Horror Fan Fiction ❯ Anette: Testimony of Lives ❯ Beginning Notes ( Chapter 1 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: WalkingDead 
In Which Rules are Mentioned.
Miscellaneous: Horror Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Horror | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 05.22.2008 | Updated On: 05.22.2008 | Pages: 1 | Words: 3.3K | Visits: 195 | Status: Work In Progress
In Which Rules are Mentioned.
Miscellaneous: Horror Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Horror | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 05.22.2008 | Updated On: 05.22.2008 | Pages: 1 | Words: 3.3K | Visits: 195 | Status: Work In Progress
The Beginning Act: A Note on Rules
Rules. If you haven't ever noticed while in your usual vampiric dreamland, or werewolf haven, most of these horrifically odd yet particularly cheezy stories have rules to them. Almost unspoken rules. Like vampires hate light, or werewolfs need a full moon to change into their tempermental hairy state. Of course there are a dozen other monster stories with a million other rules. Of course lets not forget this story. It also comes with its own unspoken set of rules. Ones which I'm not all that interested in letting you, the reader, know about until I've decided to tell you my typical schpeel involving those two (in)famous brands of terrors many of us tremble in fear of at night when we've watched one too many horror movies, among others that you didn't even know about!
Allow me to pause in this beginning to make an introduction of myself. Annette, if you please. Or sometimes Annie, Angie, Angel, or a number of other odd nicknames picked up from the dozens of different places at different times that have marked my life. My unnaturally, long human life-span. Apart from my lengthy human years, I'm fairly normal. Except for the uncountable unusual nervous habits I developed from years of ... well, we'll get to the other explanation later. I have never been able to stare a person in the eyes for too long. My record for watching one stretch of road is longer than my ability to look at a person in the eyes. You must understand first off: Looking into the window of a person's soul is much more intimidating than simply looking into the window of a person's house. How do I know? Why don't I tell you one of my very first experiences with vampires. Back in the day before I found out one of the many rules to this odd underground of creatures and legends.
On October 1944 in Italy, a little ways from Rome in the once small town of Viareggio that bordered the Ligurian Sea, lived me. Interesting how that rhymes. As I was saying, in the town by the sea where I was born was my first experience with what we now call the Vampire. I was a small girl of five at the time, enjoying the sea breeze like any child would..
The wind blew past my caramel coloured hair, pinching a squeal of delight from my rosy mouth, my cheeks red with the begginnings of the winter cold. My mother held my hand as we stood on the bank of the rarely found cliffs aways off from the main town of Viareggio. Here mother and I loved to see the ocean waves lap up the sides of the craggy mouth of the cliff, splashing white foam gloriously high in the air as the wind whipped the wheat-like grass to and fro. Today we were simply sightseeing this marvelous sight rather than staying for our customary picnic like we would in summertime, just before we would abandon the outside for the coming months of cold. I giggled as the scent of salt tickled my nose delightfully; this was by far one of my favorite past-times.
My mother walked the two of us closer and closer to the gaping edge of the cliff, carefully manuvering me so that I was naught but a few feet before her. When we were about a foot away from the edge, I felt a blast of chilly wind kick up and through my downy head of long brown hair back. Mother suddenly threw my arms wide before me and laughed with me in delight as the feeling of flight spread through my being and tossed my little dreams higher than ever expected.
"Reach for the sky, little Annette!" she shouted above the roaring of the ocean and wind. My child's mouth squealed again in pure pleasure. Although dissapointed that my father couldn't come along, being that the men dressed in black had stuffed him into a box and buried him in the ground, as my mother, dressed in white cotton from head to toe, flung my little arms around in the wind, the depression from the day quickly wore away and my childish heart was replenished.
Mother pulled us away from the cliff and took my frozen hand between her two, rubbing them furiously to coaxe the chill away.
"Come on now, little Annette. Let us go home and cook up a feast for just the two of us." She said with a smile that never quite reached her eyes. My small orbs glanced up questioningly into hers, the smile sliding off my five-year-old face ever so gently as I realized I could see her pain. I suppose as a five-year-old it hadn't quite sunk into me that I would no longer be scooped up into Papa's arms and wooshed around like a bird anymore. I simply realized my beloved mother was in pain, and I hadn't any idea in my tiny heart of hearts why.
The walk home always took at least an hour, just to get to the outskirts of a rapidly growing town. It was nothing more than a dirt road with many travellers going to and from Tuscany and Rome, simply passing through our town stopping only to get supplies and so forth. As we walked home, my mother's continuing depression could not only be seen in her eyes, but felt. Almost what most of you odd spiritual people would call an Aura. I suppose. As we continued to walk along the road, ignoring passing people, I couldn't help but notice a very tall man as I turned around to watch a horse and cart pass going the opposite direction.
As nothing more than a mere child I simply followed the gaze of the brown horse and my eyes fell upon the most interesting stranger I had ever seen before. The stranger did not have black hair, as most would accuse a vampire of having, nor was the shade of brown stunning in any way. It was not at all the tall nature of the stranger, who towered over my 2 foot 9 inch frame by at least six feet that attracted my gaze to him, or the fact that he had on a very loosened version of the men in black's clothing on, revealing the starts to a very pale but sculpted chest. No, from behind this ever slightly curling curtain of hair peeked a pair of black eyes filled with such an odd emotion I'd never seen before that held me captivated. I stopped and stared at the man wearing the tattered black suit and loose white dress shirt, causing my mother to pause along with me and gaze in the direction of just what had her daughter so very interested.
I suppose it was just a coincidence of rumors that started later in the years of the 1950s when an array of odd movies came out that a vampire can control a victim's thoughts by simply looking at them. This seemed to be the case until I learned otherwise in.. I continuosly lose track of my story! All things forgotten, my mother was just as captivated as her five year old daughter. My gaze left the tall brown haired man to look back into the face of my mother, who's face had gone completely white at the sight of this man. She hastily grabbed my hand up again, one which she'd dropped in her gawking, and scolded me for staring.
"Come now Annette, you and mommy must get home soon. We are moving to Rome!" She said quietly with a very happy smile on her face. "It would be a shame to miss the cart leaving tomorrow afternoon should we be late because we aren't packed."
I blinked as my mother towed me along. This was news to me! I simply didn't want to just leave behind Bella and Fransisco wondering where in the world I'd gone on a day's notice. Odd how this registered in my mind but my father's death did not. As displeased as I was, I knew not to argue with mama's point of view. I'd gotten too many whippings to know better. So simply trudged unhappily along after her as our pace quickened. Her grip on my hand had tightened painfully, and it was all she could do not to keep glancing back over her shoulder. At one point halfway through our journey I looked back to see if the stranger was still there; he was not. And although I could not see the man, for some odd reason my eyes searched the path beside us to see if he had simply changed sides of the road.
When we arrived home, mother didn't waste a moment. She hurriedly went to change into traveling clothes, breezing through the dining/living room to her and papa's bedroom. I followed her in, watching her pale face contort into worry, then into panic, and back to worry. The sudden shift in her emotions as she threw open drawers and jerked the necessities out of the drawer onto the bed they shared. Seeing as I was five, most of my clothing was in this same drawer, so I noted some of my dresses and underclothes were thrown with her things. When she was done tossing things carelessly out of the drawers she didn't even turn as she went to my small child-size bed in the closet of their room and yanked our traveling trunk out and plunked it on the bed.
She finally seemed to notice her daughter standing in the doorway with curiousity written all over her face, only she had flinched rather than smiled.
"Oh." She gasped, placing a hand over her heart. "Annie you scared me!"
She motioned me toward her with a quick flap of her hand.
"Come now, we need to hurry baby-dearest." She rushed, pulling me into the room. "Why don't you help mama load up the trunk?"
I nodded happily and began stuffing things in just as she was, not caring whether it was folded or wadded up. My little hands went about their tasks, not minding the urgency I could almost taste in the air. I rationalized this as a need to get to the coach station as soon as possible, and I was fine. After around ten minutes we were well packed. Mama had locked the trunk carefully with the key and then she spun around from the bedside with a wide smile, kneeling to my level. All hints of worry and stress had dissapeared from her face, and she had closed her eyes to sheild any sincerity from me.
"Alright Annie, I need you to put this in your pocket like a big girl and hold it for mama." She held the key up beside her smiling face and finally opened her eyes for me to see. I read relief, and underlying caution. There was something else there that completely dissapeared when the sound of our door opening came faintly from the living room.
Papa! was my first thought. But after my Mother's face lost the rest of its glow of human healthiness and shoved me down under the bed with a very panicked finger to her lips demanding my silence I began to think it wasn't father. Then Mother did something terribly odd: She disappeared for a moment and came back to me, her arm covered in blood from a long gash, and a kitchen knife in her hand. Mama grabbed me and began to smear the sticky red substance over my hair, face, and dress. I opened my mouth to complain, but she quickly put her finger to her mouth. Terror was written in her eyes as her colourless face went completely blank. Something was horrifically wrong. And so I listened to her, despite the rusted, salty scent of my Mother's blood touching my sensitive nose.
"Don't. Leave. This. Spot." Mama said, her words heavy with meaning. And with that, Mama disappeared. And I do mean disappeared, as in I never saw her past that moment for a long, long time. I heard my mother speaking in low viscious tones she never used with Papa. So it wasn't Papa. The other voice was an angry lazy, something I'd never heard in a voice before. Soon the noises of their arguement went up in tone until I heard a loud crash. Something broke on a far wall, and Mama screamed. Then a series of screeching of protest from what must have been our sparce furniture, as well as the occasional thud of something falling over, quick footsteps and screaming. I lay under the bed in complete submission, understanding just why Mama had commanded I stay here. The sounds only went on for a moment, before Mama's shoes clicked quickly as she ran into her room. I could see her pale dusty shoes enter the room running as she grabbed the knob of the door, slammed it, and locked it firmly. She went to the far left of the room and hesitated there, but was only there for a second before a loud crack sounded and the door flew away from the hinges. My body jolted in fear, tight with tension as one black clad foot entered, soon followed noiselessly by another.
"You stay away from Annette." Mama snarled. I was completely taken aback Mama would use such a tone, for I'd never heard it used with me. Her white shoes took another step back, trying to move away from the black dress shoes advancing on her. The shoes suddenly blurred with speed, and were over by Mama's in a second.
"You made a deal with us, Maria Antoinette DeGarcia. We won't allow you to go back on our part. Where is the delightful little kipper? I won't ask again." A smoothe rich tone came coldly.
"I killed her myself when we came home. She will never, ever fall into your hand you filthy sorry sons of the de-" Then Mama's shoes were lifted off the ground as a loud squelching sound filled the air. It was silent for an agonizing long moment, before the room was filled with screams.
I could only lay there on my stomach in petrified fear as I heard a loud splat and noticed a bright red blot stain our wood floor. It was joined soon by another red smear as my mother's cries continued to fill my ears, though suddenly silenced a moment later as a loud, bodily thud took it's place. I listened to this loud disgusting sound fill the room, three on the back wall, four times on the left sidewall, and countless other times along what sounded to be dozens of inventive surfaces. That red splotch seemed to grow in front of my eyes as the substance covered Mama and Papa's bedroom floor. After what seemed like hours, the horrific sound stopped.
Of course, this could be attributed to the fact that the familiar presence talking to Mother had left with her and I had yet to come out of my odd, calming stupor to notice this important change. I was still in this strange comforting state when a pair of strong tanned hands reached beneath the bed and felt around before finding my body and tugging at my dress. My eyes finally shifted to the groping hand and my brain answered by laying the small palm of my hand onto of the wandering one. I was then tugged out via this hand, and pulled into the arms of some man with a long black beard. I only remember because the beard tickled my temple.
"..covered in blood!"
"What happened to Maria?"
"Poor girl!"
"Dear God, what a shame..."".. just sick.."
Dozens upon dozens of different statements were said about the room. Before they had found me, the discovered blood in the kitchen that was just to the right of our living/dining room, and had followed the trail down the hall and to the right in Mama and Papa's room. Inside of this room the found a blood-soaked floor, walls smeared with differnet shapes imprinted on their once white paint, and blood nearly seeping through the trunk that Mother had packed before meeting the stranger. The one to which I still held the key, and refused to let go.
'Paul', or so I learned his name had been, had been the one to stumble upon my little self. He had slipped on blood throughout the room, checking nooks and crannies for any sign of Maria or myself, prayer that somehow they would find either of our bodies. When Paul found mine, the men and women that had known my Father and Mother wept with releif. As Paul cradled my body, the scent of drying and decayed blood stuck in my hair and over my face. I shivered violently in fear of something I did not know. The moment someone touched the key I held onto, I screamed bloody murder. Paul had tried to coax it from my hand, then tried to pry my fingers away from it. When he failed, Bella's Mother came and soothed my hand, coaxing once again for me to let go.
I still refused. And it had been a good thing I did. When they put me on a coach to an orphanage in Rome for special children, they packed the trunk along with it. Since that day it has been a legacy for myself to carry on. Upon arriving in a Roman Orphanage where they raised children in the Catholic way of the Faith, I was immeadiately loved on by the nuns that lived there.
Not that I had ever cared the moment I had entered. They gave me a small room, shared with four other children. It was nothing more than a scarce room, with two sets of chests by which to put your clothes in and a little metal framed bed with a spring mattress. I shared my drawers with another little girl, newly moved in as well, whos name was Jeannette. Her parents died in a tragic fire, and she hadn't any relatives that wanted to take her.
While most children cried at night because of the death of their parents, much like Jeanette did, my first nights were dwelt on the thing that killed my mother. I wondered, and thought, and pondered a little bit more. I was sure beyond any reasonable doubt that the creature was the man that had been traveling behind us on the road. The shoes matched. Of course many more people would find reasonable doubt in the evidence my young mind presented, but out of something many people believe only animals have, my instinct told me otherwise.
The enormous stone church that housed myself and the other children in Rome had many fascinating attributes to it, such as an extremely well fashioned Roman Bath that included the tepidarium, caladarium, and frigidarium, garnished with small fauns and fairies along the bath for the childrens sake as the splashed around in the tepidarium for pleasure. However, I found myself most enthralled with the study. The Bibliotheca was an enormous study, taking up nearly half of the larger west wing portion of the sturdy old building.
Allow me to tell you the tale of the day that I met Brother Petros of the Church of Saints, one of the brothers that worked at the church and was part of the clergy.
Rules. If you haven't ever noticed while in your usual vampiric dreamland, or werewolf haven, most of these horrifically odd yet particularly cheezy stories have rules to them. Almost unspoken rules. Like vampires hate light, or werewolfs need a full moon to change into their tempermental hairy state. Of course there are a dozen other monster stories with a million other rules. Of course lets not forget this story. It also comes with its own unspoken set of rules. Ones which I'm not all that interested in letting you, the reader, know about until I've decided to tell you my typical schpeel involving those two (in)famous brands of terrors many of us tremble in fear of at night when we've watched one too many horror movies, among others that you didn't even know about!
Allow me to pause in this beginning to make an introduction of myself. Annette, if you please. Or sometimes Annie, Angie, Angel, or a number of other odd nicknames picked up from the dozens of different places at different times that have marked my life. My unnaturally, long human life-span. Apart from my lengthy human years, I'm fairly normal. Except for the uncountable unusual nervous habits I developed from years of ... well, we'll get to the other explanation later. I have never been able to stare a person in the eyes for too long. My record for watching one stretch of road is longer than my ability to look at a person in the eyes. You must understand first off: Looking into the window of a person's soul is much more intimidating than simply looking into the window of a person's house. How do I know? Why don't I tell you one of my very first experiences with vampires. Back in the day before I found out one of the many rules to this odd underground of creatures and legends.
On October 1944 in Italy, a little ways from Rome in the once small town of Viareggio that bordered the Ligurian Sea, lived me. Interesting how that rhymes. As I was saying, in the town by the sea where I was born was my first experience with what we now call the Vampire. I was a small girl of five at the time, enjoying the sea breeze like any child would..
The wind blew past my caramel coloured hair, pinching a squeal of delight from my rosy mouth, my cheeks red with the begginnings of the winter cold. My mother held my hand as we stood on the bank of the rarely found cliffs aways off from the main town of Viareggio. Here mother and I loved to see the ocean waves lap up the sides of the craggy mouth of the cliff, splashing white foam gloriously high in the air as the wind whipped the wheat-like grass to and fro. Today we were simply sightseeing this marvelous sight rather than staying for our customary picnic like we would in summertime, just before we would abandon the outside for the coming months of cold. I giggled as the scent of salt tickled my nose delightfully; this was by far one of my favorite past-times.
My mother walked the two of us closer and closer to the gaping edge of the cliff, carefully manuvering me so that I was naught but a few feet before her. When we were about a foot away from the edge, I felt a blast of chilly wind kick up and through my downy head of long brown hair back. Mother suddenly threw my arms wide before me and laughed with me in delight as the feeling of flight spread through my being and tossed my little dreams higher than ever expected.
"Reach for the sky, little Annette!" she shouted above the roaring of the ocean and wind. My child's mouth squealed again in pure pleasure. Although dissapointed that my father couldn't come along, being that the men dressed in black had stuffed him into a box and buried him in the ground, as my mother, dressed in white cotton from head to toe, flung my little arms around in the wind, the depression from the day quickly wore away and my childish heart was replenished.
Mother pulled us away from the cliff and took my frozen hand between her two, rubbing them furiously to coaxe the chill away.
"Come on now, little Annette. Let us go home and cook up a feast for just the two of us." She said with a smile that never quite reached her eyes. My small orbs glanced up questioningly into hers, the smile sliding off my five-year-old face ever so gently as I realized I could see her pain. I suppose as a five-year-old it hadn't quite sunk into me that I would no longer be scooped up into Papa's arms and wooshed around like a bird anymore. I simply realized my beloved mother was in pain, and I hadn't any idea in my tiny heart of hearts why.
The walk home always took at least an hour, just to get to the outskirts of a rapidly growing town. It was nothing more than a dirt road with many travellers going to and from Tuscany and Rome, simply passing through our town stopping only to get supplies and so forth. As we walked home, my mother's continuing depression could not only be seen in her eyes, but felt. Almost what most of you odd spiritual people would call an Aura. I suppose. As we continued to walk along the road, ignoring passing people, I couldn't help but notice a very tall man as I turned around to watch a horse and cart pass going the opposite direction.
As nothing more than a mere child I simply followed the gaze of the brown horse and my eyes fell upon the most interesting stranger I had ever seen before. The stranger did not have black hair, as most would accuse a vampire of having, nor was the shade of brown stunning in any way. It was not at all the tall nature of the stranger, who towered over my 2 foot 9 inch frame by at least six feet that attracted my gaze to him, or the fact that he had on a very loosened version of the men in black's clothing on, revealing the starts to a very pale but sculpted chest. No, from behind this ever slightly curling curtain of hair peeked a pair of black eyes filled with such an odd emotion I'd never seen before that held me captivated. I stopped and stared at the man wearing the tattered black suit and loose white dress shirt, causing my mother to pause along with me and gaze in the direction of just what had her daughter so very interested.
I suppose it was just a coincidence of rumors that started later in the years of the 1950s when an array of odd movies came out that a vampire can control a victim's thoughts by simply looking at them. This seemed to be the case until I learned otherwise in.. I continuosly lose track of my story! All things forgotten, my mother was just as captivated as her five year old daughter. My gaze left the tall brown haired man to look back into the face of my mother, who's face had gone completely white at the sight of this man. She hastily grabbed my hand up again, one which she'd dropped in her gawking, and scolded me for staring.
"Come now Annette, you and mommy must get home soon. We are moving to Rome!" She said quietly with a very happy smile on her face. "It would be a shame to miss the cart leaving tomorrow afternoon should we be late because we aren't packed."
I blinked as my mother towed me along. This was news to me! I simply didn't want to just leave behind Bella and Fransisco wondering where in the world I'd gone on a day's notice. Odd how this registered in my mind but my father's death did not. As displeased as I was, I knew not to argue with mama's point of view. I'd gotten too many whippings to know better. So simply trudged unhappily along after her as our pace quickened. Her grip on my hand had tightened painfully, and it was all she could do not to keep glancing back over her shoulder. At one point halfway through our journey I looked back to see if the stranger was still there; he was not. And although I could not see the man, for some odd reason my eyes searched the path beside us to see if he had simply changed sides of the road.
When we arrived home, mother didn't waste a moment. She hurriedly went to change into traveling clothes, breezing through the dining/living room to her and papa's bedroom. I followed her in, watching her pale face contort into worry, then into panic, and back to worry. The sudden shift in her emotions as she threw open drawers and jerked the necessities out of the drawer onto the bed they shared. Seeing as I was five, most of my clothing was in this same drawer, so I noted some of my dresses and underclothes were thrown with her things. When she was done tossing things carelessly out of the drawers she didn't even turn as she went to my small child-size bed in the closet of their room and yanked our traveling trunk out and plunked it on the bed.
She finally seemed to notice her daughter standing in the doorway with curiousity written all over her face, only she had flinched rather than smiled.
"Oh." She gasped, placing a hand over her heart. "Annie you scared me!"
She motioned me toward her with a quick flap of her hand.
"Come now, we need to hurry baby-dearest." She rushed, pulling me into the room. "Why don't you help mama load up the trunk?"
I nodded happily and began stuffing things in just as she was, not caring whether it was folded or wadded up. My little hands went about their tasks, not minding the urgency I could almost taste in the air. I rationalized this as a need to get to the coach station as soon as possible, and I was fine. After around ten minutes we were well packed. Mama had locked the trunk carefully with the key and then she spun around from the bedside with a wide smile, kneeling to my level. All hints of worry and stress had dissapeared from her face, and she had closed her eyes to sheild any sincerity from me.
"Alright Annie, I need you to put this in your pocket like a big girl and hold it for mama." She held the key up beside her smiling face and finally opened her eyes for me to see. I read relief, and underlying caution. There was something else there that completely dissapeared when the sound of our door opening came faintly from the living room.
Papa! was my first thought. But after my Mother's face lost the rest of its glow of human healthiness and shoved me down under the bed with a very panicked finger to her lips demanding my silence I began to think it wasn't father. Then Mother did something terribly odd: She disappeared for a moment and came back to me, her arm covered in blood from a long gash, and a kitchen knife in her hand. Mama grabbed me and began to smear the sticky red substance over my hair, face, and dress. I opened my mouth to complain, but she quickly put her finger to her mouth. Terror was written in her eyes as her colourless face went completely blank. Something was horrifically wrong. And so I listened to her, despite the rusted, salty scent of my Mother's blood touching my sensitive nose.
"Don't. Leave. This. Spot." Mama said, her words heavy with meaning. And with that, Mama disappeared. And I do mean disappeared, as in I never saw her past that moment for a long, long time. I heard my mother speaking in low viscious tones she never used with Papa. So it wasn't Papa. The other voice was an angry lazy, something I'd never heard in a voice before. Soon the noises of their arguement went up in tone until I heard a loud crash. Something broke on a far wall, and Mama screamed. Then a series of screeching of protest from what must have been our sparce furniture, as well as the occasional thud of something falling over, quick footsteps and screaming. I lay under the bed in complete submission, understanding just why Mama had commanded I stay here. The sounds only went on for a moment, before Mama's shoes clicked quickly as she ran into her room. I could see her pale dusty shoes enter the room running as she grabbed the knob of the door, slammed it, and locked it firmly. She went to the far left of the room and hesitated there, but was only there for a second before a loud crack sounded and the door flew away from the hinges. My body jolted in fear, tight with tension as one black clad foot entered, soon followed noiselessly by another.
"You stay away from Annette." Mama snarled. I was completely taken aback Mama would use such a tone, for I'd never heard it used with me. Her white shoes took another step back, trying to move away from the black dress shoes advancing on her. The shoes suddenly blurred with speed, and were over by Mama's in a second.
"You made a deal with us, Maria Antoinette DeGarcia. We won't allow you to go back on our part. Where is the delightful little kipper? I won't ask again." A smoothe rich tone came coldly.
"I killed her myself when we came home. She will never, ever fall into your hand you filthy sorry sons of the de-" Then Mama's shoes were lifted off the ground as a loud squelching sound filled the air. It was silent for an agonizing long moment, before the room was filled with screams.
I could only lay there on my stomach in petrified fear as I heard a loud splat and noticed a bright red blot stain our wood floor. It was joined soon by another red smear as my mother's cries continued to fill my ears, though suddenly silenced a moment later as a loud, bodily thud took it's place. I listened to this loud disgusting sound fill the room, three on the back wall, four times on the left sidewall, and countless other times along what sounded to be dozens of inventive surfaces. That red splotch seemed to grow in front of my eyes as the substance covered Mama and Papa's bedroom floor. After what seemed like hours, the horrific sound stopped.
Of course, this could be attributed to the fact that the familiar presence talking to Mother had left with her and I had yet to come out of my odd, calming stupor to notice this important change. I was still in this strange comforting state when a pair of strong tanned hands reached beneath the bed and felt around before finding my body and tugging at my dress. My eyes finally shifted to the groping hand and my brain answered by laying the small palm of my hand onto of the wandering one. I was then tugged out via this hand, and pulled into the arms of some man with a long black beard. I only remember because the beard tickled my temple.
"..covered in blood!"
"What happened to Maria?"
"Poor girl!"
"Dear God, what a shame..."".. just sick.."
Dozens upon dozens of different statements were said about the room. Before they had found me, the discovered blood in the kitchen that was just to the right of our living/dining room, and had followed the trail down the hall and to the right in Mama and Papa's room. Inside of this room the found a blood-soaked floor, walls smeared with differnet shapes imprinted on their once white paint, and blood nearly seeping through the trunk that Mother had packed before meeting the stranger. The one to which I still held the key, and refused to let go.
'Paul', or so I learned his name had been, had been the one to stumble upon my little self. He had slipped on blood throughout the room, checking nooks and crannies for any sign of Maria or myself, prayer that somehow they would find either of our bodies. When Paul found mine, the men and women that had known my Father and Mother wept with releif. As Paul cradled my body, the scent of drying and decayed blood stuck in my hair and over my face. I shivered violently in fear of something I did not know. The moment someone touched the key I held onto, I screamed bloody murder. Paul had tried to coax it from my hand, then tried to pry my fingers away from it. When he failed, Bella's Mother came and soothed my hand, coaxing once again for me to let go.
I still refused. And it had been a good thing I did. When they put me on a coach to an orphanage in Rome for special children, they packed the trunk along with it. Since that day it has been a legacy for myself to carry on. Upon arriving in a Roman Orphanage where they raised children in the Catholic way of the Faith, I was immeadiately loved on by the nuns that lived there.
Not that I had ever cared the moment I had entered. They gave me a small room, shared with four other children. It was nothing more than a scarce room, with two sets of chests by which to put your clothes in and a little metal framed bed with a spring mattress. I shared my drawers with another little girl, newly moved in as well, whos name was Jeannette. Her parents died in a tragic fire, and she hadn't any relatives that wanted to take her.
While most children cried at night because of the death of their parents, much like Jeanette did, my first nights were dwelt on the thing that killed my mother. I wondered, and thought, and pondered a little bit more. I was sure beyond any reasonable doubt that the creature was the man that had been traveling behind us on the road. The shoes matched. Of course many more people would find reasonable doubt in the evidence my young mind presented, but out of something many people believe only animals have, my instinct told me otherwise.
The enormous stone church that housed myself and the other children in Rome had many fascinating attributes to it, such as an extremely well fashioned Roman Bath that included the tepidarium, caladarium, and frigidarium, garnished with small fauns and fairies along the bath for the childrens sake as the splashed around in the tepidarium for pleasure. However, I found myself most enthralled with the study. The Bibliotheca was an enormous study, taking up nearly half of the larger west wing portion of the sturdy old building.
Allow me to tell you the tale of the day that I met Brother Petros of the Church of Saints, one of the brothers that worked at the church and was part of the clergy.