Chapter Text
"What gift could be worth my entire family dying?" I demand.
The stranger looks to the starless sky. "How shall I explain this?"
"Just explain it. How hard is it just to give me a straight answer?"
"Unfortunately, even the straightest answer requires some telling."
"Then tell me quickly," I say. "I don't have time for riddles."
He lowers his face, then starts walking once more. I cannot help but follow him, now dragging my feet through the blood as if wading in the shallows on the beach.
"I don't know if I was chosen by some greater power to be as I am here, or if it was simply a contrivance of fate," he says. "I only know what I am capable of doing, and so I do it freely and without thought of reward… eternal or otherwise. In life, I was much the same. I gave what I could, when I could. But as I grew older I grew also weak, and I found myself unable to help as I once had. I withered away… alone, but with a prayer on my lips that I might be given just a little more time and strength to be of some service to others."
"And were you given that time and strength?" I press.
He glances partway in my direction. "While I lived, no. But after I passed on, I was given that chance… or rather, my soul was given the chance to help the dead here, while my body helped those living on Earth."
"How could your body help people—" I shut my mouth tightly for a moment, unsure if below is the right word… or perhaps above. "How did it help the living?"
The man stops walking and turns to me, holding up his hand. On his palm I see a sheen… a clear redness, more like oil than blood, slowly flowing over his skin.
"What is that?" I ask, looking closer.
He closes his hand and lowers it to his side. "I have only ever thought of it as grace," he says. "As for what it does…? Well…"
Again we start walking along the body-lined street.
"Years after I died, I heard voices around my grave," he goes on. "They spoke of how my body had not rotted away as it should have, they spoke of this strange substance that they had found around me… they spoke of how cloths soaked in that substance were used to cure the sick and speed the closing of wounds."
"Are you saying your touch can heal?"
"I would never claim that," he tells me humbly. "It would imply that the mending was of my own design and doing."
My eyes dart back and forth at the languishing dead. "But… do you think that's why you still have freedom here? Because your body is still… well, whole?"
"That might have been why at first, but by now my body has at last rotted away… and yet still, here I remain. I have prayed for clarity on that point, myself, but it seems that the angels have better things to do than answer an old man's questions, so I feel that I will never truly know."
It is getting harder to push my way through the blood at my feet, and I realize how very close I am coming to my own end. "So, what does all of this have to do with me? With my brothers?"
"You asked me why you could see me, when the others could not," he says. "You wonder why I could draw only you into this world in the midst of your dreaming… you wonder why, when I touched you, you could feel a warmth beneath your skin. I cannot explain it, but I know… somehow, I know it is because you have the same grace within you as I have within me."
His words shock me. I stop walking, then look down at my own palm, almost expecting to see the same substance crawling across it. But there is nothing. The man goes on for a couple more steps, then comes back around to my side.
"I don't understand… why would…" My words fail as I focus on my rough green skin. "I'm not even human."
"And why should that matter? Do you think that you have no soul of goodness within you because your kind are not dominant in the world?"
I curl my fingers into a fist. "Maybe I don't have that… goodness inside me." I cast my eyes ahead, looking at all the bodies laid out along the flowing river of red. "I've killed so many people… I know that at least some of them must have told you about how my face was the last thing they ever saw, how my voice was the last thing they ever heard… how my sword cutting into them was the last thing they ever felt."
"In fact, they have," he says. "And it was a surprise to me that this warrior they spoke of was also the son of my dear friend. But most of those who died on your blade understood that they were inviting death when they sought you out. They were prepared for it, and to them dying in such a way was honorable. None have ever claimed that you made the first strike against them… and some even admire you for your skill and honor." He smiles faintly. "Is that so hard to believe?"
"Honestly, yes," I tell him. "I don't see how it makes a difference whether they attacked me first or not, or how honorable they found my actions, or how proud they were to die for their masters. They still died by my hand, and for that I don't deserve any… grace. I don't deserve forgiveness or absolution, or whatever you want to call it."
The man draws his ragged eyebrows together and we start walking once more. "Your brothers have killed as many as you have, and under the very same circumstances. Do you feel that they are not deserving of forgiveness?"
My jaw slacks… the man does not wait for me to respond. Perhaps he knows that I can't respond.
"People often search for a line between the saints and the sinners, but they can never agree on where that line is," he goes on. "The truth is, that line does not exist. A saint can stray, can lie and cheat… can do harm by doing nothing, when he could have done something. A sinner can feed the poor, can help a weak man to stand, can lay down his life for a friend or even a complete stranger. To condemn yourself for the bad things you have done would be to imply that all the good you have done was only in service of the bad. You are not an evil person, Leonardo… nor are your brothers. You are simply people."
I hang my head, then I open my hand and stare at my palm once more. "So if that… grace is already inside me, then what… what was the gift that you wanted to give to me?"
"The gift that I myself prayed for, but did not receive," he says. "Time."
"What do you mean, time?"
"When you saw me touch Donatello, it wasn't merely a warning. I was giving him time, conveyed through a portion of grace. I gave the same to Raphael, though you did not see that touch… and to you, when I laid my hand upon your arm."
At once I feel a fatigue come over me. "What good does time do them if they're already dead?"
"You have heard stories of people dying on the operating table… of people freezing or drowning, and then being brought back? Of people being resuscitated after their hearts have stopped beating?"
"Of course I have."
"Those people can come back to themselves because there is a tether linking their souls to their bodies… a small window of time after death, when they are still able to return to who they were. When I touched your brothers, I strengthened that tether with my grace."
I draw to a sudden halt and take a step towards him. "What do you mean?" I ask, though my voice seems to be swallowed up by the atmosphere. "That there's still a chance for them? That they can still… that they can go back?"
"For now, yes," he tells me. "But the longer their souls remain here, the thinner the tether is stretched, and eventually it will snap… and any chance you have of saving them will be gone."