Elizabeth Rizzoli heard the priest's voice as Katherine and Nick lovingly held the child.
Her child. Her son. Her one and only.
Elizabeth and her wife, Maggie Ross, had decided to have their child baptized on the Easter Vigil. The priest told the story from the Old Testament. About the angel of death who went around Egypt to slay every firstborn of the Egyptians. But the Israelites, the chosen people, knew how to protect themselves. For the angel of God had warned them. They were to slaughter the lamb. Eat the meat. And keep the blood. The flesh and the blood.
Take some of the blood and put it on the doorposts and lintels of the houses where the lamb is to be eaten ...
This is how you are to eat it: Your hips girded, shoes on your feet, staff in hand. Eat it quickly. It is the Passover for the Lord. That means: the passing of the Lord ...
The Passover, Elizabeth knew, was the forerunner of Easter. Maggie had chosen the passage from the Old Testament, Exodus. Elizabeth didn't necessarily think it was appropriate because baptism was about new life. And not about the angel of death slaying children. But Maggie had taught her that Easter was the feast of baptism. The Passover of the Israelites was the predecessor of Easter, and life is only possible out of death. Perhaps the ME was right about that.
But when it came to death and rebirth, Elizabeth had to think primarily of death. Above all, she thought of the baby that she and Maggie had lost two years ago. The baby that a murderer who called himself BodyCounter had kicked out of Maggie's body and that now lay in a cold grave in a cemetery. In the same grave where her first wife, Sarah O'Laighin-Rizzoli, lay.
Until the day of resurrection. Or forever.
God was the creator of the universe. And had thus created the most significant suffering ever possible. God was also the greatest criminal in the universe. He had even abandoned his son. My God, why have you forsaken me? Jesus had said, tortured, and nailed half-dead to the cross.
But God had done nothing.
The priest continued:
This night, I will go through Egypt and slay in Egypt every firstborn among men and cattle. I, the Lord, will execute judgment on all the gods of Egypt.
The blood on the houses where you live, the blood of the lamb, shall be a sign for your protection.
When I see the blood, I will pass by you.
And the destructive judgment of the angel of death will not strike you when I strike Egypt.
Elizabeth's gaze swept over her sister Katherine. She was fully recovered after the insane BodyCounter had shot her in the abdomen, and she had survived by a hair's breadth only because Katherine had closed her abdominal artery with her finger. At the same time, the psychiatrist knelt in the dirt and felt the pulsing blood on her fingertip. The detective's blood.
Elizabeth's gaze left Katherine and slid to the ceiling of the church. A colossal painting stretched across the vaulted ceiling; a painting one would have expected to see in a Roman church rather than in Boston. The Apocalypse with the Last Judgement, with Jesus Christ as the savior of the world and the sacrificial lamb. The lamb that was slaughtered to ward off death. Back then in Egypt, then in Revelation. And hopefully also in Benjamin's life.
Benjamin.
That was her son's name.
He wore a white christening robe and beamed at Elizabeth with his big blue eyes.
Elizabeth felt a pang in her heart, full of joy and fear. Benjamin. He was infinitely precious. And infinitely vulnerable. Elizabeth would die for him a thousand times over, just as she would for her other two children, Nikki and Ashlyn. And she would kill for the three thousand people to protect them.
Nick and Katherine approached the baptismal font with Benjamin.
The water of the font moved slightly with a breeze, and the reflection of the Apocalypse on the ceiling began to move like the spirit of the Lord that hovered over the water before the world's creation.
Nowadays, only the child's head was moistened with water, but in the past, baptized children were pushed underwater for a moment. It was meant to symbolize death, that you had to die to live again.
The priest raised his voice again. "Don't you know that all of us baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?" The priest turned to Elizabeth and Maggie, to Katherine and Nick. "What name have you given your child?"
"Benjamin," Maggie and Elizabeth replied. They looked at the baby. Their baby, who looked at his parents with his blue eyes, was a little puzzled, a little dreamy, and perhaps a little hungry.
"What do you ask of the Church of God for Benjamin?"
"Baptism."
Elizabeth looked at the podium on which the missal lay. The podium was in the shape of a cross. The foot of the podium was a metal serpent impaled by that very cross. It was the victory of the angel over the dragon, the victory of the law over the serpent, and the victory of God over Satan.
"Exorcizo te, immunde spiritus, in nomine patris et filii et spiritus sanctus," the priest murmured. It was the minor exorcism that was part of every baptism. The banishment of the evil spirit so that it would never lead the baptized person astray from the right path in the future.
The priest turned back to the parents and godparents while Benjamin let out a soft chuckle in Katherine's arms.
Then, the priest raised his voice and looked at everyone with a penetrating gaze. "Do you renounce evil to live in the freedom of the children of God?"
"I renounce," said all four. Maggie, Elizabeth, and the godparents Nick and Katherine. Standing in for Benjamin. Elizabeth's gaze flitted across the pews. Jane, visibly moved and proud, followed the scene. Her wife, Maura, sat next to her. And next to her Elizabeth's daughters from her previous marriage, Ashlyn and Nikki.
The priest continued to speak. "Do you renounce the temptations of evil so that it does not gain power over you?"
"I renounce."
The priest continued with the last question: "Do you deny Satan, the author of evil?"
"I do deny."
Oppose Satan.
To recognize evil.
Was it possible to prevent evil?
Elizabeth had always believed that she would be spared from evil if she knew all the tricks and perversions of it. But would it help her in the end? Would it protect her in the end? From a projectile from a concealed weapon, a quick knife, an explosion?
Perhaps it was best not to fear anything and to be surprised in the end. Because maybe nothing would happen at all. Nothing good, but nothing bad either.
Knowing nothing could be a blessing.
Knowledge, on the other hand, was a curse.
The tree of knowledge was not the tree of life.