City of IF

[Shady Stoat]

The vote went towards Keli attending the evening call of Itharien. Here's what happens next...

Chapter Eight

Two hours later, there was a knock at the bedroom door. Sara came in, holding a pair of soft leather slippers. They were lined with fur and they looked like they would be as close to comfortable as she was currently likely to get.

She managed a smile, though her insides were being gnawed by dread.

“Thanks.”

“Soon as you’re ready, come down. We don’t want to be late, do we?”

Sara breezed out of the room, all smiles.

Keli passed a hand over her eyes. She had thought and thought. There really was nothing else for it – she had to go to the Call of the Evening and hope that she could pass undetected there.

The temples probably held hundreds. A sea of faces, one very much like another. The chances were that nobody would even notice her. Even if they did, how would they know that she had visions? She had escaped before a formal Trial had taken place, only a few days ago. No alert could have been raised in that time. Certainly not one wide enough to cover every official in every temple in the City! They couldn’t possibly be that organised! She was safe. She had to be.

It was at least the hundredth time she had told herself the same thing. It didn’t help.

She eased the slippers onto her feet, then stood up as gingerly as she was able. Willing her face into impassivity, she began her journey down the stairs.

It was time to face this.

---------

The journey was mercifully short. Keli was thankful for the comfort of soft, padded shoes. Even so, her feet stung and ached by the time she got to the Temple.

A crowd of people had joined them, even in the space of three street-lengths. Amid the hubbub, Keli was virtually ignored. The only one who took any notice of her was Sara, whose arm she was leaning on. Her new friend chattered happily, throwing comments both in her direction and out to the crowd.

Keli felt bewildered as the two of them dropped to the rear of the group. The people seemed so happy, like they were on a family outing. They acted as if they had nothing to fear. Yet earlier, the ones in the bar had seemed to know people who had disappeared at the hands of the Cult. Were they stupid, or acting, or merely ignorant?

She was still trying to figure it out when they reached the doors of the temple. Keli looked at the building with a frown. It was not what she had expected at all!

In her dreams, there had been a large, stone cavern of a room, complete with altar, cage and victim. She realised that, subconsciously, she had been expecting to meet the same scene in the temple. She had not been anticipating a timber-framed structure, high in roof and narrow in width. It nestled between a carpenter’s shop and a saddlery, just like any other store. The only difference was the presence of a large gong, standing a little way out from the doors. A man in robes beat a padded hammer rhythmically against it, evoking a low boom like the one she had heard last night.

It was only when Sara gave an impatient little jerk against her arm that she realised she had stopped. People were still milling around her, but many more had already hastened inside. She moved as fast as her feet could manage, into the dingy innards of the Church of Itharien.

Before she got a chance to take a good look around, she was tugged to one side.

“You’ve got to sign up,” Sara murmured rapidly. “Won’t take a minute, just over here, there you go.”

Before she could protest (and what protest could she realistically have made?), Keli was pushed in the direction of a high, wooden lectern. A book lay open on its rest, with a pen and an inkwell beside it. Keli scanned the room nervously, but nobody seemed to be keeping watch over the register. However, Sara stood at her shoulder, looking on with an innocent smile. There was no opportunity to write anything other than her real name and the address of the Inn.

No sooner had she done it than she was bustled to a hard, wooden pew, to settle by the innkeeper and his daughter. Her bruises and aching bones immediately protested at the severity of the seat. She did her best to ignore them. It was a discomfort she would willingly endure, so long as she could escape this service unscathed!

Settled now, she finally had a chance to glance around at her surroundings.

The church was no wider within than it had seemed on first appearance. It was surprisingly long, though. Close to two hundred people were seated and there was still the odd gap here and there. It had two large and ornate windows, front and back. With evening closing in, though, they failed to illuminate the room at all. It was oppressively dark, despite the candles that fluttered their flames at regular intervals around the perimeter.

Her eyes tracked the front portion of the church. That, at least, was a change from the barren starkness of the pews. There was a curved section of wood-planked platform, raised like a stage and lit with lanterns instead of candle-flames. The wood was silver-edged, ornate patterns having been painted into the grain. They glittered mystically in the stronger light. Another lectern stood at the front-right of the stage. This one was either stained in black or made of ebony, she couldn’t tell. A plinth filled with water, made from the same wood, stood at the opposite side of the stage.

Great sections of tree had been sculpted into the cross sections of hideously misshapen creatures. Then they had been set back against the walls. The overall impression was of animal-gargoyles, frozen into the very structure of the building.

And there, right at the back was another stand of black wood. It lay in the shadows, barely noticeable even to someone drinking as deeply of the details as Keli was. Her eyes found it, almost as if they had known it would be there. It stood about four feet tall; a vertical construction of wood, ending in a simple horizontal square. On top of the ledge was a cushion of dark velvet. Almost invisible, dimpling the cushion with its weight, lay a dull red stone run through with thin black veins.

Keli felt as if an invisible weight was pressing down on her. For three nights, now, she had been spared her usual visions of the sacrifice and the stone. Nevertheless, it still lay embedded, with horrific clarity, in her mind.

It burned people alive. Destroyed them from the inside out. And here she was, sitting in the same room, staring evil straight in the face!

Her head was filled with an angry buzzing. She could feel a pulsing at her temples, as if the blood was trying to explode from her pores. Her muscles were locked into a painful rigidity and she could hear the slight hitch in her breath.

“Keli? Are you all right?” whispered Sara, touching her tentatively on the arm. “You don’t look good. Are your feet hurting again?”

Somehow, Keli wrenched her gaze away from the rock. Looking into her friend’s worried face, she stretched her lips into what she hoped was a smile.

“A bit,” she managed, suppressing a shudder. “I’ll be all…”

“Shhh,” warned John, leaning over. “You two be quiet. It’s starting.”

All around them, the murmuring stilled. A robed man stepped into the well-lit area from a hidden recess to the side. Two others followed, a moment or two behind him. There was silence as they each lit a thin wand of incense. Then they retired to the gloom behind where Keli and the others sat. The first man, however, walked forward to the front centre of the stage.

Keli was surprised to see that he wore no hood. Again her visions were leading her into false expectations. The man had dark blond hair and pale skin, made ghostly by the shadows that the lanterns cast. A cold smile spread the shadows deeper into his features, without softening them in any way. His eyes seemed to pierce the gloom as he stared from face to face.

Keli looked down at her feet, but she could still feel his penetrating gaze pass her by. She felt hot and exposed. Sweat began to form on her forehead and she began to feel a restless urge towards movement. She bit her lower lip, finding a small measure of relief in the pain.

“Brothers,” said the man in a soft voice that carried, nonetheless. “Let us pray.”

The words slid like rancid oil from the man’s mouth.

“…cleanse these brothers of the beast’s foulness…”

“…through fire we shall purify…”

“…cast out the lesser creatures…”

“… demons that degrade our souls by their very existence…”

“…all praise Itharien, in his might and wonder…”

Eyes closed, head bowed, Keli could not concentrate. The buzzing sound filled her ears, making the prayers disjointed and meaningless. Her feet felt uncomfortably warm in her slippers. The hair on the back of her neck prickled, as if she were about to be attacked from behind.

For the first time, she began to wonder whether this was natural panic… or something more un-natural altogether. Unable to help herself, she opened her eyes to slits and began to turn her head towards the rear of the temple. Past the ends of the benches she looked, and past the racks of lowered faces. There, right at the back, was one of the robed clerics. He stood equidistant, between two candle-flames – and he was glaring directly at her.

She gave a gasp that was almost a whimper, whipping her head back around to face the front. Someone had noticed her. She was being watched!

The prayers ended at that moment. While Keli was still trying to deal with her shock, she vaguely heard the priest shouting something about shedding the false skin of the beast. The sibilance of the crowd’s whispering was back. They jostled with each other, turning to see the faces of their friends and neighbours in the crowd. They looked like eager children, waiting for teacher’s reward.

Finally, a thin woman in a black dress stepped out into the narrow aisle. She walked slowly, flaunting her humility as if it were pride. The priest watched her approach in silence, seeming unsurprised when she dropped to her knees before him.

“What is your sin, woman?” The priest stroked the top of her head as if she were a hound, come to him for attention.

She mumbled something at the floor. The pale man lifted her head.

“You must speak it!” he commanded. “Tell me and tell your people, that they may judge you.”

She looked into his eyes and swayed, as if she were a snake, rising from the charmer’s basket. Her voice raised into a harsh cry.

“I have been tempted by the beast!”

A muttering rippled around the audience. Keli listened, feeling far away from her surroundings. Her feet had gone from warm to hot and they were tingling and itching incessantly. She could still hear the buzzing in her head, but now it seemed like a voice whispered there too, trying to form words that she could not understand. Although the pounding was gone from her temples, she was feeling sick. She took shallow breaths and tried not to vomit.

A male voice declaiming, then a woman’s, back to the sneering tones of the man again. It all washed over Keli like a dream. Her attention faded in and out, taking in only snatches of the service.

Now the priest was beating the woman with a long wooden stick. She was hunched on the ground, hands curled protectively over her head, crying out. Five, six, seven strokes landed, and then the robed man stopped. His mouth opened to say something, but Keli could not make out the words through the whispering in her head. The woman looked up, smiling and crying, crawling forward to lay a kiss at his feet.

The audience had been leaning forward, watching in fascination. Now the muttering began again. The implication was obvious; who would be next?

A young man, barely in his twenties, shuffled through his neighbours to the end of the bench, then walked forward. It began again.

Minutes passed, wavering and hazy and full of a barely audible clamouring in her head. Keli smelled poppy in the air. ‘Opiate in the incense’, she thought, faintly. ‘Perhaps that’s what’s wrong with me.’

She knew it wasn’t. Something was hammering at her mind, trying to find a way in. She glanced back at the Itharienite who had been watching her before. He was still there, still gazing unblinkingly back.

Sara nudged her. She turned her head quickly back to the front, only to have to hold back another retch as her head span. Immediately, she became aware that the people on the pews were standing. She was the only one still remaining seated. As she hastily rose, the burning flared in her feet. She gasped and immediately felt Sara’s hand on her arm, supporting her weight a little.

It seemed that the floor-show was over. The congregation had returned to their places and the Priest held centre stage again. Keli watched, unfocused, as he went through a litany, pausing for the mechanical audience responses before chanting the next phrase. She mumbled along, not knowing the correct procedures and hardly caring. She just wanted it to be over.

Finally, it was. They sat down again. Keli rubbed her bandaged feet back and forth within the confines of her slippers. The itching was becoming unbearable. Sara shot her a warning glance, but she didn’t seem able to keep still.

The priest turned, walked to the back of the dais and picked up the cushion where the stone lay. Carrying it carefully, he walked to the side of the platform and into the shadowed recess again.

Keli’s eyes rolled and fluttered.

For a moment, she was not in a temple at all. She was in a dark place, with a smell of filth cloying in from all sides. The floor was ridged into a ‘V’ shape around her feet. Remnants of stone tiles still lingered in place, although many were cracked and smashed to fragments. Green fungus grew on the walls, seeming almost black in the shadows. It was as if a giant had taken the place and smashed it with a hammer, repeatedly. The air felt rotten and dead, as if no-one had been there for years. There was an overwhelming sense, though, that she was not alone. There was a far-off tapping sound, but something was closer. Something…

“Keli!”

Her eyes jerked open. John was staring at her, in a mixture of anxiety and fear. At his shoulder, Sara was biting nervously at a fingernail. The congregation was filing past her, heading for the door. A single gong-stroke sounded from outside.

“Are you all right?” asked the innkeeper, regarding her warily.

“I…” Keli paused. “Yes. I am.”

She no longer felt ill. Her head was clear and the prickling pain in her feet seemed much reduced. Now that the ceremony was over, she wanted, more than anything, to get out of there.

Only seconds had been lost to the vision. She could still get out with the crowd if she hurried. Keli stood up, attempting a reassuring smile in the direction of her two companions.

Neither of them returned it with any great warmth. Nevertheless, they stood aside as she walked past them. She joined the ranks and walked through the doors, out into the fresh air again. John and Sara followed in silence.

Keli was halfway up the street before she noticed. She wasn’t shuffling any more. Her feet itched and burned. They were still sore, but not as they had been earlier. Something had changed.

Too late, she tried to mask the fact that she could walk properly. It was barely possible that John and Sara had missed it. Indeed, from the cold edges to their looks, she was certain that they hadn’t. She followed the crowd back to the inn with a sinking heart.

Once inside, the barman and his daughter began to run their usual errands, ignoring Keli completely. She found herself very glad to head up the stairs without having to answer awkward questions.

When she was on the upper floor, she dropped the limp and headed straight into her bedroom. She sat on the bed and pulled her slippers off. Then she unwound the bandages, torn between dread and excitement.

She looked, astounded. The skin was red but no longer raw. Unpopped blisters had faded into wrinkles of loose flesh, and the weeping ones had dried to dead-skin scabs.

What had happened to her in the Temple of Itharien? She sat, gazing in wonder at her feet, unaware of the passage of time.

A knock at the door made her look up. Sara stood nervously, out in the corridor.

“Miss?” she said tentatively, and Keli noticed in that moment that she had ceased to be a friend. “Da says you should leave, Miss. Probably they won’t come ‘til morning, but we don’t want no trouble here. We won’t say nothing, but you can’t stay past dawn. Here’s your money back, Miss.”

She held out a gold piece at arm’s length. Keli looked at it, trying to gather her thoughts. Who wouldn’t come? Where could she go? What was she to do next?

She stood up…

[Night Walker]

Great chapter. :D

Well.First of all,she should get away from the inn,before "They"
come to get her.
After that she should try to find some safe place to hide for some time,because whoever are coming for her,aren't probably going to give up the search.

[ethereal_fauna]

She needs to leave soon. And she needs a disguise. If a werewolf can melt away into the city, she should be able to as well. Staying in the lighted streets, spending money at reputable businesses, is only going to get her caught. She'll have to slip into the shadows in order to evade capture, although it's not going to be easy to survive either way.

[Smee]

Great chapter.

The effort was worth it :)

I think she needs to appeal to whatever threads of friendship remain from Sara to find out as much as she can about 'they'. Who are they, what would they do to her, etc.

In contrast to Fauna, I think staying in the light and shopping a little is probably going to be the best way of escaping.

They will expect her to try and slip into alleyways, and shadow. She should walk around, buy some new clothing, maybe a big cloak to cover herself and then go to another Inn across town. She'll be arriving clean, well dressed and not hobbling on her feet - completely different to her arrival at the original inn. With a bit of luck she can buy herself a day or two to come up with a better plan.

Happy Writing. :)

[Night Walker]

Smee wrote: They will expect her to try and slip into alleyways, and shadow.

True.But wouldn't "they",whoever they are,would also be checking the other inn's.

[Suneila]

I have to disagree with Smee. If she finds an inn on the other side of the city, they'll drag her to the evening service again. She needs to slip into the shadows, if she's going to avoid the temple.

I'm wondering if she should leave the city. Find a smaller city or large town, like her hometown, where the Itharien don't have quite so strong a hold, and she could skip the temple services without notice.

~sunny

[ethereal_fauna]

The idea of 'hiding in plain sight' might have merit, but Sunny brought up a good point. They'd just expect her to attend temple again, and that she doesn't need to do. She's not on some pic-nic here, but struggling for her life. She needs to keep a low profile.

[Idea master]

Indeed. Keep a low profile. Change your name. Cut your hair. Take yourself up as an herbalist apprentice. And if at all possible, Stoat, bring back the Were she was travling with into the story.
On a side note, I finally caught up with the story. I must admit, it is brilliant. You do a magnificant job of writing, and I do a horrible job of spelling.

[Ingrothechundyer]

I wonder who "they" are. I think she should try to find out and then leave the city by the river. Buying a waterproof bag, clothes, and food from some of the nicer stores before leaving.

[DukeReg]

At the moment she has to find out who is after her from Sara.

Any city is likely to be full of shifty people who she could join with to
avoid notice, but they may just be the same people who will decide she would make a good slave and/or prostitute, or just club her on the head and steal her money as soon as they see her.

However, I think she is going to fail if she just keeps running from city to city, town to town, because she'll never have time to find out about her visions, and may end up starving to death in the wilderness after being chased out of one last town. What she needs to do is find out over a couple of days about any places that aren't fully under the sway of the church, and prepare for a trip. Then leave inconspicuously. This city is not the place for her, but another might be.

[Tazgirl18992]

I know i haven't posted all through the story, but i think it is brill!! Keep it up!

[Shady Stoat]

OK, I've just put the poll up on this one. A difficult set of options, because many of the suggestions posted weren't necessarily mutually exclusive.

Note that the decision is which one Keli should prioritize above the others. Many of the smaller details (like getting herself a disguise and asking Sara for more information on 'them') seem more like common sense than things that need to be put to the vote.

I need a start on what she would consider most important. After that has been voted on, we'll see where the next chapter leads :)

[Ingrothechundyer]

Voted for escape. She has food clothes and money. I think she should go somewhere where the temple isn't a power.

[Smee]

Ah - I see my vote was helpful in bringing it to a 3 way tie.

Nice to be useful. :)

[Guest]

Quote: Voted for escape
No, that wouldn't be the best option, i don't think. Because remember she needs to save the boy's twin wasn't it?? :?

[Ingrothechundyer]

Anonymous wrote: Quote: Voted for escape
No, that wouldn't be the best option, i don't think. Because remember she needs to save the boy's twin wasn't it?? :?
But does she even have a clue where the twin is? I might have missed where she discovered that he was in this city.

[Tazgirl180992]

Quote: But does she even have a clue where the twin is? I might have missed where she discovered that he was in this city.

This is the city she found the boy so the twin is likly to be in the city also, but i suppose you've got a point... :?

[Shady Stoat]

Exploring the city it is. Thanks to all who voted. The next chapter should be up in the next day or two (in between the turkey dinners and the repeats of Mary Poppins) ;)

[Smee]

*Goes to fly a kite.* :)

[Shady Stoat]

Ahh, who wants to watch Mary Poppins again anyway? Next chapter's up, and I'm off to watch Madagascar instead :)