Kitabı oku: «Bloody Dawn. Daughter of Dawn», sayfa 2
Prophetic dreams
Ferdinand rushed on a narrow bed in his cell. Silky blond strands were scented over a rigid pillow. Luxury on a bench canvas. The appearance of the young man remained his only treasure. Human beauty burns like a candle in a poor gray atmosphere. Well, another rose’s aroma behind the beautiful binding of the firmware also reminded about the brilliant world in which Ferdinand lived sometime. Everything remained in the past. In addition to the memorable person, which many could learn. Would you laugh at the same familiar or shuddered from what he saw? The brilliant young aristocrat with excellent condition and pedigree brought himself sacrificing for the sake of faith. Well, isn’t it hurt and not funny? Who else did it? Many would find Ferdinand stupid, not chosen. Or even insane. But did the saints who donated from all and those who went to torments on their own will were not madmen for the world?
Contrary to the convictions of the world, in which Ferdinand was ready to be ordained not for the sake of promotion on the social staircase, as it happened for many cardinals and bishops. In contrast, he was not the younger or the second son of a notable family. He was the first and only one child. Would his parents be alive, and they would come crazy from the recklessness of the son and the heir. But they died… Ferdinand perceived their death as a sign. He considered himself created in order to bring himself sacrificing to the ministry of God. And God embodied for him in that marble angel at the altar.
And today, after taking the fatal decision, this angel was, as if very close. It seemed to be just a stretch of his palms, and he would touches something living and sacred, not marble.
It is said that evil can also be sacred. Ferdinand did not even remember who of the holy fathers said it to him and for what purpose. Perhaps it was just a metaphor. The deep and cruel words were very fascinated in the soul. Ferdinand almost saw them with burning fire on the bare wall of his cell. The situation around seemed such wretched, but his dreams were invariably remained Divine. Sometimes they were even more beautiful than dreams. After all, he almost did not allow himself to dream. He tried to not distract his thoughts from prayer.
And today in a dream, he finally got the desired response to all his long posts and prayers. He dreamed of… more precisely, he dreamed of a marble angel from the cathedral. Only in a dream the statue came to life. She left freely the pedestal. The movements of the angel were feline. There are in her something from predator and at the same time something majestic, he wanted to fall on his knees before her. Only in his dream, Ferdinand could not move his hand or a foot. He could not even talk. But marble in front of him has gained flesh and continued to undergo the most fantastic changes. Of course, the angel was a girl. She was a divine creation with smoky ash wings framed by golden border. She looked at him impassively. And yet it seemed that in her eyes there was a light reproach, even anger.
«I worship you,» he still found the strength to whisper her. It is a pity that enthusiastic words sounded rather as an excuse. «I worship only you. I am idle you. And you are my only deity.»
«So Judas said,» said a clear angelic voice. Ferdinand felt as if he was struck. He did not even immediately realize that for the angel he is Judas.
He woke up in cold sweat. Probably he shouted in a dream, because in narrow corridors, concerned the steps of the brothers were heard. The night guard have already hurried to him.
Ferdinand cast back strands from his forehead. How terrible! The angel compared him with the most disgusting traitor in the history of mankind. Did he deserve it?
And this happened not for the first time. A voice in his head broke his consciousness, and it was like burning fire. The feeling that the dragon, about which is stated so much in Scripture, burned all his brains and thoughts. Inside, too, everything was burning. He reached out for the jug and spilled water. The transparent puddle spread over the table. It seemed to him that this was a blood again, which he was given it today. After the overthrow of the rite, it did not break it away. Although he was sure that this would happen. He mentally prepared for the fact that he would be sick of all night, but nauseous was not. Instead, inside everything was burned as in fever. It is too unnatural – drinking the blood of other people or any living beings. Man should never do so. They explained to him that God wants so much, and he obeyed. Perhaps it was not worth…
Inside the hell was expressed. There was no fireplace in the cell or even a tiny furnace to warm up in the cold. The fever proceeded from his own body. It is said that if you drink the blood of the dragon, then all your insides will simply burn. He felt as if he had just drank the blood of a fire monster, about which so much was written in the secret books of the Brotherhood. And here the dragon burned him from the inside. It was exquisite torture.
He remembered the fireplace in the old family mansion, it was made in the form of a wounded dragon. As a child, this grand subject of the interior did not seem to him terrible. Now even the memories of it brought the wave of fear.
It seemed that the dragon was here, not just inside this room, but inside him. The dragon entered him, merged with him, and it was a merger to death. Now he will just burn.
His brothers broke into the cell. They did not even knock. They just came running on his cry. It was quite explained. He shouted as if he was torn by the claws of living dragon. If they heard this cry, they understood everything. The Order Brothers should have known what nightmares were tormented him.
Someone stroked his hair. Tonio, a beautiful brunette was his friend before the brotherhood and here too. He also followed the brotherhood for him by a certain only him known reason.
Ferdinand barely distinguished the faces of his fellows. There were just white spots, not the faces around him. He recognized Tonio in a voice. Tonio told something comforting. The sounds calmed as a lullaby. Clean sounds. Tonio is the most beautiful singer here in church as before he was the most beautiful singer in the sophisticated salon of the palace. Then he was just a poor aristocrat, now he is an equal member of the community, which was and respected, and secret. They were in secret above all religious communities, but no one knew about them. They were just shadows in dark capes or cassocks. A strange fraternity that was allowed to have weapons, track, kill and call it all the God’s judgement. It was all allowed. They did not change their names, entering the brotherhood, as was customary in most monasteries. They did not have tonsure, the taking of monastic vows was purely symbolic. But the terrible rituals were not symbolic. Today, Ferdinand was convinced that everything was very really: the blood of his fellows in his tongue, a flame inside and an accusing angel’s voice.
He wanted to ask his senior and more experienced brothers, what could mean when an angel calls you Judas. But he did not dare. He suddenly became scary and ashamed.
In addition, it was only their mystery: his marble angel. And in general, the statue was silent. It did not say anything. He heard the voice only in his head.
«You will be better,» Tonio whispered in his ear long ago, but the meaning of words began to reach him only now. «It will soon pass. Father Donatello says it’s just one night.»
One night may seem like an eternity in such agony. It was easier to die immediately. Ferdinand suddenly remembered the ritual dagger, which he now had to be with him. Do not reach the handle. In addition, there were observers nearby. It will not be allowed to him to cut himself and to release something burning out of his blood.
«He has it stronger than others,» someone said. Ferdinand did not recognize the voices.
«So he will have more strength than they had.»
The pain inside remained fiery, and the outlines of the world have lost all clarity. It is said that in this state it is easy to hear the voices of supernatural creatures, but he heard only the dialogue of people.
«How do you know how it passed by others?»
«But there are records…»
«What if they understood the degree of suffering, so as not to scare the upcoming generations?»
«Then they would have broken a vow. After all, we swear to transfer only the truth in the scripting on paper. Future generations should be aware of what they expect. Otherwise they could not fight against her?»
Against her! Again, someone said that, and Ferdinand did not like how they uttered it. Why not call the devil with his own name, whatever his new shell was. After all, the devil always remains the devil. In any kind. It would be more difficult for many brothers if the devil turned out to be a beautiful young man, which he was by the time of his fame. Many here believed that the young men are much more seductive. Here is Tonio, for example. How gentle is his touch. In the presence of a girl, he would become stone, but he felt some kind of attraction to a friend. Maybe it only seems to him… Never in his life he did not experience passion to anyone. Therefore, he was chosen to fight the devil. He will have the final victory over him. Others are easy to tempt, he is not. He just won’t feel anything. He makes a blow and that’s it. And the walls of the monastery will again hide him from the eyes of people, from all the passion that people can experience to him. And maybe someday he will be proclaimed a saint. For many, he was already so. First, because he did not want to know the sin, secondly, due to the fact that he was chosen to win over the devil.
The head of the Order believed that he had already won. Donatello was sure that he made the right choice, as many and many heads of the Order were confident, when every few hundred years of their pointing finger snatched from the crowd the next favorite. Many of these people were canonized after death, but they themselves simply went into the shadow. The terrible stories came to Ferdinand that these people just went crazy after the devil have looked into theirs eyes. They killed him, but they became his slaves. He died, but he mastered their consciousness, and they were forced to stay alone until the end of their days, struggling with terrible urges inside themselves.
Donatello promised that this would not happen to Ferdinand.
«You’re too clean,» he explained. «Not a drop of wine, not a single night with a courtesan and not at all because in your pockets you didn’t have money. You lived among the temptation and did not succumb to them, because you just didn’t want. Such and there are real chosen, they simply do not feel the desire to sin. God created you morally very strong. You will do your job, but your reason will remain untouched. If such as you were more in our ranks… But someone is special, like the devil, is born only once a few centuries. Such is the idea of the Most High.
In the prophetic gift of Donatello did not doubt no one. Ferdinand had to believe him for word. And he believed until the fire began to burn his blood from the inside.
Their order was also similar to the dragon, just at the same time, almost sleeping. Each cycle they expected the appearance of the catch.
And here it appeared. After the rite, Donatello took him to the hall at the very top. A strange hall with columns, but without glasses and balustrade, blown by all winds. From there, the sea and the sky were visible, and there was an amazing clock under the ceiling.
«This is a clock of the Universe,» Donatello explained. «Devil’s clock! When the hands meet at the very top, and this happens only once in a few centuries, at the time of the sunrise, which is clearly visible from here, in this moment you will have only one second to strike. Only in this moment the devil is vulnerable. Just one – the only second, and it should be enough for you. Do you cope?»
It was not a question, rather a statement. Nevertheless, Ferdinand nodded. The clock consists entirely of gold plates and monograms, firmly crashed into memory. It seemed that they had a living face as an ornate sun disc. So far, it dreamed, obviously, it will wake up only when the decisive moment comes. In this moment, the devil either dies from his hand, or remains in the world already forever, only no longer as a ghost creature, but in the form of a real and only ruler. It all depends on the determination of Ferdinand.
It is stupid to hang such responsibility for a single person, but he will have helpers, a whole order.
This thought was not easier. The image of the clock pursued him, recalling the sleeping supernatural creature with two hands, gears, musical ticks and an ominous golden glitter. How can the creation of the devil be the most beautiful thing that you saw in your life?
«Remember that the mechanism of the Evil One only one second for the centuries works against him himself,» Donatello inspired him.
Now Ferdinand dreamed of this clock, but in dreams they were huge from the floor to the ceiling and further. In dreams they lived. The golden face was smiling. Ferdinand concerned the hands and felt the blood of the cuts immediately flows on the dial. The clock seemed to drink this blood.
Donatello explained to him about this clock not all, but in some of the books stored in the monastery, it was recorded that they mean all divisions, symbols and letters on the hellish mechanism. So far, he knew that one of the hands measures time in the supernatural world, the other in human, and both of the same length. Only one of them moves into the past, as if giving tribute to each cycle of the devil recovery, the second hand moves into the opposite direction. When both hands will meet, the decisive moment comes. Ferdinand instinctively squeezed his hand. When it is time, he will not shake.
Silence. Obviously, the brothers decided that he fell asleep, and left him alone. Only he did not sleep. So the heat drops after the fever: the body is still trembling, but there is no more fire in it. Ferdinand hardly rose. In this state it was madness, he felt very weak, but he wanted to read about the clock now. It did not remain so much time to the decisive blow. Now there was a deep night. Well, night is the best time for prayer. At night, nothing will distract you… Is it only except for lechery thoughts, but Ferdinand did not have them. He could not call any object: neither female, nor male, which would attract him.
Although the exception was. Just one thing. The statue in niche. But his love for it was far from physical. It was some kind of piercing spiritual aspiration that could not describe any words. It was his God. It made him morally strong. It deprives all the desires towards people.
Someone from his cousins would laugh, saying that the feeling towards sculpture stands between him and all the brothels of the Universe. The cousins were sad about nothing. Ferdinand left them his titles, estates, land. Many would call him crazy or blissful. He was still. He chose his destination in life.
The strange clock was waiting for him in the hall. Since the initiation, he had the right to all. He could choose those who will be his right and left hand in the fight against evil, could give orders, Donatello temporarily moved to the shadow. Ferdinand was allowed to enter where the other was forbidden. Therefore, he was extremely amazed, noticing someone else’s at the clock. The man fell down as a shadow, and more resembled an unearthly winged creature. Actually, there was nothing surprising in meeting near this clock a supernatural creation, but someone was not. The fact that Ferdinand at first accepted for the wings was only the folds of the monastic hood. Just the gray robe was slightly open, hence the feeling of the fact that the wings winks over the old monk.
Ferdinand froze in indecision. In his life, he did not mention the word with his brother Ernesto and was already accustomed to consider the old man a dumb.
Silence came for a long time. Ferdinand began to study the symbols on the clock, and then noticed that there were some wounds and scorched lines under the folded collar, like after torture. Maybe he only seemed that the scars on the Ernesto body add up to the same symbols as on the clock.
He managed to see a little. The lines, for sure, were burning out with fire, such deep and inflamed, as if their carved the dragon burning claws right on the human flesh.
Ferdinand heard that the devil skillfully tortures people, but never saw anything like that. Ernesto smeared the gray robe too quickly. He was gloomy and inconspicuous, as a touching ghost, but in his eyes it was frozen something inexpressible. Suffering, pain, longing, a whole range of negative feelings. Only fear was not in them. Last Ferdinand respected. Full fearlessness.
He suddenly felt sympathy to a gloomy monk.
«I always think about it as the beginning of the world. The devil has so much power over us, because we all started with him. From the moment he became himself, as we now know him,» said Ferdinand
Ferdinand himself did not know why he was set in revelation.
«Sometimes he is not like himself,» Ernesto said. «Sometimes he can become closer to us than God. Be careful, boy!»
There were already many such warnings. Ferdinand got used to them without much attention. He was aware of what risk goes, and it was not scarecrow. But the words of the monk hung like a black cloud. It seemed that he invested in them some kind of special meaning.
He left, went into darkness as an imperceptible shadow. The clock was purely gold, but it seemed that all the darkness of the universe was accumulated within it. It had no eye, nor lips, but Ferdinand felt that they were laughing at him.
It was a fair laughter. They left him just one moment for victory or defeat. Here is really a devilish trick. Ferdinand wanted to move away from it and could not. It seemed to measure the term of his own life. And this term approached the end. But then, how can he be able to defeat the evil, if he will not live.
«Stupid, just one moment,» the clock stated. «To wait for a single moment, you do not have to live for a long time.»
Aspiration
«Why not now?» said James.
«Let the clock are not in a hurry, and we hurry,» it was the moral of three scouts. Bob, James and Renault hurried to him with news. Father Donatello naturally did not know anything. He would not allow anything like that. Ferdinand also had doubts. He himself would not be ahead of the events, but three young people kept their principles. For a long time they collected information about a certain sect that worshiped the living embodiment of Dennitsa. They even had to pretend that they would like to join it. They said that it was risky, because the head of the sect can read thoughts. But so far everyone has been intact, which gave them a lot of courage.
Only Tonio doubted.
«What if it’s just heretics or is it easier swindlers? Suddenly they are not connected with her, and we will only spend time in vain?»
His claims almost did not hear.
«We will pretend that you also want to join their ranks,» said James. «You are both…» He measured Tonio and Ferdinand with quick glance. «Fully fit, there welcome only young and beautiful. This is the sect of the devil. Physical beauty for them is in the first place. In addition to loyalty, this is the only criterion.»
«Loyalty?» Ferdinand frowned. He already gave his loyalty to God.
«Rather, obsession,» James suggested. «Everyone becomes some kind of crazy and cold as statues.»
Statues! The word caused unacceptable associations. They can not know how he belongs to the statues. More precisely, to only one of them. He did not tell anyone about it yet. And not going. It was his secret. No one should know it. His feeling to marble sculpture was too sacred.
Ferdinand reached for a dagger with a graceful gilded handle in the form of the dragon. Here is his new sacred relic. The dragon will be defeated, said Donatello, when he gave him the blade.
«It’s too early to see the enemy territory,» Ferdinand concluded reasonably. «We are now vulnerable, not an enemy. We must wait.»
His argument was supposed to sound weighty. Now he takes the post of head, although temporarily, only until the evil is not destroyed by his hand. He had to feel strong, and all the order’s brothers secretly obey him. However, James and Renault began to objected. Usually they behaved more restrained, but now they burned to rush into battle, track, destroy.
«We must at least look at,» meanwhile claimed Bob. «You need to know with what we are dealing with.»
«We know,» Ferdinand assured. «The evil will be destroyed.»
«But you can do it today.»
But the clock? Ferdinand again remembered it as a creature that laughed at him.
«Do you remember the residence of Cardinal Lisandro?»
The cardinal did not drink wine and did not go to the harlot, but for some reason he had a terribly negative reputation. It was all the case in his sermons. In his hints and open calls. Someone considered him a prophet.
The false prophet, so called him to himself Ferdinand. Many shared his opinion. But there were followers. A small society gathered around Lisandro. Order of communion! They tried to scare the devil with blood. Lily and blood are their symbols. Both were initially devilish symbols. But Lisandro held beautiful rites and assured that the Fallen Archangel Dennitsa is not so terrible as it seems. He stated even that he could call him and destroy. Obviously, today was the one night when he was going to take it.
Ferdinand would not put a penny on the fact that his intention would succeed. Not everything is as simple as it seems. Lisandro and his Order is really just heretics, blessed by Pope. It is unlikely that their prayers reach the ears of God, and the threats are afraid of the devil. Although it would be so easy to attach the fallen angel on lilies, which once in paradise were considered his flowers, blood, spilled like a bribe for him, and then kill. All weaklings dream of a simple decision of the question. Ferdinand knew that his path would be more complicated. He squeezed the handle of the dagger tightly.
True, now he had to prove himself that he had a determination.
«Not yet time…» It was his last objection. But not already decisive.
«It’s time now,» Bob objected. «They will gather for midnight, as during Christmas and Easter, only it will be a terrible sacrament.»
«Rather, Mysteria,» Ferdinand has long appointed the price to such events and on the experience remaining from his lush secular life, decided that they differ little from theatrical performances. The only thing that are designed to approve in the spiritual authority one specific person who spends them. In this case, Cardinal Lisandro. Probably he believes that the throne of Pope is already secured by him. In any case, hardly enviable place will be free, everyone whose mind he embarrassed, will support him.
Behind meditations, Ferdinand himself did not notice how congregates pulled him on the night of a cozy cell. He firmly pressed the handle of the dagger, hiding it under the cape. Consciousness said that it is still early, but something militant inside himt has already rushed into battle.
The dagger with the dragon on the handle was alarmed only at the beginning.
«You need to kill evil with evil,» said Donatello. The conclusion is too abstract and unreasonable. We need to beat the enemy by his own weapon. Kill the devil with the help of his – a dragon. It is bold, ambiguous and controversial. But it can work.
Ferdinand did not doubt his power. He forbade himself to be afraid. Will’s effort was able to suppress weakness and fear. He was aware that he was elected to die, but to win. His hand in the decisive moment will not tremble.
And what if the decisive moment is still today and the prophecy that there is everything only one moment to strike this just a legend?
Ferdinand did not want to return to the gloomy palace of cardinal Lysandro, but today, as Bob said, the members of the Devil’s Order will be present there. And their lord always comes as shadow with them. We just need to look around and learn him in the face. Ferdinand was well prepared. His companions were also.
When they came, the sacrament with blood and lily petals was in the night assembly over. Through the dark arches of high windows stood an unbearable smell of the same flowers. Garden lilies! Such light flowers were in such a gloomy place, among the black arches and ghostly burning candles. White petals as if symbolized something dead and unnatural.
Lysandro himself reminded the royal person. But pride is a sin.
Ferdinand looked at the gloomy hall. It seemed to him that there was no unity in the Order. The gathered kept in groups. Rather, some of them were collected in groups, leaving the communion, someone as if hid behind the backs of those who stood ahead.
Bob leaned toward Ferdinand and explained in the whisper:
«A conspiracy is preparing against him. He inspired so long to them that the fallen archangel is the essence of everything that they believed in this a little more sincerely than he wanted, and moved to the Order of Darkness.»
Lysandro just pronounced that he is close to the False Archangel Lucifer, and God at the same time. Like many he called himself elected and blessed.
«This is the night of all nights,» his voice sounded monotonously. «Night when he appears to us.»
The last sentence sounded somehow unnaturally. Ferdinand licked the dry lips. It seemed that the smell of lilies became suddenly particularly sharp, as if one of the flowers burned on fire.
He wanted to raise his hand to take a blond curl from his forehead and could not. The creation at the column saw at him. A divine creation! The azure eyes pierced him through, and the hand, squeezing the dagger, froze, and did not have time to rise. So it means that the deity looks like! He had to think about the debt, about the call, but he was able to think only about that he looks at the unearthly creation. Here it is the most sacred sacrament – to see the first angel of God in front of him and know that the angel is alive. Real! Now he is not a statue.
The marble face came to life. It was real, though very insensitive. The eyes that he had got used to see marble, lit with the azure. Cool hair curls were golden. Under the cape behind his back trembling something similar to the overall wings.
Nikolette! The name came from somewhere from the depths, as if the flame candle was lit. The marble angel in niche was not named. In any case, he did not call him, even mentally. Probably, now the niche is empty, because the revived statue stood in front of him. Her cold look studied him. So looks the angel from the height of his pedestal. Eyes shone like azure ice, only they did not blame him.
Ferdinand tried to call a fixed white statue in memory and asked for help, but nothing came out. What he saw now was much better.
Only his hand on the dagger remained motionless. Now he understood what he was warned about. If you do not prepare in advance, when the decisive moment comes, he will simply become not able to strike. So it came out. Only it was no longer important.
He could rush forward, could hit, but did not even try. Although the goal was in front of him. There was no doubt about it. Ferdinand realized that the fallen archangel is here in all its original beauty. For some moment, their eyes met and could not break away from each other.
It means that love arises. Like a knife in the heart. How to hit the head. Consciousness revealed to the unknown worlds, and he suddenly understood. She knows everything. He was sent to kill her, and she knows it.
He squeezed the knife and hid his hand behind his back. It was a chance. The second one may not be introduced. And yet he missed it. He wanted to bow his knees in front of her.
Ferdinand did not immediately notice that an angel with a gold head appeared not one. Next, similar to the shadows stood some people. Just people, not supernatural creatures. But one of them was unusually handsome. The brunette with emerald eyes. He looked at Ferdinand hostile.
Nicolette has already moved towards Lisandro, she was fast as a shadow. No one seemed to see her. None of those who could alert. Obviously, only the conspirators saw her and supported. Lisandro himself, too, did not see her, until she came very close. Face to face. Did he recognized the devil in the face?
Ferdinand regretted at this moment, that he is not able to read thoughts. He could not look into an angel’s consciousness or into a person’s consciousness. But the fatal moment is approaching, he felt it. Now there will be something significant. Only he had no right to intervene.
The bloodless lips of the angel slightly revealed, like a slit in a different world.
«Be blessed!» Nicolette said with some frighteningly cold intonation. Suddenly the knife flashed in her hand. Just on the moment. She managed to put him in the body of the cardinal so sharply that Ferdinand shuddered. Absolutely indifferent, rhythmic, calculating. Nicolette cut him from the bottom of the belly to the throat. Blood spattered her skin and clothing. But the angel himself seemed to be pure, even in the blood. Or is it just an illusion?
Ferdinand watched it as if from afar. Many were in a hurry to run out of the hall. Someone shouted. The most reasonable, apparently conspirators, knew that there was a force from which they did not escape and just watched. Silently. Like Ferdinand himself. In this case, he was not for nor against. This case did not concern him, like his fellows. Their Order did not have the right to interfere if it was not about the direct execution of the order.
Nicolette did not embarrass. She raised the blade in her hand. For some reason, this simple action resembled a mystery much more than the rite spent before.
