WMOM: Chapter 31 🦇 (+SO MANY ARDELIANS)

Nor morning stars shun thy uprising face.

What Manner of Man is a queer gothic romance novel about a priest and a vampire, written in epistolary form, served a bite at a time. What you’re reading is a draft of the novel, which was originally published for free online throughout 2023. If you’re reading for the first time, I recommend you start from the beginning.

(Get the final edition of What Manner of Man here¹ or DRM-free on Itch.io! 📚)

VERY IMPORTANT:

Have you ever wanted a powerful supernatural being to love and cherish you into submission? I need you to stop what you’re doing and go read A Marriage of Body and Soul; a short story about a troubled young man and card-carrying monsterfucker who summons the demon of his dreams but gets slightly more affirmation than he bargained on. →

A Marriage of Body and Soul

(Just published yesterday!)

I’m getting back in the swing of things, inch by agonizing inch. Yesterday, on Patreon, I shared some preliminary notes regarding the current state of the ✨ new novel ✨ (still untitled) that I’m working on. I’ve loved the thoughts that people have been sharing with me about it, and I’m looking forward to discussing the novel in greater detail soon!

To quote a friend of the publication, there has been a veritable outpouring of Ardelians (+ one Lord Vane!) this week on Tumblr. I strongly encourage you to scroll to the end of this e-mail to take a look at them all!

JOURNAL ENTRY (CONTINUED)

Undated.

When Alistair had finished describing his tragic history, his appearance was more than ever like some fallen angel as depicted by Doré. He looked broken; crushed under those centuries’ weight of history. As he’d spoken of it, his voice had altered strangely, taking on a harsh, inhuman quality. Something in me clamored to run away and hide at the sound — almost a growl — and I suppressed a shiver of instinctual fear. The man, overcome with anger and grief, was beginning to give way to the beast.

Conquering the momentary urge to draw back, I took up his pale hand and pressed it to my lips. He seemed to return to consciousness of my presence with a start — as if his gaze had been turned inward, fixed upon the shadows of centuries past. The light in his eyes was fearsome and strange.

“I won’t let you die —” There was a slight tremour in my voice as I spoke, but I was determined to fight. “Not now; not like this. I don’t care what it takes.”

Hope seemed to kindle, fleetingly, in his eyes, only to be snuffed out again by cold resignation. “It’s no use — when you took up that ring, you took the first step upon the forest path that has led, inexorably, to this. From that moment, you were bound to bring about my end as assuredly as each night is bound to end with day. We have been drawn by the same invisible hand to this time, this place. The god of Swallow’s Rest, who surely has some purpose in mind for you, intends that these events should be carried through to their conclusion.”

“For what purpose?” My words sounded leaden to my own ear.

“Perhaps you are intended to assume my mantle. You said you have felt the mystery which is Swallow’s Rest. At the temple you were initiated, and you have possessed the ring. Doubtless it will pass back to you and with it perhaps some part of the duties I once fulfilled. You may study, receive the ancient devotion. It is fitting — you would make a beautiful vessel, a fitting servant to any god.”

“Damn your god! Damn your god and damn mine, and damn anything else that says you must die! You’re wrong, Alistair. The people of this island, they are still here. They have changed, perhaps beyond your recognition, but it’s been two millennia! Their religion is no longer yours. Who would I be high priest for, what people would I serve?”

“You would serve Swallow’s Rest. There is nothing else.” 

“I would have dropped the ring into the sea along with my cross, had I known. Serve a god that would punish you beyond justice or reason? No, Alistair. I have not rejected the bondage of one cruel faith only to take up another, like an ill-used wife who flees from her abusive husband into the arms of an abusive lover. Your god is made in your image. The people of St Silvan’s Head have their own relationship with the unseen spiritual world. There are other ways. If no path exists that doesn’t end in your death, we must forge our own.”

“You’re mad,” he said, with such fondness that it was practically a term of endearment. “You almost persuade me to attempt the impossible, but a life must be exchanged for a life — that is the principle of sacrifice.”

I could be still no longer, rising to my feet in agitation. “That mystery which we call gods resides first in the human breast. They can only find expression through us, can only rule our lives if we consent to be ruled. Any god that demands sacrifice of us can be defied by us!”

“I do not even know what I would become, were I to survive.” His pallid, shadow-haunted face seemed to me almost skeletal, sharp in all the wrong places. “I have no notion what it would do to me.”

“I would be there, no matter,” I said. “You said that Swallows’ Rest loved you in its way, as you were its steward — but gods cannot love like this.” I reached for him then, but Alistair flinched as if scalded. “Gods do not dread parting, they do not cling to their beloved in the night praying against the dawn. They cannot; not when death holds no sting for them. You and I are the same. The same heart beats in both our chests, and the same air is in our lungs. I would kill your god and mine to save you if I could. I need you, Alistair. You must live.” 

“Victor,” he whispered, “Many people have passed through this house, many other priests, but never once has there been one like you. From the first, the way you spoke — the very way you carried yourself — marked you as different. There was secrecy behind your smile; something I didn’t understand. Above all, the astonishing transformation I’ve witnessed in you — these things you’ve been saying. In all my lifetimes, I have never witnessed such a capacity for growth. I find that I care for you very deeply; I feel such affection for you as I have rarely experienced. Swallow’s Rest has chosen well.” 

The intensity of his gaze and the sweet, impossible things he was saying stole the breath from me. What cruelty this was, what torture! To have him so near, saying such things to me, yet flinching from my touch. I knew it wasn’t that he feared me; it was himself he didn’t trust. Nonetheless my heart could not bear it. 

“You must trust me,” I pleaded, just preventing myself from going on my knees before him, “Though I have been blind, so have you. What you did was not evil. A god worthy of devotion would show mercy. Just as I was wrong to obey the cruel bidding of an unjust church, so must you defy this curse. I defy any god that will not allow us to be together in this moment.” I longed to try to touch him again, but refrained. 

“You should put me again in chains if you must be near me. I cannot withstand the feelings you awaken in me. If I give in, they will pull me under, and I cannot account or what I might do.”

“You will not hurt me,” I said with simple conviction.

“Victor, there is a part of me which wishes for nothing less than to devour you, to take you apart with my hands, to taste your blood, to —” As he spoke his expression grew inexpressibly dark. “What it takes to resist — if I let myself have what I want, if I bend even to the slightest degree, I will not be able to stop any of it. Do you understand? I am changing; whatever you may once have admired in me is vanishing rapidly. Every moment it grows harder to see where I end and it begins.”

Beside us a length of pearly white fabric gleamed arrestingly from a twisted knot of rent garments and linen. It drew my eye, somehow familiar. Idly taking hold of the material, I began pulling it free.

It was the white robe — the one he had worn — “When you seemed about to take my life, you could not,” I said. “First during the ritual, and afterwards, twice more you were prevented from harming me, though you lost control.”

“That was because you possessed the ring.”

“Do I not still?” I retrieved the ring from my pocket and slipped it on my finger. “If you cannot trust yourself, then trust at least in this. There is no safe path before us! Even if it is all we ever have, I would rather know you once than never at all. I love you, Alistair, and if you do not hold me this moment I will simply die.”

His eyes fell shut. A sound somewhere between a sob and a moan escaped him and he reached out, blindly, folding me in his arms and pressing his lips to mine. He sighed like one, dying of thirst, whose parched lips felt the first drop of water they had tasted in days.

✧ FAN POST OF THE WEEK ✧

There was some discussion on Tumblr this week of the different ways people have imagined the characters while reading What Manner of Man², and I now have the pleasure of presenting a few different visions:

First we have Tumblr user ganymedian’s lovely interpretation of Father Ardelian (both with and without blush!)

Plus: matching Lord Vane! I love his sultry eyes and long, luxuriant hair.

Tumblr user orgyofthedamned posted these cute-as-a-button Father Ardelians and I’m completely smitten with them. Look at his little ears!

As if that weren’t enough: in the final stretch of the kitty v. puppy poll (click to see the thrilling result!) Tumblr user doing-something-unholy drew this delightful picture of Father Adrian (his own priest OC) helping Father Ardelian to deliberate the two alternatives.

OBLIGATORY TWICE-PER-EMAIL REMINDER: What Manner of Man has been published! You can purchase the e-book here (or DRM-free on Itch.io!)

All those who dare to venture into the haunted sewers of Goodreads or Amazon to leave a review will earn my eternal gratitude! 💜

Yours in love and terror,
St John

1. Due to unforeseen technical difficulties, this link is still just Amazon.

2. As I said recently on Tumblr: while obviously I love @beastliness 's wonderful cover very much, I do regret a little bit that the style of cover we felt What Manner of Man called for necessitated giving both leads a very definite "official" physical appearance.

However you envisioned the characters before the cover was made (if you were a reader before that) I hope you don't feel you need to revise that just because there's art now. 🥺

(Also I LOVE finding out the different ways people have been picturing them. Please tell me what your personal Lord Vane and Father Ardelian look like if you want to!)