Chapter 2: A Harsh Lesson In Naivete

The Gardens, The Accardi Estate, Verdicci, Italy, 1647...

  Six-year-old Athan Accardi had been dressed in his best attire despite his meager means of protest against it and his long raven locks draped down to his thin shoulders as his mother, Antonia Accardi did her best to ensure that her youngest son had been as well dressed and disciplined as her older son, who had been twelve years of age at the time. Athan had not been impressed with the way his mother had handled her piety, the same subpar tribute and high exaltation of a life he had not understood all for the sake of satisfying the ego of a man dressed in black robes with a high white collar. Vincenzo had been none too keen on attending these places for quite some time but Athan had been blissfully unaware of what had been in store for him.

Vincenzo had protested in the beginning, his and Athan's involvement with his mother's ongoing crusade and devotion to this mysterious man in black robes, looking ever more an unruly sorcerer than a priest of the cloth as he greeted them all with an eerie smile filed across his rather ugly face. He'd been given to balding, the crown of hair wrapped around his nearly bare skull a laughing stock if ever young Athan had ever seen one. He'd been portly beneath the robes, and sluggish in all manner of movement despite his heightened sense of devotion to his deity and pious lifestyle when in the presence of "charitable" donors, like Antonia Accardi.

She had been a very beautiful and a very pious woman in the same regard despite coming from considerable wealth at birth and marrying into an abundance when she had been betrothed to Sergio Accardi and bore him his first and second-born sons. To Athan, his mother thought pale and decidedly modest for a wealthy bred woman, had been the most beautiful woman he had ever known inside and out. If anything he had believed her to have been a true believer, and quite naive about life outside of her religious zealousness.

He had not known just how naive his lovely mother had been until the day she had taken him to the church founded by the rather plump priest going by the name Father Gregory, Upon their first encounter, Athan had not liked the look of him, a sentiment that he noted that Vincenzo had shared despite being powerless to protect his younger brother and himself in the wake of their mother's rather tragic folly.

Antonia had left her boys in the care of the priest Father Gregory and made the trip back to her estate intent on going over her prayers and making the rounds for her donations. Piety had never seemed to take a day off when it came to Antonia's devotion and she ended up leaving her sons in the care of wolves in sheep's clothing.

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Unknown Location, Unknown Bedroom...

Hot tears streamed down the cheeks of a young Athan Accardi as he gripped the red satin bed sheets that had been a mysterious addition to the place he'd awakened in the feeling of agony through his young body had been everywhere and he found it difficult to breathe. Disoriented and confused, he had attempted to make sense as to why his clothes had been missing and that he'd been naked amid vomit and bile along the bed sheets covered in a thick sheen of sweat. He knew not where his mother nor his elder brother Vincenzo had been but he had gotten a sense that his world, with its abundant bliss, would never be the same.

Slowly and carefully he attempted to move feeling little more than agony as his body adjusted to a rather harsh truth that his young mind had no way of comprehending.

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The Vestibule, Unknown Location, Unknown Place...

Vincenzo had rushed over to a rather silent and joyless Athan, tears streaming down his pale cheeks as he narrowed his sorrow-filled eyes in reaction to the seemingly soulless expression that filed across the face of his baby brother. He had known the look all too well and knew instantly what had taken place even if Athan's young mind had not been able to comprehend past the pain of what he'd just experienced. The reason for his unruly protests about him and his baby brother coming to this place despite his well-meaning but clueless mother's insistence that they frequent it like all the other ill-informed fools that lead their children like lambs to the slaughter their innocence long stripped away and the husk of what once was given to platitudes and false faces despite the ever returning memories of darkness and horrors committed against them.

"Sono qui, Fratelli," said Vincenzo softly as he kneeled before Athan who remained silent and frozen in disbelief and agony.

He hugged young Athan as tightly as he had ever hugged anyone and the lad had not made any move to acknowledge it. Rage burned behind the deep brown eyes of the young lad despite his sallow expression and he saw only blood, blood in the form of a pool oozing from the body of the so-called priest who had dared to violate the children of the Accardi line due to their own mother's negligence.

Vincenzo continued to hold a silent Athan in his arms as they remained huddled together in the midst of the awkward and heavy silence that told more than any words that came from their young mouths.

The eerie coldness that set in at that moment young Athan Accardi had been quite sure that he'd never forget as his body trembled and his young heart shattered in the wake of his most heinous violation. The only thing that seemed to keep him from crumbling altogether had been that he had not been alone in his shame and horror. Vincenzo had been there and he had known exactly what they had to do in order to live their lives accordingly.

"Non preoccuparti, Fratelli," said Vincenzo with a rather cold tone that was born of knowing, that his exposure to the vile evils of man in an equally vile world had been just as shocking and horrific as that of his baby brother's and it had all been due to the efforts of the swine in black robes going by the moniker Father Gregory. "Lo uccideremo."

Athan stood in relative silence as he and Vincenzo had both quietly mourned the loss of their collective innocence at the hands of the false teaching brute, the wolf in sheep's clothing whom their foolish mother and countless others had entrusted with their well-being and spiritual journeys.

"Li uccideremo tutti." concluded Vincenzo as his eyes blazed with fury and hatred that Athan had not seen as he held him close. "Tutti fino all'ultimo."

Young Athan had not known the full extent of what it had been like to kill someone but he had guessed that whatever punishment these monsters received had been well-earned given what they had done to children like him and Vincenzo in the first place. He recalled a story about a millstone and the ocean from the very book these fiendish bastards had professed to read and teach.

Young Athan had been in agreement with his elder brother that these apparently unwell individuals, especially Father Gregory deserved whatever they had coming to them.