“It is true. He is Lazarus,” the Cardinal Archivist whispered, shaking still. “I saw…that day. Christ…”
“But that would make you millennia old,” Charles argued.
“I have witnessed much,” Lazarus said. “Through the blood of Jesus I was returned to life after four days of death. It was a blood that changed me forever, just as my blood is a plague to all who meet me. He did this to me, called me to help fulfill His will and convince the world to believe in Him. A will that has cursed me for centuries.”
Cardinal Farina shuddered anew. “Proof. Real proof. In my mind,” he whispered, rubbing at his temples. “I saw your sisters there, that day…”
“Martha and Mary did right by me,” Lazarus continued. “My sisters sent for the Christ, whom I followed out of devotion and love. I saw the truth of His will even then, the reasons for it, even if I knew not its implication for my own soul. I followed God, to see right done in a world that yearned for it. The truth could not dispel the judgment—the jail time—that was given to me though.” The vampire sneered, eyes flashing pent rage. “I was not asked if this is what I wanted.”
“He returned you to the living though,” Charles said, putting a small bit of trust in what the Cardinal Archivist had seen. “Some would call that an incredible gift.”
“They have not walked my life,” Lazarus said. “Destroyed lives. Families decimated. Spread evil.”
“Of course. You are a true vampire,” the knight said. “A killer.”
“I am that. Make no mistake.”
“But you blame Christ for your actions since then?” Charles said. “I am sorry, but even vampires have a choice.”
“Therein lies the irony,” Lazarus growled, his eyes grown darker. “After my resurrection, I learned He waited two whole days before making the journey to Bethany, days I still lived my mortal life. Two whole days,” the vampire seethed. “Choice, you say? You mock. By that time, I had passed beyond into…beauty. Absolute peace. I have since learned hatred for the reason of my rebirth. ‘I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.’ Christ, I curse those words, words that I have read more times than breaths I have taken, unable to ignore the bloodlust with which I was cursed. I no longer believeth yet I live. Through His blood. Choice? What choice? It took centuries of searching for an answer to counter my existence—a hunt that has led me here.”
“And Jesus wept,” Cesare Farina added, tears filling his eyes. “But not for the sorrow of your sisters at your passing or for the lack of faith some in Bethany felt but instead for what He would do to you.”
“Perhaps this Cardinal Archivist is not as dumb as I took him for,” Lazarus said. He patted the old man’s bearded cheek like a child’s. “No, He wept for the atrocity that I would become, for the travesty of life I would reflect, for the hypocrisy of His cause. He needed the miracle for the Word and his everlasting Church. He knew what he created, the miracle that would grow his flock. And for that I am forever damned.” He paused. “If He had only arrived two days earlier, thousands of lives I have taken would have not known my bite, my curse. If only He had let me lie in my cave and remain in the peace and tranquility of death. If only He—”
“Life is filled with ifs, Lazarus,” Charles said. “They don’t allow you to revisit and correct. Ifs are best forgotten.”
“That is where you are wrong, Charles Ardall,” the other whispered. “I will set right this wrong. Tonight.
“An if shall set me free.”
Charles could barely comprehend the historical gravity of what he found himself in. Let alone the danger. He knew the Bible and the main writings that comprised the doctrine Catholics adhered to. The creature across from him didn’t just know history that had shaped the world. Lazarus was history. The vampire possessed knowledge that every scholar would desire; he also undoubtedly knew information that could be used for his evil purposes. If Charles had already been on edge, he was even more so now.
Yet the Heliwr felt a growing sense of sympathy for the vampire. Of pity. The man that had been Lazarus of Bethany was something else now, betrayed by the very goodness he had followed, had loved. The act that the Word had enacted—if what Cesare Farina had seen was true—was an evil far more virulent than what the vampire had become since his first death.