Chapter 15
The Church of St. Margaret of Antioch really was dark and cool. Bastian tucked his Wayfarers into his shirt pocket and savored the chill air whispering against his skin, a soothing balm after the heat of the sun.
Only a couple of tourists strolled between the gray stone columns, speaking in hushed tones that resonated in ghostly whispers among the three aisles.
Modest iron chandeliers hung between the thin columns, and the rough-hewn brickwork was blackened in places where old stone met new.
Nobody sat at the wooden pews that faced the curved pulpit.
Above, a peaked wood roof clutched at shadows while muted sunlight crept in through ancient glass windows to cast golden puddles at the feet of the stone Mary and Jesus.
Aside from the occasional whisper, it was blessedly quiet.
Bastian supposed the lure of the sun was enough to keep most people outside—not to mention the morbid excitement of the body in the harbor.
He smelled incense, old wood, and age—the fusty aroma of a building that had housed more souls in its time than he could ever hope to count.
De Luca removed his cap, running a hand through his black hair. Whitby trickled down the center aisle, exploring the ancient building, but Bastian hung back when he noticed the inspector looking at him in that hooded way that he was quickly growing accustomed to.
“Another question, dear? I mean, De Luca.”
De Luca blinked. “I thought vampires couldn’t enter consecrated ground.”
“On the contrary. I have always found churches to be calming.” At De Luca’s questioning look, he added, “Don’t get me wrong, some vampires would come into a church and fry on the spot, but those vampires are centuries old.
They still fear the religious symbols of their day, like the cross and the Virgin Mary.
That stuff doesn’t hold much sway anymore.
In fact, some vampires drink holy water as a party trick. ”
“Vampires have changed?” De Luca asked. “Over time?”
“Oh, we come in all flavors, like sorbet. Some can walk in the daylight, others spend long stretches of time buried in the earth like trapdoor spiders, only breaking cover to hunt. There are stories about ghost vampires that steal your soul rather than your blood, but I’m pretty sure they’re just a myth. ”
Bastian smiled as he ran a hand along the polished wood back of a pew.
“When I was a child, my mother insisted we attend church every Sunday. I never complained, because I liked the peace and I adored the hymns, especially when the priest encouraged us to dance and clap. It felt safe in there. Like I was in touch with something bigger than our tiny town. Something that cared.”
Bastian’s mouth pursed. “Of course, that changed as I grew up. I felt less and less welcome, because of who I was. I couldn’t hide my queerness, and in the 1970s, any diversion from the norm was condemned.
I wanted to be a dancer, but my father forbade it.
If he caught me so much as thinking about a ballroom, he would use his fists on me. ”
De Luca’s eyebrows rose. “That’s terrible.”
“It is what it is. I would dance in my room, where he couldn’t see. It wasn’t something I could control. Dancing made everything better. When I danced, I felt free.”
He closed his eyes as he was overcome with memories of his teen bedroom.
The posters of David Bowie, Audre Lorde, Judy Garland, and James Baldwin on the walls; the issues of Blueboy bought on day trips to the city hidden under his mattress.
He would twist and jump in his crop top, savoring the sensation of his bare feet sweeping the carpet, joy and defiance like fire in his veins, making him feel powerful, angry, and alive in a way that he couldn’t be outside of those four walls.
When he opened his eyes, he found De Luca’s gaze resting on him. He appeared sad, appalled, and moved all at once. Then a new question entered his gaze.
“You were a teenager in the 1970s?”
Bastian smiled. “Trying to figure out my age, Inspector? How utterly scandalous of you.”
The other man’s mouth pressed into a line, and Bastian couldn’t tell if De Luca was irritated by Bastian’s teasing or attempting to suppress a smile.
“I was turned in eighty-five,” Bastian said. “Nineteen eighty-five. I was twenty-three. I’ve been a vampire now longer than I ever was a human. Funny, the way time works.”
They looked at each other for a moment, and Bastian swore he saw a little of that conflicted light in De Luca’s eyes again, the same look he had observed after the incident with the scooter.
“So, you’re a young vampire,” De Luca said.
Bastian chuckled. “Practically a baby compared to some. Barely out of nappies. Careful with these questions, dear, we’re in danger of having an actual conversation.”
De Luca’s mouth twitched, and Bastian wondered what it would look like if the inspector let go. Just allowed himself to have fun. Something as little as a smile could make a world of difference to a person.
De Luca cleared his throat. “How are you feeling now? Is it dark enough in here?”
“I’m feeling much better now, thank you, Inspector.”
De Luca nodded. He looked around them, his brow furrowed, and Bastian saw that the church was empty. Whitby sat by the pulpit, cleaning herself. Bath number three of the day, at least. Bastian could almost imagine they weren’t hunting a killer and were simply enjoying a little sightseeing.
“Come,” De Luca said. “I want to show you something.”
Bastian looked at him in surprise. He followed De Luca farther into the church and stopped by a marble statue on a plinth.
The black stone formed the shape of a woman with a proud countenance, her head tipped back so that she stared up at the ceiling with a look of rebelliousness.
One hand was raised, elbow crooked, as she held aloft two snakes that coiled together, their fangs bared at her in a silent hiss.
“She is fabulous,” Bastian said, admiring the piece. “Who is she?”
“Sofia di Vernazza. Everybody in town knows the legend. She was a nurse in the fifteen hundreds when a terrible plague cut through the population. Sofia had a vision from God that if she permitted a snake to bite her, its venom would cause her tears to be imbued with divine power. Her tears could be used as an ointment to heal the people of Vernazza and save the town. Sofia loved the townspeople, and so she allowed herself to be bitten once, then twice, then three times. Just as her vision had promised, her tears ended the plague and helped cure the people, but Sofia had been bitten so many times that the venom killed her. She died saving the people of Vernazza.”
Bastian peered at the statue with renewed interest, intrigued by the story and moved by De Luca’s clear reverence for the woman. It was the longest he had spoken to Bastian, by far.
“People still believe Sofia can heal them,” De Luca said.
“They come to Vernazza just to touch this statue. If you look closely at her right arm, you can see a patch that has been worn smooth from people running their fingers over it. As a kid, if you grazed your knee or cut yourself, you asked Sofia to make you better. As weird as it may sound, she inspired me, growing up.”
“She’s certainly giving big-time queer icon energy,” Bastian said.
De Luca snorted. He blinked and cleared his throat, and his voice dipped as he said, “My parents insisted we come to church every Sunday, but I didn’t mind, so long as we sat near Sofia.
I loved her strength and defiance. I loved the look on her face as she overpowered the snakes, and she made me feel strong, like I could stand up for myself, even if people didn’t believe in me—even if I didn’t believe in myself.
I missed her, when I stopped coming to church. ”
“Why did you stop?” Bastian asked.
De Luca gripped the cap tighter in his hands. “What you said about feeling unwelcome after a while…I felt the same way.”
“Is that so?”
De Luca nodded, giving Bastian a fleeting glance.
“We were born in different decades, but that feeling hasn’t changed—of difference, of not belonging. Being gay is more accepted nowadays, but it’s still far from accepted without question.”
Bastian tried not to stare at the inspector, but it was difficult, given what he had just revealed about himself. Ispettore Nicolas De Luca had come out to him, here in the Church of St. Margaret of Antioch, under the watchful eye of Sofia di Vernazza. Bastian decided not to make it a big deal.
“Did your family know?” he asked.
A head shake. “My father never did; he died before I came out. And Mum, well…she wasn’t all there after Dad.”
“That must have been hard for you.”
De Luca shrugged lightly. “I found ways to cope. Music. Work. The occasional hookup with a horny tourist.”
“Inspector, surely not,” Bastian said, faux shocked.
“I couldn’t commit to anything serious. Not with work and my family responsibilities. They took up my time.”
“Yes, responsibilities tend to do that.” Bastian glanced at Whitby, who was still bathing beneath Jesus on the cross. “I took Whitby in five years ago, and the sense of obligation I felt for her was immediate. It stunned even me. She’s a scrappy little thing, but she needs me.”
Bastian drew himself up, remembering the gravity of his present situation. “It’s why I must clear my name. I don’t know what Whitby would do if I wasn’t around anymore. If the Obliterati did their worst and ended my life…I’m not sure Whitby would cope.”
He felt De Luca’s gaze on him, shining in the gloom of the church.
He turned to look at him and noted the muscle tensing and untensing in the inspector’s jaw.
Perhaps he couldn’t believe that a vampire could be a person, too, rather than a mere set of fangs.
Bastian got the impression the inspector had his own preconceptions, and they were being challenged with every second they spent together.
“A shame, though,” Bastian said, “that your life is so consumed by the needs of others. It’s so easy to deny our own needs, but it’s important to indulge in life’s pleasures, no matter how fleetingly.”
De Luca scowled. “Pleasures can be overrated.”
“I think it’s more a case of finding the right person with whom to indulge in them,” Bastian said.
The inspector met his gaze, hovering on him for a moment, and there it was again, that adorably nervous look. That inner conflict wrestling to the surface.
“You look better,” Whitby said. She had hopped onto the pew behind them to appraise Bastian. “Is it time to resume our investigation?”
“Yes, dear,” Bastian said, unfolding his shirtsleeves so that he had something to focus on other than De Luca, whose cheeks had flushed once more. “I think I’m ready to go back out into the sun.”
The cat’s tail thumped against the wooden pew. “The question now, then, is where we go next.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” De Luca said. “Both victims were found by the sea, which could mean the killer has fled each scene not on foot, but by boat.”
“Interesting theory,” Bastian said. “What are you suggesting?”
“The Grotta della Maimuna is a cave beneath the town. It’s accessible only by sea. You can take a boat there directly from the harbor.”
“Sounds like a great hiding place for a killer,” Bastian said.
De Luca nodded. “Agreed.”
“Inspector, it sounds like you’re inviting us on a boat ride,” Bastian said, “in which case, yes, let’s go. I do so love boats.”
De Luca’s eyes flashed at him, and Bastian was certain they contained a smile.