Lucan, Part 2

By Christine Duts

Having left the ordeals of his mortal life, Lucan has survived immortality for over a thousand years. His losses and victories, enemies and allies all have a unique role to play in this unwilling journey to the true fount of vampires and werewolves. His ties to the banshees, the animosity between him and werewolves, and his bond with Hadea; all is revealed in this incredible saga.
Sometimes the end is just the beginning.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christine Duts
• Release date: Jan 11, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463414170

Christine Duts

I was born in Germany, my father being an officer in the Belgian Armed Forces stationed in Germany. I grew up as a Belgian, and later went to London and then Los Cabos, Mexico, where I eventually settled. I am a teacher of World History and Literature at a private high school. Although I love teaching and my students, my passion is writing. I have been writing since the age of six, and I still have the very first story I ever wrote, packed in a tattered suitcase; I have lost the key, and I will have to cut it open to get that story.I often find inspirations while walking on the beach or sitting on the sand and staring at the waves, and I find that dreams can inspire me too. My goal is to live off my writing, because it is who I am; if I do not write, something is missing in my life.I also rescue and foster animals; and I volunteer for Baja SAFE, an animal rescue organisation. Naturally, I often have a variety of rescue animals in my house. My dream is to run an animal sanctuary from my land in Los Cabos, and that my writing can support such a dream.

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Chapter XXXV: Compromise

We spent nearly two more decades in Antioch, and at a certain point we had to come to terms with our son’s death. When his time came, at the age of fifty-nine, we stood outside his house and waited for the inevitable. His wife had passed away a year before him, and he had not been the same without her. Althea believed that he died of a broken heart. His children – our grandson and granddaughter – sat by his side.

Marius tried to speak, but every word cost him immense effort.

Do not speak, his son urged him, but Marius would not listen. He insisted in getting it off his chest, and he stammered, Y-your grandfather…

A little taken aback, the young man who resembled him so much gazed at him in surprise, wondering why he mentioned me – the one who had never been there, the one he had believed dead.

He… is alive.

He must be over eighty now. I doubt that he is alive.

Violently, Marius shook his head.

Not in that way.

The young man stared at him, as if wondering in what other way one could be alive, and his twin sister gave him a puzzled look. She seemed to doubt her father’s sanity.

He is dead, father. He died a long time ago. You said so yourself.

Vehemently, with the remaining strength he could muster, he shook his head.

His children did not believe him, thinking that he was delirious and that he did not know what he was saying. It was better that way. It would not do them any good to meet me now. Mine was a world that had to remain separated from theirs. Marius, however, could not tell them any more. He coughed and wheezed, and at last his eyes lost their final sparkle of life and stared at them emptily. Life left him so soon that his own children did not even realize it. He was gone, and so was the tale of my existence.

My grandson did not remain in Antioch after his father’s death. He had always been an adventurer, and he never married, though I had often seen him with courtesans. He had travelled frequently, but now he was to leave Antioch for good. After arranging a grand burial for their father, my granddaughter returned to her husband, and her brother freed the slaves. He travelled west, heading towards Rome. Erastus spent the remainder of his days in Persia, where he married the Gaelic slave. He had three more children with her. His sister, Lidia, gave birth to two girls and one boy, but after that I stopped keeping track. Althea was the one who wrote everything down. I often told her that there was no use. We could never interact with them anyway, but she replied that it would be interesting to see our family tree grow over the centuries and observe where it branched to. I could not care less, but it gave her something to do. She clung to our family, because it was our only human side that she wanted to cherish.

I continued my wine business, which became very successful and provided a steady supply of gold, allowing us to live in wealth. Over the course of the centuries, I continued to invest my capital in various business ventures. In that way, I made sure that I always had enough money to pay servants, ensure the silence of carriage drivers, and provide for any expenses I needed to make.

The temple kept its farce of a cult and drew more believers for over a decade. Contrary to what Althea had said, we co-existed with Orion’s small coven, despite what had happened. We hunted in the same streets, but we avoided each other.

Orion did not seek me out for fifteen years. He knew that Athena had provoked the attack, and he did not seem to harbor any feelings of revenge for my having destroyed her. As time went by, the temple lost its followers and people abandoned the strange cults that had taken over Antioch. Fifteen years after the assault on Claudia’s home, the temple was abandoned by its members and even by its priest. Its blood drinkers – the fake gods – remained in their lair under the base of the giant statue, but their victims no longer walked willingly into their arms. When dust settled on the stone birds, the fountain stopped flowing, and the blood smudges dried, Orion hunted the streets at night, and it was on one of those nights that I encountered him.

I was alone. Althea and I had argued over a slave girl. I had merely praised the girl for her skill in mending broken amphorae, but when Althea saw us exchange words, her jealousy took over and she accused me blindly. She would not listen to me, and, in her anger, she killed the poor girl, who had not done anything wrong. She snapped her neck and left her body on the floor. Then she gave me a challenging look, which merged triumph with dementia, a look I would have preferred not to have seen and which was rather disconcerting.

This time her jealousy had gone too far, and infuriated, I stormed out of the house, calling her names I will not repeat here. What occurred I describe in only a few words, and the reason for that is that these scenes became quite repetitive. It was the first time, though, that a girl had lost her life, and it would not be the last time.

It was this obsessive jealousy which drove me away from my wife and led me to go on trips that lasted a few months and sometimes even years. As a mortal, Althea had been reasonable, and her jealousy had been something she joked about; but as an immortal it had become a source of uncontrollable rage. In all cases she had no justification, and in the one case where she had had every reason to go berserk, she had not… Ariana had been the only one for me, and despite her jealousy of the girl, Althea had never suspected anything between us. It did not make much sense to me, and every time she started to rage, I would make sure to leave the house, to avoid a fight and the unnecessary death of another girl.

I was angry and not willing to witness any more scenes of jealousy, and it was in this state that I ran into Orion. In fact, I did not run into him. He had waited for me, wanting to meet me, and when I crossed the town square, I saw him standing by the portico of a grand official building. His stare was penetrating and when I reached him, he kept those cold, stark eyes on me. No malice or vengeance came from him. He seemed pleased to see me, and when I came closer he opened his arms. We hugged like brothers.

When he let go of me, he said, You expected me to kill you.

Not so much. Althea was the one who thought so. I was not sure, though, how you would receive me if we met again.

He smiled.

She asked for it, he said. He meant Athena. She attacked your sister’s home. I would have defended it, too. I would have done the same thing.

She was your companion.

Yes, he said dismissively. "But she was getting uncontrollable. I could hardly get through to her. To her, Claudia had to die. She said so many times. I could have prevented the attack, but

then, who knows? I did not even know when it was going to happen. I knew, when you killed her…"

You felt it?

Maker-fledgling bond.

Tell me about it.

It is an intense bond. At a short distance, we can call and feel each other. At a large distance, it becomes more difficult. We can then sense that the other one is in trouble, but we do not always know what it is. When you killed Athena, though, I could feel the blow in my neck. I knew exactly how you killed her.

He described it as an ordinary event, as if it had not been his long-term companion who had been destroyed. And we talked as if we had just picked up a conversation which we had left unfinished yesterday, as if fifteen years had not passed at all. Our friendship was still there and we had forgiven each other. It was a conversation we both knew we should have had a long time ago.

Trust me, I wept for her. She was trouble and a pain, but I loved her. And yes, I wanted to kill you, but I also knew that you had acted in defense. You had defended your sister’s life. Therefore, I left you alone and I ordered the rest of the coven to do the same. They understood. They did not protest.

A cool breeze blew over the square, playing with a girl’s lustrous, black hair. The sight of her hair took me back to Ariana, to the visions her leaving soul had allowed me. I should have turned her… but if I had done so, Althea would have destroyed her. Damn Althea… she could be so wonderful and so cruel at the same time!

It was too late for your sister, was it not? Orion asked.

Yes, it was, but we saved her son.

Where is he?

In Persia.

He nodded.

Far enough.

He then took my arm and said, Let’s walk.

And so, we promenaded through town and talked about the last fifteen years. He told me about the temple and noticed my amused smile when he mentioned that the cult was over.

It was all a lie, Orion. It is good it is over.

He did not reply. We continued our walk and spent all night together. When dawn approached, I had no desire to return home, but I did not wish to go to the temple either. We could have walked on and enjoyed the day, but we were both tired; I had not rested in a long time and neither had he. So, Orion took me to an underground chamber on the outskirts of Antioch. It was hidden under an old ruin. A trap door, which was concealed under a bush, led the way into an underground world he had kept secret for decades. Not even Athena had known about this.

He pulled the trap door open, and I noticed that the bush concealing it was in fact dead. It was a bunch of dry branches which had once sprouted green leaves and flowers, but that was no more. Its roots were cut off under the trap door. It was ingenious, really. No one would suspect it. This little hideout was in fact the inspiration for my underground chamber outside Paris in the eighteenth century, the one where I took the mortal Aurélie and made her a blood drinker. But I am centuries ahead of myself.

Orion led me down wooden steps. The stairway smelt moist – rain had probably seeped through some time ago and dried slowly. In time, the wood would become moldy and he would have to replace the stairs. We arrived in a comfortable room. It was small, but sufficient for one man. There was a table covered with documents, one wooden chair next to it, a few torches placed in the wall, and an Egyptian sarcophagus. An elaborately carved mask covered its head, and I wondered where he had taken it from. It looked like an expensive sarcophagus, only fit for a king.

He lit the torches and said, It will make the dampness go away.

Then he opened the sarcophagus and invited me to enter. Soft blankets had been carefully arranged in the cask, and feeling tired, I stepped in. He made himself comfortable next to me and closed the lid.

After a hundred years in Antioch, Althea and I finally returned to Rome, and what a surprise awaited us! The city had changed, and not for the better. Although always beautiful, it had decayed. The Colosseum stood neglected, a giant of a blood-filled past now cursed to permanent silence. Plebeian houses had been destroyed and haphazardly rebuilt. Patrician villas were either abandoned or taken by new families. Some of the villas were falling to ruin, but the ones that were occupied had been restored to their former glory.

Our villa was still standing and had been invaded by a young family, which we quickly chased out. It was in Rome where I began to enjoy daylight more. I had been able to do so after my fifth year of immortality, but I had never been much inclined to take advantage of it. I suppose that I was a creature of habit. When Althea’s jealousy increased, however, I tended to disappear for long periods. I even found an old ruin and excavated a hole that was large enough to accommodate a comfortable room below. Essentially, I copied Orion’s underground dungeon, but I made mine more luxurious, as I spent several weeks or months there whenever Althea became unreasonable.

It was a pity, really. When I married her, she had been a delightful and witty woman; immortality, though, had brought out the worst in her. It had not diminished my love; that would never change, for deep down she was still the woman I had fallen in love with. She just did not let her come out that often any more. When she did, however, we had incredible times together.

And so, in this manner, our lives went on. We spent centuries in Rome. We loved and fought; cherished and bickered; laughed and cried. She pulled me towards her and pushed me away, and in that way our long separations began. If I did not stay in my underground chamber, I usually went to England and spent some time with Morgan, who brought me peace and calm. On other occasions, I travelled east and fell into some adventures: but I will not go into details. They were certainly interesting and worthy enough for this account, but they are unrelated to any of the described events.

Sometimes Althea also left and when she did, she would make sure to keep track of our family tree by visiting the areas where far relatives dwelled – if one could still call them that. According to her, Erastus and Lilia’s descendants were still in Persia. Marius’s daughter had remained in Antioch and so had her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. His son, Marcellus, had never married, but he had spread his seed all over Europe if I was to believe my wife. His offspring had begun families in countries which were by then known as Romania, Poland, Germany, Belgium, France, and the Netherlands. She kept track of all of them. I thought that this

was exhausting, but she enjoyed it, and whenever she produced her scrolls and went over her list, there was a joyful sparkle in her eyes which I did not see that often any more.

In the fifth century, I encountered Gael and he took me down to the Catacombs, the very same ones where I would take Aurélie many centuries later. Penelope received me warmly, and she was relieved to find me alive. She claimed that not many fledglings made it here, thinking themselves invincible and taking unnecessary risks, which inevitably led to their doom. Back then the irises of her eyes had slowly begun to merge with the whites, giving them a strange brown-grey hue. She informed me that Gael, Balthazar, and she had dwelled here for four hundred years already, and that I was never to disclose the location to anyone. She was now much more willing to answer my questions, and so I spent two days in the Catacombs of Rome, learning what I could and finally losing my loathing of her. I actually began to like and even admire her. She also learnt a great many things from me. She already knew about Orion and she was pleased that we had become allies. She had heard a great deal about him and thought that the fake cult he had set up was quite ingenious. She also learnt about Althea and the family tree she was writing down. I wisely left out Morgan, since I remembered that there was an ancient feud between both creatures.

When I returned home after that short escapade, Althea received me with a warm hug, and we went hunting together. All quarrels were forgotten.

During all those centuries Althea and I would fight and then return with loving embraces. It was the way it was. I was careful enough only to hire male help in the house, which avoided many jealous scenes and saved quite a few lives. It certainly made a difference, and we grew closer together again. Finally, after centuries of fighting, we had found a compromise and a way into each other’s arms again. It had taken us six hundred years…

Chapter XXXVI: Finding Each Other

If you allow me, I will skip some more centuries. If I were to describe every event and every adventure, I would never finish my account. Despite missing nearly a thousand years, I still have so much to tell you. I will, however, give a brief summary of what we witnessed, for there were many historical events and people that impacted the world, and some of them we met.

Althea was lucky enough to lay eyes on the legendary Jeanne d’Arc (or Joan of Arc) in France, during one of our separations. She did not actually speak to her, but she saw her as she led her army on the great siege of Orleans. Jeanne’s actions enthralled Althea; her courage was inspiring and her men would have followed her to the end of the world. She truly proved herself to the other captains who had doubted her at first for being a woman; later they were forced to admit that she rallied the men where they never could, and that she had led the French army to thunderous victory over the English. Althea wept when this brave, beautiful maiden was betrayed and burned at the stake. She wanted to rip the French king’s heart out when he did nothing to save her. It was because of Joan of Arc that he had won back the throne, yet he let her burn. Althea left France, cursing its cowardly king.

In the beginning of the fifteenth century we made the acquaintance of a member of the English Court, who then invited us there. Thus, we met King Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. I will not dwell on Anne’s destiny, for we all know what happened to her. Being there, though, was quite interesting, and both Althea and I found Anne very educated, witty, and excellent company. She was quick in giving response and was not intimidated by the male members of the Court. She also seemed to be the only woman who was not afraid to speak her mind with King Henry, a feat everyone else feared to do. The time we spent with her was actually a marvelous time for her, because Catherine of Aragon, Henry’s first wife, had recently passed away, an occasion that provoked much joy for Henry and Anne. Unfortunately, Anne’s luck was not going to last. In that same year when everything looked so promising for her, she quickly came to her downfall. We had long left when the accusations against her began, but news travelled fast. Althea was sincerely affected when she heard of the execution, and she felt that the former queen had been framed. She often voiced her doubts on the grounds for the execution.

Treason? she spat, not believing a word of it, and when Henry married the young Jane Seymour only two weeks after Anne had been killed, she expressed the desire to return to England and drink his blood in vengeance. Henry VIII was certainly not in her good books, and as his repertoire of wives grew, she often scoffed at him whenever the topic came up.

When Anne’s daughter, Elizabeth, inherited the throne after her sister, Mary – or Bloody Mary as she was called – passed away, Althea rejoiced, and again she spat at the memory of Henry VIII, who had always wanted a son to inherit the throne. Elizabeth proved to be Anne’s ultimate triumph, according to Althea.

Elizabeth will be a great queen, my wife confidently predicted, and as it turned out, she was right. We never met this enlightened monarch. We did, however, go to the London Globe Theatre and we watched Shakespeare’s plays, which we delighted in. Sometimes we even spotted William Shakespeare himself among the actors. He often participated in his own plays on stage. At that time, we realized what a wonderful playwright he was, but we did not know how very privileged we were to live through all this history and lay eyes on this man

who toyed so marvelously with the English language. We loved how he brought out human emotions in his dramas and comedies, and those plays were really a link to our own lost humanity. Shakespeare’s art drew us back into the mortal lives we had lost, and therefore we enjoyed them more than mere mortals. We went to see Much Ado About Nothing four times; we truly enjoyed The Taming of the Shrew; we saw Othello twice; and we saw Macbeth once. We loved them all! A Midsummer Night’s Dream – how absolutely enjoyable it was! We went to see that one three times. We saw most of his plays, and we both avidly devoured his sonnets. My favorite was ‘My Mistress’ Eyes’, and Althea loved ‘Sonnet No. 18’. You could say that we were avid fans, although the word ‘fan’ did not exist in those days in that context. I am very happy and relieved that mankind has preserved Shakespeare’s works and that his plays can still be enjoyed at the theatre, and even as films. I still go to see his plays. Back then we never spoke to him, but we saw him, and that was honorable enough. No other mortal provoked such admiration in us.

There were quite a few people of importance we met or spotted from afar and we both felt privileged to have come close to them, but it was through Shakespeare’s plays that Althea and I found our way back together. She learnt to control her jealousy and even to laugh at it. So, when the era of the Renaissance took its course, Althea and I were very much united as husband and wife, and the privilege of meeting even more people of importance was still awaiting us. Everything looked splendid.

Chapter XXXVII: Tales from a Lost Brother

Italy was a great place to be during the Renaissance, but it was with reluctance that we left England and Shakespeare behind and returned to Rome. I hoped that Althea would remain sane even without his influence and that the days of her demented jealousy were truly over. We decided to make a few stops in Florence and Sienna, where we delighted in the new art. Renaissance means rebirth, and in this era artists were reviving old classical Greek and Roman styles, which to us was wonderful. We felt as if we were going back in time, back to the ancient Rome we had known as mortals, and yet, the art was different. Michelangelo and Raphael had their own personal touches and became legends in their lifetime. I will not dwell on their paintings and sculptures, for I am very well aware that not everyone is seduced by the same interests. It was an incredible time, though. Not only art was revived, but life and religion, too. Over were the days of the despondent religious belief that one had to spend one’s lifetime in misery, in order to – after death – frolic in heaven happily ever after. People reasoned that it was fine to enjoy themselves while still alive. Many no longer wanted to wait until they were dead to reap the rewards in heaven. The dreary beliefs of the Middle Ages were now replaced by secularism, and Catholicism had to content itself with other religions that had risen, such as Protestantism and Calvinism. There were many others, too numerous to list here. It was the early, hesitant beginning of religious tolerance, which – in my opinion – was a big step forward for mankind.

Rome welcomed us with open arms, and we had our villa on the Aventine Hill refurbished. It was a task that needed several workmen and it brought Althea much distraction. She enjoyed overseeing the renovations. Not that she needed to; the architect had no use for her assistance, but the good man did not protest. He seemed a bit in awe of her, due to her vampiric presence, which he could not fathom. Who would in this age of Enlightenment? It was a good era to walk among mortals, for no enlightened mind admitted our existence. We were deemed products of a dark imagination of the human mind, no more. Therefore, it was also easy to hunt and lure our victims into our arms. Until the very end they would not believe, and when the truth finally dawned on them, it was too late. The Renaissance was a welcome change for mortals, but also for us immortals. Indeed, we often sensed the presence of another blood drinker nearby. They were usually passing through, in search of a place to settle. We quickly let them know that we had laid claim to Rome, and that we would not tolerate anyone else, except for Penelope, of course, who still dwelled in Rome’s catacombs. It was she who really tolerated Althea and me, regardless of the fact that we had claimed this city more than a millennium ago. Once or twice we shared Rome with a vampire from Antioch’s lair, but they never stayed longer than a few months or years. And for old time’s sake, we accepted them. Orion never made an appearance, but we heard that he had made St. Petersburg his lair, and that he did not intend to leave soon. Apparently, he was enjoying himself immensely, and he had that wonderful Russian city all to himself.

Slavery was not over, but the Italian Renaissance cities had no use for it; every wealthy household had a live-in staff – maids and servants. Slaves were used on plantations overseas, on the exotic new continent in the West across the Atlantic Ocean that had been discovered and avidly explored and conquered. Slaves were also used in the colonies in the East, on the conquered lands and islands in the Pacific Ocean occupied mostly by the Dutch and the English

East India Companies. Stories of adventure reached us, and we were tempted to travel and discover these new territories. We often discussed where we would go first and we could not always agree, but we enjoyed contemplating these trips.

It was a beautiful afternoon. The sun stood bright in the sky and ricocheted on the cobblestones, warming them in her summer rays. Its light hit the Colosseum and bathed it in an ethereal golden glow, which gave it a most pleasing appearance and for a moment hid the ugly truth of the daily sacrifice its arena had once been witness to, a long time ago… in a time when I had been mortal. Now it was not much used. It had become a ruin. The only purpose it served on occasion was to provide the stone that was stolen to build new palazzi. Despite the abomination of the former amphitheater’s current maintenance, it remained symbolic of a once great nation, a powerful empire that was built on blood and sacrifice, an empire we had been proud of – yet, we had always known what it had taken to create.

I stood on the plaza with my hands folded behind my back, serenely looking at this remnant of my past. My father had taken me here to watch a few games, although he had abhorred them. Claudia had been here too, and Silio. Marcus had been the only one who had shown sincere enthusiasm for the blood spectacle in the circus, but Marcus had been who he was. He had been a brother who had not had ties to any of us. He had been the one who had brought doom on us all, more than a millennium ago…

Strange how old buildings could evoke so many memories. I was not always happy recalling certain events. Marcus was a brother I would have liked to forget. Claudia’s memory was beautiful, but tarnished by her violent death. My father had been a victim of his own pride. Silio had disappeared. My mother was perhaps the only one who had been allowed to live out her life and die of old age. Althea was the only one from my past who was still in my present. Althea had always been there and it was reassuring. It had been hard. Living together was difficult, and doing so for centuries was challenging and deadly. We had often been close