The crypt floors were white and black, intersecting checkered tiles like an erratic chessboard. Shiny black pulpits reflected the warm lights dangling from the bricks of the steep domed ceiling.
“Some consider the crypt a church in its own right, you know.”
Vi wasn’t surprised. As she followed the cardinal further underground, her footsteps echoed through the chamber. It was not as large as the church upstairs, but the crypt was still larger than some of the small-town churches she’d been to.
“The original cathedral was completely demolished and re-built in 1913. But parts of the crypt are still colonial.”
Vi hummed in response. The cardinal continued as he retrieved a key and unlocked a black door.
“I’m so glad there is some renewed interest in the cathedral. It was renovated in the turn of the century, but the exterior could use some work already. It’s difficult to keep anything pristine in this city.” He smiled over his shoulder at her. “Public involvement is so important. I hope your research will help in that. What did you say your topic was, again?”
“The intersection of indigenous folklore and catholic doctrine in modern-day Brazil.”
“Yes, yes. I’m sure you know this, but the spread of the catholic church in Brazil was much more peaceful and focused on integration compared to other places in Latin America.”
The cardinal sounded proud as he opened the door, leading her to a round, brightly lit room. The crisscross checkerboard tiles continued here, caging a black marble tomb. Above it, a brass bust inlaid in black marble stared with empty eyes at her. Martim Afonso was inscribed below him; a Christian name earned for his cooperation with the Jesuits. The same name as the Portuguese nobleman who oversaw the colonization of São Paulo.
Vi took out her phone and began photographing the tomb. The cardinal stood, arms crossed behind him. He executed his role as performatively as Vi did. Then again, she never felt at ease around religious people.
“Can I photograph the inside of the tomb? To see how he was buried?”
The cardinal blinked.
“I’m not sure that is possible. Why is that of importance?”
Vi took a photo of the inscription, and the brass crosses embedded above the bust. “Anthropological relevance. It tells us a lot if he was buried following catholic or Tupi customs. Or, a mix of both.”
“I see. I’m afraid that won’t be possible today. Maybe you can arrange a meeting with your thesis supervisor at the university. I am happy to discuss with him-”
“Her.” Vi interrupted.
“Apologies. With her, to see if we can arrange a more in-depth observation. I have concerns at ensuring that the tomb remains as it is. It’s a very important piece of history.”
“I know. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”
They held each other’s gaze over the black tomb of the buried chieftain.
Vi pulled out a notebook and turned back to the brass inscription before replying.
“I’ll tell her to send you an email. I just need to take a few more notes, and I’ll be out of your hair. For now.”
“Take your time.” She could hear the cardinal’s polite smile in his voice. She rolled her eyes and began slowly writing down her grocery list with her back to him. She was halfway through listing her dinner ingredients before a knock sounded on the door.
She heard the cardinal step back, open it, and speak in a muted tone to someone on the other side.
“I need to step out for a moment. Will you be alright by yourself?”
Vi hummed and nodded, pensively staring at the inscription before writing down whole-grain bread. As soon as the door shut behind the cardinal, she dropped the notebook, turned to the tomb, and began to push. Her stomach twisted as the sound of stone scraping on stone echoed in the crypt antichamber. She hoped whatever bullshit Rafa had cooked up had taken the cardinal out of the crypt, and out of earshot.
Her arms strained against the tomb lid as she braced her feet against the wall, pushing her body between it and the heavy black marble. Vi groaned as she forced a gap between the lid and the sides of the tomb, just wide enough for her forearm. The smell of decay wafted up, and she breathed out as she stuck her hand into the gap. Vi palpated the 500 year old corpse, fingers brushing against bone. Sharp, inhuman. She grabbed on, exhaling sharply as bone dug into her palm, and pulled.
Vi heard the cracking of the chieftain’s head dislodging from his neck as she pulled the necklace from the tomb. It was a beaded cord holding three fangs the size of her palm. She pocketed it, ran to the other side of the antechamber, and grunted as she struggled to push the lid back to its original position. The marble scraped slowly back in place, and Vi collapsed briefly against the side of the tomb with the momentum before scrambling over the tiled floor to pick up her notebook. She got up, brushed the decaying remains that coated her hand against her dark jeans, and tucked the errant black hairs falling over her eyes behind her ear.
She took a breath, and resumed her grocery list. Her right hand burned as she held her pen. One of the necklace’s fangs had pierced her palm. She wiped her hand against her jeans again, smearing the dollop of blood away.
It wasn’t the cardinal that opened the door a few moments later. She turned back to see a different priest, young and blonde walk in. He looked apologetic.
“The cardinal has an important matter to attend to. I would be happy to escort you out.”
Vi nodded. “I’ll have to arrange a follow-up, probably. If my supervisor can pull enough strings. Otherwise, tell him thanks.” The priest nodded, locking the door behind her. They walked through the crypt and up the carved stone stairs to the cathedral proper.
Vi tried to ignore the burning pain in her palm, and the irony of the stigmata. The cathedral stretched nearly into the sky, and its interior was lit by chandeliers reflecting light on brass statues of angels wielding spears. Rows of pews lined the central hall, some housed devotees even now in the late evening. The sound of her footsteps over the marble tiles bounced off the high ceilings and stone columns.
“Do let us know if we can be of any more help in your research.” The priest smiled as she exited the church, nodded at him, and walked out into the warm night.
The See Cathedral spanned over 100 meters of Neo-Gothic spires out of place in the rain-stained and graffitied apartments of central São Paulo. It towered over See Square, it’s imposing stature still in defiance against the residential apartments that had sprung up around it over the years. Vi walked down the square, bracketed by rows of palm trees. She kept her pace consciously casual but alert, like any young woman walking alone at night in the megametropolis. She knew the priest would still be watching her, deputized as he’d been with her wellbeing. See Square was the heart of the catholic church’s jurisdiction; the stage for the city’s episcopal see.
Vi’s steps faltered for a second. She felt a second pair of eyes on her. She scanned the passerby’s walking in the square, illuminated by the orange glow of the streetlights. She met the gaze of a woman standing on the opposite end of See Square. Her copper hair was haloed by the streetlight. Flames began to lick at the woman’s pale face, burning streaks into her skin as she cried red hot fire. The woman reached to her face as it was engulfed by the fire, burning away as a columnal inferno erupted out of her neck and into the black sky. Vi yanked her hand from her jacket pocket, the hole burned along with the woman’s head, searing her hand in pain.
A car’s horn sounded above the sounds of the city.
“Vi, in the car, come on!”
Vi turned. Rafa had rolled down the window and reached an arm out from the driver’s seat, slamming his hand against the hood of the car to call her attention.
Vi whipped her head around. A man laughed a few meters away. Two teenagers made out against one of the palm trees. None in See Square reacted to the spontaneous combustion of the red-headed woman. Vi faced ahead again, looking towards the end of See Square, but the woman was no longer there.
Vi walked to the edge of the square where the car was parked. Rafa motioned for her to enter the car.
“I’ve been circling the block for almost an hour. I think a guy thought I was cruising. Or a cop. I have a feeling he’s going to start shit soon that I’d rather not be around for.”
Vi slammed the door behind her, looking at her hand. The hole no longer burned, but she felt her hand thrumming around it.
“Not very open-minded of you, Rafa. How do you even know what cruising is?”
He scoffed. “Because I am open minded and I have gay friends.”
“You can’t tokenize your friends to excuse your homophobia.”
Rafa rolled his eyes, pushing his dark locks out of his face.
“You know you’re not actually a student, right? You don’t have to keep up the critical thinker bullshit around me.”
He had started driving west as soon as she entered the car. The drive from the city center to the university campus was nearly an hour of navigating cracked asphalt, tagged buildings, and lush trees that broke out of the sidewalk like overgrown weeds. It was past rush hour, but the streets of São Paulo were never truly empty.
One of his hands rested calmly on the steering wheel as he drove, more relaxed now that they were on their way. With his dark hair, cargo shorts and white tee, Rafa looked like everyman. The perfect getaway driver.
Vi elected not to respond to his dig, instead picking at the wound in her palm. She saw Rafa look at her hand from the corner of her vision, before he reached across her lap to open the glove box.
“Disinfectant spray and bandages are in here. But if it’s not bleeding, it’s better to just clean it and air it out.”
The words fell out of her mouth before she could stop them.
“You’re not really a student anymore either, you know.”
He slammed the glove compartment shut and his hand returned to the steering wheel, gripping it more tightly than before. A dispute with his supervisor that got ugly, and the promising young surgeon had his doctorate cancelled. Since then, he could apply to as many positions in as many hospitals as he wanted, but there always seemed to be somebody with a slightly better score.
Glass houses.
She could admit, however, that her comment had poor timing. Rafa drove onto Dr. Arnaldo Avenue. Tombstones, mausoleums, and frozen angels of the Araçá necropolis peaked over the white wall on their right, water damaged and tagged. No reverence for the dead was spared for the barrier. To their left lay the vast hospital complex. The grand, white colonial building of the medical faculty of USP appeared in flashes between the trees lining the side of the avenue.
The veins on Rafa’s arms snaked up his forearm as he gripped the steering wheel tighter still.
Vi sighed, opened the glove compartment, and pulled out the white spray bottle, wincing as she applied disinfectant to her wound. It wasn’t bleeding. She replaced the bottle, pointedly looking out the window at the passing headstones.
She didn’t have a future to lose like Rafa. She was a different kind of desperate when she was recruited by the Doctor.
“I’ll take a look when we get there. What did you do?”
“The necklace was pointy.”
“Ah.”
They continued in silence. Vi opened her backpack crumpled on the floor of the passenger seat and pulled out a plastic sample bag. She carefully retrieved the chieftain’s necklace from her jacket pocket, taking it in. It was a beaded string decorated symmetrically with two white seashells, two small curved pieces of bone, and a large central fang. The tip of the fang was coated in red. Fresh, shiny and ferrous. Vi couldn’t imagine the size of the snake it once belonged to.
She placed the necklace in the bag and sealed it, putting it back in her backpack.
“Do you ever wander what she does with them?”
Vi shrugged. “Study them, I guess.”
“What does that mean, though? She’s not a biologist. Or a chemist. Why do you need to steal shit to study it if you’re a historian?”
“Historical anthropologist.”
“Point stands.”
She shrugged again. “Ask her.”
Rafa shook his head, crossing himself. “No shot. As a rule, I don’t speak with the Doctor unless spoken to. If I start a conversation, I always end up wishing I didn’t.”
Vi didn’t reply. She knew what he meant.
They approached the grey concrete bridge that connected São Paulo proper to the so-called ‘university city’; an area of the megametropolis centered around USP. The university city was large enough to almost have its own jurisdiction. Its single story, free-standing homes were more reminiscent of smaller towns than the state capital. But the imposing skyline of São Paulo remained ever-present, stretching from horizon to horizon with apartments and smaller buildings hungry for space, overgrown and tumorous, its pollution of light and fumes creating a dull orange haze over the night sky that made Vi shiver as she thought of the combusting woman at the square.
They crossed the bridge into university city. Below, the Pinheiros river, normally a dark, putrid green, appeared inky black in the nighttime. The red-painted bike paths on its bank were empty at the late hour.
“Can sepsis cause hallucinations?”
“You know I hate it when you self-diagnose. You probably don’t have sepsis.”
“But can it?”
“Yes.”
Vi nodded, glancing down at her palm again.
“Are you experiencing hallucinations?”
“Not anymore.”
Rafa looked at her, raising a dark eyebrow. “Sometimes I think you’re obtuse on purpose to seem more interesting.”
“I don’t need to impress you.”
He snorted. “No, I guess not. It’s not like I have much of a choice either way. Besides, sticking your hand in a dead guy’s tomb to take his necklace is more impressive than ominous word choices.”
She half-smiled. Rafa returned it.
“Probably not sepsis anyways. You’re probably just cursed.”
“Is that your official medical diagnosis?”
“Yup.”
Vi thought better of making another jab at his lost doctorate position as Rafa pulled into one of the parking areas at the edge of campus.
Vi threw the backpack over her shoulder as she exited the passenger seat, Rafa following closely behind after locking the car. Although they were often mistaken for siblings with their matching brown skin, thick black hair, and dark eyes, Rafa was tall where she was short, and muscled where she was slight. The university city was less dangerous than the more central areas of the state capital, with most of the crime amounting to petty theft. But fear permeated the sides of Vi’s vision when the sky darkened. Having Rafa’s imposing frame trotting next to her eased the ever-present vigilance of being a young woman in the night.
Their partnership was orchestrated by the Doctor early in Vi’s employment, when Vi had her previous backpack stolen with one of her first assignments still inside. Rafa made her a less easy target, usually dissuading any down on their luck kid from chancing a few bucks and a laptop. He kept her, and her assignments, safe.
They walked across the sprawling campus, only passing one other dimly lit pedestrian before arriving at the faculty of philosophy, language, and social sciences.
Vi always thought the building looked like a series of gigantic shoeboxes arranged as the outline of one the mazes on the back of a cereal box. It’s outer walls were almost entirely lined with windows set into concrete and underlined with large red tiles.
The entrance was easy to miss, especially for freshmen. Vi took out a set of keys from her backpack and unlocked a glass door that was barely distinguishable from the windows beside it. The two walked down the entrance hall, modern and minimal, before veering off to a stairwell and up to the second story. Their footsteps echoed in the dark empty corridors. They stopped in front of a yellow door. A sign read ‘Historical Anthropology’ in bold white letters. Below it, in smaller lettering, read ‘Dr. Isabela da Souza Alves’.
Rafa tidied his dark curls as Vi straightened her jacket collar. After a beat, she opened the door.
“I could hear you approach, you know.”
The Doctor sat on her wooden desk on the far end of the classroom, the blackboard behind her still streaked from being wiped down after the day’s lectures. Her graying hair was pulled into a loose knot, with stray strands framing her face. Age had begun to crease it, setting her expression at a near permanent frown that was, at this moment, illuminated by the blue glow of her laptop screen.
Rafa cleared his throat, shuffling in place. Vi commanded her legs to move. Eventually they did, crossing into the threshold of the classroom. The wall to wall windows beyond the rows of wooden desks provided a view of one of the inner courtyard gardens below. Moonlight shone through the glass into the classroom.
Vi took off her backpack, removed the plastic baggie holding her assignment, and placed it on the Doctor’s desk. The Doctor’s sharp black eyes flicked to Vi’s hands, then the necklace in the bag.
“You contaminated it. How many times have I told you to wear gloves?”
Vi felt the color drain from her face.
“Let me see it.”
Vi stammered before replying, “The necklace is in the bag, Doctor.”
“Your hand, Vitória.”
“Oh.”
Vi approached the desk again, turning her palms upward. The Doctor’s gaze pierced her palm more sharply than the fang had. Vi swallowed hard as one of the Doctor’s hands gripped her own, bringing the stigmata closer to her inspecting eyes before releasing her and retrieving the necklace from the clear plastic bag.
The Doctor measured the fang’s length, as well as the length of the streak of blood, recording both numbers on her computer. She replaced the fang in the bag and stowed it in her own purse.
“This is a storied necklace. It has almost as intriguing a history as its owner. Without the collaboration of Chief Tibiriçá, some argue São Paulo wouldn’t have existed. He betrayed his family by siding with the Jesuits, even killing his own brother and nephew.”
The Doctor’s voice was calm, almost soothing when she lectured. Vi felt her shoulders relax as her employer’s attention shifted from her to the assignment.
“Before dying of disease, the Chief sired many, many children. One of whom was the direct ancestor of the current queen of Sweden. Tibiriçá was notoriously … passionate. Even his name is a reflection of this; although some argue that it means watcher of the land, it’s widely agreed that Tibiriçá translates most closely to watcher of the buttocks.”
Rafa snorted from the desk he had sat on, tensing when the Doctor directed her gaze to him before turning back to Vi.
“This necklace was said to have been crafted from the fang of one of the folkloric snakes of the Tupi mythos. I’m sure you heard of the Boitatá growing up?”
Vi nodded. Most children had. It was a boogeyman, a giant snake of fire that ate your eyes and burned you to death, not after driving you to madness. Campfire story.
“There are differing beliefs on the purpose of the Boitatá in folklore. Some say it was beholden by Jaci, the moon goddess, to protect the forest. Some see it more metaphorically, as a manifestation of the fear that the dense jungle and snaking rivers of the Amazon inspire in the hearts of men.”
The Doctor rose from her seat, eyeing Vi more intently. She was taller than Vi, but she could make even Rafa feel small.
“Some even say it takes your eyes and drives you mad. But a sect of the Tupi believed the opposite. It did not take your eyes, it gave you vision. That is the madness. The ability to see.”
Vi looked away.
“See… what?”
“Souls, spirits. The truth which can only sometimes be glimpsed at during nights where the moon shines bright and the wind whispers to you. The ability to see clearly where myth comes from.”
“Do you believe in that stuff, Doctor?” Rafa’s voice was low.
Vi was grateful as she felt the weight of the Doctor’s gaze shift to him.
“I am interested in it. I am curious as to what makes people believe the things they do. How stories are made. That’s what we do here.”
The Doctor closed her laptop, placing it into her bag, and moved away from the desk.
“Luckily, I don’t think your contamination will affect the value of this item. There is still a lot we can learn from this. You may consider the assignment completed successfully.”
She walked to the door, before turning to address her employees.
“I will contact you with details for you next assignment shortly. Please remember to lock up behind you.”
Vi and Rafa watched her exit, hearing the clacking sound of her heels echo down the hallways and down the stairs.
Rafa let out a long breath.
“She’s so intense, man. We should probably head home. I’ll look at your hand, and we can get some sleep.”
Vi wasn’t listening.
A woman stood in the courtyard. Her hair was copper, her skin pale in the moonlight, and her eyes burned with yellow flames as she stared up at Vi.
“Vi?”
Vi jumped as Rafa was suddenly beside her, holding her gently by the forearm. She looked at him with widened eyes before whipping her head back to the courtyard, now empty once again.
Rafa’s face grew concerned.
“Maybe we should get you checked for sepsis. You look like shit.”
Vi blinked, heart still racing. She shook her head.
“I just need sleep.”
“…Ok.”
He did not sound convinced as he followed her out of the classroom. They locked the door and made their way back to the car. The hairs in the back of Vi’s neck stood on end the whole way. She worried that whatever was following her was beyond Rafa’s ability to keep her safe. She was already a target.