The Lost Scholar

CHAPTER: 13

THE STRENGTH

“How can we be so blinded by this…?” The small child sunk into the velvet blankets sobbing quietly. “How can I be this stupid and let this happened?” Roy refuse to answer any of the questions Gabriel sutured. The cleromancer studied the journal for any other clues and kept them to himself till it is fit to tell a child, but when would it be appropriate? “What will happen? I can’t just let my mother go, I should have told my father to stay! I should have begged! I already lost my father and now I will lose my mother! This isn't fair...”

“... When did Johan leave?” the cleromancer asked before drowning another blood shot, as he called it.

Gabriel wiped his tears with a fist full of blankets. “H-he… he left--” the boy didn’t know what to say, when he remembered that last kiss on his head, and the warm palm on his cheek, he remembers standing outside after hours. “I… don’t know…”

“Was it about a few months ago…?” Roy doesn’t move, he glances at the weeping apprentice with the corner of his eyes, hidden behind tinted lenses.

“... I — Can’t remember…”

“See, when you told me Johan walked out on you guys, I was skeptical. Johan is many things, cunning, brilliant, strong, a cunt in white robes… But to walk out on you and Grizelda is very unlikely…” He turned to the boy as he read from the journal. “I spoke to your mother recently, and she told me the same thing, that he went to investigate the murders and never came back.” Roy lifted his gaze to make eye contact with Gabriel. “I bet your mother and your father didn’t want to worry you with what was happening, so I assumed they never told you."

"Or I am just a stupid child that fails to see reality as it should be..." Roy was silenced by the remarked and kept to himself for a moment till he sparked a different conversation. “We need to go to the fortress. I know you are unwell, but we are running out of time and there are still some things left unanswered.” Roy was correct but Gabriel lost all hope. He felt it deep in his heart he would not make a difference.

“Are you listening?” Roy asked, knowing well Gabriel wasn’t. “You know what my father used to do, before he left…?” the boy whispered and the drunk man listen closely. “He would sing in a different language mostly in Spanish or Italian. After he left, the only two sounds you can hear are the ones of agony and silence… Now they are both gone my life had become this desolate silence.”

“You speak as if they're gone forever,” the cleromancer didn’t much enjoy the boy’s dread.

“Soon they will… There is nothing that will help me, not even you who are experience with this can make a difference. I fear this is all for nothing…” Gabriel was drowning in his pain and doubt and nothing would fix it. No amount of miracles would fix something so broken.

“Why not pray to Crow?” Roy offered with a gentle hand on his good shoulder.

“Pray to him…? What good will it do now?” Gabriel wondered why Roy was being ridiculous at the worst of times. The cleromancer sat next to him basking in the silence before speaking.

“Jesus of Nazareth was born to save humankind with his sacrifice… He slowly spread his gospel of the lord with genius tactics to gift his children the promised land, the new Eden. He had many disciples, but he had one who he favored and will forever consider him his best friend; Judas of Iscariot. Jesus confined in him, things he dared not tell a soul, not even his own wife, Mary Magdalene. One of the many things he confessed was, "there is no god, and if there were, he never existed now." Jesus was slowly breaking, he wondered what if the lights he saw were nothing but daydreams, that his sole purpose in life is all a fabrication of Moses’s mind, or that his sacrifice will do nothing if not worsen what is happening? Judas comfort him, assuring with a sound ‘amen’ after they prayed quietly for who ever listened.”

“Judas was a traitor… how could Jesus consider him someone so close to him…?”

“Judas never betrayed Jesus. They were close friends, so close that even Mary Magdalene was close to him. It wasn’t till Jesus’ wife died did he truly succumb to the darkness. Judas brought him out through prayer, the one Jesus recited in the sermons.”

“Impossible, they praised Jesus because he was perfect,” the pessimistic child remarked.

“... There is no one who is righteous, not even one.” Roy quoted from the heart, words he lived by. “He couldn’t handle the pressure, so he devised a prophesy to escape, a prophesy of betrayal.”

“The kiss of Judas…” Gabriel finished the sentence. He was familiar with the story, a story the church uses to bring fear for those who fall into any sin.

“It was a kiss of farewell… Judas looked at him with pleading eyes and all he received was an expectant smile. Judas reached in and kissed his cheek saying, ‘forgive me, for I have yet to commit the ultimate sin,’ they dragged out Jesus of the temple, and forgave him.” The altered version of Roy’s story was too similar to Amelia’s, save for the witch being a heartless woman. Roy laid back on the bed and pulled the child with him, showing him the decorative ceiling of all the stars charted into a map to the library at the center of the universe.

“When they crucified Jesus his fears were present to him all at once, ‘Why have thou forsaken me?’ He sang a new prayer, for any god to hear him. The only answer were crows pecking at him, relieving him of his slow and painful demise. He spoke of a place in the sky, far away from heaven, a god that welcomed him with open arms and hope…”

“... But according to Yuri and even Crow himself, they were enemies…”

“That was long behind them, along with the Kingdom on Earth for the children of God. He was born again and lived as a man, not a Messiah...”

“Why do you tell me this…?” The child had enough of the stories and sat up straight.

Roy followed suit and stared down at the child shrouded in gloom. “Because through dark times one sings or prays for enlightenment. I know in my heart that Johan prayed in the form of song, following a similar dead god’s teachings. You are dragging yourself through the mud and losing sight of your hope and spirituality. Pray to him.”

“He hasn’t helped at all…” Gabriel avoided his gaze, keeping them steady at the ground he barely touched with the soles of his shoes. The bed lifted, Roy was standing tall in front of him with a worried look, perhaps a mirrored concern.

“Gabriel, pray…” The cleromancer stood on his knee, taking Gabriel’s hands and pressing their foreheads together. “Why is he so close…!?” The boy flushed a heavy dye of red and purple and his palms clammed underneath the heavy hands.

“Let us pray together...

My world, devoid of star and dreams,

My mind plagued with doubts and nightmares,

I sing of hope and pray to thee

the Hermit of knowing and God of Creation,

Open your doors your home beyond the stars, a sanctuary,

Protect my soul, heal my wounds, and silence the voices from the distant.

I am your child, a companion, a familiar,

Merxill Umnai…”

Gabriel’s eyes blinded by his grace and holy aura. The small body dropped onto the bed and his soul ascended to the asylum in the sky.