A/N: Refs to ch: 25, 73, and ch 8 of Between the End and the Beginning.
I do not own or profit from any of what Kazue Kato has created.
Water. Salt. Fire. For ages, humans had relied on these to purify and banish evil. Funny, though. How and why these things worked remained unknown. Most were just grateful that they did, not bothering to question. Most shrugged and accepted it, perhaps attributing it to the power of god.
The power of god…
Iblis was supreme ruler of Fire. Egyn commanded Water. Salt was of the earth, a mineral, and under Prince Amaimon's reign. Each with the power to counter and vanquish other Princes' forces according to the chart of demonic elements. Each with the power to purge and purify.
The power of… gods…?
"A fine addition I'll make to your fold." He'd thought so in the church, the small familiar church where the parishioners came together each Sunday. He'd thought it loud and clear as he had approached the altar, but the starved image of the saviour on the crucifix above it hadn't seemed to hear him.
It never did.
Water, salt and fire: baptism and confirmation. The initiation rites of Catholicism had all the hallmarks of the Pagan beliefs they sought to purge him of.
The Paschal candle – image of Christ, guiding flame of the world – had cast its light on him and on the congregation. It had cast its reflection on the holy water that would wash away his sins in one of the highlights of Easter Vigil: the welcoming of new lambs into the flock. Before that candle he had renounced sin and Satan. Before the parishioners he had professed his faith in Christ, the only son, Saviour of the world. Before the bishop who blessed the contents of the ornate baptismal fount he had pronounced the name under which he wished to be reborn into the fold of the Lord:
Alexander. He who defends and protects.
Words and vows had poured from his mouth, steady streams from empty wells; they had come so easily, void of meaning from repetitions and rehearsals.
Father Hayashi, his sponsor in faith, had dried remaining water out of his hair with a towel when he was dressed with the white robes of the pure. They had exchanged few words but kind ones: a father's joy, a son's appropriate reply. He had been given a candle, his own light lit from the wick of Christ's, and the bishop had anointed him with sacred chrism and prayer for confirmation, making him part of the congregation. He had shared the communion wafer as one of them, drunk the blood of Christ as one of them, sung the praise of god as one of them.
The Monday after, Satan's son rewarded his performance with more "cultural hands-on practice".
It always seemed to rain when he was in Rome. It was always that light kind of rain that never meant any serious business, though, so it didn't matter.
"You should have seen it in evening light, the red hues in the bricks come out so nicely when the sun sets on the Tiber…" To Samael it mattered, of course. Whenever art was concerned, he seemed to take it personally when things weren't to his liking. "Aah~ I love Italy for this… Nnh~ so rich, so creamy – and the flavour, goodness, it's like an orgasm in the mouth!"
The first thing Samael had done when the magical key had gotten them through the door was to buy Italian ice cream. The second thing he had done was to forever ruin Shiro's appetite for it by demonstrating exactly how long and… nimble… demons' tongues were; and reminding him of certain dreams he wanted to strangle him for.
"Don't rise to the bait." He repeated the familiar mantra to himself and stared straight ahead at the museum the asshole was forcing him to spend the day in. "That's what he wants."
Evening sun or no evening sun, the building before them puffed its chest out proudly for the tourists and their flashing cameras. The cylinder of Castel Sant'Angelo wasn't that impressive if you compared it to the mountainous shape of True Cross Academy, but considering how long it had stood there the Academy couldn't even compete. The rain that coated Rome seeped into innumerable dents and cracks in the old stone; dents and cracks carved by a long history as fortress, treasury, prison, mausoleum, and presently museum. All in all, the foundations of Sant'Angelo had stood for almost two thousand years.
"These are all by Bernini's students: you can tell the difference by the curve of the lines", Samael prattled on in enthusiastic Italian and flicked the marble angels a connoisseur's gesture with his five scoop gelato cone. His other hand was occupied by the ice cream cone that constituted the tail of his bat familiar, now in the shape of an umbrella.
The massive Aelian Bridge they were crossing was flanked on both sides by the angel statues. Art wasn't Shiro's strong point – as Samael so kindly pointed out whenever opportunity came ambling – but even he was amazed at how one could make stone look as soft and light as fabric.
"Bernini was a tremendously talented chap, but busy as geniuses are. He only made two out of these ten himself, but those have been replaced with replicas and now stand in a small basilica east of here – a shame, really, when they should by right be on display here: at the castle of angels!"
The next dramatic flourish the old goat made was to introduce the building that came steadily closer as they walked, even though Shiro knew it perfectly well from photographs. Rather than point this out, he meandered around some other tourists and pretended he didn't know the weirdo that lectured happily – and loudly – about the influence of the Borgia family in 16th century Italy.
Shiro squinted through the rain, up at the bronze statue of Archangel Michael that gazed back at him from the top of the building. Castle of angels? They could name it whatever the hell they liked, it wouldn't change what it actually was. Castel Sant'Angelo had been a prison. It had been host to torture and executions; the banisters of the bridge they walked had been decorated with heads instead of angels. Demons loved places like this. Places full of suffering and darkness. They hovered about the bridge in the shape of ghosts, fuelled with resent and unfulfilled wishes. He could see them prowling the glistening pavement, pearly white in the rain, with rags hanging limply from abused limbs. Some of them staggered around in search of their heads; others pleaded unheard for a crust of bread to bring home to families that died centuries ago.
Shiro's heart clenched at their pain. His unguarded heart clenched. But none of them approached him, none of them leapt at the chance.
"Poison and potion", he huffed quietly to himself.
Shiro walked slower. His glasses were studded with droplets and didn't do much good for seeing, but wiping them was a temporary and unnecessary measure. He kept his hands in his pockets and toyed absentmindedly with the lighter while he waited. Had to let Samael catch up.
An undiluted feeling of bitterness seeped into him, much like the rain had begun seeping into his worn shoes. The murky flavour filled him, tangy and unpleasant but nonetheless something other than the emptiness of not feeling.
Shiro stopped, then closed his eyes and turned his face up at the light rain. Droplets tickled his temples, trailing gently down his throat to be caught by the patchwork scarf he wore. Bitterness was better than nothing. Anything was better than nothing. If only he didn't have to put up with Samael for it.
Shiro had grown accustomed to the thought that there was no way of detaching himself around Samael. Shutting his heart with that particular demon nearby was impossible, probably because he had willingly let him into it once – young and blue-eyed as he had been. But he was both potion and poison; that, at least, had been true. His presence made Shiro vulnerable, but it simultaneously made other demons keep their distance.
"Did he know I was compatible from the start?" The question had been gnawing his mind for weeks. "He said there's been others like me. If he knows that he might know how to spot humans like me. He could've planned to contract me right from the start." Through the crowd of murmurs and shuffling feet his
ears singled out the clicking of Samael's boots. A smile, wry and crisp, tugged his lips at the discovery that he didn't know just how the bastard walked but how he sounded when he walked. "If I didn't know better I'd think those heels were on a woman."
"That scarf really is hideous, you know", came the familiar voice that got an even more prominent lilt when it spoke Italian. "It looks more fit for swiping floors than for being worn as a garment."
Shiro opened his eyes and turned his gaze back to the grey bridge, adjusting the dangling scarf end that had slipped from his shoulder as he did.
"I like it." Both because Kasumi had made it and because it stung Samael's eyes like nettle leaves. "Why are there so many ghosts here after so a long time?"
"Such a long time." The correction came automatically, followed by another lick on the ice cream before the actual reply: "There are two main reasons for that. The limited number of exorcists makes the Order focus on demons that disturb peace and order for humans: harmless ones like these are simply no high priority", he said and stepped aside to avoid the touch of what had once been a young woman.
Beheading is a quick end, and the most merciful kind as far as death penalty went in the old Papal States. It was still horrible. The ghost cradled her head in her arms, eyes half closed and orbs rolled back, blood dribbling from the corners of the slack mouth.
Good thing so few could see demons.
"The other reason…" Samael could pull off a smile like a cat gazing into an open bird cage, and it was an awful sight. "Well~ it's less palatable, but perfectly in line with human nature; authorities don't want these ghosts exorcised. Any guess why~?"
Shiro caught the sideways look and the challenge that came with it. Samael was in the mood for playing games. He couldn't say he shared the enthusiasm, but as with most games there was the unspoken promise of a reward if he played well enough: more knowledge.
"There must be something to gain from leaving them as they are", he contemplated reluctantly. Something perfectly in line with human nature? "I suppose they could act as guardians, but if these are thought of as to be… thought of, as… harmless", he grimaced at his clumsy Italian, "they won't make good guardians. I'll think about it."
It held so many echoes of his childhood that Shiro felt physically nauseous. Shallow words that tiptoed over cracks mended with glue and tape. Painted masks of pretence. Maybe he was turning into his dad after all.
They reached the entrance before long, ushered forward by a flock of tourists eager for the shelter inside. The rain had been picking up, as had a chilly wind from the Tiber. They all huddled into the opening in the thick wall, while the overhanging structure dripped a small moat onto the pavement below it. There was the rustling of rain clothes and coins as people lined up and began counting lire for the entry tariff. The only one not counting was Samael. The huge ice cream cone was nowhere to be seen; instead he whistled anime openings and tapped the toe of his boot in synch, leisurely waiting in line while twirling a very large bank note between his fingers. He had the same odd relationship with the Italian lira as he had with the Japanese yen, and only stuffed his wallet with notes of the 50 000 lire variety.
Castel Sant'Angelo had borrowed an exhibition from another museum, as it normally didn't have anything on display that hadn't been placed in the castle by some Pope several hundred years ago. The poster on the wall opposite the cashier's desk advertised that it would be on display throughout summer, and stated in red which dates the museum would be closed. The poster next to it reminded visitors that the ghost walk, which was a guided, historical tour of the castle's dungeons, could be taken every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday except holidays. Shiro huffed. The cartoonish two-eyes-on-a-bed-sheet ghosts someone had decided to print on the poster weren't exactly good representations of the reality that was stuck out there on the Aelian Bridge.
And maybe it was the clash between that poster and reality that made him connect the puzzle pieces.
"Hey…" He switched back to Japanese without even thinking. All he could think of was the cartoon ghosts with their cartoon chains and cartoon lanterns. And the smouldering anger pressing against his ribcage. "You mean to say they're tourist magnets?" Each word came slow. Cold. Knowing but not wanting to believe.
"Bingo!" Samael announced with a grin and a wink that earned more than a few odd looks from the other tourists. "Took you longer than I had expected, but no one can blame you with the gorgeous works of Bernini's students to delight eyes and distract thoughts."
"Oh cut the crap for once!" Rise to the bait? He would fucking lunge at the goddamn bait! "Why's the Vatican allowing this? They're not circus animals, fuck's sake they're people! And we keep them suffering 'cause it's more profitable that way?"
"Of course." Shiro's enmity sizzled at the light and chipper tone. Samael didn't care; handed the bank note over to the cashier with a charming smile and not a worry in the world. He then returned his eyes to Shiro and the Japanese they were speaking. "You need to reason more like an exorcist, Shiro: the Vatican allows this because they aren't people. Just demons animating the vapours from dead human bodies."
"That's still part of a human", he argued and ignored the voice of reason that dryly informed him he was doing exactly what Samael wanted. "That's human regret walking around on that bridge."
"Human leftovers, you mean. I doubt they want their regrets back once they're free of it." Samael's long fingers drummed absentmindedly on the counter while the cashier desperately tried to scrape together enough change. "Once you come to Rome you'll find that, in practice, ghosts are treated slightly differently from demons in general. They're pacifists by comparison, only taking that which doesn't hurt anyone. That which no one else wants." His eyes swept slowly over the bridge out in the rain behind them; slowly as if leafing through the pages of history, reading every event that had taken place on its stone arch. "Even pain and unresolved emotions."
"You can have pain and unresolved emotions and walk around on that bridge; I'd pay good money to see that."
Great, fifteen minutes into their day-trip and Samael had already gotten him to lose his cool. Shiro cursed himself quietly as they got their tickets and their change and filed out into the castle's courtyard to make room. Beige-grey walls enclosed them with little care for symmetry, and only got greyer as the rain continued to pour out of the sky. Most tourists hurried past the open courtyard, slipping by under the gaze of an angel statue with bronze wings covered in patina. That was what Castel Sant'Angelo was named for, after all. Some Pope at some point claimed he'd seen Archangel Michael descend on top of it.
"You should do your best to get rid of yours." Samael's tone was a casual one as he picked up where he left off. The ice cream had magically reappeared in his hand as soon as they were out of sight from the cashier's desk, and his umbrella reopened readily at a flick of his wrist.
"Beg your fucking pardon?" Shiro's hands curled into fists inside his trouser pockets, but outwardly he let nothing show save a snide, venomous tone.
"Your bottled-up emotions: you really should do something about them", he replied with a lazy lick on the ice cream. "As it is you're a five-course dinner waiting to be eaten by any demon passing by."
Shiro's jaws were moving – twitching, to be precise – but not a word came out. The nerve of that asshole. The fucking nerve. And his royal bitchiness thought none of it, just stood there licking his ice cream and glancing up at Archangel Michael as if teasing the statue with it. Slap the ice cream away and smash his face in; that would take care of his bottled-up emotions. Pity the old goat would just skip out of the way and turn it into a game of tag.
They only locked eyes for a few brief instants, but that was more than enough for Shiro's thoughts to rush through a quick, all too familiar loop. He wanted to hurt Samael. He was too weak to do it. He needed ways to hurt him mentally. He needed to know his sore spots.
"I know about Faust." True, Johann Faust had held a special position in Samael's life. What kind of position, he didn't know exactly. "Knowledge is useless when incomplete." And until it was… he could only grit his teeth and bide his time. "It's not like I can", he returned at last, never turning his gaze away from Samael.
"Of course you can", he smiled, like a parent encouraging a child that hesitates to go down the playground slide. "All humans can: just make your peace with them and let go."
…Shiro couldn't tell if Samael had stopped his time or if he had been so furious that he had literally blacked out and not noticed that the demon had walked past him towards the staircase in. He heard the rhythmic clicking of the heeled boots moving away behind him, and the muted hissing of the rain against the courtyard pavement. A puff of mist left his mouth. Then another. And another.
Make peace with his emotions and let go? Was that a tasteless joke or was he actually serious…?
"You think I will forgive you? After all you've done?"
Shiro wasn't interested in marble floors and gaudy tapestries and mouldy old libraries. He wasn't interested in the Popes' fancy bed and he sure wasn't interested in having Samael for a tour guide. But he kept prattling. Good god he kept prattling, there just was no end to it; every goddamn coffee stain in the papal apartments got its own special mention – wasn't relevant for five shits to history, but he had known the latest twelve Popes personally and god forbid he'd miss a chance to show off with knowledge that he was in exclusive possession of.
Shiro didn't wake from his self-induced partial coma until they climbed down the stairs to the lower levels of the castle. The hallways changed from high, vaulted ones made for living in to lower, simpler ones that were part of the castle's function as military fortress. The walls were bare brick and mortar with no effort made to clothe them in smooth slates of marble, and even the faintest whisper from the tourist mass echoed sternly back at them. The air was damper, chillier, and the stains on the walls were more likely to be from gunpowder and dust than coffee. The stocky bombards in the corner of the guard room were the first item Shiro actually read the plaque on: three tonnes in weight, capable of hurling 260 kg projectiles at a range of 100-200 meters. How did you even load a monster canon like that?
There were displays of old armour, old swords, a timeline of firearms used by the guards from the harquebus to the musket to the rifle, and for the first time that day Shiro was actually enjoying himself. The tourist batch moved on rather quickly while he took his time to ponder the advantages and disadvantages of different designs.
There was a series of lit exhibition cabinets in the centre of the old guard room, showcasing part of the exhibition that the museum had temporarily borrowed. There were detailed sketches on thin paper, accompanied by wooden miniature replicas made from the drafts. One was a huge crossbow meant to sit on the castle's battlements and fire bolts more like spears or lances at the enemy. In the cabinet next to it was a draft of a goddamn tank, or at least a predecessor to it, and next to that was a sketch of the first machine gun. A four hundred and fifty years old machine gun. Other sketches showed submarines and helicopters, even a fully operational scuba diving suit.
What really surprised Shiro was the name on the plaques: Leonardo da Vinci. He'd thought the guy only did paintings, but he seemed to have dabbled in just about everything. The plaques went on to describe that all the designs were considered to be for fully operational machines, but that da Vinci had deliberately made small errors in each of them to ensure that they couldn't be stolen and put to use without his consent.
This held true for all except a peculiar sketch that had been found among his others; peculiar because it detailed a close-range weapon, the only one da Vinci had ever designed, and because it contained such an obvious design flaw that nobody would consider building it. It was to be worn like a bracelet, containing a retractable blade operating with a spring mechanism; the application was thought to be either self-defence or assassination. This was a strange design, the plaque noted, since da Vinci's contractors killed either by warfare or by poison and had little interest in killing methods that risked the killer getting caught. Furthermore, the bearer would need to have his ring finger cut off to be able to operate the device, and the concealed blade was never built simply because there were less bothersome ways of killing unwanted individuals.
"Fantastic, aren't they?" Samael murmured next to him. The light from the glass cabinets hit his face from below, cutting his sharp features sharper with shadows. "Humanity is amazing in how much effort she spends on ways to destroy herself. Bernini was a genius, but Leo… Leo was a miracle." The green eyes were far away, trailing a voice that was reminiscing a different time, a different world. "He had a keen eye both for details and for how they fit together in the whole, and he understood things… he truly understood things. We could talk all day, all night, there was no end to his creativity and his curiosity for more – biology, geology, physics, art, mechanics! Never before and never since has there been a human so brilliant, wise, witty, talented; oh, and so handsome~" Samael was acting in that silly, giddy manner that made Shiro cringe, but the demon neither noticed nor cared: too lost in happy daydreams of dead men. "Leo had everything~"
Something coarse and rusty with sharp edges twisted deep inside Shiro's chest. 'Leo had everything.' Leo had everything, Leo was amazing and worthy of his attention, Faust was fascinating and precious – and Shiro was a pawn to be played and discarded. He was no genius, no miracle, no scholar, just… expendable.
They caught up with the majority of the tourists on the middle floors of the castle. That's where the other part of the borrowed exhibition was held: an
assortment of statues and paintings that left you wondering if maybe the museum had borrowed parts of several exhibitions, since there didn't seem to be any theme to it. There was some guy named Bosch whose visions of paradise, earth and hell made you wonder if he was in the habit of smoking things other than tobacco, and if maybe he had an aversion to music since the primary method of torture in hell seemed related to music instruments. You also kind of wondered about the guy's concept of 'earthly delights' since these apparently included huddling inside giant shrimp husks and having some dude stick flowers into your butt.
Shiro was too occupied with wonder over the bizarre paintings to notice the two girls until he almost stumbled over them. They sat propped up against the museum wall with their knees drawn up to form makeshift supports for their sketch pads. The brunette glanced up at him but looked down on her coal sketch again as soon as she had established that he wasn't going to step on them. The blonde with glasses was completely absorbed in her work and didn't react – not that Shiro would have noticed if she did, as his attention was on the generous cleavage shown by her partially unbuttoned blouse. He could have spent the rest of the day admiring that piece of art if it wasn't for the chain with the small golden crucifix dipping down in that lovely valley. One tiny piece of metal that effectively took any joy from the view and converted it to torture.
"Hello celibacy: I'd say 'pleasure to meet you' except you don't do pleasure. Or anything at all."
He resumed his tour around the exhibition room, or at least moving about and standing in front of the various pieces while he thought about how much he would miss girls and boobs. And Kasumi…
He did his best to lead thoughts onto a different track. He might not be much into art, but he could see how this was a good place for practising drawing skill. There were Greek sculptures and parts of Greek sculptures and sculptures that made you wonder if the Greek had been smoking the same things Bosch had. It was one of those that Shiro was looking at when Samael returned from his own tour of the room, filled with chirping joy over human creativity.
"Isn't it just amazing? This drive to create for creation's sake! I believe that to be a fundamental part of human nature: as the body needs sleep and nourishment, so the human soul has a need to express itself through art."
"This isn't art: it's a demon shagging a goat", Shiro observed flatly regarding the sculpture in front of them.
"If that is what you wish to see it as."
"No, I'm pretty damn sure that's what it is."
It was a satyr, and it was a goat, and whether or not it was consensual it was something Shiro wouldn't label 'an expression of the human soul'.
"But is that all it is?" Samael probed with a cryptic smile. "Looks deceive. The language of art must be read in its mother tongue to be properly understood: to you it's only erotica, but to the Romans it was a wish for cattle to be fertile, and by extension a wish for their own survival and prosperity – mixed with a healthy dose of ancient Roman humour."
Ancient Romans thought it was fun to have demons knock their cattle up with monster spawn? Sure, in a culture where gladiators fighting each other to the death was considered public entertainment maybe it was great fun to have shit like Minotaurus of Crete pop out its ugly head from some sheep's butt, who knew… Shiro wasn't that bothered by the sculpture itself but thought more of the massive problems they would have had with demon infestation if the satyrs got too frisky. There was a plaque on the pedestal, so he read it if only for practising his Italian:
Marble sculpture discovered in Naples in 1752. The mythological Pan, half man and half goat,
originates from Arcadia where he was primarily the god of the woods and wilderness.
He was also a patron of shepherds and flocks, music and sexuality, which are thought to be
functions he derived from his father Hermes (Roman: Mercury).
Hermes.
Shiro's eyes lingered on the name for a moment of blank-minded disbelief: then they shut, and his eyelids scrunched together tightly to keep the images away.
"I thought you said you didn't have kids?" he said flatly, switching to Japanese so as to avoid the wrong ears overhearing.
"Hm? I don't. I had children – quite a few, in fact." Samael had been about to more closely admire Bosch's madness but returned to Shiro's side for another look at the sculpture. There wasn't a single thing in his face, motions or voice to betray that his children were all… "Those who weren't taken by time met their ends in other ways. Pan had an unfortunate run-in with exorcists of the old Greek tradition, not long before this sculpture was made", he said, as if just recalling an anecdotal coincidence. "That's what happens, eventually, when you lure humans away in the woods."
Shiro was very busy trying not to think of why Samael's son was half goat. He was also very busy forgetting that another of Samael's aliases was Loke, and all the unpleasant associations that came with that. Not that he felt like saying 'I'm sorry for your loss'.
"'I'm sorry you had a father who didn't give a shit' would feel more appropriate", he thought to the ugly little goat molester.
"Do keep your fascination with bestiality from public eyes when you enrol at the seminar, Alexander; the Romans of today have a quite different view on sex than the ancients", he teased, leaning down to murmur in Shiro's ear and making him acutely aware that he had spent a suspiciously long time ogling Pan's sex-athletics. "Alexander… Hmmh, no, I don't think I will be using your new name", Samael continued his musings once he had straightened up again. "'Shiro' is short and handy – but the choice was a pleasant surprise."
There was room for a comment there, at the end of that sentence. An explanation for why he had picked Samael's suggestion, and maybe even an acknowledgement that it had been the right choice all along. Samael never missed an opportunity to be right about something.
Shiro trotted after his "guide" down the stairs, keeping to the right side to allow easy passage for tourists on their way up. That hair curl was begging to be pulled, bobbing up and down like that.
"We both know Jacob didn't fit me", he said noncommittally, hearing his own voice echo accented Italian from the whitewashed arches. "It was just to bait you."
"M-mm and you did a magnificent job of it, too~"
Whenever Samael praised him, Shiro got a deep, itchy feeling that something was wrong. If something was right according to Samael then it must per definition be wrong. Then again, that voice played tricks on your ears and praise could just as well be scorn in disguise.
"Are you approving or are you just trying to cover up the damage and pretend it wasn't a direct hit?" Shiro had no motivation to play games or cross words with Samael. That belonged in a past life, and all he had patience for now were blunt, straightforward questions and equally blunt, straightforward answers that he wasn't likely to get.
"You shouldn't need to ask, Shiro~ Shrewd players offer more challenging games", he smiled, and when they reached the ground floor he spun around elegantly on the tip of his toes to face him. "And I do love a good game of wits", he finished with a mischievous wink.
The truth and nothing but the truth: but not the whole truth, no. Samael had been knocked off balance and lost that round, but hell would freeze over before he admitted that. The most important words were always the ones he avoided to speak.
However, calling him out on that would add fuel to the fire, and Shiro had promised himself not to do that no matter how tempting it was. No matter how much his imprinted instincts made him itch to prod a sore spot.
"Did you know from the start that I was a possible host for Satan?" It was on his tongue to ask it, but he hesitated; and the moment was gone. Samael had made a flourishing turn and exited into the courtyard. "I'm not even sure I wanna know the answer…"
The last part of the exhibition was the city itself. The best view was had from the top of the castle, but since that was where all tourists now flocked Samael instead led them up on the walls. They were truly massive, wide enough to drive a horse carriage on and still have room for one mounted escort on either side. The rain had passed, and the clouds it had forgotten in the sky were dispersed into a gilt-edged panorama that didn't look that unlike some of the Renaissance paintings in the Papal apartments. Past the battlements you could see the green stretch of the Tiber, St. Peter's basilica, the monument of Vittorio Emanuele II the old king of Italy…
"Annnd~ pop quiz!"
With a poof of pink smoke Samael produced a sheet of paper out of thin air and fished out a ballpoint pen from inside his suit. He looked tremendously pleased with himself as he held the articles out to Shiro.
"You could've said there was gonna be a test!" That would've motivated him to pay attention on the tour.
"And ruin the surprise?" he said with an unmatched air of uncomprehending innocence.
"You're not dumb so quit acting like it. Give me the damn paper", Shiro snarled and snatched pen and paper out of his hands.
He sat down unceremoniously on the still damp bricks of the battlement and smoothed the sheet out over his thigh. The test was all in Italian, which wasn't surprising. It was also all about the various Popes and their political relations with the Holy Roman Emperor. And one question about which of Leonardo da Vinci's inventions were employed in Rome. Shiro took a deep breath, counted to five while he held it, and let it out.
"Why the fuck do I need to know when and why the fifth Sack of Rome happened?"
Shiro thought it was a well-founded question to ask, since local history had very little to do with measuring up antitoxins or putting a bullet between a demon's eyes. Samael, on the other hand, leant forward until he was right in his face and asked, the way you do with mulish little children:
"Do you know why the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan?"
"Of course I do", he snapped.
"And you know why Japan was occupied by American troops afterwards?"
"Yes", he confirmed with rapidly diminishing patience for everything that didn't have to do with the museum tour and the stupid test.
"Then you know why Japan today is a democracy with one of the world's fastest growing economies, and not the stagnant backwater empire it was before. If you don't know the past you don't understand the present", he concluded and straightened up out of his face. Tipping his head to the side, he finished: "But the more interesting question is: are these two different nations of Japan, or are they the same Japan?"
"It's…" He wanted to say it was the same, of course it was the same; but when Samael posed questions the first reply that came to mind was usually the wrong one.
The Japanese people and the Japanese language were the same: the constitution and the borders of the country itself were different. The economy was different. Ideals were different. Clothing was different. Japan a few decades ago certainly wasn't the same as the Japan of today, but…
"Perhaps a more tangible example would be better~", Samael interrupted cheerfully. He snapped his fingers, and two photographs appeared in frames full of heart shaped stickers. One picture Shiro recognised as the owner of the exorcist supply shop; the other was a black-and-white photo of a little girl dressed up in kimono, with her fair hair drawn up in a bun. He couldn't decide which one was more disturbing to find in Samael's possession.
"Moriyama Mayu-chan is forty-three years old", he informed, pointing at the frame with the familiar gentle face. "If you compare her now with her as a five-year-old, would you claim they're two different persons? Or are they the same one?"
Shiro's brow furrowed even more. They were obviously the same person; and yet, the adult Moriyama's body wasn't that of a five-year-old, and her mind wasn't that of a five-year-old… and he had never thought of it like this before…
"I… don't know", he admitted after a long silence. "Some things are the same, obviously. Other things have changed. Moriyama-san is different now from when she was a kid, but she still has the memories of being that kid so they are the same. Japan is different now from what it used to be, but it's not entirely different."
Samael gave no indication if that was a good or a bad answer, only let the photographs disappear back to wherever he kept them.
"A tough nut to crack, hm~? It's quite entertaining to see humans struggling with the mechanics of time. Reminds me of when Amaimon was little and I gave him a piece of string with only one end", he smirked, glancing at the sky and tapping a gloved finger to his chin as he thought back on it. "The little runt wouldn't stop pestering me for entertainment, but that kept him busy. For a while. I never quite knew if he swallowed it because he liked it or because it frustrated him…"
"This little runt won't stop pestering you either unless you quit sidetracking and give him the answer he's waiting for."
"Certainly", he smiled, full of untrustworthy willingness to comply. "Pass the pop quiz and I'll tell you."
Shiro almost cursed out loud. So, he'd chased the bait and walked into the trap. Play the game and be rewarded with knowledge.
"How high percentage do I need to pass?"
"Sixty-five."
"That's unfair, it's an unprepared test."
"Seventy~?"
Shiro bit his tongue to keep himself from arguing further. It was always like this. Samael made the rules, changed them when he felt like it, told you if he felt like it; and under no circumstances did he care about your opinion of it.
Grumbling under his breath, Shiro began answering the first question on the quiz.
Shiro didn't score well, compared with his usual test results, but he scored well enough. He didn't know if he or Samael was more surprised by that.
"Well: rewards where rewards are due." Samael began walking along the battlements and used his umbrella as a walking cane. Shiro followed, dusting his butt off after sitting on the damp stone. "The answer to the state of Japan and of Mayu-chan is that they change over time, retaining some of their old qualities but losing and gaining others."
"You don't say?" Shiro retorted snidely. "C'mon, I got over seventy. You owe me a satisfying explanation."
"I gave you one: it's hardly my fault that you couldn't see the obvious answer."
"I could, that's why I'm asking you to elaborate. Tell me the parts I didn't see. Tell me about time so I get how the change works. I wanna know how past and present are connected." He had spent his patience for one day. He had earned his explanation. He would get it without jumping through hoops for thatasshole's entertainment.
"Haah, that statement alone shows you didn't understand a thing…" he complained and sighed loudly at the impossible stupidity he had to put up with. Shiro was sorely tempted to put him out of his misery but grit his teeth and tried – tried – to rein his sharp tongue in.
"What statement?" Excellent: proving Samael's point by being too stupid to even realise what he said wrong.
"Past and present aren't 'connected': they're one. They're intertwined, inseparable; a continuity." Samael's voice betrayed nearly the exact same impatience that Shiro's did; and in the first positive surprise that day, he suddenly remembered that playing dumb was one of the ways you could bait Samael into talking. Because for one who cherishes knowledge and wit there's nothing more galling than ignorance and stupidity.
"Theoretical time-shit", he huffed, keeping his impatient tone carefully pitched. "I wanted to know about Moriyama-san and Japan – you know, actual stuff instead of just tossing around semantics." Good thing he'd paid attention to the old goat's tirades about his anaptyxis and semantics and god-knew-what when he was learning Italian.
"There would be no need for 'tossing around semantics' if humans understood time well enough to invent proper words for it." Perfect: now it had become a personal matter between humanity and his powers. "I suppose it can't be helped with the limited perception your senses grant you, but even the simplest aspects of time are so blatantly obvious I can't understand how you fail to see them. The past is always present, for one. Nothing ever springs from nothing: the past is part of the present and will always be so."
"I still hear nothing but theoretical nonsense, but I guess that's all there is to it", he informed as rudely as he could and kicked a pebble over the bricks. There it was; the rush, the excitement. Playing games with Samael and coming out on top. He could feel the frustration leaving him as the levels of it rose in the demon. "Taking care of my bottled-up emotions", he smirked inwardly.
"So limited." Samael halted his clicking high heel stride abruptly and muttered under his breath. He marched over to the battlements and gestured sharply at the big, sunlit dome of St. Peter's basilica in the distance. "When they built the house of God, they scavenged stone from Rome's old Pagan temples." His hand swept back the other direction, at the red walls of Castel Sant'Angelo. "When they cast those bombards to protect the Vatican treasury, they used the bronze ceiling of the sacred Pantheon." He turned back to the view almost as if speaking to the city instead of Shiro. "All over Rome, churches rise towards the sky out of the broken backs of Pagan ruins; all over the world the old entwines into the new and merges, until there's no extracting them from one another with distinctions. Dividing lines are drawn only in your minds. There's no past, no present, no future: they are all at once, but you lack the senses to perceive it and therefore you lack the words to express it."
It came out fast and all in Italian, so Shiro had to cling to every word and use his practised Aria memory to put them down in his mind for analysis. The practical examples… He wasn't sure if they helped or not. That things changed shape and that the present was made up of things from the past wasn't that hard to grasp, but to fathom that past, present and future was 'all at once'… that didn't quite agree with his brain.
Things fell unusually quiet after the discharge. Shiro was occupied with thinking. Samael still stood at the battlements, watching all the busy cars and busier people scurrying in and out between houses below them, but Shiro wasn't sure he was really seeing them. Or seeing anything.
The breeze touched them gently with the tangy smell of seaweed on the Tiber banks. A smile jerked Samael's thin lips; not the small, secretive one of Knowing Something You Don't, but the one of manic glee that reached from one ear over to the other side of the Tiber.
"History has a beautiful sense of humour."
It was the kind of statement that gave Shiro a feeling he understood what it meant on a level, but not on all levels. He got the humour in heathen relics ending up as part of churches, but he couldn't grasp why Samael had so suddenly gone from delightfully annoyed to disturbingly pleased. There must have been something he missed while he was busy catching the fast-paced Italian. Then again, sudden mood swings were his trademark…
They could have used the key on any door, and the museum sure wasn't short on those; but the overgrown kid that claimed to be King of Time wouldn't go home unless he got another serving of ice cream. So back across the bridge they walked.
Shiro was looking forward to some peace and calm and detachment back in Japan. And some sleep. There was an eight hour time difference between Japan and Italy, and his body gruffly told him it was almost one o'clock at night, no matter Rome's opinion of what time it was.
When the same headless ghost appeared out of the throngs of tourists his exorcist reflexes had him reaching for a non-existent gun holster before he dryly reminded himself that this advertisement pillar wasn't on the target list. She glided past them, soundless and unnoticed just like before.
"Aren't you going to ask why she's here?"
"I know why she's here." Shiro just wanted this day to be over, but was rewarded with a dismissive clicking of the tongue.
"Observant as a ale keg. Didn't you notice her clothes?"
"Why would I?" She had been wearing a dress, that was all he'd noticed. Dresses were rather common things for women to wear in the past. "It can't have been that common for women to be executed", he corrected himself as he started to see what Samael was getting at. "That dress looked pretty fancy, too."
"That fair lady was once named Beatrice Cenci", Samael picked up solemnly and assumed his best stage expression. "A tragic tale of desperation and injustice sealed her fate; born of beauty and of beast she-"
"Can I get the short, relevant version or should I get my earplugs out?"
"You can get an extra test on Renaissance art", he offered with venomous sweetness.
Shiro's reply to that was seven centimetres long, cylindrical and had a bad reputation for giving black lungs: and he had barely even lit it when Samael snatched it from his mouth and flipped it over the railing of the bridge. But, he did compensate:
"Beatrice was twenty two when she was executed. She had the misfortune of being born daughter of Francesco Cenci, a nobleman notorious both for violence and rape and occasionally incest. He was a regular customer at the Sant'Angelo prison grace of his family's complaints, but he never stayed for long. Blue blood has always been more valuable than legal justice."
At the ice cream stand the cashier begged him to use change instead of 50 000 lire notes, and since Samael wanted his ice cream and the cashier didn't have enough to give change for 50 000 he dug up the change he'd gotten for the museum tariff.
"The only way for the Cenci family to escape their tormentor was to murder him", he continued when the payment was taken care of. "For which the family in turn was put to death. Not the whole family", he amended as he caught his own mistake. "A boy of twelve was spared. He was to be sold as a galley slave as far as I remember, but in the long run they chose to set him free instead. But! That's beside the point." There was a point? Other than polluting the air with his prattling? "The point is that Beatrice became a symbol for resistance against the arrogant nobles. She became more than just a girl, more than just a human: she became hope, pride, wrath – she became what the Romans needed to find the resolve within themselves to stand up and fight for justice!"
And around there, Shiro wished he could disappear off the face of the earth, or at least to somewhere where nobody would associate him with that one-man freak show.
"Ah, the things you humans can do with the proper motivation; the things you can inspire each other to do!" Samael declaimed and raised humanity towards the sky in his reached-up hand. "With just one act of resolution you light a wildfire from a matchstick, moved as one in unison by one who stepped outside the lines of unity and demanded they be redrawn!" He threw out his arms for dramatic effect and somehow picked up his readied ice cream cone in the process. "And that is why it's in the interest of the whole Roman population that the ghost of Beatrice continues to be glimpsed on the Aelian Bridge. She's a monument; not of Popes or kings, but a monument of the people", he concluded and took a bliss taste of his ice cream.
"She's not a monument. She's a twenty two-year-old girl who died." Some part of him – a large one if he were honest – just wanted to bitch back at Samael. But as the words passed his lips, Shiro found that they came from somewhere deeper than personal resent.
Beatrice Cenci had never intended to become a monument, he was pretty sure of that. She had never intended to become a symbol in the fight for justice. She had only wanted to be free of people who forced their will onto her.
"She undeniably is, but she has also undeniably gained a greater importance than other young women who die", Samael argued leisurely as they went in search of a door not too exposed to public eyes. "Very few live on beyond their mortal lives as she does, and her accomplishment is even more impressive when one considers that she was neither a scientist nor an artist – nor a man, for that matter. Neither was she martyred for religious reasons, but for the most noble reason of all: being human."
"Please let there be a door somewhere…" This promised to draw out into a long and tedious argument with no conclusion – partly because there wasn't a definite answer, and partly because Samael just didn't… "You don't understand." No, he didn't: and it put a bliss, mean smile on Shiro's lips to be able to say that to his face in the most patronizing demeanour possible. "You're not human."
"Pulling the trump card on me to win the battle? How cheap."
"Taunting me into re-opening the battle you lost?" Shiro sneered back. "Nobody's cheaper than you."
A/N:
That statue can be easily found by googling pan and goat statue. Obviously, don't look if you feel your brain is better off without that image. It wasn't displayed as openly as this at museums back in the 70's, but then again it was never displayed in Castel Sant'Angelo either, so I suppose that historical inaccuracy couldn't have been avoided anyway. :P
Another historical inaccuracy is of course that Leonardo da Vinci never designed a bracelet with a hidden blade. He never cut off Ezio's ring finger either. =3
Beatrice Cenci was real, though. The legend says her ghost appears on the Aelian Bridge where she was executed every year the night before she died. In my interpretation she's there the whole time, but only around the time of her death does her presence become so strong that she can be seen by humans not afflicted with mashou.
For those who have read Eddings' works, the flirt with Beldin's twig was entirely intended. ;)
Philosophy of spolia was something my teacher introduced me to back in college, and the fascination has been with me ever since. Spolia are parts of old structures that are recycled as building material for new ones. St. Peter's basilica does indeed hold pillars from temples dedicated to pre-Christian gods. The question then is: when does the transition take place, if there is one? Who are these pillars dedicated to? The Christian god? A Roman deity? Both? Or are they just slabs of stone that we ascribe properties to? Can we erase old properties by overwriting them with new ones? Can we, by claiming these pillars are now the property of the Christian god, sever their present state from their past and nullify their much longer history as properties of another god? Can we separate an object from its history? When does the bronze that constituted the ceiling in the portico of the Pantheon cease to be the portico ceiling and begin to be something else? If the shape of it has changed, but it's still the exact same particles of copper and tin, where do you draw the dividing line? Are there dividing lines, or is it we who imagine them because we feel a need to define things around us in set terms even though time continuously makes them change from one shape/function to another?
Ghosts in Ao no Exorcist interest me quite a bit. "They are often characterized by the emotions the diseased had in life" according to the demon profiles in the volumes. Unresolved emotions and regrets, if you judge by the ghost kid and the transvestite ghost we've seen so far. I will reconnect to this later on with theories about Mephisto, but I thought it couldn't hurt to introduce the matter in advance and let it sink into your minds before getting there. =)