Am I too lost to be saved ?
Am I too lost ?
My God! My tourniquet,
Return to me salvation...
From the song Tourniquet (the Fallen album), by Evanescence
I fled to the monastery not to seek the oblivion of peace, but to endure the anguish of penance. I was surrounded by tranquility, but I refused its solace. Still, enough of it had seeped into me by the time of my twelfth month, that I was able to receive my father's summons with only the barest flicker of turmoil.
He had, he told me, found me a fiancé.
When I finally met him, I had been surprised. He was handsome, wealthy, intelligent and charming - like all of the other young men my father had asked me to meet previously. But what made him different were his eyes. They were filled with a compassion and understanding that seemed to belong to someone of a much older age.
We understood each other implicitly from the moment we met. The rest, as they say, was merely details.
His first words to me in private were not attempts to charm, flatter or disarm. He simply asked: "Did you find what you sought in Fukui?"
I gazed at him levelly. "I'll answer that only if you tell me if you found what you sought by asking for my hand."
He laughed quietly in genuine delight. "You are turning out to be far, far more than I hoped I'd be able to find."
"And what exactly were you looking for, Goldsmith-san?"
He looked at me earnestly. "A comrade, Fujino-san. And please, just call me Solomon."
"Then you must call me Shizuru as well."
He smiled, and that was how we began.
~~~~~
He told me that he was a vampire, and that he was 115 years old. He was one of the very few remaining of his kind - the rest having been annihilated in a war they had fought amongst themselves. He had nearly died himself during one of the battles, but had woken up days later, mysteriously rescued and revived.
He had spent the next few years living quietly amongst humans, only to be disturbed by the discovery that a mysterious organization was trying to revive his kind. His investigations revealed that the organization had only recently failed in its attempt to harness the powers of another class of beings - beings that he found were called Himes. Frustrated by its failure, the organization had poured its efforts into finding alternatives, and had stumbled upon the existence of his breed. Its goal, he realized, was to create a new generation of vampires that it could exploit for its own purposes.
"The name of this organization?" I asked him, though I already knew the answer.
"The Searrs Foundation," he replied.
"Why would you want to oppose them, when they're trying to regenerate your kind?"
He paused. "It's a long story, and one I I'll tell you eventually, but for now, let me just say that I choose to oppose them to honor the wishes of someone who's dear to me."
The look on his face as he'd spoken had betrayed the reason for the uncanny understanding between us. It was the tortured look of an unrequited lover - a look I could recognize in an instant from the countless times I'd seen it in the mirror.
"Why would you want the help of a former Hime? As you should know by now from your investigations, none of us have any powers left."
"None perhaps, except for the power that comes from simply wanting to survive. It pains me to tell you this, but the Searrs are planning to transform you and your friends into their first batch of vampires. It seems they're determined to have all of you in one way or another, Carnival or no Carnival."
"But why choose me out of the twelve?"
"Because you're the only who combines all the resources I need for this fight: strength, intelligence, detachment, cunning and connections."
"Was it necessary to ask to marry me?"
"No, but being your fiancé would be the best plausible reason I could have for moving about freely in your world. Besides," he paused, "it's the only way I have of thanking you for your help."
"Offering to marry someone is an unusual way of showing gratitude."
"Not if the person to whom one is proposing is unusual in her own right. I know it sounds presumptuous, but I understand your situation far better than most people do. Your lineage will require you to marry someone, eventually. If you marry me, I would grant you complete freedom - including freedom from any and all marital obligations."
I reflected on his proposal. Even in the midst of my love for Natsuki, part of me had always been aware of the intractable difficulty posed by my inheritance. I knew I would have chosen her if the choice had presented or forced itself, but it would have pained me immensely to displease my father. Solomon wasn't only offering me a solution to that problem - he was giving me an opportunity to redeem myself as well.
I looked at him and nodded. "I accept your proposal. What would you have me do?"