Dead Seth by Tim O'Rourke Page B

us, although I already understood, that as a Vampyrus and a Blackcoat, he wasn’t allowed to get close to the Lycanthrope that he was there to help integrate into the human world. Relationships between humans and Vampyrus were deeply frowned upon because such unions could lead to the birth of half-breeds, but relationships between Vampyrus and the Lycanthrope were forbidden. He went on to tell us that if such a relationship were ever to be discovered, he would be punished by the Elders.
    He didn’t, at that time explain, what that punishment might be. Both my mother and Father Paul also instructed us not to mention to anyone the days away that we shared together.
    So, day by day, my life over that year had grown ever more complex. At home I was known as Paul, at school and at the church where I cleaned the candlesticks, I was called Jack. In the privacy of our home, and on our secret trips away, I called Father Paul, ‘Dad.’ This was essential if we were to keep our secret family life together concealed. What a mind-fuck, right? But I thought the lying and the sneaking around was a small price to pay to fill an emptiness that had opened within me since the night we left our father.
    It had almost been two years since I had last seen my real dad. I had adapted to my new life, and by now I considered Father Paul, despite the fact he was a Vampyrus and the fucked-up set of circumstances that came with him, to be my dad. I could see this pleased my mother, and in turn, this pleased me. I had also come to believe my mother’s happiness was, in some way, partly my responsibility.
    With Father Paul taking an increasing role in my life, my mother would continue to fill my head with a regular diet of tales about my real father. She retold the stories so graphically that I hated the very thought of him. I therefore turned more and more to Father Paul, in an attempt to cleanse myself of my real father. Over the following year, I spent much of my time in my mother’s company. While she had me to herself, she would tell me about my father and her own childhood. I do not know if she sought out similar opportunities with my brother and sisters, but she rarely spoke openly and so graphically about her past when we were all together.
    She depicted her own childhood as harsh and severe, living amongst the wolves behind the Fountain of Souls. She told me she had an older brother. I couldn’t remember ever meeting him.
    Mother explained how, as she grew up, her brother would often be cruel to her. On occasions he had poured pepper into her eyes, and had tried to make her ill by feeding her poisonous berries that he had found around the lake on the other side of the fountain.
    “This was the start of him changing,” she told me. “He was giving into his hatred and letting the Lycanthrope curse take hold of him.
    “Where is he now?” I asked, shocked by her story.
    “I heard rumours that he had gone to live in the human world. But the curse was upon him.
    In the human world he became a killer of children and women. A team of Vampyrus trackers disguised as police officers hunted him down.
    They put him on trial in The Hollows before the Elders. His crimes were considered so despicable, that he was sentenced to death by the Elders and Vampyrus.”
    As a young boy, I felt it strange to discover that someone in my own family had been hunted down and sentenced to death. It made me think of my father. Would the same happen to him? I wondered. I didn’t know if that would be a good or a bad thing. How would it make me feel?
    I had never seen a Lycanthrope, other than my mother in the safe house, attack or harm anyone.
    Maybe these Lycanthrope only committed their crimes in the human world and slunk back to the caves to wash away their sins in the Fountains of Souls. Years later, I would discover that this was the case. The red waters of the fountains run upwards towards heaven, as the Elders are believed to be taking back the blood shed by