The Thing I Came For
April 14, 1987
2:30 a.m.
The moment had come with shocking swiftness, when the last of the morphine was gone and the awful sound began to unfurl from the grievously injured woman in his bed, this Topsider, this stranger he had found near death in the park and against all reason brought Below, risking not only his own survival but that of the close-knit family whose lives he loved more than his own. But he had done it, he had made this choice for all of them and here she was, no less a prisoner of their mercy than they of hers as the terrible toll on her broken body exacted a sound more terrifying than any Vincent had ever heard.
Unwilling to look away from her for more than a few moments yet unable to endure his own uselessness, he had paced, frantic, in endless circles around his writing table, occasionally reversing direction when interrupted by hoarse entreaties from Father who was slumped there looking very much defeated. There had been a deep angry red mark on Father’s cheek from the clasp of his medical bag where he’d briefly, for just a few minutes, used it as a pillow.
“This is the hardest part,” Father had said wearily, feeling about for his spectacles. “The part they cannot teach you at medical school.”
As a physician Father was accustomed to it, this helplessness– the limits of medicine– but Vincent was not, and as the woman’s agony grew by the minute he found himself driven nearly mad, unable to find his equilibrium even as Father pleaded with him to stop; to rest.
But Vincent could find no traction, no plan of attack in Father’s words, the woman’s torment gripping him as if his own flesh were being torn, his own bones broken, his formidable strength useless against such an enemy.
“Vincent, I beg you.” Father’s voice was ragged with exhaustion. “With Peter out of the country there is simply nothing more we can do right now. The woman is young, she is strong, and if she survives a far graver predicament yet awaits us. Save your strength, you will need it. We all will.”
Vincent stopped, gripping the edge of the table, unable to form a coherent response.
Father tried again. “Go to my chamber and rest, even for an hour. I must insist, Vincent. I need you at your best. I’ll keep watch here. Go.”
This time Vincent had obeyed and taken his leave but once in the tunnel he had changed course. It was very late but he hadn’t dared stop even to go back for his cloak; heedless of the hour and the cold he had headed down to the lower levels and down beyond those and down further still, heading to Narcissa.
* * *
Instead it is Death who waits for him by the scrying bowl. There is no sign of Narcissa.
It is not like you to interfere, says Death.
Loathe to give offense to his oldest and closest enemy, Vincent bows his head with wary courtesy, only to find his attention riveted by the image that suddenly shimmers in the blacking-water. No matter how many times he has looked into these depths he will never lose this disorienting sense of mixed awe and unease in the presence of the Other. He had learned in earliest childhood that such an encounter is not undertaken lightly; when one looks into the Other, it looks back. Exactly as Death is looking at him now.
you believe you know her
Vincent feels Death’s voice more than he hears it, an insidious electrical hum in the bones of his skull and spine, a sensation that is, by design, a half degree from actual pain and he has no illusions about his ability to withstand the effects should Death choose to increase the intensity.
“This is the woman I found in the park,” says Vincent, lifting his eyes from the eerie likeness. “As a child?”
no
I passed her by then too
And there it is, the threat unmistakable however conversational the tone; his host is here to collect a debt.
Vincent holds Death’s gaze for as long as he dares, mutely refusing the implications of the warning, steeling himself against sick dread as the realization hits him.
“You passed her by then… and took another child in her place.”
Death’s silence freezes in mid-air the breath that carries Vincent’s words, which softly falling land as snow across his tunic; he must blink hard against the sudden frost that rims his lashes, the tear that trembled there a glistening crystal now.
With effort Vincent keeps his voice calm, his face impassive as he indicates the child in the water. “This is the child you took instead,” he says.
we have always understood one another very well
until now
Vincent forces himself to hold the long-dead child’s gaze, even now beginning to disperse across this water whose darkness, like Death’s, is the whisper of the Abyss.
the stranger suffers
this is unnecessary
Vincent steps back from the brimming bowl as if he can put distance between himself and the inevitable.
you have not the means to ease her suffering
she will linger and her torment will be yours
There is no use now in trying to hide the rising panic he feels and Vincent cannot stop himself even as he hears the unmistakable note of pleading in his voice. “Father says she is very strong.”
stronger than you know, says Death,
and then, with something almost like impatience,
are you not aware ?
“Aware of what?” asks Vincent, unsettled by the unexpected question.
you are cut
Puzzled, Vincent shakes his head. “I sustained no injury tonight.” But no sooner have the words left his mouth than he suddenly feels a sharp sting inside his lower lip as, with an offhanded gesture, Death dials up the pain to draw Vincent’s attention to it.
there
Gingerly exploring the gash with his tongue, Vincent cannot remember when or how he got it, and is surprised to find himself grateful for the distraction, but almost immediately the pain disappears.
focus, commands Death.
you resuscitated the stranger
“Yes,” says Vincent. “You were there.”
one of her teeth was splintered, says Death. you did not notice in the moment
it cut you
you bled
Vincent frowns in confusion. “If I bled it wasn’t in any significant amount,” he said. It is not like Death to be so indirect.
can you not feel it in you? says Death. I can.
Suddenly every hair on Vincent’s body stands up. “Feel what?”
you exchanged blood, says Death. With the stranger.
Alarmed, Vincent struggles to follow Death’s meaning. In trying to save the stranger’s life, had he hurt her in some way? Surely Father would have told him… or would he? Perhaps Father had attempted to protect Vincent from the guilt that he knew would plague his son if he had in fact injured the woman beyond the wounds she’d sustained in the attack.
I tried to warn you, says Death. You should never have interfered.
*
Returning to this moment in his mind— as he will do, often, for the rest of his life— Vincent will never be able to articulate even to himself what instinct somehow shook him from Death’s spell and propelled him out of Narcissa’s chamber and up the tunnel that would take him home, back to the living, back to his family, to his own chamber— to his bed and the beautiful stranger in it—
And it is true that as he breaks into a run, still Death’s voice follows him—
I can take her now or I can take her later, but I will have her
But Vincent does not hear it over the wild beating of his heart; for now, for tonight, all fatigue, all fear has left him, all doubt–
because now he understands this certainty he feels. It gives him wings.
* * *
*the thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
~Mary Oliver