Pandora - Prologue

It had started long before the fire, but that was where his mind always traced things back to.

It had started with an act of mercy. A foolish, instinctive act of mercy that had resulted in one thousand years of death, blood, and pain.

Sooner or later, he figured, it always started with blood. Everything, when you got right down it, started with blood.

He drifted -if his sensations were real- in that timeless, placeless place. And while he never slept, he was well aware that he dreamt.

*      *     *

Fifty torches cut through the morning fog as the mob of villagers made their way toward the hillside manor. It was a modest building, but the inhabitants had themselves been the most modest of the lower nobility. Nobody looked at each other. It was hard enough comprehending what had to be done. Silently, the crowd moved forward, fanning out in a half-circle around the building.

The wall behind it offered no means of escape. The sun was just now rising over the wall, casting craggy shadows down from the mountains and forests above them. It hadn't started, but it was already over.

For a few moments, there was absolute stillness. Nobody had said anything on the way, and nobody said anything now. The crackling of the torch flames was the only counterpoint to the quiet sounds of the world around them. A couple of the villagers craned their necks and tried to espy any hint of movement within the manor, but the thick fog rolling down the hillside obfuscated any such signs.

Unheeded by the crowd, a young girl pushed her way past the legs of the assembled crowd and watched blankly. If anybody had seen her, they would have thought she was too young to comprehend what was going on anyway.

Finally, reluctantly, one of the mob stepped forward and hurled his torch. A few more followed, then many more. They landed around the manor, a few with enough accuracy to catch the wooden supports around the stone walls. Emboldened, a few of the villagers moved forward and kicked the torches that had fallen short into a better position. Fire started to catch here and there, slowly at first, but inevitably spreading higher and wider as fire will do. A number of the assembled mob started to mutter encouragement to each other.

Inside, the lone Baroness looked up. Her eyes were red and sick with worry, her mouth pinched at the corners as if resigned. She got up slowly, moved to the window, and peered out cautiously.

It had begun.

A noise made her turn. Her son stood in the doorway, looking at her quizzically. She felt as if she couldn't move, but forced herself to take a few steps and kneel down, reaching out to him. The boy ran over to her and threw his arms around her, burying his face in her neck. She lifted him tenderly, supporting his small frame between her body and her arms, and returned to her seat. And together they waited.

The flames had reached the thatched roof of the front room, and started to creep into the interior. She glared at it as if daring it to come further and shielded her son's face, hoping he wouldn't see. And now she could hear screams coming from outside, taunts and jeers. Although a kind woman by nature, the Baroness cursed them silently, if only for the sake of her child. She started to sob, holding him tightly. The boy, barely able to understand anything but as perceptive as anybody with a basic instinct for human nature, tried to comfort her as she tried to protect him from the inevitable.

The mob outside was now truly a mob, having fed off the beginning of violence and mutual encouragement. Maybe they weren't bad people. Certainly they had lived well and been treated better than most. Maybe they would feel okay again tomorrow, or somewhere further on in time. But right now, they called for blood.

On the outside, the young girl watched dispassionately with eyes much older than the rest of her.

Inside, a mother held her son tightly as the flames rose around them and the house started to fall.

*     *      *

He tried to scream, but he had no discernible mouth in this void. He was only vaguely aware of the passage of the years, catching glimpses through eyes that were not his own. It was a kind of void, limbo, or black prism. The only sensation he knew were the emotions conjured by the memories of his previous life and a vague feeling of cold.

Sometimes he felt that he could just barely reach out and touch the world he was cut off from. He knew there was a way, but She had grown too strong over the years for him to escape. But soon enough, he somehow knew, he would find a way.

He stopped straining against the darkness that was his entire existence and floated along in that sea of blackness, trying to remember things in the order they had happened.

One act of mercy was all it had taken to ruin so many lives.

*      *      *

Three months ago.

Ran Jenner stepped out of his simple book shop, locked the door, and looked at it for the last time.

It had been a nice enough place, a turn of the century building crammed right up onto the sidewalk like all the rest in the old quarter. The front was mostly window with some pleasant woodwork, and the inside was tasteful and dark in a way that didn't encourage people to speak too loudly. The city had crept up on it late in the century, so the upstairs apartment had been grandfathered in legally and without issue. It had served his purposes perfectly. Selling it was something of a shame.

But then again, thirty years was really pushing it, especially when Ran couldn't have been much older than that. People were starting to talk, and pretty soon he knew all too well that he'd start to become some sort of urban legend. After that it would be kids daring each other to enter the shop and a lot of uncomfortable questions and eventually some careful scrutiny of his equally carefully forged documents.

The sun had just set. Ran adjusted his Navy greatcoat against the first hints of the autumn chill and threw his travel bag over his shoulder, cinching the strap. He grinned, patting the door, and turned.

"You going somewhere, Mr. Wolf?"

He looked down, vaguely annoyed. It was... he couldn't remember the kid's name, but he lived nearby. The nickname had come from the boy's mother, and that was getting to be another problem. Ran was starting to have trouble remembering who he had slept with, which led to no end of awkwardness that he could do without. He tolerated the boy because he had to, and had studiously ignored it when the boy had thought himself much more clever than he was in his periodic bouts of swiping candy from the dish Ran left out on the counter.

"Just taking the laundry out, boy. Ain't you supposed to be home?" His accent was the perfect portrait of a Southern genteel; rich and deep, refined and honeyed, with just a hint of the street brawler that matched his poise. It should be. He had spent fifty years perfecting it.

"My mother lets me stay out until eight." The boy said with a hint of defensiveness.

"Not too smart of her," Ran rumbled "this neighborhood isn't what it used to be."

"My mother says you're dangerous."

Ran allowed himself to raise an eyebrow. "Does she, now?"

"She says you got a dangerous smile."

"Aw, go on and get, boy." Ran made a slow swatting motion and aimed the miss, barely succeeding. He let the boy feel good about his ability to duck out of the way, regardless. He glanced up the street and saw the bus pulling into the station. "Gotta go." he said.

A few minutes later he was gone, never to return. And somehow the boy knew this.

A shadow fell across him and he turned slowly, feeling a bit unusually timid. But it was just another adult. A very pretty one at that, with long, straight hair and striking features. Her eyes especially seemed somehow exotic and piercing, with a hint of cold humor and steel. She was dressed elegantly, far too sophisticated for that city. Especially the old quarter. 

"Hello, boy," she said, betraying a refined English accent, "I'm looking for a friend of mine. I believe he owns that shop." She nodded to the book store without looking at it.

The boy felt a bit lightheaded as he always did around that kind of woman, but there was something bothering him about her. Something familiar, but still unidentifiable. "You're looking for Mr. Wolf?" he asked. He hadn't wanted to, but something inside of him felt like it was being twisted around, forced into a more agreeable position. His knees felt a bit weak, and he wanted to run away for some reason.

"Mr. Wolf?" the woman said, her eyes widening a bit. She smiled, and chuckled. "Yes, I think that must be him, then."

Oh yeah, thought the boy. Another one of the women my mother would just hate. "He just left. He said he'd be coming back soon."

"Did he mention how soon?"

Again the boy tried to lie, but felt he had no choice but to tell the truth. "But he went the wrong way, and I think he went to the bus station over there." His brow creased with frustration as he tried to figure out why he was saying this.

The woman smiled in a way that the boy knew was insincere and she reached down, patting his head fondly. He flinched and stepped back. It was as if somebody had just rubbed ice in his hair. Something about her posture struck him as predatory. The sense of unease was growing.

"Thank you, child. You should head home. It's dark out." With that, she turned and walked back the way she had come. He tried to watch her go, but had trouble concentrating. It was as if she had just dissolved into the night air.

He stood there in the quiet street for a few minutes and tried to make sense of it all. He had nothing. And for all his instincts, he had no idea how close he had come to death that night, twice in rapid succession. Finally he shrugged and retrieved his basketball from the gutter he had let it roll into when he had spotted Mr. Wolf. He looked it over, then ran all the way home. Later he would realize what had bothered him about her.

She had acted, in several barely noticeable ways, just like Mr. Wolf.

*     *     *

Last night.

In a small bedroom on the second floor of a modest home, a woman slept as a man quietly but intensely ransacked her dresser. He cast the occasional glance at her before returning to his work. He was in a hurry.

It was an odd scene. The room spoke of a recent college graduate just returned home. Pennants and posters told the story of young crushes turning to sports affiliations, cluttered mementos of past interests with present responsibilities. And yet the man furtively burglarizing her room was dressed for a costume ball from the sixteenth century. His clothes were refined, but incredibly flashy and would be notable if he didn't hide them under a cloak, which itself was noteworthy in this day and age. His hair was long, past his shoulders, and his features were stony and aggressively lined, permanently sneering. He stood over six feet tall, and had given up trying to escape notice some time ago.  Besides, he didn't care. Had he his way, there would be no need for subterfuge. It was a sure way to get killed, he know, so he threw just enough caution into things to stay low.

Momentarily he grew frustrated and swept the clutter off the dresser with a vicious sweep of his arm. He stood there, staring at the girl, and tried to think around the layout of the room. He approached the bed, knelt down, and reached under it, running his hand along the floor.

He smiled and pulled out a small, decorative box. Flipping it open, he knew he was close. Photos, letters. Personal reminders of good times past. This had to be it. He looked through the photos quickly, pausing at one.

The woman was hugging a man about ten years older than herself, very much into him. The man was obviously not so much into her, but sported a grudging, practiced half-grin. Despite being good to the camera, he was obviously uneasy with being photographed.

The intruder looked back at the image of Ran Jenner and snarled inwardly. He was ready to get this over with. All of it.

He replaced the photos and letters inside the box and closed it, picking it up and rising. He looked over at the girl and placed the box on the bed beside her, reaching out and turning her over to face him.

Her eyes were open and fixed on nothing in particular. Her skin was pale, and already cold. And despite the violent gash in her neck, there was no blood on the sheets.

"I'm sorry I woke you, my dear," Maxwell whispered sweetly. "I'll let myself out."

He closed her eyes and ran his palm over her neck tenderly. As his hand passed the wound, it closed up as if it had never been there.

"You go back to sleep."

He picked up the box again, moved to the opened French windows, and breathed in the chill night air. With a final glance over his shoulder he leaped out into the darkness, cloak billowing in the sudden wind, over the street below. Nobody was there to witness his landing. He had never been there.

*      *      *

Now.

Ran approached the city on foot. It was dark, quiet. More than a city usually was. It seemed to him, from this distance, that there was absolutely not a single soul still awake, and the street lights showed signs of neglect with most not even working.

It would be perfect.