It was strange how they could be fighting mystical, otherworldly creatures one night to return to life as usual the next day as if nothing had happened. No one knew the secretive Soldier's of God had been fighting a war and had just saved the human population from a threat that they did not know existed. If ignorance truly was bliss, the humans at large were completely ecstatic.

Eva and Father Anderson had become skilled at deceiving themselves and each other by pretending certain things had not occurred while at the convent of St. Petronille. Since neither one of them exhibited feeling any awkwardness or weirdness when they were together, they did not speak a single word about that night. Perhaps that was the best way to keep hidden what had happened not only from from each other but themselves.

Since her training schedule had lightened considerably, Eva had begun helping out at the extensive library maintained by the priests of Saint Sebastian's. She cataloged and organized, dusted and cleaned, to keep herself busy. She also assisted the boys with school work when they would come to study. If she had nothing to do, she would pull books down from the shelves to browse the pages. A few of the books had grabbed her attention, holding her mind rapt for hours. She would read until one of the priests or boys would stumble across her sitting in the floor between the bookshelves. She was teased for being a bookworm in the truest sense: eating up the written words from the pages, devouring them with her mind. A small degree of normalcy had returned to her life, soothing her soul and finally giving her a sense of peace. Finding a home away from home again in the library had been extraordinarily therapeutic for her. However, there were moments when the memories of her old life haunted her mind and made her sad. It was during these times when she would take shelter in the church sanctuary to pray in an attempt to ease the ache in her heart and diminish the sorrow for what once was her life. One of two people always came to look for her on the days she sought solace in the church. Either Father Anderson or James would find her, holding her as she cried or just sitting silently beside her while she prayed.

Eva barely saw Cardinal Satomi anymore since he kept his visits with her short and businesslike, restraining them to meal times or briefings before assignments. He never engaged her in conversation outside of his house or when she was alone. Apparently Eva was not the only one who had battled a fleshly war with a sinful yearning. Father Anderson and she both did their best to avoid temptation which was difficult since they lived together. James helped immensely with keeping the two of them apart. It seemed he was always there to knock on the door or showed up at just the right time to interrupt a longing look or a lingering touch that could lead to something. The boy was always pulling her away to investigate some new discovery he had made on the island whether it be an animal or a plant or some other new and unusual thing. Eva sometimes wondered if the boy had a special radar, an innate sense that something was about to happen that shouldn't, so he was there to intervene. At times it made her angry but for the most part she was happy to see the cute, vivacious blond with the sparkling blue eyes who loved to hold her hand and take walks with her while asking dozens of questions. One of her favorite activities after a barrage of questions was to help him find a book on the topic that had captured his interest. Reading stemmed the tale wave of questions so she was granted a moment of reprieve from his inquiries. She was so proud of him. James was learning and growing, becoming as normal as possible considering he had become an official ward of Iscariot.

Just like many other days, Eva was in the library today. James had come in, requesting a book about tide pools. He was sitting at a table near her as she re-shelved books. He had been reading for more than thirty minutes before he asked a question.

"Eva, can we go to the beach today? I want to check out the tide pools. I want to see if any of these things are in there," James announced, holding up the open book for her to see. He pointed to the pictures of the mussels, starfish, anemones and other sea life that gets trapped in these shallow puddles in the rocks by the sea during high tide. Pressing his finger to the picture of a hermit crab, he excitedly said, "I want to find one of these! I can bring him home and keep him as a pet."

"Don't you think it would be better to leave him where you find him? That way he can live out a happy life at the ocean like he's supposed to," she said, watching sadness creep into his brilliant sky blue orbs to dim their joyful gleam.

"I suppose so," he mumbled, laying the book flat on the table. He flipped through the pages silently for a while before looking back up at her. "I didn't like being taken away from the orphanage to live in that awful mansion. I don't want to be like that terrible Earl. I'm glad you took me away from him. So being taken away isn't always a bad thing." He paused speaking, his eyes going blank as if he were suddenly lost in thought. His eyes suddenly opened wide before he fastened them on Eva. "I would never want to be taken away from you."

Eva reached out to run her fingers through his silky, light blond curls. She didn't want him to be like that wretched Earl. Her purpose now was to save him from being a bitter, hateful little demon who continued to spread the hate and cruelty that he had learned in that mansion of horrors. For the first time, she realized that she wanted him to be with her always as well. Another handsome blonde had found his way into her heart. Motherly instincts surged inside of her making her want to gather him into her arms and hug his pain away. If only she could rid him of all memories of that perverted old man, she would do so in a heartbeat. She poked him in the shoulder when he began to read again. "I thought you wanted to go to the beach."

"We can still go and look?"

"Of course."

"Let's go then!" he exclaimed excitedly, slamming the book closed. He grabbed her hand and off they went.

Eva laughed as he practically dragged her all the way to the beach. The tide was out at this time so there would be plenty of tide pools among the rocks teeming with a variety of sea life. She took off her sandals haphazardly throwing them on the sand next to James's discarded shoes and socks. He was already climbing all over the rocks that had been polished to a satiny smooth finish by years of punishment from the sea water mixed with the grinding sand. She pulled the back bottom of her skirt through her legs to tuck it into the waistband in the front to fashion a makeshift pair of loose pants.

"Hey! Hey, James, wait!" she yelled as he disappeared around the curve of the island where the rocks formed a cave. They were not actually supposed to be on this part of the island, but it was the only place where there were rocks, therefore making it the only place where there would be tide pools.

"Eva! Hurry! Come look at this!"

Eva scurried over the rocks, doing her best impression of a giant albino crab as she tried to get to him as quickly as possible. She finally got over the rocks to where there was smooth white sand that formed the floor of the small cavern. Taking hold of his shoulder, she admonished him, "James! You shouldn't be in here!"

"Eva, look," he mumbled, his eyes wide and fearful as he stared into the shallow cave.

"Oh, my God," she gasped, covering her mouth with her fingers to keep from screaming.

Skeletons filled the small cave. They had been here so long that there was not even a shred of clothing left on their bodies - if they had ever been clothed to begin with. No wonder she had not smelled death or decomposition. All of that odor had dissipated long ago. The bodies had been thrown willy-nilly into a pile showing no respect for the dead at all. All of the bones were deformed in some manner, particularly the skulls. Some appeared to have belonged to animals. There were canine like skulls filled with rows of pointed teeth that resembled a shark's teeth. Other skulls were exceptionally thick with protruding bulges of bone in odd places. The torsos of the skeletons appeared to be human but were also in varying degrees of deformity of the arm and leg bones from the length of them to the thickness. Some of the bones bore sharp spikes or knife-like extensions.

"What are...well, were those things? They're not people are they?"

"I don't know."

"Where did they all come from?" He stared at her expectantly for an answer.

"I-I don't know," she stammered, pulling James to her side protectively. Glancing around the cave, she began to shiver. What exactly were those scientists doing in their underground lab? "What is this place?" she muttered to herself, finally snapping out of the fugue that had overtaken her. "Let's get out of here. We shouldn't be here."

Perhaps they had stumbled across the graveyard of the failed experiments. Holding the boy to her possessively with the protective instinct of a mother, she led him back over the rocks to get away from that awful makeshift burial ground. Refusing to give into her fear and revulsion, and also to take the boy's mind off of what he had seen, she decided to carry on with their little adventure despite the gruesome, unexpected discovery. She instructed him to grab their shoes, telling him that they would walk down the beach to collect sea shells. Her mind reeled, racing from one thought to another, as they walked in the opposite direction of the cave to distance themselves from the nightmare that lay inside. Father Anderson had been one of their experiments. So had Kobungo and Genpachi. If one of them had failed, developing some malformity or not meeting some other standard set by the mad scientists, would their bones be in that sacrilegious graveyard to be forgotten as well? She wasn't a direct experiment of Iscariot's but they had been studying her since she had arrived. The scientists were constantly getting new samples of saliva, blood, hair, and other things she'd rather not think about to test them. What if they found something they were not expecting like a weird virus strain or some strange genetic anomaly? What if they used her to make something that could cause widespread death and destruction? Perhaps they were doing that already by using her to kill the things that go bump in the night. Iscariot carefully hid their murderous intentions behind the ruse of performing their religious duty to people who did not know or care. The boogeyman was real, and she, along with countless others, had become his exterminator. Who knew there really were monsters in the closet? She certainly didn't know until her life had taken a bizarre turn thanks to a damned vampire named Alucard. Bastard. So far, Iscariot had not sent her to kill a vampire. They had been using one of their other covert sects of religious soldiers for that. The Soldiers of God were not the only fighting force held by Iscariot, but they were the best above all the others.

"Eva! Look!" James exclaimed, standing over something that had caught his attention.

Eva gazed at the baseball sized gelatinous blob stuck in the wet sand away from the water's edge. She grabbed James by the arm just as he was about to poke it with his finger. "Don't! It's a jellyfish. The body is very delicate and you could kill it. Plus you don't want to accidentally encounter one of those stingers."

Glancing around, James spotted half of a large clam shell and ran to grab it. He scooped up the poor beached creature before sending him home by flinging the jellyfish, shell and all, into the ocean. "Have a good life, little buddy."

"You rescued him. You're a hero," she said, laughing as he beamed at her with pride. Suddenly, the smile dropped from his face. A heavy stone of sour emotion formed in the pit of her stomach. It disturbed her to see how quickly his moods could change, how he would plummet into a chasm of sadness with a mere thought. "What? What's wrong?"

"Will you leave me someday? Will you leave me behind...here?"

"Not if I can help it. If I do leave, I'll take you with me."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

~...~

Eva was sitting on the back porch of the little bungalow in one of the rocking chairs. She was sitting in the chair with her knees pulled up to her chest, swaying back and forth while her mind was occupied with thoughts of the macabre discovery she and James had made ealier in the day. She did not hear Father Anderson walk out onto the porch to join her. When he touched her cheek with the back of his hand, she screamed as if something had reached out from the darkness to seize her.

"Oh, my angel, I apologize for frightening you," he said, sitting down in the chair beside hers. He took her hand in his, rubbing his thumb across the back of it to comfort her. "What were you so deep in thought about?"

"Father, I saw something today. Something that really bothers me. There were these skeletons that were so scary and strange."

"Oh, I see," he murmured with a knowing, parental tone in his voice. "You wouldn't have been messing around down by the cave now would you, my dear?"

"I took James to see the tide pools. It's the only place on the island with rocks. He was searching for interesting new creatures. He searched a little too far I guess," she mumbled, propping her chin on one of her knees.

"I would say he did. The two of you shouldn't have been there, Eva. It's dangerous there," he chided her gently.

"Is that...is that where the rejected experiments go?" she asked boldly, turning her head to look at him.

"It is, my dear. I'm sorry you had to see that," he told her, apologizing for a folly that was not his own. He allowed the silence to linger between them. Only the squeak of the rocking chairs interrupted the complete quiet. Sucking in a deep breath, Father Anderson prepared to ask a bold question. "Eva, what would you say to leaving this island?"

"I think that would be a wonderful idea. Where would we go?" she questioned him, lacing her fingers through his. She would be willing to go anywhere to get of of this island full of secrets and terrible things.

"I want to take you home with me...to my real home in Ireland. I was running an orphanage there before I went to England for a visit." He paused, giving her a wide grin. "Then I unexpectedly found you. I haven't been home in a very long time. And I want to take you with me."

"Would Cardinal Satomi allow it?" She could feel her heart sinking already. Rio was not a cruel man, but he was fiercely protective of his possessions and important assets, of which she was definitely one. If they were far away from him, he would be incapable of offering them protection or to shield them from any enemies.

"He's already put in for the transfer through Iscariot," he told her, his lips parting to bare his teeth as his smile grew wider. The expression of elation drifted from her face, her smile of joy turning downward into a frown. Reaching out to pat her cheek, he asked, "What? What is it?"

"James. Can he - "

"Ah, the boy, the young lad who is so very fond of you. I see his sentiment is returned as well," he mused, chuckling when a pink tint highlighted her cheeks. "I requested that he be able to come with us as well. I will need to be replaced some day. I can train him to take over my position."

"Why would you need to be replaced?" she inquired, her voice laced with worry.

"Because, my dear, I might find a reason to leave the priesthood some day, and Iscariot as well," he responded, leaning toward her to kiss her cheek.

Eva could not breathe momentarily. The oxygen was pushed from her lungs as if she had been hit in the chest with a sledgehammer. She was unable to draw another breath in until her body took over out of self defense and inhaled the much needed air noisily. Could he really be hinting that he might leave the priesthood for her? Did he...did he love her too? Her eyes met his and she wanted to ask why, or for whom, he would leave the priesthood. Looking into his emotionally charged emerald eyes, she did not need to ask the question. Since he was already so close, she bridged the small gap between them to press her lips to his for a short, chaste kiss.

"I love you, Eva," he whispered as if it were a secret between the two of them. For now, it would have to be a closely guarded secret to keep them both safe.