Field of Blood by Wilson, Eric (dar e dil novel online reading .TXT) 📗

Jerusalem, nearly two millennia earlier.

As Ariston weighed these things, the other man’s skin turned icy in his grip. Not in the way a Jerusalem winter’s morning could leave patches of ice on the ground. Not even like the chill of packed snow, which Ariston had experienced once in his mortal life. No, this was a stabbing sensation that drove deep and spread outward through the limbs.

More accurately, it was a physiological reaction, two like creatures repelled or canceled out by one another. He’d seen the same principle in nature, in mathematics.

He dropped the appendage.

“What?” Mendel said. “What is it?”

Ariston hesitated to respond. He sensed the presence of another Collector, one burrowed deep beneath this fellow’s artifice. Some of history’s most accommodating habitations had worn the cloaks of righteousness, providing disguises worthy of any opportunistic Collector. Usually, the hosts in these scenarios were blind to their own duality.

Carefully, carefully . . .

Ariston knew that with circumspect words he might draw out the creature folded up within Mendel’s framework. If, however, Mendel was alerted to something subversive, he might halt the unveiling before it was complete.

“Forgive me,” Ariston said. “I’m still shaken by my daughter’s death.”

“She’s not the first, I’m afraid. As I said, we’ve witnessed this before in our town of Arad.”

“Are you . . . ?” Carefully. “So you are part of a larger group?”

“Yes. A number of us are clustered there.”

“Clustered.”

“As datim, we take no small measure of satisfaction in our growing numbers.” Mendel tilted his hat, and a cold spark ignited in his dark eyes. “Of course, not many are capable of treading our path of humility and uprightness.”

“Humility.”

“Not all are blessed with it.”

The man’s shrug caused long curls to sway, and Ariston caught whiffs of something acidic. The man’s facade was giving way to an inky essence within.

“Well, Mendel,” he said, “you can see that I have my own cluster. As their leader, I’m still seeking a place where we can tread out our own path, a place where this sort of . . . tragedy is less likely to occur.”

“I don’t know that any one location is immune to hardships.”

“Of course not.”

“But we do seem to have our disproportionate share of them here in Arad. We’ve experienced an upsurge since the arrival of these Nazarenes.” Mendel spit out the word, his saliva black and glittering in the play between shadows and moonlight. “In fact, we’ve centered many of our efforts around harassing them, hoping to drive them away.”

“What does this have to do with my daughter?”

“Hear me out.” Mendel bent forward at the waist, eyes widening beneath the brim of his hat. “See, they follow the ways of the Nazarene, trying to deceive the city’s poor and the destitute, the youth too. They dis-tribute clothing and food. They befriend the lonely. With lies, they strip away what little dignity these people have left.”

“And you spend your time harassing them for this?”

“Shut up, shut up. What business is this of yours, I ask?”

Ariston raised a hand. “Pardon my intrusion. Perhaps you should explain these ‘lies’ to me. My cluster and I, we’ve been Separated too long from such matters.”

“Separated?”

The word was a notched key, turning the final tumbler in the lock upon Mendel’s being. His mouth gnawed at the air and his tongue pushed at his lips. Canine teeth shoved down from his gums, sharp, and tinged crimson along the grooves. He bobbed on stockinged legs, side locks swinging, his eyes hooded by his hat so that only his fanged mouth caught the nocturnal light with each backward sway.

“These Nazarene lovers,” Mendel hissed. “They speak always of him and his sacrifice. His blood. After three days, he came back from the grave—so they say. He conquered death.”

The words flooded Ariston’s mind with vestigial memories: a radical and a blasphemer named Yeshua; a trial before the Sanhedrin; a crucifixion and a . . .

It was enough to make him sick.

“They’re still talking of this man?” Ariston was incredulous. “He’s still beloved?”

“His same sad tale is still spreading.”

“I’d hoped time would erase some of that . . . well, that nonsense.”

“It’s disgusting.” Dark spittle pooled behind Mendel’s lower lip and dribbled down his chin. “There are many humans who go through the of drinking his blood, sipping grape juice or wine. As a formality. A duty. Nothing more. But others—these Nazarene lovers—drink to remember and identify with him. It’s different. I don’t know. Regardless, that’s where your child slipped up.”

“She’s gone now. Speak plainly.”

Mendel wiped his hand along his mouth. “See, she appeared while I was outside the home of Arad’s head Nazarene. We hound this man’s family, hoping to frighten them away, and tonight I was slashing the rear tires on his Toyota.”

“Ah. One of the king’s chariots.”

Mendel snickered. “This man probably thinks so.”

“So what was Salome doing there?”

“You must believe that I didn’t see her hiding. When the family’s son stepped through the gate, I shrank back so as not to be caught at my work, and that’s when your Salome charged from behind a white broom bush. She sank teeth into the boy’s shoulder and started drinking before I could stop her.”

“She was thirsty,” Ariston said. “Foraging with the others.”

“Naturally, she was drawn to the scent of his blood, but I’m telling you, Arad is a dangerous city for it. That little runt of a boy pried her loose and commanded her to leave. When she rushed him again, he simply dodged her and walked back inside. Fearless, I tell you. Like his parents, he drinks the Nazarene Blood, and now he’s transformed into one of them.”

“Them?”

Ariston bristled at the idea. Felt his own tapered incisors swelling from their roots. He knew, of course, the power of the Nazarene. He and his cluster had been expelled from their habitation by a mere touch, sent into a herd of pigs. He could still hear those beastly shrieks as they plunged into forlorn waters.

Now, after centuries, he was abhorred by this persistent influence of the Nazarene, as well