Italian Interlude (Hellmouth of LA)
Rome was like any other italian city. Cultured, steeped in beauty on the surface and yet, underneath, it was somehow too iconoclastic for my tastes. Perhaps that is why I tired of it so quickly. Dru and I were happy there for a while, a year or two I think it was. I didn't bother to count actually. Our nights were filled with luring beautiful dark men, and women, to their wicked and unseemly deaths. Succulent beauties that we punished as we pleased. And yet eventually even this pleasure began to lose its allure. My thoughts always seemed to return to him. To my dear boy. Why did I still wonder what he was up to? Wondering what noble deeds his foul and filthy soul was leading him to. I suppose I still mourned for him, for the unpredictable magnificently wicked being he had been a century ago. Why does everything lead back to him? But I am rushing ahead.
So when did things change? It was when Drusilla insisted that she wanted to get closer to God. She pleaded with me to take her into one of the largest of the Rome's cathedrals. St Peter's I believe. Her current whim was to taste the flesh of His Chosen. I decided to indulge her, anything to end the incessant ramblings on the subject. Besides, I thought it would hold a delicious irony: the two of us, the eternally damned , sneaking into god's house and holding our own communion. Although I did not look forward to the feelings such a place would invoke in a creature such as myself, I relished the challenge. What better way to defy Him than to stand in His place of worship as a demon and a whore, defiling it in anyway I could?
We waited for the dark to descend. We slipped into the cathedral as easily as an unscrupled man slips into an unsuspecting maid. I felt my unbeating heart constrict as we stepped over the threshold, we were not welcome here. And yet I also felt a thrill at the sacrilege I was committing.
Dru with her strange unerring accuracy weaved her way through the passages to the nave. Ahead there was the murmuring hushed voices. Drusilla sped up her pace, I knew she was eager for the hunt, but I hung back in the shadows. I wanted to savor the rebellious fervor that had overcome me. I was in God's house, and yet I had not been struck down. God had no power over me anymore.
Then my attention was drawn to the conversation I was overhearing:
"Father! Father!" A young man cried as he approached what appeared to be an elder of the order.
"Michael! What is the matter? You do not look well. Are you ill?" replied the older man.
"Father, I just got news from the City of Angels. The evil has risen!" gasped the messenger.
"What are you talking about?" The priest regarded the other with alarm, I felt something come over me, call it a premonition, but I knew I had to hear what came next, as if my very existence depended on it.
"The Wolf, the Ram and the Hart. They have a new leader."
"Wolfram and Hart? Who is the new leader, Michael? Who from hell have they raised again?"
"The vampire! The one with the soul!" It was my boy, my darling boy.
"The hope of ours? He is the new W&H's leader?!"
"Yes, Father! He now is the one who owns the evil!"
"Why do angels keep falling from heavens with broken wings?" sighed the elder, his posture was one of defeat.
"Because there's always a devil to catch them." I replied as I stepped from the shadows into the candlelight. Both men gave a start.
Drusilla was at the ready beside me, and swooped upon the priest before he could react.
"It has been a long time since my last confession," she murmured as she took him into her arms, "Tell me, do the angel's still sing to you?" Then she was sinking her fangs into the crook of his neck.
My prey was backing away with terror in his eyes. I saw him as the divine messenger, he had brought news of my boy to me. I would be tender. I would reward him.
"Don't fight me, sweetling. It won't hurt for long." I whispered. Then I pulled him to me. He hardly struggled, gazing up at me as if I were a vision, an apparition to him. And then I ripped into his throat, not caring at the agony I was causing him. My thoughts were on Angel, my dark prince. As I felt the boy's life ebbing away, I pulled back and cut into my own skin above my breast with my sharp nails.
My victim's head lolled as he gasped for breath, for life. I guided his lips to my self inflicted wound.
"Taste." I urged. "Then you will know what true damnation is."
But he resisted me, averting his lips with his last ounce of strength, then his heart gave way, and I felt him die.
I dropped him to the floor in disgust.
Drusilla was rocking her meal back and forth with a hymn on her lips, hardly aware that he was already dead to this world.
"Did you hear?" I queried, "Things have changed, perhaps for the better." I told her. She was still cradling the priest, stroking him as she would a sleeping child.
"Come," I commanded. "Our sport is ended. Time to go."
Drusilla looked up to me questioningly.
"Is Daddy back? Does he want to play now?" She crooned in her eerily singsong voice.
"Perhaps." I ventured, almost daring to believe that he might have returned to me.
I took her hand and lead her away.
And so here we are, back in the City of Angels.
And so I hope that he, the one who still haunts my dreams, has finally fallen as so often angels do.
So when did things change? It was when Drusilla insisted that she wanted to get closer to God. She pleaded with me to take her into one of the largest of the Rome's cathedrals. St Peter's I believe. Her current whim was to taste the flesh of His Chosen. I decided to indulge her, anything to end the incessant ramblings on the subject. Besides, I thought it would hold a delicious irony: the two of us, the eternally damned , sneaking into god's house and holding our own communion. Although I did not look forward to the feelings such a place would invoke in a creature such as myself, I relished the challenge. What better way to defy Him than to stand in His place of worship as a demon and a whore, defiling it in anyway I could?
We waited for the dark to descend. We slipped into the cathedral as easily as an unscrupled man slips into an unsuspecting maid. I felt my unbeating heart constrict as we stepped over the threshold, we were not welcome here. And yet I also felt a thrill at the sacrilege I was committing.
Dru with her strange unerring accuracy weaved her way through the passages to the nave. Ahead there was the murmuring hushed voices. Drusilla sped up her pace, I knew she was eager for the hunt, but I hung back in the shadows. I wanted to savor the rebellious fervor that had overcome me. I was in God's house, and yet I had not been struck down. God had no power over me anymore.
Then my attention was drawn to the conversation I was overhearing:
"Father! Father!" A young man cried as he approached what appeared to be an elder of the order.
"Michael! What is the matter? You do not look well. Are you ill?" replied the older man.
"Father, I just got news from the City of Angels. The evil has risen!" gasped the messenger.
"What are you talking about?" The priest regarded the other with alarm, I felt something come over me, call it a premonition, but I knew I had to hear what came next, as if my very existence depended on it.
"The Wolf, the Ram and the Hart. They have a new leader."
"Wolfram and Hart? Who is the new leader, Michael? Who from hell have they raised again?"
"The vampire! The one with the soul!" It was my boy, my darling boy.
"The hope of ours? He is the new W&H's leader?!"
"Yes, Father! He now is the one who owns the evil!"
"Why do angels keep falling from heavens with broken wings?" sighed the elder, his posture was one of defeat.
"Because there's always a devil to catch them." I replied as I stepped from the shadows into the candlelight. Both men gave a start.
Drusilla was at the ready beside me, and swooped upon the priest before he could react.
"It has been a long time since my last confession," she murmured as she took him into her arms, "Tell me, do the angel's still sing to you?" Then she was sinking her fangs into the crook of his neck.
My prey was backing away with terror in his eyes. I saw him as the divine messenger, he had brought news of my boy to me. I would be tender. I would reward him.
"Don't fight me, sweetling. It won't hurt for long." I whispered. Then I pulled him to me. He hardly struggled, gazing up at me as if I were a vision, an apparition to him. And then I ripped into his throat, not caring at the agony I was causing him. My thoughts were on Angel, my dark prince. As I felt the boy's life ebbing away, I pulled back and cut into my own skin above my breast with my sharp nails.
My victim's head lolled as he gasped for breath, for life. I guided his lips to my self inflicted wound.
"Taste." I urged. "Then you will know what true damnation is."
But he resisted me, averting his lips with his last ounce of strength, then his heart gave way, and I felt him die.
I dropped him to the floor in disgust.
Drusilla was rocking her meal back and forth with a hymn on her lips, hardly aware that he was already dead to this world.
"Did you hear?" I queried, "Things have changed, perhaps for the better." I told her. She was still cradling the priest, stroking him as she would a sleeping child.
"Come," I commanded. "Our sport is ended. Time to go."
Drusilla looked up to me questioningly.
"Is Daddy back? Does he want to play now?" She crooned in her eerily singsong voice.
"Perhaps." I ventured, almost daring to believe that he might have returned to me.
I took her hand and lead her away.
And so here we are, back in the City of Angels.
And so I hope that he, the one who still haunts my dreams, has finally fallen as so often angels do.