Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Vampirino, Tomas Does His Best But Somebody Dies Tonight... 3/18/14

Tomas gets very protective at times like this. He told Billy to hide. He told him to leave. They know what's coming. Elferinos and elferinas going too. I don't know where they're hiding. Why should I? Disembodied spirits feel things, but we don't know everything. Thought can be locked up too. There's so much you don't know. 

This is Zebulon... and I know death. Thirteen I was when they stoned me. But that was almost twenty one hundred years ago and I've seen multitudes drift up like smoke since then. So I'll narrate this flight. Welcome aboard. And fasten your seat belts. It's gonna be a bloody night. 

Billy's with Baylah. I can tell you that. Got a Saint Patrick's Day thing at  her Piano Bar. Guy at the keyboard sings Galloway by Broadway, the score from Finian's Rainbow, Dancing At Lunessa , Philadelphia Here I Come, even Brigadoon. That's Scottish, but still Celtic, so close enough. think he even plays the score from The quiet Man. 

Waitress gives Billy a Guinness. Who doesn't like that? We had all kinds of ales and dark beers in my time too. The Egyptians had a lot of beer recipes. Shipped it all over. They had it in Rome. We had it in Judea... in Jerusalem and Ceasaria Maritima, up by The Sea of Harps, what you call the Galilee, where the bards came from. Now they think beer has to come from some place that has them cuckoo clocks and oompah bands, or places like them. But you believe what you want. I've not come to cure your ignorance. What's fixing to unfold tonight scares me. Not so much scares me, as makes me sad. Oh, there's an after. There's a world to come... a what will be. I know that. I've climbed Jacob's ladder too. But there's so much you still waste. And that includes night-folk and 'magic' souls too. 

Conrad hasn't left his dark chamber. Actually, that's just a snug, little bedroom with secure shades and shutters where he can escape the light. That's what they have in the townhouse. Sometimes they lay out a few in the basement too. The 'ghost' of the polio kid who frequents the place likes it. He likes company. You know how it is.

But Conrad's scared. I think he's more than scared. I think there're grades of being scared. First you're concerned (a little tickle). Then you're afraid(an itch). Next comes scared (a rash)... terrified ( a fiery oozing eruption)... horrified(lava)... I don't know where it stops. You get the picture. My God, how many pictures this age has. You're never free of them... Books, screens, photographs, paintings, sketches... Like a tattooed Pictish tribesman without a clear spot left. Do you ever look at the stars? Can you still see them?... Or the faces of real people and not just colorful shadows 'on line?' I don't think you do.  And that goes for you vampires too. Oh, you hate that word. But I don't care.

Conrad's dying, or diffusing, or dissolving, or whatever it is night-folk do. They should have let him be. Some people are not meant for this. Some see the scarab as a living jewel. Others see only a dung beetle. Quite deep for one only thirteen years in the flesh. But the soul learns more than the body ever will. 

Doctor Franklin called. There's trouble over there, at his compound, I mean. Oh, the Grand Armonica's not broken. It's just not working right. He tried to expand and contract a goat. Sometimes harmonics can do that. But the goat died.  Diffused it out into the large room like a cloud.... a nebulous aze (Hebrew word for goat) like smell and nothing more. But the trouble started when they brought it back, when they drew it in. The process wouldn't stop. The creature began to bleat.. to scream.  The particles of it's being sliced into each other... blood and water and bile and lymph ran from its thrashing body like a sponge. When it was over nothing was left but a small, dry brittle 'figurine'... like a primitive clay fired image. The colors looked painted on. Doctor Franklin told Tomas all about it. So they let Conrad be and prepared him for the end. 

Now the only ones home, besides Conrad and Tomas were Leo and Edith. She tried her best to make him comfortable with her witchy-woman, pow-wow magic, but death-stopping she cannot do. Leo himself is new to the night, though naturally instinctive about these things and guilty over his part in it {see the previous post... click OLDER POST at bottom} . He cried. He prayed. Faith doesn't die. Night-folk believe what they've always believed. If you follow this you know that. Look at Tomas... Tomas de Macabea also known as Jonathon ben Macabi. 

So they carefully bore him up to the roof, back from the street, where none could see, and laid him down on an old feather bed. Better be done with it before the 'born' witch came, 'cause they could feel her approach and the air grew charged around them. Soon he began to talk about his family, his mortal family, I mean. He spoke of dinners and holidays and plain things too. Then he could speak no more. Edith whispered - He looks bigger. He looks... ghostly. Not pale, but I can see the blanket through his hand.... and then she said nothing, but tears ran down her face. It was cold up there. The night-folk didn't care, but Edith was mortal, so Tomas hugged her and told her to go inside. There was a doorway up there, not full height, maybe five feet high. you had to bend down a bit and step into it. Remember, the townhouse dates from colonial times. So she nodded and went in. Tomas wished Sarah was there, but she was gone too. Not to Baylah's, with Billy. She's probably walking the streets doing good deeds. That's how she is. Oh, I don't mean she won't kill somebody when she has to, but she knows the difference... 'Let the righteous live. Let the wicked die.'..... Night-folk have prayers too.

Then Tomas and Leo uncovered him, as his body began to expand. Any mortals on the street about at such an hour would have seen but a strange, rising mist. Though the two vampirinos had sharper eyes and they could see it all. Conrad's physical form was disassembling. His molecules went back to God. I can say that. That's how it looked to me. Tomas recited the old Kaddish prayer... the prayer for the dead. More a 'My God is near. I know not fear' recitation than a petition for the peaceful repose of the soul. He knew God would do that. Leo stood there quietly humming something. I think it was an old hymn--- Joy, Joy,Joy, Joy Down In My Heart.

And so two night-folk... two vampires, if you will, kept vigil with another on his way... A 'Rite of Spain' (Sephardic) thousand year old Jew and a maybe three year old, somewhat lapsed Protestant.

When Conrad was gone, they rolled up the feather bed and went back in. Edith gave them hot tea.

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