Arnulf the Destroyer Read Online Free PDF Page A

old guilt bubbled up from deep within me, tortured me with memories of past regret. 
    I dreamt of the girls I seduced with no honest intentions.  Too vividly did I remember my excitement in pursuing them and my eagerness to be away from them once they had given me what I sought.
    The night played for me again how I had betrayed my college roommate, framing him for a wrong I had done.  I saw again the people I belittled, the wineries I destroyed, the hurtful things I carelessly threw at others.  Even the time in fourth grade when I hit Ronnie Sanders in the face with my lunch box rose up to plague my sleep.  There wasn’t a night that wasn’t filled with guilt and grief.  It was my life’s worst moments lived over and over again.
    For weeks this continued.  During the day I could hardly eat or drink because my tastes had become corrupted.  At night I couldn’t sleep for dreams of sins past.  I felt life draining from me, one day at a time.  And for sure I would have died had things not changed.
    It was Rome again, that same city where I had tasted the ‘45 Rothschild, I was hurrying from a nauseous meal back to my hotel.  To even think of a nauseous meal in Rome seems heresy itself, but such was my curse.  As I hurried through the city, not even taking in the majestic and ancient buildings I passed, I spied for an instant the old man from the Expo.
    It was just a flash.  For the briefest moment I caught the grey and grizzled beard, the deep set eyes.  There was no mistaking that it was he who fed me that cursed wine.
    Just barely did I catch him hurrying into an old church when the crowd closed in around me.  I lost not a single second, barreling through the crowd and into the church.
    The cold darkness of the church closed over me, lit only by the prayer candles that flickered in the narthex.  A feeling of holy and silent dread filled me like the shadows behind the stained glass windows and the chilly glare of saints staring from the marble walls.
    “Where are you?!” I screamed, not caring one whit about holy silence.
    “I know you’re here!  Where are you?!”
    “Peace, I am here,” an old, velvety voice answered from the darkness beside me.
    I whipped around to face the old man who looked at me with that same, sad smile.  It was the same smile he wore as I lost consciousness at the Expo.
    “What did you do to me?  Who are you?  What did you give me to drink?”  I spit the questions out one on top of the other.
    “What do you want to know first?”  He asked back with his arms spread out.
    “Who are you?”
    “No one of consequence,” he answered with a shrug.  “An old priest with a dangerous curiosity.  That is all.”
    “What did you give me to drink?”  I questioned further.  “What was that?”
    “You are Leo the Incredible Wine Reader, are you not?” the old man smiled, broader this time.  “What did you taste?”
    My mouth turned dry and couldn’t answer him.  All of a sudden the whole thing seemed ridiculous to me.  It couldn’t be what I thought it was.
    The old man only waited a moment for my answer and walked past me.  He lit a prayer candle, quietly murmuring to himself and made the sign of the cross.  I followed him into the sanctuary and stood beside the pew he seated himself in.
    “What did you give me to drink?” I pressed insistently.
    “A cheap merlot,” the old man shrugged.  “A seven dollar bottle out of California.”
    “No, there was more.  You put something in it.  Something awful.”
    “What did you taste?” the old man asked me again.
    “I tasted blood,” I whispered, barely able to gasp the words out.
    The brows of the old man wrinkled up in thought.  He smiled again and shook his head.
    “The mysteries of God are difficult to ponder,” he said.  “Did you taste wine at all?”
    “I did.  At first I tasted your cheap merlot.  Then I tasted a lot of other things: an old vintage, the Mediterranean air, crowds of people,