D’Molay held it close and gazed upon his handiwork carefully as he removed the remaining plaster debris. He was genuinely pleased for the first time in ages by his success in reforming that lump of metal into what it had once been. It had been his own cross for many years until that night when he had completely abandoned his faith in God and thrown it in the flames.
Realizing he’d never had the chance to confide his life story to Aavi, he chose to tell her now. “Well, Aavi, I thought I was done with God and I was sure he was done with me. Back on Earth, he’d left me to burn in flames. I was sure the Pope would save me, but he let the King of France burn me alive. But then pride goeth before a fall. Now I know I was wrong, wrong about everything.” Examining the cross, he said in almost a whisper, “I melted this down while I was drunk and angry and desolate. Then, the very next day I met you. The only Knight Templar in the City of the Gods to meet the only angel? That was no coincidence. You needed a guide and I was called to duty, without even knowing it.”
She had been the answer to a question he had long ago stopped asking: Did God care? Now he was sure he knew that answer.
D’Molay’s Redemption
Digital Alteration of King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid (Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1884).
* * *
There had been a blinding flash and all the pain from the arrows in her body disappeared. An instant later Aavi found herself in a place of pure white light. She floated with no weight to her movements or sense of any ground, but was not afraid. She remembered being here before.
As her vision adjusted to the whiteness, she began to discern other shapes floating in the void. They were translucent and somehow indistinct from one another. One of them approached her and she heard its voice, not with her ears but with her mind.
“You have returned. We were worried for you.”
Aavi remembered the last few moments before the blast. She had been with D’Molay on a battlefield and the beast was near. There were armies, and . . .
Aavi found the details of wherever she had been slipping away. “I don’t understand. Why was I there? Why am I here now?”
“It need not concern you now. It is all over.” The cloud-like form shimmered in front of Aavi. Within it, she could see same sort of glow that she had seen emanating from the beings she had just been with. She now understood that glow was what they would be if they were here, just as now she was a glow in this realm of light. Their bodies were like the clay urns she had seen on the ship, just vessels to hold their true inner selves.
Then she began to remember that she had been sent on a specific mission, but as she traveled, something had interfered. Something had stopped her from going to Earth. “I failed to take the beast to Earth,” she admitted to the being. “I failed to open the great seal.”
“Perhaps you failed, or perhaps not. It may well have been that your journey served an entirely different purpose. Just because you are not aware of that greater purpose does not mean there is not one. There may even come a time when you will be called upon again, and then you will know more of why your current journey was necessary.”
Aavi thought about what she had just heard. “So it wasn’t all for nothing? All the suffering of others and the pains endured were for a reason?”
“Of course there was a reason for it all. Believe that, if you believe nothing else. We will help you understand. Join the rest of the Host and share with us what you have learned.”
The being reached out to touch her and she instantly remembered the joy of being part of their company. To be so, was to be a part of the great calm, the great love. Yes, she wanted to join again and to be with them all. To be safe, and warm and loved. It was all she wanted. “Yes please, take me to the Host.” The glowing form started to drift off and Aavi followed.
She thought of her friend who had been with her at the end, and felt sadness. Although she now could not remember his name, she wanted to return, to let him know that everything was going to be all right, so he would understand too.
“Wait. Can I see him again, to explain it all to him?”
The glowing form paused for a moment. “He must find his own answers, but perhaps you will see him again someday.”
Aavi glowed a little brighter as they floated towards the Host. “I would like that.”
THE END
CITY OF THE GODS: FORGOTTEN Page 54