Post by KG on Feb 2, 2008 1:16:25 GMT -5
Here is a past life regression Gary and I wrote together. In these two lives we were Cathars in Southern France during the Albegenian Crusade. The first part explains about who Mercy is and how she also came to be Vengeance. Please forgive the excessive violence and sexual content. This is what happened. I too find it shocking that my past life was so bizzare, but wanted to post this anyway.
Part 1 Frankgold
Frankgold stood quietly by the fireplace. Around him were troves of books collected over lifetimes. The warmth of the hearth was nothing compared to the warmth he felt in his heart as he surveyed his beautiful Collien. She had been through a lot recently, and so had he. The battles raged, but in this place was safety. The only safety he knew was here, in her heart.
He had known her by many names. Collien, simply meant little girl in Gaelic, and he had called her that in every language he had ever spoken, and even a few he was not fluent in. She was always the little girl to him, no matter what her age or size. She was Collien, but she was also Mercy, a childless Madonna, always adopting orphaned children, as well as inviting souls into heaven.
This place was comfortable and familiar so soon after death. It had not changed over the centuries, nor would it change in any century forevermore… not if he could help it.
This house was really a temple built on high magic, and a bit of alchemy, but most of it was a work of love. He had designed and built the temple on two realms, and chained them together with a golden thread, which spanned from heaven to earth, and somehow it suspended that miraculous dome in both worlds. He had wrought this miracle in the days when he was called Isidore. It was well known that the invisible golden thread from heaven suspended the dome of the earthly temple of Holy Wisdom. It was considerably less well known that there was a replica of it in heaven, and the tie between them was what really held both intact. They were double strong, by way of dual existence, as were Mercy and Frankgold. Less known still was the set of golden cords which forever bound their hearts to this temple.
This temple was officially dedicated to our Lord, and he supposed that was a more acceptable explanation for most people, but he alone knew the true meaning of the 32 doors, the impossible dome, and the magical algorithms peculiar to this temple home. Only he knew that he had built this temple to honor his wife, and that only she burned in his heart as he designed it. This was their safety net, because he had already seen in Alexandria, what the ravages of persecution were like.
How many times had those Pagan savages, Islamic barbarians and uncivilized Christians looted, attacked, or burned the library? How many people slaughtered for a difference in religion, in a place known as an intellectual center for the whole world. What idiocy he thought, to burn the one place that housed all the knowledge of the known world. To burn all record of wisdom, just because your neighbor brought in a book or two of their own religion was the height of ignorance. Nor were the Christians content with killing the Pagan, and the Islamic… no they had killed each other just as zealously over every little difference of opinion. It was insanity… but insanity with a single name… Demurge.
At least this place was safe. He had promised upon its earthly construction that it would be indestructible, since the last two structures in its place were destroyed, by the same insanity that wrecked the library, and killed some of the most knowledgeable people who ever lived. Still Binah and Sophia cannot be killed, so the people continued, and the books were still preserved in Heaven. Not just here, in their temple, but in great libraries throughout all the kingdoms of light.
At least he had found comparative peace in Constantinople, but only because he was protected by the emperor. Those were some of the most turbulent times in history, but for once they were not completely out of place with their beliefs, or the fact that Collien was outspoken, well educated and powerful. The emperor could understand because he himself had one of those unusual wives. Unlike Frankgold, the Emperor had no clue what his wife was, but he treasured her. Frank had been surprised when the Emperor Justinian I had whispered that the temple was the only thing he had seen which compared to the beauty of his beloved Empress Theodora. As he spoke, a dove trapped within the dome flew down towards him, and the Emperor was so moved that he wept, caught in some strange spiritual ecstasy which was far out of character for the man. It made Isadore uneasy. He hoped no one would see the secrets he had filled this place with, for they lay in open sight.
Frankgold knew quite well what Collien was, even when he was Isadore, or maybe especially when he was Isadore. That time had stood out as a singular moment of triumph in his otherwise turbulent existence. Constantinople, the inner chamber of the Library of Alexandria and Heaven were in his memory the only recollections of truly secure places for him, but no matter where he was, he always found security in her.
They had originally come into existence in preparation for the birth of Christ. He recalled through the eyes of his father, the time of their birth. They had come about not by sexual union, but by a quite different set of circumstances. Sophia, their mother had drawn them from her umbilical Chakra, as two overlapping transparent shells ready to be filled. It was always strange to watch this, in his mind’s eye. What he observed looked more like something that would occur at the other end of a glass blowers mouth piece, than a birth. Once she had produced the babies, she ripped a piece from Gheb’s heart. He was about to become their father, in every way, save one; he had not had intercourse with the mother. That would be indecent, for he was not her consort. He was a donor of angel heart energy which she plucked from his breast rather painfully, and placed in the combined and overlapping chests of these transparent babies, which were mere containers in most ways. She then filled them with Hawthorne, a symbol of marriage. Hawthorne is also called creatagone, literally the word means “crater of the heart.” They were both made thus, with the idea that the rest of their existence was merely a shell for the great heart that was placed in them. They were vessels, both. That was the sum total of what Frankgold was to Collien, he was her heart and core, as she was his center also. They shared this combined double strong chakra in some powerful ethereal way.
The little girl had been infused with an attribute of Sophia, the mother. That attribute was Mercy, and thus she was a part of the Sophia, one of the mother goddesses, and hostesses of heaven. Sophia was one of the Greater seven mothers. She incarnated within her daughters, all of them. She was multiply incarnate, housed within thousands of women all over the world. Thus when persecution struck, she was not one soul chased to the ends of the earth to be destroyed. There was always a survivor, and the others came back time after time.
Together they were wisdom incarnate. Sophia was also Mother of Christ, but in a different way. His earthly mother Mary was one of the Sophians, and so was his wife the Magdalene. The Sophia herself gave birth to him in heaven, as Mary delivered him to earth, and so he was also the sum and total of her, plus so much more. He was a child of the true God, and his magnificent light was contained in Christ’s heart, which he shared with his wife, in a greater, yet similar way as Collien and Frank shared theirs.
Collien contained the mother, and was a vessel of not only the angel heart, but of Merciful Wisdom. Frank her twin brother, was also her protector, her lover, and her companion. He was much like his father, in appearance, though he was not precisely an angel. He looked like one, but he was something different than his father at least in design, though not so much different in spirit. Gheb’s name means literally Manly Strength, and Frank also embodied the attribute masculine strength. Though he was an excellent swordsman his strength was more supportive than combative. He was as the pillars of this great temple. He supported the very structure of Mercy, the spirit of the miraculously impossible dome.
He and Collien belonged together, and though they could be separated physically, in this world they were always joined in the temple of their hearts. This temple was a great asset, because its 32 doors were portals to the other worlds. Many worlds awaited them, but Mercy was not prone to venture far into any but heaven, and of course earth. Occasionally they incarnated on other worlds, but those incarnations were even rougher than the earthly ones, and he still remembered at least one of them rather painfully.
Wishing he had not thought of that, he returned to musing about their birth and assigning. After the babies were complete to her satisfaction Sophia had awakened them and let them realize they were one, and then she caused them to sleep, and separated them into two distinct beings. They had both screamed when they saw they had been made two and not one thing together. They reached for each other frantically, before finding the other’s embrace and settling into the act of copulation as the only way to repair this horrible injustice of being separate. After 1200 years he still could not sleep outside her embrace. She was his treasure, and his constant companion, not always in body, but forever in the heart.
It was strange that his alchemy was so richly rewarded in Constantinople, but this time it earned him torturous abuse in Gallia. “Not Gallia by then,” he thought, still in the mindset of Isadore. “Oh what did they call that place now?”… In any case he remembered his deaths vividly, and so did she. She even more acutely than he remembered his tortures. She felt them, and experienced them through him as if they were her own. She found her own death of little consequence, but his suffering always hurt her more deeply. He wondered if she would ever be the same after this one, or if he would be.
Mercy’s eyes fluttered open, as she looked around. “Frank?” She enquired, breaking the silence of the Castle.
Frank gently caressed her hair, and offered her a sip from his wine glass, but Mercy almost spilled it as she embraced him. “Oh Frankgold!” Oh my God Frank, are you alright? It still hurts? Sweetheart I… I’m so sorry. I love you so much.” Frank kissed her lips softly, and she frantically searched his body with her hands. “I saw you, I felt…” She looked into his eyes with frantic searching, and he knew she had seen everything. He blushed with humiliation, as he realized the depths of her abilities, had allowed her to see exactly what they had done to him. He turned his face from her, and tried to move away, but she grasped him tightly. Her hands traced the muscles of his back, as she cradled him a bit more gently.
“I am fine now. Nothing can hurt us here, except our memories and we should try to forget. It was but three days, and we are together now. I am with you, as always.”
“OH Frank, she wept, they killed you?”
So she didn’t know everything. She had not been sure of his passing, perhaps there were other details she missed. He didn’t want her to know the worst of those tortures but he suspected she did. How could it be that the enemy, masqueraded as something so holy, and yet was so perverted as to engage in sadistic torture? His followers actually enjoyed torture in the most carnal way. Despite their delusions about self denial, or maybe because of them, they had been greatly aroused at his sufferings. He bowed his head in shame, as he realized she heard his thoughts.
“It is not your fault! You are so beautiful, it is no wonder they in their perversion, would be stirred in that way. You did nothing wrong, and I adore you. You know they despise women, and that is why they claim they are forced by God to be chaste. You also know of the mutilations that women endure in their hands, thus you have sacrificed yourself to cover my involvement, only to suffer the same sort of pain and humiliation yourself. You should not have confessed. It was my mistake, and I was the one discovered. I wish you had allowed me to take my own punishment, instead of claiming the document was your own, and that I could not even read it to know what it was.”
Frank looked into her eyes. He wanted to speak, but was unsure of his voice. She knew! She had seen it all, and yet she still loved him. How could she after seeing him humiliated like that. His death was of little consequence, but the pain, and indignity of his final tortures was almost more than he could bear. The fact she knew stung him even more. Because of their natural abilities, she had been forced to watch as if from within him. She had no doubt experienced it just as he had, empathing his every agony, and shame. He had not spared her the suffering, and indeed he had only intensified it. Now she would have to endure that world without him, at least physically. Perhaps he in his chivalry had made a miscalculation about what was best for her. That was what she was thinking anyway.
Her heart was heavy with unbearable grief, despite the fact she now held him in her arms. In the morning she would awaken and have to go about the business of survival alone in that God forsaken world.
The Demurge played God, and men were corrupted into the service of Satan in the name of the Lord. The Demurge was truly Satan, and all consumed with their destruction. He knew his enemy hid behind the faces of women and cats, so he killed them all without prejudice, though he directed most of his efforts towards the ones which seemed intelligent, or somehow powerful.
Wisdom was his greatest enemy, and she alone would reveal the ignorance of his kingdom. The true God, and their precious Lord were the personification of love, but Demurge stirred hatred and division in their name. His followers killed both at home and abroad, as they tracked down every true servant of God. It was not that they were Catholic, for the Muslims did the same. They called each other infidels, and the righteous they called heretics. They were the true infidels, and their teachings were full of wicked heresy, so they pointed their fingers at those who knew the truth. The crowds followed licking up the spirit of cruelty, as if it were honey. They played on the worst parts of human nature, and made those seem Godly. They dared to massacre the saints, in the name of God, while otherwise good people cheered, and felt vindicated.
Their team had been in trusted with the true message of Christ, and yet they burned for spreading it. They were crushed, impaled, mutilated and skinned alive by those who brazenly claimed his name. Jesus never taught that. It was heresy of a most damning kind, and someday Jesus himself would settle this. For now though their charge was to protect documents, spread the word to those open to it, and avoid the persecution. In this life they had failed, and now he was no longer there to protect her.
“Perhaps you should find another husband, among our team, someone strong to protect you through the persecution. You are still quite beautiful, and many envy my position as your husband.”
Collien wept bitterly. “How can you say this, since you only passed away this very hour? I want no one but you, you are my hearts desire, and without you I cannot live. I was considering suicide, not a wedding.”
“My dear, you cannot do that, and you know it. That is not among your choices.”
“Then I will avenge you, and no doubt die in the process. I will hunt down every priest who has touched you, until I am caught. I will slit their throats in the darkness of their monasteries. I will impale them on their crosses. I will lay the inquisitor himself on the false altar of his hellish church, and torture him, as they did you. I will drench their sanctuaries in blood, and thus they will know the wrath of Mercy. They will die for this, as painfully as you died my sweet and gentle one.”
“No Mercy, please do not do this. It would bring you to their level, and make you no better than they. You are the embodiment of Mercy. How can you speak this way?”
“It hangs on no one’s soul but my own. Mercy be damned if God cannot understand, and I will henceforth be known as Vengeance. I cannot tolerate those men to live, after what they have done. No man will live who has the memory of seeing your body that way. I will have my vengeance, and my wrath will run red into the streets of France. I must avenge you.”
“Then at least be true to the rest of your nature, and use your wisdom. Cool your temper and go at it carefully. Take your time and be cautious, so that you may serve the purpose you were called to. Killing to preserve is a last resort, and Vengeance has no place in the heart of Mercy, but if you must at least make it count.” Frank’s heart broke, as he empathed the wrath of her powerful Vengeance. For a moment he too was swept away by her powerful emotions. “Mercy, please do not do this. You may very well damn yourself. Please not on my account. I am fine. I am here, always with you. They cannot separate us, not by prison, or torture or death, but possibly if you let your heart go black as it is now, it will either drag my soul to hell with you, or come between us forever. Oh please Mercy be true to your name and let this pass.”
No, my love I cannot let this pass. I am bound by honor, and every shred of my soul is crying for blood. Not one man of them shall live. I must have my revenge.”
“She’ll not go to hell, and you know it.” Gheb had been standing silently behind Frank. He had heard their argument, and come to see this rare event which caused these two to disagree. He had honestly never seen them argue before. “Mercy in hell? It would crush the place. The very structure of hell could not bear it. How can there be Mercy in hell? Besides she already knows to come here. Do you think that our God would drag her kicking and screaming from her own heaven? Surely you of all people know he is not like the Demurge.”
“Yes, but neither was she till a few minutes ago. Now she is so angry, and wrathful. I am afraid for her. I am almost afraid of her, because I feel it in my own heart as well. Get the behind me Satan.”
“I wish that he would dare, since I stand behind you myself.” Gheb laughed, and the sound of it was foreign to Frank. He had heard his father laugh many times but never like that. His tone was mocking and cruel. He too was bitterly angry.
“You think she should do this?”
“No, but I know that she will. She must. Perhaps not now, but eventually, she will take the head of the inquisitor, and you yourself will crush it in your hand.”
“I? But I am dead to that world. How can I crush anything, my hand would be as ineffective as the wind.”
“In time, my son… now is not the time Mercy, and your vengeance will have to wait, but you will have it. In full! Not that there won’t be repercussions. You will all most probably burn for it, but you will have your revenge.”
Mercy had one last impression of Gheb’s face before he turned and left the room. She embraced Frank, and made impassioned love to him. As she did, though scenes of his torture and mutilation ripped through her mind. He was in every way hers. How dare they touch him? She kissed him all over, to remove their scent from him, and take away the stain on his soul, which they had left. He would never be able to forget what they had done, and neither could she. Though they may live a thousand lifetimes this would be a blot on their souls which could not be erased. She knew because it was not the first such incident. He had been martyred before, but somehow this was different. This was crippling, it was the death nail after all that had gone before. She would not tolerate this.
Mercy awakened in her own bed. Frank, she murmered as she reached across the bed searching for him, without thinking, before she even opened her eyes. She felt nothing with her hand, but there was a presence in her heart, and she knew. Frank had left the physical world, just as she had dreamed the night before. He had given himself, that she might live. Sadly she didn’t want to. “Oh Dear God that you would let me die. That is my single prayer to you. Please most Merciful Lord take my life now, before the coldness sets in.
But the coldness was already stirring in her heart. She sat up in bed, and felt nothing. She slammed her fist hard into the wall. It made a sound, but still she didn’t feel pain. Suddenly fascinated, she lit a candle, and held her hand over the flame. It wasn’t even uncomfortable. It almost felt pleasant, but when she looked at her hand it was indeed red, and had a small blister. Perhaps she had felt so much pain in the last three days that she had increased tolerance for discomfort.
Part 1 Frankgold
Frankgold stood quietly by the fireplace. Around him were troves of books collected over lifetimes. The warmth of the hearth was nothing compared to the warmth he felt in his heart as he surveyed his beautiful Collien. She had been through a lot recently, and so had he. The battles raged, but in this place was safety. The only safety he knew was here, in her heart.
He had known her by many names. Collien, simply meant little girl in Gaelic, and he had called her that in every language he had ever spoken, and even a few he was not fluent in. She was always the little girl to him, no matter what her age or size. She was Collien, but she was also Mercy, a childless Madonna, always adopting orphaned children, as well as inviting souls into heaven.
This place was comfortable and familiar so soon after death. It had not changed over the centuries, nor would it change in any century forevermore… not if he could help it.
This house was really a temple built on high magic, and a bit of alchemy, but most of it was a work of love. He had designed and built the temple on two realms, and chained them together with a golden thread, which spanned from heaven to earth, and somehow it suspended that miraculous dome in both worlds. He had wrought this miracle in the days when he was called Isidore. It was well known that the invisible golden thread from heaven suspended the dome of the earthly temple of Holy Wisdom. It was considerably less well known that there was a replica of it in heaven, and the tie between them was what really held both intact. They were double strong, by way of dual existence, as were Mercy and Frankgold. Less known still was the set of golden cords which forever bound their hearts to this temple.
This temple was officially dedicated to our Lord, and he supposed that was a more acceptable explanation for most people, but he alone knew the true meaning of the 32 doors, the impossible dome, and the magical algorithms peculiar to this temple home. Only he knew that he had built this temple to honor his wife, and that only she burned in his heart as he designed it. This was their safety net, because he had already seen in Alexandria, what the ravages of persecution were like.
How many times had those Pagan savages, Islamic barbarians and uncivilized Christians looted, attacked, or burned the library? How many people slaughtered for a difference in religion, in a place known as an intellectual center for the whole world. What idiocy he thought, to burn the one place that housed all the knowledge of the known world. To burn all record of wisdom, just because your neighbor brought in a book or two of their own religion was the height of ignorance. Nor were the Christians content with killing the Pagan, and the Islamic… no they had killed each other just as zealously over every little difference of opinion. It was insanity… but insanity with a single name… Demurge.
At least this place was safe. He had promised upon its earthly construction that it would be indestructible, since the last two structures in its place were destroyed, by the same insanity that wrecked the library, and killed some of the most knowledgeable people who ever lived. Still Binah and Sophia cannot be killed, so the people continued, and the books were still preserved in Heaven. Not just here, in their temple, but in great libraries throughout all the kingdoms of light.
At least he had found comparative peace in Constantinople, but only because he was protected by the emperor. Those were some of the most turbulent times in history, but for once they were not completely out of place with their beliefs, or the fact that Collien was outspoken, well educated and powerful. The emperor could understand because he himself had one of those unusual wives. Unlike Frankgold, the Emperor had no clue what his wife was, but he treasured her. Frank had been surprised when the Emperor Justinian I had whispered that the temple was the only thing he had seen which compared to the beauty of his beloved Empress Theodora. As he spoke, a dove trapped within the dome flew down towards him, and the Emperor was so moved that he wept, caught in some strange spiritual ecstasy which was far out of character for the man. It made Isadore uneasy. He hoped no one would see the secrets he had filled this place with, for they lay in open sight.
Frankgold knew quite well what Collien was, even when he was Isadore, or maybe especially when he was Isadore. That time had stood out as a singular moment of triumph in his otherwise turbulent existence. Constantinople, the inner chamber of the Library of Alexandria and Heaven were in his memory the only recollections of truly secure places for him, but no matter where he was, he always found security in her.
They had originally come into existence in preparation for the birth of Christ. He recalled through the eyes of his father, the time of their birth. They had come about not by sexual union, but by a quite different set of circumstances. Sophia, their mother had drawn them from her umbilical Chakra, as two overlapping transparent shells ready to be filled. It was always strange to watch this, in his mind’s eye. What he observed looked more like something that would occur at the other end of a glass blowers mouth piece, than a birth. Once she had produced the babies, she ripped a piece from Gheb’s heart. He was about to become their father, in every way, save one; he had not had intercourse with the mother. That would be indecent, for he was not her consort. He was a donor of angel heart energy which she plucked from his breast rather painfully, and placed in the combined and overlapping chests of these transparent babies, which were mere containers in most ways. She then filled them with Hawthorne, a symbol of marriage. Hawthorne is also called creatagone, literally the word means “crater of the heart.” They were both made thus, with the idea that the rest of their existence was merely a shell for the great heart that was placed in them. They were vessels, both. That was the sum total of what Frankgold was to Collien, he was her heart and core, as she was his center also. They shared this combined double strong chakra in some powerful ethereal way.
The little girl had been infused with an attribute of Sophia, the mother. That attribute was Mercy, and thus she was a part of the Sophia, one of the mother goddesses, and hostesses of heaven. Sophia was one of the Greater seven mothers. She incarnated within her daughters, all of them. She was multiply incarnate, housed within thousands of women all over the world. Thus when persecution struck, she was not one soul chased to the ends of the earth to be destroyed. There was always a survivor, and the others came back time after time.
Together they were wisdom incarnate. Sophia was also Mother of Christ, but in a different way. His earthly mother Mary was one of the Sophians, and so was his wife the Magdalene. The Sophia herself gave birth to him in heaven, as Mary delivered him to earth, and so he was also the sum and total of her, plus so much more. He was a child of the true God, and his magnificent light was contained in Christ’s heart, which he shared with his wife, in a greater, yet similar way as Collien and Frank shared theirs.
Collien contained the mother, and was a vessel of not only the angel heart, but of Merciful Wisdom. Frank her twin brother, was also her protector, her lover, and her companion. He was much like his father, in appearance, though he was not precisely an angel. He looked like one, but he was something different than his father at least in design, though not so much different in spirit. Gheb’s name means literally Manly Strength, and Frank also embodied the attribute masculine strength. Though he was an excellent swordsman his strength was more supportive than combative. He was as the pillars of this great temple. He supported the very structure of Mercy, the spirit of the miraculously impossible dome.
He and Collien belonged together, and though they could be separated physically, in this world they were always joined in the temple of their hearts. This temple was a great asset, because its 32 doors were portals to the other worlds. Many worlds awaited them, but Mercy was not prone to venture far into any but heaven, and of course earth. Occasionally they incarnated on other worlds, but those incarnations were even rougher than the earthly ones, and he still remembered at least one of them rather painfully.
Wishing he had not thought of that, he returned to musing about their birth and assigning. After the babies were complete to her satisfaction Sophia had awakened them and let them realize they were one, and then she caused them to sleep, and separated them into two distinct beings. They had both screamed when they saw they had been made two and not one thing together. They reached for each other frantically, before finding the other’s embrace and settling into the act of copulation as the only way to repair this horrible injustice of being separate. After 1200 years he still could not sleep outside her embrace. She was his treasure, and his constant companion, not always in body, but forever in the heart.
It was strange that his alchemy was so richly rewarded in Constantinople, but this time it earned him torturous abuse in Gallia. “Not Gallia by then,” he thought, still in the mindset of Isadore. “Oh what did they call that place now?”… In any case he remembered his deaths vividly, and so did she. She even more acutely than he remembered his tortures. She felt them, and experienced them through him as if they were her own. She found her own death of little consequence, but his suffering always hurt her more deeply. He wondered if she would ever be the same after this one, or if he would be.
Mercy’s eyes fluttered open, as she looked around. “Frank?” She enquired, breaking the silence of the Castle.
Frank gently caressed her hair, and offered her a sip from his wine glass, but Mercy almost spilled it as she embraced him. “Oh Frankgold!” Oh my God Frank, are you alright? It still hurts? Sweetheart I… I’m so sorry. I love you so much.” Frank kissed her lips softly, and she frantically searched his body with her hands. “I saw you, I felt…” She looked into his eyes with frantic searching, and he knew she had seen everything. He blushed with humiliation, as he realized the depths of her abilities, had allowed her to see exactly what they had done to him. He turned his face from her, and tried to move away, but she grasped him tightly. Her hands traced the muscles of his back, as she cradled him a bit more gently.
“I am fine now. Nothing can hurt us here, except our memories and we should try to forget. It was but three days, and we are together now. I am with you, as always.”
“OH Frank, she wept, they killed you?”
So she didn’t know everything. She had not been sure of his passing, perhaps there were other details she missed. He didn’t want her to know the worst of those tortures but he suspected she did. How could it be that the enemy, masqueraded as something so holy, and yet was so perverted as to engage in sadistic torture? His followers actually enjoyed torture in the most carnal way. Despite their delusions about self denial, or maybe because of them, they had been greatly aroused at his sufferings. He bowed his head in shame, as he realized she heard his thoughts.
“It is not your fault! You are so beautiful, it is no wonder they in their perversion, would be stirred in that way. You did nothing wrong, and I adore you. You know they despise women, and that is why they claim they are forced by God to be chaste. You also know of the mutilations that women endure in their hands, thus you have sacrificed yourself to cover my involvement, only to suffer the same sort of pain and humiliation yourself. You should not have confessed. It was my mistake, and I was the one discovered. I wish you had allowed me to take my own punishment, instead of claiming the document was your own, and that I could not even read it to know what it was.”
Frank looked into her eyes. He wanted to speak, but was unsure of his voice. She knew! She had seen it all, and yet she still loved him. How could she after seeing him humiliated like that. His death was of little consequence, but the pain, and indignity of his final tortures was almost more than he could bear. The fact she knew stung him even more. Because of their natural abilities, she had been forced to watch as if from within him. She had no doubt experienced it just as he had, empathing his every agony, and shame. He had not spared her the suffering, and indeed he had only intensified it. Now she would have to endure that world without him, at least physically. Perhaps he in his chivalry had made a miscalculation about what was best for her. That was what she was thinking anyway.
Her heart was heavy with unbearable grief, despite the fact she now held him in her arms. In the morning she would awaken and have to go about the business of survival alone in that God forsaken world.
The Demurge played God, and men were corrupted into the service of Satan in the name of the Lord. The Demurge was truly Satan, and all consumed with their destruction. He knew his enemy hid behind the faces of women and cats, so he killed them all without prejudice, though he directed most of his efforts towards the ones which seemed intelligent, or somehow powerful.
Wisdom was his greatest enemy, and she alone would reveal the ignorance of his kingdom. The true God, and their precious Lord were the personification of love, but Demurge stirred hatred and division in their name. His followers killed both at home and abroad, as they tracked down every true servant of God. It was not that they were Catholic, for the Muslims did the same. They called each other infidels, and the righteous they called heretics. They were the true infidels, and their teachings were full of wicked heresy, so they pointed their fingers at those who knew the truth. The crowds followed licking up the spirit of cruelty, as if it were honey. They played on the worst parts of human nature, and made those seem Godly. They dared to massacre the saints, in the name of God, while otherwise good people cheered, and felt vindicated.
Their team had been in trusted with the true message of Christ, and yet they burned for spreading it. They were crushed, impaled, mutilated and skinned alive by those who brazenly claimed his name. Jesus never taught that. It was heresy of a most damning kind, and someday Jesus himself would settle this. For now though their charge was to protect documents, spread the word to those open to it, and avoid the persecution. In this life they had failed, and now he was no longer there to protect her.
“Perhaps you should find another husband, among our team, someone strong to protect you through the persecution. You are still quite beautiful, and many envy my position as your husband.”
Collien wept bitterly. “How can you say this, since you only passed away this very hour? I want no one but you, you are my hearts desire, and without you I cannot live. I was considering suicide, not a wedding.”
“My dear, you cannot do that, and you know it. That is not among your choices.”
“Then I will avenge you, and no doubt die in the process. I will hunt down every priest who has touched you, until I am caught. I will slit their throats in the darkness of their monasteries. I will impale them on their crosses. I will lay the inquisitor himself on the false altar of his hellish church, and torture him, as they did you. I will drench their sanctuaries in blood, and thus they will know the wrath of Mercy. They will die for this, as painfully as you died my sweet and gentle one.”
“No Mercy, please do not do this. It would bring you to their level, and make you no better than they. You are the embodiment of Mercy. How can you speak this way?”
“It hangs on no one’s soul but my own. Mercy be damned if God cannot understand, and I will henceforth be known as Vengeance. I cannot tolerate those men to live, after what they have done. No man will live who has the memory of seeing your body that way. I will have my vengeance, and my wrath will run red into the streets of France. I must avenge you.”
“Then at least be true to the rest of your nature, and use your wisdom. Cool your temper and go at it carefully. Take your time and be cautious, so that you may serve the purpose you were called to. Killing to preserve is a last resort, and Vengeance has no place in the heart of Mercy, but if you must at least make it count.” Frank’s heart broke, as he empathed the wrath of her powerful Vengeance. For a moment he too was swept away by her powerful emotions. “Mercy, please do not do this. You may very well damn yourself. Please not on my account. I am fine. I am here, always with you. They cannot separate us, not by prison, or torture or death, but possibly if you let your heart go black as it is now, it will either drag my soul to hell with you, or come between us forever. Oh please Mercy be true to your name and let this pass.”
No, my love I cannot let this pass. I am bound by honor, and every shred of my soul is crying for blood. Not one man of them shall live. I must have my revenge.”
“She’ll not go to hell, and you know it.” Gheb had been standing silently behind Frank. He had heard their argument, and come to see this rare event which caused these two to disagree. He had honestly never seen them argue before. “Mercy in hell? It would crush the place. The very structure of hell could not bear it. How can there be Mercy in hell? Besides she already knows to come here. Do you think that our God would drag her kicking and screaming from her own heaven? Surely you of all people know he is not like the Demurge.”
“Yes, but neither was she till a few minutes ago. Now she is so angry, and wrathful. I am afraid for her. I am almost afraid of her, because I feel it in my own heart as well. Get the behind me Satan.”
“I wish that he would dare, since I stand behind you myself.” Gheb laughed, and the sound of it was foreign to Frank. He had heard his father laugh many times but never like that. His tone was mocking and cruel. He too was bitterly angry.
“You think she should do this?”
“No, but I know that she will. She must. Perhaps not now, but eventually, she will take the head of the inquisitor, and you yourself will crush it in your hand.”
“I? But I am dead to that world. How can I crush anything, my hand would be as ineffective as the wind.”
“In time, my son… now is not the time Mercy, and your vengeance will have to wait, but you will have it. In full! Not that there won’t be repercussions. You will all most probably burn for it, but you will have your revenge.”
Mercy had one last impression of Gheb’s face before he turned and left the room. She embraced Frank, and made impassioned love to him. As she did, though scenes of his torture and mutilation ripped through her mind. He was in every way hers. How dare they touch him? She kissed him all over, to remove their scent from him, and take away the stain on his soul, which they had left. He would never be able to forget what they had done, and neither could she. Though they may live a thousand lifetimes this would be a blot on their souls which could not be erased. She knew because it was not the first such incident. He had been martyred before, but somehow this was different. This was crippling, it was the death nail after all that had gone before. She would not tolerate this.
Mercy awakened in her own bed. Frank, she murmered as she reached across the bed searching for him, without thinking, before she even opened her eyes. She felt nothing with her hand, but there was a presence in her heart, and she knew. Frank had left the physical world, just as she had dreamed the night before. He had given himself, that she might live. Sadly she didn’t want to. “Oh Dear God that you would let me die. That is my single prayer to you. Please most Merciful Lord take my life now, before the coldness sets in.
But the coldness was already stirring in her heart. She sat up in bed, and felt nothing. She slammed her fist hard into the wall. It made a sound, but still she didn’t feel pain. Suddenly fascinated, she lit a candle, and held her hand over the flame. It wasn’t even uncomfortable. It almost felt pleasant, but when she looked at her hand it was indeed red, and had a small blister. Perhaps she had felt so much pain in the last three days that she had increased tolerance for discomfort.