Bryan ingressed into the foyer of the old farmhouse shutting the strong, oak door against the dark tempest brewing behind him. He tried to reach home before the storm, but obviously hadn’t made it. The wind tore at the magnolia trees and would, at least, clear them of the dead leaves and decaying branches. With the grace and fluid movement of a Siberian tiger, he climbed the stairs. In the bathroom, to the left of the landing, he quickly stripped his clothes and dumped the wet pile into the claw foot tub. He dried himself and finger combed his hair into ordered disarray.Freed from his encumbering habiliments, he glided down the stairs to the public rooms below. Straightening the gold Star of David pendant he wore, he moved to the window to watch the prevailing strum und drang. Long, brilliant blue streaks of static split the early morning sky as torrents soaked the newly green grass. Above the anger, the Sun began pushing the darkness back. Yawning, Bryan felt himself drawn toward the Great Gates. He did not miss the irony. He would begin equivocating death as most people stopped. Soon they would emerge from their cocoons of cotton sheets and Shetland blankets. He wanted to return to their ways, but on the fringes of the emergence of the Empire, he made his choice and could not change his mind. His avatar and his food was the thick, crimson juice pumping eagerly through mortal veins.
Pondering the cloth Lachesis wove for him, Bryan made his way through the house to the kitchen. Walking to the cellar doorway, he descended into the abyss. The cellars of most farmhouses in the region were dark, damp holes feeding the overactive imaginations of children. Bryan’s differed. He spent weeks planning and months rehabilitating the monarchial masterpiece. The cherry paneling on the walls and ceiling contrasted against the plush, dark blue carpet on the floor. The recessed lights in the ceiling could be used for night games at Candlestick Park, but numerous candelabrums sat around the room. Bryan collected the ornate furnishing over a millennium of wandering through Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. On the north wall of the imperial suite stood Bryan’s destination: his inlaid mahogany coffin. Polished with lemon oil, its mirror-like quality reflected light back into the room. The forest green velvet on the kneepad of the vade mecom prie-dieu needed brushing to remove a thin, nearly invisible layer of accumulated dust. Passover was near; he could do it then.
Climbing into bed, Bryan dimmed the lights to near extinction. The buttery soft, cool, ivory satin bristled against his bare flesh. Raising his left hand, he ran it against the lining of the lid and thought of pleasures that would leave humanity crying out in the Ten Directions for Justice and Punishment, but he was the harbinger of those ideals, so he need not worry. His head met the pillow, and Bryan fell instantly into the equivocation of death. Chris, his mortal friend, companion, and ward, would come later and close the lid, but for now, Bryan lay in state, naked and unadorned before the world.
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