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There are petals in his mouth—ghostly white and soft satin to the touch, glows blue in the night—and Roland knows what it means. A rare disease first discovered in East Asia, assumed to have been another product of Babel and its calamities. The seed of the asterisque takes root in the lungs of those afflicted by the malady, sprouting and propagating throughout the respiratory tract, sowing more of its seeds inside the body to germinate in blood vessels, swell in the brain, clog up arteries and choke the liver, kidneys, strangle the heart—multiple organ system failure, as pathologist reports describe, and elsewhere, cut open the body and spill a garden.
Roland’s never seen the famed flower save for its depictions in pictures, paintings, and books, until one day he is coughing them up, filling his mouth with their honey-sweet fragrance, the taste lingering on his tongue even as he tries to wash it off. Later, in Gévaudan, as asterisques fall like snow covering the white grounds of the d'Apchier estate, he will try to steady the impulse to cough lest Olivier sees him and wonders. In the early days, the church had been wary of the illness, believed it to be one of the things that warp the natural order of God’s creations—why should a plant grow inside a person, after all, choke the life out of them?—placed it in the league of evil, much like vampires, only to revise its position and say that while the malady may be a spawn of Babel, humans who suffer it can seek the church’s aid. Though, they’ve never been much of a help in that regard, offering only a sanctum, a comfortable place to die.
The working theory is that it’s a rewritten fungus transmitted through spores in the air, but it doesn’t explain why patients who share the symptoms have complained of the same inciting incident of unrequited love. Romantics, they were dismissed, but as one doctor notes with relative optimism, Remissions have occurred among those for whom love was reciprocated. Might we call it a cure?
Roland chuckles, a lonely sound in the solitude of the underground archive he’s settled in for the night to investigate his disease and review the Church’s history, laughter that soon turns into a light coughing as petals fly out of his mouth. They look pretty in the low light of the basement, even in the dark. He can hardly believe these things will kill him. He’s an optimist—he can’t help but look at the bright side of things, at the grace of God instead of this world’s misfortunes. Isn’t it fascinating to have such a special flower growing in his chest? He tucks it into the pocket of his pants to stow with the rest that he’s kept in a jar on top of the bedroom dresser. His own little nightlight.
If there’s no other cure than love for a malady brought by love, then perhaps Roland would need to work hard at earning Vanitas’s affection. It’s him, after all, he decides, the itch at the back of throat first appearing after watching him laugh as he lay beside his vampire friend on the floor of Moreau’s laboratory, the sight of them earth-shattering as Babel. A vampire and a human, friends—could you believe it? Roland wouldn’t have had he not witnessed it. Two petals, four petals, seven, the scratchiness of his throat grows more uncomfortable each day. Soon, it will be difficult to hide it, and he’ll run out of excuses for his hacking and coughing—the weather you see, too much pollen in the air, Paris is truly the city of flowers isn’t it, the fragrance in his breath explained away by a sweet, a dessert, perhaps a unique kind of flavored toothpaste? So he rifles through church documents, stray accounts from various specialists, hoping for an answer.
In Gévaudan, he manages to hold his own and protect even as they are battling monstrous beasts, even when the ground shook and rose beneath them, the world being broken down and rewritten in front of him. His lungs constrict from the cold or from his illness, but he manages not to lose his breath and to whip his blades with ever the same ferociousness. Even Olivier—always so attentive—doesn’t notice the barest slowing down of his movements. Roland needs to buy Vanitas time for his plan. And is there anything a man won't do when the request comes from someone who has unwittingly sowed his seed inside him? No, not with fleshy stems wrapping themselves around his airways, each staggering breath transformed into a name, a plea, a declaration or a promise even if it’s not heard or won’t reach. Not with Olivier reminding him, When the time comes, don’t hesitate. Despite aching lungs, Roland says he won’t, but he wonders if that’s true.
Though he can’t trust that he’ll kill Vanitas if it comes to it, he can trust Vanitas at least, and he’s glad that he does, because Gévaudan’s unraveling landscape becomes transformed into a garden, downpour of petals, the asterisques this time all around outside of him instead of in him. They say asterisques grow in places where someone has tinkered with the world formula, and Roland imagines the tower of Babel and its attendant tragedies—the earthquake of Shaanxi, the flooding of the Yellow River and the coasts of Germany and the Netherlands, the cocoliztli epidemics that wiped out fifteen million, the famines across Europe before the turn of the century, glowing red eyes and sharpened fangs. And then: flowers.
He would have wanted to watch it all with Vanitas, feast their eyes on the flowers of his doing and talk about what will come after, but he’s nowhere to be found. Astolfo has collapsed from overdoing it. The other chasseurs are closing in and Roland needs to move them along. It’s not until a few days later Vanitas will run into him again, knocking into Roland’s chair as he absentmindedly rushes past the café looking uncharacteristically harrowed and distressed, all glib and cheek fallen away. Still, he flinches like a cat as he always does when he sees Roland, and while he’ll never understand why Vanitas has such an extreme reaction to him, at least this is familiar. He addresses him by the alias he gave when they first met, easy and casual smile despite the rasp building in his windpipe. Fancy meeting you here!
A friend of yours? Olivier asks across from him, tipping his head curiously.
Roland fabricates some excuse to conceal their relationship—would what they have even count as a relationship?—and Olivier seems to buy it, invites Vanitas to sit with them for coffee. To Roland’s surprise, Vanitas agrees, plopping on a chair and stuttering, Since you’re offering, I’ll take you up on that coffee.
Usually so chatty, Vanitas has been quiet for more than ten minutes, and Roland worries something must be bothering him. The itch at the back of his throat burns. The tea he is drinking can only soothe. So he talks and talks to fill in the quiet, talks about the ease of piloting a small aircraft, the upcoming exhibit, disguises the invitation as a suggestion to go now, and in the gaps between sentences thinks, we can go together.
The first few words out of Vanitas seem like a struggle, and Roland wonders if there are asterisques in his chest, too, if in his own quiet way he might desire simpler things, too. If that’s why he’s stammering his words as he asks if Roland has someone special.
I do, Vanitas, I do. Does he dare hope? No, I don’t! Not now. But perhaps if you’d like…?
Women always throw themselves at you and then toss you aside pretty quickly, don’t they? Olivier pipes in, never one to keep a filter on his talk.
Don’t say it like that, Roland chides, glancing at Vanitas and hoping he doesn’t take it the wrong way. He veers the subject away from him and aims at his friend, jabbing an elbow at his side. Olivier is an incredibly popular fellow!
This is about an acquaintance of mine… Vanitas manages to say after some hemming and hawing. Lately… no matter what he does, he can’t get a certain woman out of his mind…
The burning in Roland’s chest should be familiar now, close and intimate, constant companion through mornings when he’s hacking petals and leaves and spatters of blood on his bed, through fights where his lungs are struggling to inflate themselves with precious air, but Roland aches in new ways as he listens to Vanitas talk about this mysterious woman, her pale skin and ample bosom, the novelty of her expressions, the kiss they’ve shared and more. Roland hopes he’s keeping his expression leveled even when he asks, She seems to shine then?
Vanitas gasps, startled that someone might understand. What’s this—does he suppose what he feels is a singular, unique experience, his and his alone? You know?
Of course Roland knows, is well-acquainted with the vision, though if he were to describe Vanitas perhaps glow instead of shine, phosphorescent flower caught in his mouth. In a word… that’s love! he says with all cheeriness. Vanitas looks like he’s about to throw up and faint, bewildered to find he’s mortal and pervious to emotion, too, demands a way to rid himself of his “symptoms”, of the flutter in his chest caused not by some mysterious vegetation but emotion. I hate this agony, he says. This disgusting feeling, as if who I am is being written from the inside—I can’t stand it.
But isn’t he so lucky to have the object of his affection return his feelings, too? Roland coughs into the crook of his sleeve, lets a few petals escape unnoticed. He almost understands what Vanitas means by agony. Almost but not quite.
It’s revolting… the thought of someone falling for… a person like me, Vanitas whispers, looking for the first time terrified and small, helpless child alone in the dark with the monsters, asking to be saved. Roland had suspected as much but never did expect this much hatred packed in this boy’s small frame. If dying of love is terrible, wouldn’t denying yourself of it be so much worse? Roland gets up and clasps Vanitas’s gloved hands in his, assures and declares because it’s true, No need to worry! If you can’t love yourself, then I’ll love you enough for the both of us! He had been lucky enough to be blessed with so much of it to give—great gardens in his chest proof enough of that—his body rewritten from within. Cut me open, Vanitas, and I’d spill my bounty, make his bloom and blossom rain like Gévaudan. There’s nothing scary about loving someone. As soon as he says it, Roland is confident in this certainty, that even dying is inconsequential, even agony is just another blessing to bear.
First tragedy; and then flowers.
What’s scaring me now is you, Vanitas screams, yanking his arms away and retreating, wounded animal lashing out. I was a moron to try talking about it with the likes of you! Moron!!! With a final derisive look he says, Never come near me again, you moron!
Roland had been holding back his coughing and he lets it out against his hand when he notices Noe crouched behind one of the chairs. He smiles. How lucky Vanitas is, to be showered with so much love even if he won’t let it reach him. Go on. Hurry and go after him, Roland urges.
With a tip of his hat, Noe is rushing away.
I see, so that’s the rumored kin of the Blue Moon, Olivier says coolly when Roland sits back down. That’s rare… You don’t usually get attached to individuals.
Naturally Olivier would catch on. There’s no hiding from someone who’s known you for what seems like your whole life. Soon, even the flowers in Roland's mouth will be revealed and he can already imagine the ways Olivier’s face will contort in pain, as if he were the one with stems shooting out of his gullet.
Vanitas is just… He seems terribly shaky, I suppose. It feels as though the moment I take my eyes off him, he’ll shatter to pieces. Roland rests his chin on his palm and swallows the cough building in his throat. I just can’t leave him alone.
Olivier sighs, cautions him to be careful. Between researching the Church’s history, covering for Vanitas and Noe, and the vampire eradication faction’s movements, they’re bound to be caught. It’s only a matter of time until the upper echelons order us to secure the kin of the Blue Moon.
In the past, it would have been easy to simply follow orders like the good soldier he was, to not consider possibilities and follow with blind devotion, each step leading naturally to the next, unquestioning. He snatches the cigarette that Olivier had just lit and takes a drag, the bitter smoke masking the perfume of asterisques, dismisses his coughing to the cigarette he keeps between his lips.
Roland's symptoms only worsen in the days after, his hacking now barely concealed. He keeps pausing in the middle of missions to wheeze and wipe the trails of blood from his lips, earning concerned looks from his subordinates. Captain, take a few days off and rest, Maria says as she rubs circles on Roland’s back. Her concern is moving but they all know there’s no cure for his illness.
In his flat, Roland can only wait, soothe the pain in his chest with some medicine and find some temporary relief in sleep. When he wakes up, there’s something tickling his throat, like a lodged fishbone. He dips his fingers as deep as they can go into his mouth until he grasps the thin and hard stem, tugs it out in no easy glide, thorns scraping the muscles of his esophagus until he’s sputtering blood in the sink with a four-inch barbed twig sitting at the bottom. You’re so prickly today, Vanitas, he croaks, snickering at his own joke. It probably won’t be long now.
He throws on a coat and makes his way to Hotel Chouchou, hoping to catch Vanitas and warn him of the Church’s movements, just in case Roland doesn’t make it through the week. The incident in Gévaudan had only whet the higherups’ appetites, but the skirmish in one of the amusement parks downtown a few days ago now had them famished and eager. Vanitas can’t possibly defend himself without the necessary information about Gano and his faction.
Lady Amelia leads him to Vanitas’s room, tells him he’s lucky because Vanitas rarely stays in even at night. Roland takes it as a sign from God that he is exactly where he needs to be.
He had heard that Vanitas had been badly injured from the recent battle, but Roland finds him upright and moving with ease as he shuffles medical textbooks aside. Vanitas looks up at Roland with usual wariness, eyeing him head to foot with a deepening frown. My, you look as if you’re about to drop dead, Jasper, Vanitas says. Roland’s laughter quickly turns to wheezing, tufts of flowers shooting from his maw, surprising Vanitas. His gaze softens the tiniest bit as he catches an asterisque in the air and examines the stained flower. How unfortunate, he whispers.
Is it? I don’t think so, Roland replies, but there’s no time to dwell on it. Instead he changes the subject to the Church’s plan—
I could probably heal you, Vanitas says suddenly, leaning back in his chair with a sly smile playing on his lips. Asterisques are just like astermite and vampires, he explains, with a pipe to the world formula. I can tinker with it just as I do with vampires’ true names. My services will cost you, though. More than a few favors. How about it?
Roland blinks slowly, trying to absorb Vanitas’s words. He had been living for months under the impression he had a death sentence because of the garden in his chest teeming with life. Calculating eyes assess, waiting for an answer. Roland wonders if it’s a test by God’s providence, if this is just like when he met Noe and Vanitas and had to decide between trusting them and following his duties. It’s one thing to let the power of the Blue Moon interfere with vampires, another thing entirely to tamper with humans. Has it not been God’s will to afflict Roland with this? To take the easy way out—would that not be crossing the line to blasphemy? The Church had relied on the power of astermite much later than the rest of the world, believing it a grave sin to use the product of Babel, until a pious clergyman had argued they could harness the power of evil for the greater good. All’s well that ends well, so they say, always the same excuse of ends justifying any means. Could Roland do it?
Are you really deliberating about this? I was right—you are a moron, Vanitas declares with a shrug.
If I… If you—Roland waves his hands—will it just disappear then, this flower?
I believe so, but I’ve never actually had a patient with this malady before. Are you not a gambling man? he teases.
The chasseur smiles. I’m a man of faith, it’s hardly the same thing.
I’m a terrific doctor, though. You’re in good hands. I’ve said it before, haven’t I? Listen to me before you listen to your so-called God.
Roland places a hand over his heart, imagines soft tendrils coiling around his ribcage, bristled stalks crawling through his gullet in search of the sun. Would his chest not feel strangely hollow without it? Would Vanitas glow with the same luminous intensity of asterisques without it? Vanitas had spoken of agony once, had begged for ways to make it stop, even the Son of God had prayed for his cup to pass him. The eternal good of God would not allow suffering to exist without purpose, and Roland believed the garden in his chest served a reason—proof of love, a blessing itself, a piece of Vanitas whether Vanitas likes it or knows it or not. Roland watches the roll of Vanitas’s eyes as he gets up and busies himself with books, muttering his annoyance under his breath.
So many questions rifle past Roland’s head—none of them germane to the conversation. He wants to know what Vanitas’s childhood was like, if his parents were dear and kind to him, if he played with other children, how he felt when he was still a chasseur, why he now saves instead of kills what used to be his enemy. Roland wants to ask, wants to learn and understand, as if in untangling the puzzling, inscrutable existence of Vanitas, the questions of his faith will be answered, that God will reveal himself to his loyal servant like a voice from a burning bush. Instead he settles for a single question, Will… Will I still be the same person, feel the same way, if you do what you’re going to do?
Vanitas raises an eyebrow, amused. What do you think it is I do when I use the Book of Vanitas? You won’t change per se, just be restored to your proper functions. Nothing more.
Wheezing in a handkerchief, Roland feels another stem coming up. Vanitas jumps back. The scowl on his face might be disgust or it might be concern, but Roland is an optimist—he only believes what he can believe. And the shrub trapped between his ribs is not his heart, and his heart is not his love. Suffering exists for a reason—that he might learn strength, learn to be humbled by pain. Know what it means to relinquish and trust. To be saved by God’s grace in the form of two gloved hands opening a clockwork grimoire.