The Lost Scholar

CHAPTER: 01

THE HIEROPHANT

“Gabriel! We're late for church! Wake up!” The sleeping child heard from down the stairs. He rose in search of his glasses before he dressed in his best vestments. Gabriel rubbed the crag from his dark blue eyes, smudging his glasses as he did so. After cleaning them with a clean rag, he found a crow standing on his head post. Never understanding how long it stood there, but he was sure the window was securely locked. He glanced over to verify “How did you get in here…?” The small boy walked over to it, expecting it to fly off around the room or to bite him, but the bird allowed him to carry him to the window to set it free. However, it stood on the windowsill admiring the view. “What? I can't keep you--”

“Gabriel! Hurry up!” his mother yelled again. He panicked and grabbed his bible from his nightstand drawer and ran downstairs. “Where have you been? We’re late.” She dragged him out into the cold.

Mother and child walked down the street till the centerpiece in front of his church made the boy’s blood run cold. A little girl hung from the gallows. She had curly hair and pale skin. He could tell she was crying till the end, she had frozen trails under her gouged eyes where the crows feasted on.

“This happens to children that misbehave.” His mother spoke in a cruel tone. “For mocking the Lord with profanities as welcoming the devil to her home. Never fall into the devil's temptation, Gabriel.”

Gabriel walked in the church sitting in the center section, unable to shake the horrible image from his mind. The night before he encountered a girl who looked very similar, “did I see her...?” he whispered to himself.

The sermon began, as the priest stood by the altar and spoke: “Good morning children of God. Let us open our bibles to Deuteronomy 18:9–9.” Gabriel and everyone did so, he placed his bookmark over the page to study it later.

“When you come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations the Lord your God is driving them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God, for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do this.”

Gabriel was confused. Yes, fortune-tellers and prophets are different but they are similar in his mind.

“My children. Our land has been forsaken by the filth of the devil. It will try to place a foothold in the land our Lord gifted us. Witches, wizards, fortune tellers, devil worshipers; they are all here. But fear not my children for to our Lord there is no such thing, he will rise and destroy the evil which Satan has scattered through our holy land and defiled it with its unholy power! No longer shall they sacrifice us to the devil! No more shall we let them do as they please! They are an abomination! When our lord created us and brought us to this land he told us never to tangle into the web of lies of Satan. He will disown us and his wrath will be a reminder of what sort of filth we rolled over! We shall remove any abomination from his land, we shall sanctify every soil for they have used it for their rituals and sacrifices. Children have been born into monstrosities because of this horrific reality! Witches married to the devil, conceiving the devil's children! Men are being deceived by witches to steal their souls and humanity!”

Gabriel felt a little sick to his stomach. He was unsure why they are evil. “What have they done to us?” he wondered. Children don't take the form of evil just because.

“Children let us pray….” Everyone kneeled, except for Gabriel who was daze staring at the crucifiction display.

“Our Father,

Who art in heaven,

hallowed be Thy name;

Thy kingdom come;

Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;

and forgive us our trespasses

as we forgive those who trespass against us;

and lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil. Amen.”

They all stood after they crossed themselves. Gabriel didn’t do it. His young body tensed and he felt a shooting pain up his spine, he whined and fell on his knees.

“Let us begin the last supper,” said the priest as prepared the wine and the piece of bread, symbols of the body and blood of Christ. Gabriel wondered why was it forbidden to drink the blood of other humans but it was all right to drink the blood of Christ, or to even consume his own body. “Would that count as cannibalism?” Gabriel thought. His mother pulled him to make the line to accept the supper. He was nervous, he didn't want to accept it because he was the devil's child.

It was becoming his turn. He would look around at the christian decor, the stained glass windows.

of saints portraying mercy and faith. He then looked up above the cross where Jesus was crucified; his own creation mutilated him following his own rules. He trembled at the thought.

His mother pushed him to the ground, he kneeled to the priest. He held a chalice for Gabriel to sip from, he closed his eyes and took a small gulp of the bitter liquid. It always tasted horrible to him. He then took a bite of the stale bread, the taste help wash away some trace of the vile liquid from his tongue.

Little Gabriel stood up and walked back to the bench with his mother after she partook of the supper. His stomach churned with the contents. The child took deep breaths and willed away the urge to purge his stomach. The tiny Amesthyn was thankful that the sermon was almost over and that once it did he could take refuge in the comfort of his room, far away from the ghastly society he lived amok.