The strange man nodded, filling his own chalice to the brim before settling back into his seat. Davius observed the lack of slaves in his home; it seemed this man really did live entirely alone.
“So, you know of this beast?” Davius asked him, carefully.
“I do,” he replied, taking a generous sip of wine. “It has plagued me since my arrival.”
“Do you know what it is?”
Lucius sighed. “Where do I begin?” He looked down at his cup. “From the beginning of time, man has been haunted by the unknown. He has scrambled to make sense of it, composing elaborate stories to explain the inexplicable. These things, whether the uneducated Roman believes they are punishments from the gods, or the philosopher believes them to be the fancies of the disturbed mind, creatures exist for reasons we may never know. What you saw was a daemon, a lower being who feasts on human energy, either from the living or from the departed souls on route to the Underworld. These beings only move by nightfall, and being a nocturnal person myself, I have witnessed this particular creature’s rampant cavorting many an evening. I suffer from a plague of the skin, which prevents me from enjoying the sunlight,” he explained.
“How do you know of these things?”
“I am a traveler,” he replied easily. “I was born in Greece to a wealthy family who all died when I was quite young. Since I was a child, I yearned to sail across every sea, to investigate every unknown land. I have spent most of my life in active exploration. My greatest passion is the quest for knowledge, the only true power in this life. You may conquer the world like Caesar, but you will never hold the truest command. Look at how many advisors he surrounds himself with. Only the man who unlocks the mysteries of the mind can truly master the world.” He paused, as if preventing himself from rambling.
“To answer your question directly, I learned of daemons during these travels. Each civilization, from the Egyptians to the Chinese, calls them something different, yet the creatures are all the same. Some cultures argue their authenticity, but I can attest that they are very real. I suppose I do not have to convince you of this, however.”
Davius was quiet for a moment, pondering his words. “Do they speak?” he asked, finally.
Lucius looked thoughtful. “I suppose if they could, they would.”
“Do they...cause visions?” He stiffened at the completion of his sentence, speaking more openly than he intended.
“That, my friend, is another conversation all on its own.” The man’s concealed eyes seemed to scintillate behind their shadowy veil.
Davius tore his eyes away from his gaze, settling his attention on the paintings that surrounded them. He now understood what the strange, illustrated creatures depicted in fresco paint were. He briefly wondered who the original artist was, and what it would be like to bring the once so vivid images back to their former glory.
“Would you paint them for me?” Lucius asked, as if he had read his thoughts.
“Sorry?” Davius blinked, openly caught by surprise.
“Paint, my dear boy, paint.” Laughter twinkled in his voice. “I have renovated my home in all other aspects. I briefly considered chipping off what is left of these frescoes, but I could not bring myself to do it. I recently discovered that the artist was a mad priest who inhabited this place, feverishly painting his religious hallucinations until he descended into a lunacy he could not come back from. How could I possibly scrape them away after learning such things? I would be forever indebted to you for your help. You have the delicate hands of an artist. Besides, my intuition never fails me...and it screams that you are a gifted painter.”
Davius ached to accept his offer, but life at the villa surfaced in his mind. “I am but a slave, sir. If you wish to purchase my services, you would have to speak to my master,” he said, sullenly.
“In Roman custom, yes. Fortunately, you and I are not true Romans. Besides, does your master give you this?” Lucius tossed him a satchel, which Davius scrambled to catch. He opened it to reveal dozens of gold coins that sparkled in the candlelight.
Davius thought of Gaia, and his dreams of what their life could be. Money like this could be used to purchase their freedom, and secure their place as citizens of the countryside.
“One last thing before you make your decision,” Lucius’s voice interrupted his musings. “I would not be able to forgive myself if I did not impart one last piece of information. Daemons prefer to prey on slaves since they have learned of their worthlessness in Roman society. Their absence rarely causes distress, their deaths seldom examined. This allows them to feed undisturbed. I am sure you have noticed the unusual disappearances of some in your employ. It would be a wise choice for you to earn your way to freedom, along with whomever you may be close with.”
Davius was silent.
“You can come at nightfall as your master slumbers,” he pressed. “He will not notice anything amiss. I will pay you a piece of gold for every night you can sneak out to visit me.” He stood before him, removing the bag of coins from Davius’s hands and exchanging it with a single gold piece, which he pressed into his palm. The metal was warm and wonderfully alluring.
“Shall we begin tonight?”
Exhaustion had taken its toll on Davius.
Since Moira’s death, Gaia’s demeanor had shifted from warm and lively to dejected and melancholy. It was unbearable for him to see her suffer, his efforts to lift her from depression were in vain. It was as if the entire villa had succumbed to despondency, the usual cheerful chatter that accompanied their daily labor absent for weeks. Eridus no longer paced, instead wandering aimlessly about his home, unkempt in a depressive stupor, bottle of wine at hand. Rumors circulated that Eridus loved the girl more than was blatant, and it was a lover’s heart that was shattered by her passing.
It took all for Davius to muster the will to continue his work in the stables, as he eagerly awaited sunset. He kept vigil over Gaia each evening, whose initial stay in his bed had evolved into a nightly occurrence. He comforted her the best he could before she fell asleep, leaving her each night with a kiss before slipping off into the darkness. He came to cherish his evenings with Lucius, his tribulations falling away as he listened to the man’s endless chatter, his brush alive with each deliberate stroke. Lucius had purchased for him the finest oil paints in Rome, horsehair brushes, and rare charcoal pencils. Davius was mystified by how easily they applied to the concrete walls, entranced by the rich pigments as he tenderly caressed the faded artwork back to life.
Lucius’s stories added to his pleasant dissociative state, regaling him with tales of his adventures overseas. He was a masterful storyteller, describing in vivid detail places beyond the conquest of Caesar, where people of odd shapes and colors, with equally strange customs, dwelled. His riches had enabled him to hire the most skilled shipbuilder in all of Greece, who availed him a vessel more impressive than the Roman fleet. It was luck that prevented any shipwreck, only one great storm had threatened to end his voyages. Davius remained skeptical of the accuracy of his tales, but enjoyed them all the same, accepting the budding friendship with this strange man who kept to the shadows, goblet in hand.
Days passed without the opportunity to sleep, and he often succumbed to dozing in secret in the warm, clean straw of the stables. These brief rests remained sound and unburdened by nightmares, until one evening when they unexpectedly returned.
He had accidentally fallen asleep next to Gaia, whose warmth seduced him into lucid sedation. He planned to visit Lucius that evening, as usual, but the melodic rhythm of her breathing had craftily lulled him into an unintentional slumber.
He was immediately submerged once more into the ocean of blood, landing on a flat surface as flashes of misshapen daemons hailed him from below. He realized he stood on a great precipice in Tartarus, the realm beneath the Underworld where evil doers were banished. Their tortured wails echoed all around him, the heat of the realm’s fiery Phlegethon River scalding the air. The creatures looked up at him with grotesquely distorted faces, their leathery skin torn by protruding skeletal wings, small versions of the original beast from his dreams. Their voices permeated his mind like burrowing worms in his skull, Great David! You are home! They took turns bowing to him, their bones loudly popping and creaking with exertion. Their clawed hands and feet slipped on the blood-soaked floor beneath them. One approached from behind the crowd, dragging a heavy mass behind it.
An offering! It chirped, fixing its bulging eyes on him excitedly before tossing its cache at his feet.
Davius recoiled but forced himself to look, observing the body of a woman, whose identity he already knew.
Drink! Drink! The creatures sang, happily, and to his horror, he was struck with the overwhelming desire to follow their commands. He reached down to scoop up his subdued, but still alive lover into his arms, brushing back a fallen lock of her rose-tinted hair.
She looked up at him, sleepily. Where is Davius?
I am Davius, he replied helplessly, overcome with the maddening desire to puncture the lovely, throbbing vein housed within her neck, releasing the sticky warmth that flowed inside. He could barely focus on her face, her flesh beckoning to him, begging him to taste her. The daemons’ laughter surrounded him, and he closed his eyes in submission, bending forward and plunging his teeth deep into her, releasing into his body the sweet throb of ecstasy.
“Blood dreams.”
Lucius pondered the words, absently fingering the rim of his cup. His long frame was stretched out across a dining couch, the remnants of his barely touched supper summoning the occasional fly. Davius had yet to see the man eat, but he always made sure to have his table set in anticipation of Davius’s nightly arrival. He spared little expense, heaping servings of roasted parrot and pickled jellyfish regularly accompanying the customary bread, olives, and cheese he never neglected to provide.
Davius sat adjacent to him, unable to sample anything from the feast set out before him. He found he was unable to paint as well, his pallet of fresh pigment gradually hardening from lack of use.
