Even in the Night

Kelantha

Even in darkness, they grew.

I could hear them growing, as one senses the passing of time without consciously being aware of it. They were so small and fragile, the plants our son had teased into adulthood. Their petals glowed in the moonlight, the flowers closed to await the morning sun, when it would arise and creep across the rocks to reveal the scarlet stain where the boy had lain. I had stood above it, staring at the spattered life that now lay broken in the cold and desolate castle above, its crumbling foundation granting only mild assurance that it would withstand the violence to come.

For a moment, as I stood over my son�s body in that endless haven of candlelight, I had thought to burn it to the ground, to take a single flame and touch it to the wealth of draperies and paintings that created such a surreal atmosphere away from the world. My hand had come within an inch of the candle, halting only as I beheld Mihail�s face in death, the tranquility of his repose. He would not have wished it, would not have desired for his history to be engulfed in a sea of flame. It was what drove me into the night, and what lead my tentative stride into the courtyard.

I stood above the garden, utter and complete in my coldness. They awaited tender hands that would nevermore caress them, nor offer them water from the urn standing nearby. They longed for a touch that would not return. The plants would have mourned him had they lived, and had I left them, they would have died in the absence of nourishment. My hands emerged white from the black contours of my cloak, the fingernails long and coated with Mihail�s dried blood. I could not weep over the body, but had held it tightly to my breast with all the anguish a mortal mother has for her child. I hate you, for what you have done, my mind cried, knowing that he understood, that he heard, that it wounded him more deeply than if I had taken up a stake and plunged it into his heart.

Ripples of moonlight played over the leaves, caressing their delicate contours. Mihail�s fingerprints were still in the earth. That I would never again hear his voice, not in the many centuries, indeed in all of eternity, haunted the impenetrable nature of my thoughts. I considered him buried beneath the earth, to rot as all things touched in death, and still tears would not come. My eyes remained dry, gleaming in the moonlight, hardened with the rage in my soul.

Flowers had no right to flourish in such a place of death.

How could you have encouraged him? I demanded, sinking to my knees.

I tore up the first plant, strewing the petals the length of the courtyard.

How could you not have told me the truth?

Another plant came up beneath my relentless hand and was flung to the stone cobbles at my feet.

How dare you play with fates as though they were your tarot cards!

It had been Mihail�s garden and would never again experience life. It would not dare.

He is eternally condemned, and you are to blame!

My icy fingertips hit something hard in the earth, drawing forth a coin from its quiet repose. I had given it to him on his insistence, claiming he needed things from the town. I stared at it, knowing now that he had buried it and obtained his desires through other means.

What did you create? What have you begun?

The coin was all that I took with me.

I never once turned back, not for worldly possession or the plaintive voice that came briefly into my mind. I banished it forevermore, locking him from my thoughts as successfully as if I had turned a key against him. I fled into the wood, knowing only that I had to escape the soulless creature that had made me. The love and affection he accused me of never having revealed were banished in the overwhelming passion running through my veins. The poor traveler on the road gave an outlet to the bloodlust that drove me, drawn violently from his horse to the ground as he drew up in concern for my well being. He was foolish, this man, to have traveled alone at night and halted to speak with a lonely wanderer. If I had not found him, the gypsies would have.

They would find him, but not until the morning, when his limbs had stiffened with death and the look of wild terror faded from his eyes. His beast shied as its master attempted weakly to fight, but he was already too far-gone to do more than grip my shoulder. His fat fingers slowly parted and fell as I lifted my head from his neck, beholding death as it came across his face in a gray shadow. Had it been the same for our son? I wondered. Had the gray hand of Satan come forth to pluck his soul from the broken form and drag him into hell? I left him there and strove to catch the reins, the horse dancing wildly before I mounted his broad back and directed him through the wood. I did not know if Dracula would come after me, but I did not desire him to.

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