Current mood:	blank
Entry tags:	fic, the circle, van helsing

the Circle, part 3
Suprisingly I have nothing to say... Which is bizzare. I always have something to say. So go on enjoy.



Part 3



And now I speak to you are you in there
You have her face and her eyes
But you are not her
And we go at each other like blankettes
Who can't find their thread and their bare
Can't stop loving
Can't stop what is on its way
And I see it coming
And it's on its way
-Tori Amos, “Bells for Her”




Outskirts of Rome, August 1889

Gabriel clutched the letter against his palm as he was led through the house. He had seen a few wedding parties, but in none had the houses been this empty. As they began to approach the rear end of the house music began to echo in the stones. A circle of firelight lit the darkened yard. Huge tables had been carried out and people milled about. He could see the bride and groom sitting in the middle, nodding to the passing guests.

His eyes were drawn to the six women dancing in the middle. In a complicated swivel of steps and claps they danced, their heavy skits swishing above the sand. He remembered that Anna had been an accomplished dancer and was not surprised to recognise her laughing face in the circle. Gabriel’s guide motioned for him to wait by the door as he moved through the dancers. She stopped in mid-twirl, shooting a venomous glance at Gabriel. She could not really see him through the fire, but her glare seemed to find him anyway. She excused herself from the group and made her way to the door. With a thick black skirt reaching her calf and her chest bound in a red bodice, Gabriel realised this was the first time he had seen her in a dress voluntarily.

“What do you want? I presumed that the matter of the painting was resolved.”

Her voice was tired and Gabriel felt bristled.

“Yes, it was resolved. Or buried more like it.”

He tore open the letter addressed to her and read out:

“The Order would like to advice you that the matter to which you were called to attend seven days previously has been resolved internally and we no longer require your participation.”

He gave Anna a tight-lipped scowl.

“Respectfully yours, Cardinal Jinette. Or did you actually think they were going to let anything be resolved, be discovered? I had to pull this from a messenger.”

It seemed like Gabriel was not even talking to her anymore, as if he had been transported into a different time altogether.

“As if Jinette would ever give more that scraps of my past. Hauling me around like a dog on a leash.”

The last words were punctuated with scorn. Anna looked away, eyes following the line of the dancers as they gathered more people to join the festivities.

“He needs you. He thinks that if you know you will leave. He thinks that the only obligation holding you to the Order is your need for resolution, for knowledge.”

Her eyes were dark and Gabriel could not read the expression on her face.

“They buried the painting and the drawings like they were nothing. Made them disappear into the bowels of the library.”

“And you believe otherwise. You think that there was something there, some link to your past.”

It was not a question and some of the hostility had gone out from her eyes, and Gabriel nodded.

“I think I need to show you something.”

She led him through the house. An old woman passed them in one of the corridors. Gabriel could see the ill in her eyes as they passed and she hissed something at Anna, which made her freeze. He was ready to defend her honour even if he did not know what was said, but with a speed of a striking snake she grabbed the woman’s arm and shoved her roughly against the wall. Anna pressed her face very close to the woman’s and hissed something back at her. Gabriel could not understand the language, but could recognise Gyorgy’s name from her low speech. After a tense moment she violently pushed the woman away and she scurried down the hall and out of sight. Swiftly she moved on and Gabriel jogged to keep up with her.

“What the hell was that?”

Anna merely moved on as if he had not spoken.

“Anna!”

They entered a well-lit study and she turned to face him.

“She called me a whore. I am her queen and she called me a whore.”

“Why?”

She shook her head in disbelief.

“Oh you know very well why, Gabriel.”

He looked away and her voice softened a notch.

“But I did bring it onto myself.”

She smoothed her hands down her bodice and smiled a little.

“Among my people women do not wear red. Well at least if they wish to be seen as honest. Only brides are allowed to wear red and that only to signify that they are still a virgin.”

She moved deeper into the room, which was filled with travelling trunks half unpacked and hundreds of books. There was something very familiar about their smell and feel.

“It was an easy way for me to show the noble men that I am indeed unsuited to be a wife.”

Anna stressed the word men so subtly he almost missed it and then she smiled as if she did not quite believe her reasoning herself, so Gabriel let the matter go with a nod of his head. Anna walked to an uneven pile of parchment balancing precariously on the edge of the huge desk caressing the books lovingly as she went.

“This is all of my family’s things from Vaseria. A new family will be taking over the grounds this fall. I am to live here permanently now.”

She waited for him to respond, but Gabriel had nothing to say so she continued.

“Among the books and papers came a folder of personal correspondence of Decebal Valerious, which I had never seen or had any access to. You know him as Valerious the Elder. It has some letters which you will probably find very interesting. He wrote many letters to his steward from his journeys in Jerusalem. And one from Italy when he came to Rome to ask for forgiveness for the sins of his son.”

She fingered the papers unsure and then gently folded open a worn and torn parchment and began translating haltingly:

“I had much whished to deliver my deepest thanks upon the man, Gabriel, who imprisoned and conquered my son, and to hail the lady, Anna who aided him. I have been told that she is now the respected Lady Protector of the Knights of the Holy Order. However, during my travels in Rome I found neither. She had been slain mere moths ago. The priests refused to speak of it, but I discovered she had been brutally butchered near the royal stables of the Vatican. To my horror I found that she was with child. I paid my respects to her tomb and prayed salvation upon her and her babe.”

Anna smoothed the thick paper against the leather of the folder.

“The names are our names, but they were very common at the time. One thing I find strange that there is no mention of marriage. If she truly was with child it would have been a grave scandal in the society of Rome. It is strange that there would be no other records of them.”

Anna studied the letter, voice truly curious. Gabriel was silent. Just for a second he though he could feel the putrid smell of blood in the back of his nose.

“Anna… have you thought about….”

“I do not want to talk about it!”

The change in her demeanour was sudden; voice venomous now and with a snap she continued to read:

“The man, Gabriel, sick with grief, had escaped to Sicily. And it is from these shores that I write to you my dear friend. For I am again too late to give my thanks. Gabriel passed on early this morning, mere hours before my arrival. His body had withered, but I could still see the stature of a great man and I hope my prayers will hasten his journey to heaven.”

She would not look at him and Gabriel felt shamed. He did not really know why. The child had been his as well, and he wanted share in on her grief, but maybe that was too personal.

“I’m sorry. I should not have brought that up.”

She nodded:

“Now I must conclude and return to Vaseria to deal with my son. He is deserving of a great punishment, but watching the light play on the ocean I wonder if I am man enough to deliver it onto him.

“And the rest of the story we know. His father locked him into a tower of ice and then the Devil gave him wings. I asked Gyorgy to look around the city archives for any information, but there was nothing left. Rome has been sacked so many times, most documents have been lost.”

Carefully she folded the papers and pushed them inside a leather folder.

“I have no more answers for you Gabriel. I must return to the party now.”

“I cannot let this go Anna. And I think you know why. I think you feel it too. I think you taste the blood and smell the putrid earth.”

“You think I am her. You think that if we opened that grave I would lie there.”

She would not look at him, eyes turned away. Gabriel nodded and he knew she would feel it. He watched as she returned to the party, easily navigating among her own people. But it was too late to return to them now. Gabriel had seen her in that painting; had seen her eyes watching him from canvas and paint.