's fate, and truly hadn't had any since the battle in the clearing had concluded. Whatever would happen to him had yet to be determined, and that decision rested in Rome. With Gaspar.
The hunter ran an exhausted hand over his face. Despite the fact that Lamar was now well, the scars he bore from this mission would not be erased – and for the first time in many years, Gabriel was left searching his vast memory for a reason why. It made no sense, but unfortunately there was no shortage of viable reasons. It could have been the drugs in his own system, or the fact that Carl had acted on by himself, pulling the power from Gabriel in raw form and channeling it, undirected, into Lamar. It could even be Lamar himself. The hunter had seen the man staring at the thin lines scoring his skin, rubbing thoughtfully at the scar tissue; but the Jerusalemite had not shared whatever thoughts were troubling him. Thus, there would be difficult explanations ahead, when the time came to report to the new Head of the Order.
It was more worrying than the changes he was now seeing in Carl. There was nothing precisely different about the young man, and his worry had quieted once Gabriel remembered where he had seen this before. It was simply that the friar had reached out, and touched a power that was too great for mortality to encompass. He might notice it eventually, in the few newly silvered strands of hair at his temples. It was a strange shine in his eyes that emerged every so often, when he wasn't paying attention. It was the memory of something so great and wondrous, it settled somewhere beyond definition and left the one affected scrambling to describe it. They were changes too subtle to be noticed, too fleeting to be explained, though they existed nevertheless. Luckily, however, the hunter was left with one less thing to justify to Gaspar. But the warlock's son would make up for it in spades.
His thoughts kept circling back to Hastings. The frown that seemed permanently etched on his face grew deeper.
"Weighty thoughts for a celebration," commented a light voice, rudely jerking him from his ruminations.
Alicia Hastings, the woman now running the town of Boxborough, smiled down at him. Of diminutive height, she was a lovely woman with a soothing presence. He smiled back. "Nothing of import," he murmured. She sat next to him, gentle skepticism coloring her features.
But she did not press him. "I do not see Mathilde here tonight," she observed calmly. "Nor Ben, or Ned."
"Ben and Ned have decided to journey with us. They wanted to spend their last night home with family."
At this explanation, Alicia nodded. "I thought they might not be with us for much longer." She smiled. "Now, at least, I do not have to fear for them."
Gabriel winced slightly. Such empathy was difficult, often lending the individual affected to pick up on feelings and desires that others were planning to act on. It was an extremely loose type of prophecy, given to change at a whim.
"How are your sons? Tyler, and Eric?"
She accepted that he wanted to change the subject, easily moving on to another topic. "They are well." Alicia shrugged faintly. "They are not here tonight, but I did not expect them to come. Tyler still struggles with belief, while Eric is feeling betrayed. Both see the evil that has occurred, yet neither of my sons can conceive that their father believed he was doing good. I am wrestling with it, myself."
"It is a difficult thing, to believe yourself betrayed by one you love," Gabriel murmured.
Alicia started. "You speak as if you have undergone something similar," she questioned curiously.
Gabriel's eyes were far away, and at her words his attention was pulled back into the festive meeting house, down into a room full of chatter and laughter, music and storytelling. "No. Not I." His thoughts were on someone dear to him, Alicia could sense, and Gabriel's mind had long since turned to a man who had been a younger brother in all but blood – because he, after all, was not mortal.
Thoughts of another time, past and future. Shaking his head, Gabriel offered Alicia a smile, which became genuine as Carl began to sing once more. This time, the tune offered was a rowdy sea shanty, overheard from Ben and never forgotten. A genuine laugh burst from the hunter at the conclusion, the mood of the celebration lightened considerably.
And so the night passed, full of merriment and joy as the people of Boxborough celebrated their freedom from darkness and the departure of new friends.
The following day, Gabriel, Carl and Lamar set out early from the Widow's house, making their way into town to collect Hastings. It was something that made Gabriel nervous. As they left the lockup and moved back eastward, his anxiety only grew. The people of the town were out and about, gathering quietly as they continued through the main square. Should they decide that they wanted to keep Hastings here, they would have little trouble stopping the hunter and his companions. But they seemed content to simply line the streets and watch as Carl led the other three toward the path. Lamar had silently refused to put his back to Hastings, which left Gabriel with one hand firmly on the former mayor's arm as the Jerusalemite brought up the rear.
His every sense was alert as they came to the end of the street, and Alicia Hastings was standing before them, blocking the way. He met her eyes for a moment, as she focused in on each of them individually. "Before we were pulled into darkness, there was a tradition in our community. We welcomed each new arrival with festivities, and sent them off with the same. At the moment of their departure, we would gather, and wish them well. Today, I revive that ceremony. Godspeed!" she cried.
The people of Boxborough threw the word back at her in a roaring echo; their brothers from Rome were caught in the collision of sound. "Godspeed!"
Alicia smiled, then, and nodded, stepping out of their way to leave the path clear before them. "Go with the Lord."
Similar words, words of goodwill and prayer, sounded lowly as they passed the last of the townspeople. Only when the sound had faded away, as they came to Mathilde Austin's home, did they truly feel as if they had left Boxborough behind.
Ben came out to meet them, followed by Mathilde, who was carrying Tanya. The boy exchanged a few words with his surrogate family, while the men checked their packs and belongings one last time. The boy and dog had finished their goodbyes before the men had completed their check, and came to stand beside them. Mathilde set Tanya down, and the two followed at a more sedate pace.
When she reached the men, holding Tanya's hand, she did no more than stare expressionlessly at Hastings, for several long moments. There was no hate in her gaze, but neither could any shred of pity be found. She kept her daughter behind her, well away from him, and coldly dismissed the murderer from her attention. Moving on, Mathilde looked at the hunter judiciously. "I think I now understand what it is you do, Mr. Van Helsing." And then she surprised them both by saying, "Thank you."
Uncomfortable, the hunter settled for touching his hat in acknowledgement. "You're welcome."
Mathilde turned from him to Carl, and shook the friar's hand firmly. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Wheldon."
Carl thanked her politely, smoothly returning the compliment. When Mathilde came to Lamar, she smiled at him, and gave him a chaste kiss on the cheek. The two exchanged several words too low for the others to hear, and Gabriel kicked Carl when the friar tried, not-so-discreetly, to edge closer.
Ben saw the interchange, and hid a smile. Mathilde came to him last, and rubbed Ned's head affectionately, whispering a few words in his ear. When she at last turned to the boy, Tanya threw herself on Ned, stifling sobs in the dog's fur. The black Lab compassionately licked her hand, and she clung tighter.
"Look at you," Mathilde breathed, her eyes bright with tears. She hugged him, and then held him out at arm's length. A trembling laugh broke from her lips, as she gently smoothed his tousled hair back from his forehead. "You look almost just as you did when you came strolling into my yard, whistling and playing with that great hound of yours."
Ben smiled, but there were tears on his cheeks as well. Mathilde smiled at him, and he smiled bravely back. "None of this, now," she told him, wiping his face with a corner of her apron. "Be good, Ben." Ned nudged her, and she rubbed his ears fondly. "You too, Ned."
Ben nodded, and threw himself at her for a last hug. She murmured quietly in his ear, and they slowly parted. Tanya grabbed Ben, sobbing quietly, but he spoke softly to her, gently disentangling himself. Tanya latched on to her mother, burying her face in Mathilde's shoulder as she cried.
As the group turned and left the Widow's home, Gabriel caught Ben glancing back only once. Ned looked straight ahead, but he bumped his head under the boy's hand, asking for a scratch. The lad and his dog turned their faces away, then, and on to the fresh road they were traveling. Gabriel's heart ached at the sight.
The day's journey was somewhat slower, but they had ample time. Traveling through the waning winter, it seemed to those from Rome that the freezing chill that had maintained its icy grip over Boxborough, even into March, was lessening. The day was unseasonably warm, and through the woods around them, the noise of melting ice and falling snow could be heard.
The silence that had reigned throughout the hours of walking continued as they made camp, in the same place they had stayed on their first night in America. It an ironic juxtaposition, Hastings was the one bound to a tree in this clearing. In unspoken agreement, the watch was split three ways, with Carl taking the first, Gabriel the middle, and Lamar the last.
The night passed quietly, and when the hunter woke, the stars had shifted enough to tell him that it was past time for his turn at watch. Scuffing free of his blankets, he clambered to his feet and moved to where the friar was sitting, eyes roving around the clearing warily.
"Why didn't you wake me?" Gabriel sat next to him, stifling a yawn. The hunter scrubbed hands over his face, banishing the last of his sleepiness.
Carl shrugged. "Not tired."
It was an unusually succinct answer for the normally talkative man. Gabriel frowned. Carl spotted the expression out of the corner of his eye, and his mouth twisted. The friar's attention turned, with practiced ease, to Hastings. The man was curled at the base of one of the trees supporting their shelter. Because he was so far from the fire, he had been given two extra blankets. The only parts of him which were visible were the top of his dark head, and the bound hands poking from the nest of cloth. "What's going to happen to him when we get to Rome?"
The question which had no doubt been plaguing the young man since the cable had arrived from the Vatican.
Gabriel shrugged. He had only a rudimentary idea. The grisly joke was more truth than rumor – he rarely brought back alive the charges he was told to pursue. Most of the time when he was the one sent out, it meant that the Vatican didn't want or expect him to, no matter how the orders were worded. He had been their tamed tool for over four years, unleashed to wreak destruction on the forces of evil, because he was good at it. Jinnette had tried to obscure the issue, claiming that it had been clear to all those in power that Gabriel "had been sent to do God's work." The old Cardinal had been right, but not in the way he'd thought.
Gabriel snorted softly. He had definitely not lost his memory "as a penance for past sins". It had been a fully calculated tactic, and had worked beautifully. But that was beside the point – and he still hadn't answered Carl's question.
"I don't know," he responded truthfully. "He may be given a trial within the Order. On the other hand, he may simply be judged by Gaspar and sentenced. I truly don't know."
Carl sighed softly. "I don't know what to expect," he confessed. "If Hastings survived that disaster in the woods just to -"
"There are two types of forgiveness," Gabriel interrupted firmly. The friar held no responsibility or guilt for whatever Hastings' eventual fate, and Carl must be made to see that clearly. "There is the mortal kind, which comes in many shapes and forms, if it comes at all. The other kind is only given out by God, and requires only one thing to be granted."
"What is that?" As ever, the friar's curiosity could not let something as tantalizing as that statement lie ignored, especially when the hunter was offering it unprompted.
"Repentance. True penitence. That is all." He twisted the ring on his finger absently.
Carl gave up trying to make sense of where the hunter's train of logic was leading. "And?"
"And so whether Hastings is granted the second is up to him alone, and between him and God. Whether he is granted the first lies entirely in the hands of Gaspar, and the Order. There is almost nothing we can do about it. In reality, we've done all we can. He must answer for his crimes."
"I refuse to believe that there's nothing more we can do," Carl objected strongly, though his heart didn't seem to be truly into the protest. It was an argument that neither wanted to start.
The piece of jewelry that he had been distractedly fiddling with claimed the hunter's attention.
Carl heaved a sigh, and uncharacteristically let the matter drop, falling silent. His eyes moved from the man huddled within his blankets, far from the warmth of the fire, and rested on his friend's moving fingers. A somewhat questioning look on his face, he reached out to see what the hunter was toying with. His hand pulled back, aborting the attempt, when the small piece of metal caught the light of the flames.
Gabriel slowly pulled the ring from his hand, turning it over to the friar with a small smile.
"Why did you keep it, all this time?" Carl asked, skimming his fingers over the roughly-worked silver, softly changing the subject.
"It was a reminder," Van Helsing replied, hunching closer to the fire in his contemplation.
"Of what?"
The hunter paused with a frown. "Of promises fulfilled," he responded at last. "Of a duty that was to go unfinished for four hundred years."
Carl played absently with the ring for a few moments, quietly pursuing that thought. "You knew he was not truly dead?" he asked, finally.
There was a short laugh at that. "He was dead. I know death quite well – he had passed into God's judgment."
"And then the devil gave him wings," Carl said softly. The words had a tone of reminiscence about them, and both men stilled for a moment, silent in respect and grief.
Gabriel shrugged slightly. "Vladislaus Dracula still had a part to play," he said softly.
Carl snorted inelegantly. "Aye, a part in the murder of thousands," he snapped, his sudden ill-temper ugly to behold. He tossed the ring back to the hunter, who caught it effortlessly.
"All things have a purpose," Gabriel returned, and it was the weariness, as opposed to the warning, in his voice that made Carl subside.
"Even evil?" There was a soft desperation in the voice, and Gabriel started. Lamar was awake, and he didn't know how long the Jerusalemite had been listening to their conversation. Nightmares, he surmised, seeing the haunted expression in the dark man's eyes.
"Especially evil," Gabriel responded gently.
The Jerusalemite's eyes hardened at that, and he seized the blankets roughly, dragging them around himself like a shield. "How do we have a God who stands for such things?" he spat. "Is this a . . . a test?"
Gabriel couldn't count the times he had heard that question, or the many languages and peoples he had heard it from. His head dropped to his chest for a moment, and he breathed slowly before raising his eyes to the men who were waiting for a response.
The only reason he spoke was that he could feel the need for an answer practically vibrating from the Jerusalemite. Lamar was struggling, ultimately, with his faith, while Carl was staring with curious eyes.
"Sometimes," he admitted lowly. "Yes, it is a test of mankind, to see what he is capable of – but it is not put forth by God. Why should He have need of such a thing? He made it all. The only tests that we face are the ones put forth by evil, and one another." Gabriel glanced over at Hastings.
"But how can He allow it!" Lamar was sputtering, completely undone by this one idea, a concept that squatted in his mind and betrayed his sense of justice.
Gabriel looked at him compassionately. "How can he not?" Lamar's eyes bugged out, and he gaped. Mouth working soundlessly, the Jerusalemite stared in disbelief. "God gave mankind many gifts," Gabriel slowly explained, searching for a way to put words to something ineffable. "Among the foremost of these is free will." Language escaped his grasp then, and he waited patiently for the idea to come to the forefront of his mind. "He loves his children. And for love of you, he could never take that gift away, not from any. To take from one is to take from all."
"But the creature – Beelzebul . . ." Carl began doubtfully.
Gabriel laughed then. "You think I do not have the freedom to choose my course, Carl? All of His sons were given that gift, as well as His children. Beelzebul, as he is now called, made a choice as well."
Lamar looked at him despairingly. "If things such as that have the power you say, and the will to use it -"
"I have made a choice as well." Hazel eyes, shining golden in the firelight, rested lightly on him. "There is always law, and there are always rules, but choice exists for all of us." The entrancing eyes turned, to rest on the still-sleeping Hastings. "The choice to do good, or to do evil."
Gabriel looked at the ring that had been enveloped in his fist. The winged serpent sneered back at him, and he contemplated it for a moment before reaching a sudden decision. His face void of expression, the hunter took up the ring once more and cast it into the flames.