The Stolen Child I started to get, but my mother I haven dealt with yet

Chapter 4: Cathedral

The doors closed behind her as she just barely had set foot into the cathedral. Directly to her right was a wall built of wood. An oak wood wall that stretched approximately 10 yards in length and 20 or more so yards in height. The wall demonstrated designs of God's holy kingdom onto square cassettes carved into 12 inch squares. In each square were figures of the Holy and High ones, saints carved into the dimensions of each and every square. A consistent patron of two to three figures per square and there were hundreds upon hundreds of squares of wooden panelling. As Jamie stood in the entrance she could glimpse the cathedral's interior past the wooden wall. It was built from large stones, light gray. The bowels of the cathedral stretched far and deep with just as much height as depth to convey to the unholy ones, the greatest of God and righteousness of his ordained servants. The riches and the power belonging to them according to the will of God's Righteous Ones. The cathedral was enveloped in a misty gray light and through the glass stained window above the altar where the priest would hold his sermon, Jamie noted that the daylight that was trying to enter the holy sanctuary from outside, but was deprived.

The man that stood in front of her opened a door that had been well concealed within the wooden panelling. Concealed from persons not privy to the lives of the ordained ones. He motioned with his head and sourly disapproving grimace that she should follow him. He was dressed in a long and white robe with an embroidered shawl that hung over his shoulders and down to his feet. He wore a headpiece that could be described as an oval shaped cone on his head and this was too, white with an embroidered front. His entire garment was made of expensive satin, including his foot wear, white satin slippers. Jamie had also been clothed in a robe, more like a long cloak that covered her from her neck to her feet, revealing nothing of her body inside this carpeted design. The cloak resembled and felt as if she was wearing a Persian carpet. Her head piece was also designed as an oval shaped cone and made of the same material as her cloak, a thinly woven Persian mosaic. This mosaic normally was only used for carpets that the rich citizens of the city bought to warm the floors of their villa's with and to distinguish their place above all others less fortunate than themselves. Jamie followed the Highest One up the stairs that lay before them. It was an odious labour for Jamie to climb the stairs up to the next floor. The weight of her garments made her movements slow, deliberate and she needed to bend a little forward to even the weight of the garment and her movements. 'So, she thought to herself, this is how they make themselves look full of piety, their garments are so heavy they can't even walk upright or at a normal pace.' As they reached the first floor the Highest One ushered her through a hallway with walls and ceilings as high as those in the cathedral, with one exception, all the walls here were covered with the same wooden panelling as the ones in the entrance of the cathedral and the stair well, but there were no windows. At the top of the walls were frescos of a yard in height that functioned as a finishing to wooden carvings and the arched ceilings. Large candle lite candlers hung between the arched vaults. Jamie was again ushered through another wooden panelled door. It was an exact replica of the door in the cathedral, however the chamber to which she had just entered did not resemble anything of the cathedral. It reminded her of a vesting, a high stone tower with a winding staircase that lead up...to somewhere. The Highest One continued on his way up the staircase. He gained speed and distance from her. As he moved further away from her she could clearly hear his monologue. 'What am I to do with this wench, to have her as a wife to my son. This unholy being, a young girl, a sexual sin in the flesh to roam within my world....INTRUDER!' ' ' 'These people are from a world of nothing and should remain there, accepting their existence as an offering to us. We decide when we take and how we take, the degrees and the lust....they cannot enter this holy dominion and live here among us. Fuck them, fuck them.....fuck them all. Now I must take this thing of my making, to my son's bed......to have sex, to breed....like dogs. Let him ruin her without mercy, until she bleeds!' As she heard the priest's monologue, his voice remained steady, a tone devoid of empathy. Jamie realized that it was not his voice she had been listening to, but to his thoughts. At the moment of this realization, the Highest One, the Head of this order, stopped at the top of the stairs and turned to look at her. His look bore witness to the fact that he was fully aware of the fact that she could hear his thoughts. He greeted her look with distain and disgust. As Jamie continued labouring her way up the winding stair well, he disappeared from her direct sight so that she was forced to focus on the task of putting one foot in front of the other. Jamie was in the knowledge that she was to be bedded with the son of this Highest One, that the mother of this son, had demanded that this union must take place. Jamie had no idea who this person was that she was ordered to copulate with. What he looked like or the kindness or cruelty of his character, his person . She did however have knowledge of his mother. A great beauty, an arrogant and sexually promiscuous woman who was rumoured to have slept with her own son. Teaching him depraved morals and skills in the act of sex by bring in prostitutes to allow him to experiment on while she watched....so it was rumoured. Jamie had finally reached the top of the stair well and found herself standing on a small wooden landing, the Highest One was awaiting her. He turned his back to face her. He said,' You have this hour to bid your farewells, be back here within the hour.' Jamie nodded as a sign that she understood.

Her next memory was opening the high panelled wooden door from that landing onto a great entrance room that consisted of only wooden panels, carved wooden panels with figures, endless amounts of figures, a slate tiled floor that had one Persian carpet placed in the middle of this extensively large space. It had the dimensions and shape of a rectangle, with a high, high ceiling and long walls that resembled the cathedral below her. The light in this department was scarce due to the fact that sun had set. The time of that 24 hour cycle when the sun has just set, dusk sets in with tones of deep gray...just before it goes dark. Jamie could see to the other side of the enormous hall and saw a door at the opposite end. She began as quietly as possible to walk straight through to the other side making as little noise as possible. With each step that she took, she placed her foot with great care so as to balance her body weight as gently as possible to avoid the sound of her shoe meeting the slate of the floor which would echo throughout the interior. Each step took a lot of effort because of the weight of the garments she was now forced to wear. She finally had reached the door on the opposite end of the enormous hall, then opened the wooden panelled door which was difficult in itself. While she walked through the door entrance and proceeded to pull the door closed, she saw at the other end of the hall she had just crossed, two small yellow lights, eyes peering around the corner of the door at the other end. Her heart jumped and she drew the door to a close as quickly as she could. Jamie turned in what was becoming a panicked state and looked into the room she now was standing in. Again another huge, high, deep and wooden paneled space with thousands of figures carved onto the square cassettes......endless! She saw a door to her left, one to her right and one at the opposite end of the hall. She suddenly heard loud and rapid footsteps that were crossing the hall and approaching the door that she stood behind of. 'Where to go', she thought! ' Left. I'll go to the left door and hide within whatever is behind it.' As soon as she lifted her feet to move, she felt the weight of the garments she was wearing. A quick escape was no longer an option. Jamie now stood about 2 yards from the door that she had just closed. Her heart was racing and her limbs felt paralyzed. She could barely feel her arms or legs and her breathing was becoming increasingly difficult. Tight, everything felt tight, her chest was pinching her lungs, her heart and her throat were closing in, making it harder to breath. She tried to swallow but it was like passing sand down her unwilling throat. In a fraction of a second she made a decision, fully aware of the fact that it was prohibited to make a sound. She swiftly moved towards the closed door and the sound of the thuds of the approaching unknown being and thought, ' I'd rather face this monster than run away, get it over with.' Jamie pushed the huge wooden door open and stood clenching the door handle as she confronted whatever demon had come for her. To her surprise, she stood face to face with another woman. This woman stopped dead in her tracks, and delivered a a look of shocked surprise back at Jamie. After a moment or two, Jamie thought,' I can't let her know I'm afraid, I have to say something before she does!' Jamie gave the woman a quick look over. The woman opposite her was at least forty something, she had mousy blond hair pulled back from her face, perhaps into a ponytail. She wore a long sleeved t-shirt with a dark blue and white flower print and light coloured blue jeans. Her facial features were rather plain, she was not pretty nor ugly, she just expressed a startled look. Jamie plucked up the courage to speak formulating what she was about to say in her head before she would say it, and how she would say it...with force! She would demand of the woman what she wanted! Jamie tried swallowing and proceeded to open her mouth which was followed by a loud croak and something muttered that sounded like a sentence. 'Ahhgh....wwwhat do youu want!?' The woman opposite her regarded the reaction with a baffled expression on her face. In that exact second, Jamie knew that the woman was a daughter of the Highest One.