by V. Cobe
CHAPTER 33
The Hard Truth
He didn’t return home. Once he closed the manhole and stepped onto the tar, he stole the first bike he saw and rode it toward Heart of Carmel. When the ascent became too difficult, he dropped the bike and ran.
A spotlight blinded him once he reached the great gates but turned off immediately after. The gates opened as if by magic. Not a single Brigade guard was there.
He walked the trails, rounded the fountain and stopped in front of the building. The doors of the church were wide open.
The bishop was lighting a candle near the altar. Dozens of candles were already burning and casting frightening shadows. His godfather looked at him and raised his eyebrows, with a smile.
“Hello, Alemeth!” he said as he lighted another candle. “Come on in.”
He turned off the match in his hand and walked to Alem.
“You’re full of blood… what happened?” He gave him a tight hug.
Alem didn’t return the hug, but the bishop continued to embrace him for a few seconds and then sighed deeply and let go. He returned to the altar and sat in the first row of seats. Alem followed him but didn’t sit.
“I know why you’re here, Alemeth. We didn’t know for sure if you’d come, but I had a feeling you would. I know you well.” He had a strange calmness and a strange smile on his face. “It’s not worth it to be here denying everything.”
The church doors closed. Mother Zilá locked them with a key. Sister Sara and Sister Ada emerged through the left side. The three of them slid to the altar, like ghosts, covered in habits crawling on the floor. Evilness haunted their faces. The bishop’s resembled an insect’s.
Alem suddenly felt very stupid. He was completely unprotected. He thought that his strength and agility would be enough against the old age of the bishop, if it came to that, but now they were advancing toward him with a dangerous aura, an evil power, and he shuddered when he realized that their weapons would be neither strength nor agility.
“You are part of Umbra.”
Sister Sara laughed softly. Her face in that light seemed to change shape for a split second. It withered, filled with wrinkles, many more than any face could have. Her eyes smiled at him.
“We are, yes,” she replied.
“But this is the Institution’s!” shouted Alem, looking at the church.
“I met Umbra a long time ago, Alem. A very long time ago.” She laughed. “At the time, I was an apprentice of the Order of Healing, in the Health branch. Umbra disgusted me as it disgusts you, and I wanted to reveal it to the Institution. But Defectio offered me a deal: I don’t speak to anyone about what I discovered and in return they promised me eternal life.”
“They should’ve killed you,” said Alem.
“I don’t know why they didn’t. Perhaps they knew that it’d be me who one day would deliver you to them when you arrived into the world,” she said and smirked.
“I accepted, of course, but the conditions quickly changed. I had to do things for Umbra in exchange for the youth rituals. Bad things. And I stopped caring about it.”
“You were poisoned by evil,” said the bishop.
“Shut up,” she replied dryly. Then she smiled at Alem. “Addicted to evil, perhaps. You’d be surprised at what you can achieve with evil, Alem.”
He shook his head contemptuously.
“By definition, evil cannot be good.”
A cruel glow appeared in Sister Sara’s eyes, and the flames trembled.
“Don’t be a smartass,” she snapped. “Or you might end up in the dungeons again.”
He felt sorry for her; her and the others. They were consumed by evil. They felt pettiness, bitterness, hatred, every day of their lives. It couldn’t be good.
“Later came Ada and Zilá. Daughters of mine whom I wasn’t able to abort.”
It was Mother Zilá’s turn to speak.
“What you saw in the forest is the ritual where we conceive. And then we abort. As you know, in order to have youth we need to get it from somewhere….”
Alem wanted to vomit.
“But Umbra didn’t allow me to abort these two girls.”
“Perhaps they also knew that we’d help Mother deliver you today,” said Mother Zilá.
Ada laughed.
“They always know a lot about the future,” said Zalmon.
“How can you allow such a thing?” asked Alem, afflicted. “You disguise yourself as a man of God!”
“And I am! I’ve never set foot in Umbra!”
“The three of us are defectici; your godfather is a man of the Institution.”
“If that were true, he’d never allow you in here, doing those rituals in the forest.”
“Well, things aren’t that simple,” said the bishop. “There are certain… benefits that Umbra gives me in exchange for my cooperation.”
Alem didn’t want to know what they were.
“And it’s a cooperation that comes from long ago,” added Sister Sara. “Long before Zalmon arrived here. You must be asking yourself why we chose this monastery for the rituals, aren’t you? Well… we’ve been waiting for you.”
“Defectio has members spread across almost every school in the world,” said Mother Zilá. “That way we can be aware in case the child we seek shows up.”
“And here you are,” said Sister Sara.
“Why didn’t you just take me, then? Why wait for me to see that in the woods? And why not take me again after I escaped?”
“So many questions!” squeaked Sister Ada.
The others laughed, and even the bishop looked amused.
“You are wicked! How is such perversion possible? You won’t get away with this, you won’t continue to do this. The Institution won’t be happy at all when they find out!”
The laughter intensified. The candle flames trembled violently.
“The Institution, Alem?” asked the bishop. “Do you think the Institution doesn’t know about this? It’s the Institution that pulls the strings. I just obey!”
Alem swallowed. He stepped back to regain balance. Lies.
“Umbra wants you, but the Institution… wants you as well,” said Zalmon. “It has protected you since you were born. There are security guards following you everywhere, but you don’t even notice them. In fact, it was they who prevented your mother from being killed by Defectio when you were still a baby and allowed her to flee to Sun’s Farm. It was all planned, Alem. Everything. It was hard to keep you safe with Defectio always behind you, and so the Institution sent you to Reuel. Do you really think the Institution lets anyone get away into the countryside? We knew all along where you were. Reuel had orders to protect you and teach you the Faith until you reached the age to study here. Because here, only those who I want enter. When that time came, I went to pick you up personally. I don’t know if you remember. And of course it was all filed. Your mother had to spend only a few days in the Correction Center. You never thought that was strange? Is the Institution often so lenient? It was the Institution who protected you when your hair color changed in front of everyone. Or don’t you think that would send anyone right to the stake for witchcraft? However, here you are. And now it seems you’ll be the new Most Holy President. You who just got in! You’re not that clever, nor that good, to already be the most powerful man in the world. Or do you think you are? Did you never think you were being taken up on someone’s lap? For years, my partnership with Defectio was based on allowing these nuns to perform their rituals here, as my predecessor did. With the approval of the Institution, of course. I didn’t know they were looking for a special child, nor did they know I was involved in keeping you safe on the farm, under the Institution’s orders. But when you came here, we put the cards on the table. They wanted to take you, I had orders to not let anything happen to you. Until one day the Institution gave me a different order: you could be taken by them so they could do whatever they wanted to you. But on one condition: you’d have to watch a ritual in the forest and you’d ha
ve to be kept in the dungeons for three months. What these nuns don’t know, which I’m going to reveal now, is that the Institution never planned to actually deliver you. They just wanted you to think that it was Umbra who was doing all those bad things to you. But after three months, when they thought you were ready, they would save you.”
The nuns sizzled.
“Oh, Zalmon… you should not have done that.”
“What are you going to do?” he asked sarcastically. He turned to Alem and continued, “But you ran away, and again my orders from the Institution were for no one to harm you. They tried to dissuade me, but alone they didn’t dare try to take you. They would die immediately. And you’ve realized by now how much they love to live. Defectio did everything to get in here, but I couldn’t let that happen. You know, I’m much more afraid of the Institution than of Defectio.”
Alem’s voice quaked as he asked, “But why do you want me? Why did you do all of that to me?”
Zalmon stepped forward, and Alem retreated down the hall.
“Have you heard of the Great Superstition?” asked the bishop.
A rumble came from the church’s entrance when the doors sprung wide open. The candle flames seemed to double in size as the woman, quick stepped, walked down the aisle. Her outfit was completely black, snug, framed by a black cloak she dropped behind her. Her blonde hair was caught in a ponytail that dragged on the floor.
Alem had seen her before. She was the woman in his vision.
“Thank you for that clarification, bishop,” she said, taking long strides toward them. “It’s always good to know I was conned.”
Her voice echoed throughout the church.
The bishop, confused, said, “Not quite, Nimda…. It’s complicated, you see. But everything turned out all right, didn’t it? He’s here now. But the Institution is too strong.”
“Of course.”
Like a swift animal, she raised her right arm and fired a shot at Zalmon’s head, killing him instantly. As she continued advancing down the hall, she moved her arm with frightening precision and pulled the trigger three more times.
“Here’s your eternal life.”
It was as fast as the breaking of the door and as effective.
Beside Alem lay the bishop and the three nuns’ bodies, each with a dark spot in the center of their foreheads from where blood flowed to the cold stone of the church.
Nimda stopped in front of Alem and pointed her gun to his head.
“You. Come with me.”