He locks the door, but before returning he stops in front of a large armoire. Deep within the aged wood, so far that his large upper body disappears, he reaches in for just a moment and reappears with a thick, worn, leather-bound book. Soon we sit eye to eye as he sets the pages on my lap.
The cover has the embossed word Velieri on it and I run my fingers across the divots. His weathered skin thumbs the silver edged papers until he finds the place he’s searching for and opens it. It reveals an ancient picture not appropriate for children or the faint of heart. The harsh medieval drawings depict men and women fighting to the death with fire and swords on paper that is so old it looks like it might turn to powder beneath Arek’s touch. The words at the bottom of the page are small, but impossible to ignore. “War of Methos and Ephemes: The hunting rapidly rose as the Methos line grew.”
The next page has an equally disturbing picture with a man tied by his hands and feet lying on his side. Another man stands over him with a knife handle wedged between his white knuckled fingers and is just about to press the knife into the trapped man’s ear.
Arek calmly begins, “To live a hundred years in your mind is a long life. Yet I know you’ve heard of immortality.”
A nod from me is enough, and he continues.
“Immortality is not real. There have never been immortals except in literature or entertainment. We must all see death. Yet what if some people had more time?”
I read a portion of the book out loud. “The Ephemes preyed upon the Methos without warning.” Yet I stop, unable to continue. “Why are you showing me this?” I try to close the book and push it away.
“What if humans existed who are genetically gifted, starting from the days of Methuselah, who are allowed more time on this earth than others?”
“Are you telling me that you can live longer?”
“Yes.” He gives a moment. “I age slower than others.”
He opens the book to the same pictures again. “The Methos were given this gift—longer life but suffered at the hands of the Ephemes. This was the name given to the short lived . . . another word for ephemeral. Do you know what ephemeral means?”
I think for a moment, “Lasting only a short time.”
He nods then continues, “Ephemes were jealous of the Methos for having more time on earth, and sometimes old generations even believed God loved Methos more for what they had been given, and in the end, they hunted them.”
He turns a couple more pages, “So after years of war that never led to any respite, the leaders of the Methos struck a deal with the Epheme government deciding every Methos would go into hiding. Only certain few Ephemes would know about the Methos world. They made a decree stating, from that moment on, no Methos could acknowledge who they were. Instead, they were mandated to blend in, create lives amongst the Ephemes, and in so doing they would end the constant war and hate. After many years, the history of the Methos died with the generations. And among us, we kept quiet, calling ourselves the Velieri. And that is what we have become, a dream, a rumor . . .”
“You are Velieri?”
“So are you. One in every one hundred humans are Velieri.” He waits a moment so that what he says might be absorbed, but I’m not sure that is possible. “You are one of us,” he says, “gifted with many years. There are rumors of our existence but that is how it has to stay—rumor.”
Outside it has started to snow again. The ceiling above our heads begins to turn black as the ice covers every inch of the glass. Arek reaches out and flips a switch. Instantly a quiet whirring begins and just like a windshield wiper on a car, but much larger, a wiper slides across the ceiling—slowly pushing the built-up snow from above. This is, strangely, a pleasant distraction from our conversation.
Finally, I continue, “I studied history in school and there was nothing about this.”
“There won’t be.”
“An entire section of history is just erased?”
“We spent hundreds of years tracking down every bit of information making sure that it was.”
“But if all of this is true, why don’t I remember?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“What can you tell me?”
Arek walks to the window to watch the falling snow. “You are a Velieri and my job is to protect you.” When he turns back to me again, he takes a step closer and stares directly in my eyes and I am captivated, “Please trust me.”
I stand up to meet him. “You want to tell me,” I whisper.
He steps closer, “I do.” Yet after a moment of studying each other, he’s stronger than his desires, “But it’s best if I don’t.”
“Did that first attack have anything to do with this?”
He looks away again. “I don’t know. All I can say is if it gets out that you are here, it will cause chaos and we just can’t have that right now. Only certain few should know that you have returned, and even still, as you have been made aware, the wrong people have found out.”
“Arek . . .” The sound comes out more desperate than I’d like, and finally he looks back. “Return from what?”
“Not yet,” he says.
Then together we stare silently at the snow.
“If you let me, I will do my best for you. And what is best is that you know as little for now as possible till we talk to him.”
“Him?”
“The Monarch of the Electi.”
It’s obvious that my questions are useless. None of the words he is using make any sense. “You’re asking me to follow you . . . blindly.”
He hesitates. “Yes. Because you must understand, your questions will all be answered. And when they are, it’ll feel like you’ve always known.”
Unexpectedly, just twenty feet away upon the white blanketed pastureland, a mother lynx pads by with her babies leisurely following. My head throbs as I watch these small animals. “Okay.”
He grins.
“What?”
