Weekly Drabble #211: Commandment (Patreon)

This week's prompt is 'thou shalt not' from Robert Gatlin-Martin and with it, we return to a Chicago currently beset by some... shall we say... changes. Enjoy!

~

Commandment:

With only the soft rustle of muted conversation, the parishioners heeded the call to service. Their house of worship was an old baptist church. It had been part of this community since before many of them had been alive, but as its congregation had aged, fewer devotees came to replace them and for the last five years, it had stood empty. Now, life and light had returned and its halls were once more a place of faith and community.

Gone were the symbols of false salvation and mortal flesh. Instead, the signs of the Queen decorated the vestibule, nave and sanctuary. Local artists had redecorated the walls and windows, while carpenters and metalworkers had made symbols of worship. A sculptor had even donated their latest work to the church; a marble work of the queen herself, her arms wide and her coiling shadows stretching outward as if to envelop all who stood before her, welcoming them into her eternal embrace.

As the congregation took their seats, the priestess of this church mounted the pulpit, placing her hands on its fine wood sides. Once, a priest of a false religion had stood here, offering pablum and placebos to those before him. At first, she had felt unsettled and uncertain about standing in the same place as a pretender, but she long since settled that insecurity. She knew the goddess was with her. The bright wood of the pulpit was turning dark, its carefully-cut edges smoothing into round corners, and the pattern of the grain seemed to change a little, forming into the shapes and symbols that the priestess had seen when she dreamt of the goddess and heard Her voice.

Just like the pulpit, the entire chapel was changing, little by little, as the love and devotion of the people within it was concentrated in its walls. Soon, there’d be little left of its original self. It would instead perfectly match with the new faith spoken of within. A better faith. A true faith. Reverence for She Who Walks Among Us, the Queen of Shadows. Melinoë.

The priestess herself was young, only just out of her teen years. Many might have questioned her credentials as the leader of this congregation, but that was a judgment born from ignorance. The Queen cared not for her subjects’ age, nor how long they had studied dusty tomes or said the right things to the right superiors to sidle into positions of power and privilege.

No, all that mattered to the Queen of Shadows was how deeply Her children felt Her call and there could be no question that the priestess, out of all the dozens that packed the pews and filled the mezzanine, heard Melinoë deepest of them all. She had been chosen, and she had accepted this duty, this responsibility and burden. She was gifted, but she knew she had to share that gift with others.

Several of her robed followers circled through the chapel, swinging censers of incense and chanting in low, soft tones. They spoke a language that none of them had been born to, that had instilled itself into their very minds as they slept and listened to Her call. Joining the priestess on the sanctuary, standing either side of her were her two highest-ranking acolytes, Jackson and Maleesha. Like the priestess, they’d grown up on Chicago’s streets, doing whatever they needed to in order to survive. Like her, they’d heard the Lady’s call. Jackson came to know Her during Her cleansing of the city. He’d been a low-level gang-banger; tormented by dreams that he’d once confused with nightmares, he’d been late to a party his crew had been throwing. They’d had an unexpected guest that night, and that party had been their last. Jackson realized that not only had he been spared, but it was for a great purpose.

Maleesha had been getting beaten by her pimp when a shadowy figure had passed by. Too high on crack to realize he had been looking at divinity, Maleesha’s pimp had pulled out a knife and threatened the newcomer. A flicker of darkness, a tendril of half-formed smoke, a second of a goddess’s attention and the man was rendered into a spray of red upon the bricks, a mark that had not yet washed away. A symbol of Her protection.

Almost all of the priestess’s acolytes had the Queen’s hand upon them; Her beneficence, Her mercy, Her love. Some had only seen Her in their dreams and waking visions, but they were all blessed by Her. Some not as much as others; some had reached their positions not through the Lady’s overt touch, but through diligence, dedication and faith. There was no discrimination. All that mattered was your love and your loyalty to Her.

The congregation knew that too, though the young priestess was aware that not all of her flock were truly devoted to She Who Walks Among Us. Some came out of curiousity. Some, from fear. Some believed that worship of Her would make them safe from the other horrors of this city. The priestess didn’t turn any of them away. She welcomed them all and would gladly preach, for a questioning heart was the first step on the road to truth and every soul that she could turn from agnosticism, fear or selfishness was a victory. On the day that the Queen of Shadows cast away Her human form and enveloped the Earth in perfect, unending darkness, the faithless would be separated from the true believers.

Until that moment came, there was still the Lady’s great work to continue. The priestess spoke to her congregation, talking to them of her visions and of the Queen of Shadows. The changes the city had gone through and would still continue go.

“You know of Her work,” the priestess began. “You have all lived through the pain of this city. The drugs,” she placed a hand on Maleesha’s shoulder. “The gangs,” she touched Jackson next. “The murders. The rapes. The crimes that we have all have to live through while the wealthy and the powerful clucked their tongues and waggled their fingers, passing laws that did nothing but make their lives safer... and our own harder. You all know the truth: they never cared about us. They only ever wanted us to be quiet.”

A stir of agreement passed through the group, heads nodding. “And we thought that was our life. To look for others to provide for us, like dogs waiting for scraps from the master’s table.”

“Like slaves!” a young man burst out as he shot to his feet. “Like God-damned slaves!”

The priestess nodded. “Like slaves. ‘Vote for us and we’ll take care of you’. ‘Do what we say and we’ll protect you’. ‘Look to us for guidance, but never meet our eyes’. We were dogs, one and all. But then She arrived. The Queen of Shadows.”

“The Queen of Shadows,” the congregation whispered reverently. “The Queen.”

“She showed us the truth. She showed us the path. The red path. Her path. Our enemies were never anything but meat. Meat, bone and blood. They can bleed. They can die. She showed us this as She cleansed Chicago of its corrupt, its diseased and its cruel... but she did not finish the task. That, she left to us.” She paused a moment, letting the weight of that statement sink in before she continued.

“Have any of you ever had a cat?” the priestess said with a smile. “Have you had them bring you dead animals?” There were a few nods, some confused expressions at this sudden change in topics. “People say that this is them showing affection to you; gratitude for what you’ve done in caring for them, but that isn’t true. Not at all. They give you these things to teach you,” the priestess continued.

“Yes,” she said to her congregation. “To teach you. They think you don’t know how to hunt and they are trying to show you how to do it. They start with something small, something already dead so that you can learn what you are supposed to do.”

Understanding started to dawn on her flock, and the priestess beamed as she saw the lesson taking root. “This is what the Lady has done for us. She has given us dead animals, not as a threat. Not as a gift, but as a lesson.”

“Tell us!” a middle-aged woman with a shaking voice shouted. “Tell us her lesson!”

The priestess nodded. “You know the lesson,” she told the woman. “You all know it. She wants us to learn from Her example. To hunt, just as she has. To cleanse this city! Cleanse it of the drugs that poisoned our communities, the gangs, pimps and thieves that filled the streets and the corrupt and indolent politicians that dangled bribes and boons in front of us like we were their pets to dance for them! These are what we will hunt, these are what we will purge and with their blood, we will remake this city as our goddess has shown us! We will make it a paradise and prove ourselves worthy to Her! She will look upon us and know what we have done and once this world ends, She will accept all of us to Her bosom!”

“Praise the goddess!”

“Praise the Lady!”

“Call the shadows!”

“Praise her!”

“But,” the priestess said, cutting short the jubilant cheers. “This is not an easy task. We are opposed. By the animals, the beasts and the vile that She has left for us. By cowards who fear Her embrace and renounce Her name. By those who would deny her divinity. By the government and the police, who would destroy our Lady if they had the chance!”

A roar of anger was her response and the priestess waved it down. “But none of them know. None of them truly know Her. They will, though. They will come to embrace Her love, or their hatred and corruption will be purged from this city! Their blood will pave the way for our ascension and our Lady’s glorious apotheosis! Their blood will give us paradise!”

“Spill their blood!”

“Kill them all!”

“The blood!”

“The blood!”

The priestess let the furor build, men and women rising to their feet and cheering for the destruction of the unbelievers, those who refused the Lady’s calls, those who ignored it and those – most pitiful of all – who had never heard it. “Blood,” she answered them. “The blood of animals will be shed tonight and our city will be one step closer to perfection!”

The crowd howled in excitement. It was time for the sacrifice.

The priestess stretched out her hand towards one of side rooms. “We know the Lady’s lesson!” she called, her dark eyes wide with excitement. “Our acolytes have hunted and now it is time to once more prove our worth! Bring the sacrifice!”

A trio of her acolytes emerged from, two of them dragging their struggling victim towards the sanctuary and the altar upon it, just in front of the pulpit. The priestess cocked her head, a moment’s confusion on her face. Before they could lash the sacrifice to the table, she raised a hand to stop them. “What is this?” she asked of her acolytes.

“The sacrifice,” one of the acolytes said. “She gave us quite a run, too. I wasn’t sure we’d catch her before the services started.”

The victim that they’d brought to the altar wasn’t what the priestess had expected. They shed the blood of those the Queen of Shadows had condemned through her own actions: criminals, gang members and those who took up violent arms against the faith. That was the lesson of the hunt, the lesson the goddess had shown them. What had been brought before her was instead a quivering young woman with bright blue eyes, only as old as the priestess herself. She had been prepared as all the others had; stripped naked, wrists bound, mouth gagged and with the ritual marks painted onto her flesh in preparation for her sacrifice. The Lady’s marks, to call to Her in turn and let Her know that Her children still continued Her work of cleansing this city.

At her hesitancy, the congregation grew silent. The priestess lifted the woman’s head, looking into her eyes. She was gagged, drool and blood from cut lips dribbling down her chin. “What,” she asked of her acolytes, “was this one’s sin?” Women had died on this altar before; madams, drug dealers and even a leader of a sex trafficking cartel, but the priestess saw no corruption in this shivering girl’s soul.

Their leader smiled. He was new to the church’s ranks, but he’d swiftly made himself a place among the other acolytes. The priestess had never been quite sure about the strength of his devotion, but Jackson was his cousin and had vouched for him. She looked at the other man now. His expression was drawn, his jaw tight. He hadn’t known about this. “She’s the daughter of that rich asshole who been buyin’ up all the land in this area,” the acolyte explained.

That was a new problem. As the weak and fearful – or at least, the weak and fearful with money enough to do so – fled the city and property values plummeted, developers and venture capitalists snapped up the land, holding onto it with plans to ‘improve’ it once the current “crisis” passed. It was not the cult’s intention to see this situation end, not until the Queen of Shadows embraced all Her believers, but many people were losing their homes, forced out to allow the rapacious and greedy to snap up entire city blocks. Many of those had nowhere to go, and many had just vanished, swallowed by the night... or more likely, some of the dark things that inhabited it.

“I see. But she has done nothing?”

“Aside from being some privileged little penthouse bitch? Thought we could use her to send her daddy a message. ‘Stay the fuck outta this neighbourhood’.”

The priestess smiled dismissively. “Privilege is hearing our Lady’s call and dreaming Her dreams. Wealth does not buy Her love or Her attention. We have people here from all walks of life,” she gestured to her parishioners. Most were from the neighbourhood, but there were more than a few outsiders. They’d been drawn to this church and the priestess just as she had been drawn to proselytize the truth of the Queen of Shadows. “When She gathers us all to Her side, money will mean nothing. Only faith.

“Her father will learn that in time,” she continued, “But this girl is not one for the lessons we give. The Lady has shown us those we are to hunt. With blood and shadow, marking their reshaped bodies with her hatred. That is the lesson She gave us; a cleanse of the impure,not wanton slaughter. We are Her Purest children, and we will hold to that. That is why She loves us, and we will be the first to rise to Her side.”

Murmurs of assent ran through the watching crowd as they nodded to one another.

The acolyte blinked, not sure what he was hearing. “After all the trouble we went through to get her, you’re not going to bleed this little cunt?”

“You’ve brought an improper sacrifice to satiate your own petty agenda,” the priestess replied scornfully. “There’ll be no blood tonight. Release her. We’ll discuss your contrition and how you’ve spoiled this evening’s worship later.” She turned her back on the acolyte.

He looked from his fellows, who stepped away from him and the woman he was still holding. He looked over at the congregation, saw the disappointed, sullen faces. Even his cousin Jackson glanced away. “Fuck you!” he shouted at the priestess. “Yeah, I said it. Fuck you. What is all this shit, exactly? You talk a good game about community and coming together with Her and all that bullshit, but what are you doing for us? What are you actually doing, huh? We have people losing their homes and businesses because of fuckwads like this bitch’s daddy and we have a chance to do something about that! And you... you turn your fucking back on us? Where’s this fucking queen when people are getting evicted?”

“This church is open to all,” the priestess reminded her subordinate, her tone turning icy. “We will shelter all from the darkness that is of not our Lady.”

“Well ain’t that peachy-fucking-keen,” the new acolyte snapped. “That doesn’t bring back homes, does it? This is our chance! Our chance to send all those fucking privileged fucks a message that they can’t screw with us any longer and you want to let this useless bitch go? What will she ever do except post selfies on her fucking instagram or some shit?!”

“She may do much, if she hears the Queen’s call,” the priestess replied, her backed still turned to the acolyte. Jackson wasn’t meeting her eyes, looking down at the ground, ashamed of how his cousin was dishonouring the priestess, their church and their faith. “Let her go. This is the last time I will tell you.”

The other man’s jaw worked. He looked again at his cousin, then the congregation. “Fuck you,” he spat. “If you won’t do what’s right for us, then I will. I’ll do what needs to be done.” He pulled his own knife from his belt. The bound woman’s eyes widened even further and she squealed around the gag in her mouth. The acolyte swung the blade towards her belly-

-the knife stopped inches from her skin.

The acolyte looked down in consternation, his mouth dropping open. Thin, shadowy hands were wrapped around his arm, holding it in place as surely as if had been caught by a closing vice. Smokey trails whisped from the ends of those limbs, flowing back up into the folds of the priestess’s robes. More disembodied arms skittered into existence, crawling from shadows to wrap around the acolyte’s limbs, like the grasping hands of an unseen crowd. The knife fell from his fingers as his grip was pried open by dainty, inhumanly strong fingers.

Finally, the priestess turned to acknowledge the acolyte as he was forced to his knees. “You are right,” she told him, raising his chin to meet her gaze. “We shall have a sacrifice tonight after all.”

~

The sacrifice struggled in their bindings, sweating, panting and begging through the cloth that muffled their screams. The priestess let her new acolyte make the first cut, bright red blood spurting out of the wounds they made until she accepted the knife back and began the ritual, bleeding the sacrifice fully, Jackson, Maleesha and the other acolytes collecting the dripping crimson liquid. The congregation knelt in reverence and prayer, the air within the chapel thickening, the shadows shivering and pulsing as the blood was spilled and worship was offered their goddess, the Queen of Shadows.

Once the sacrifice’s heart beat its final time, the priestess led her flock in unified prayer, before turning to her new acolyte. She anointed their forehead and cheeks with the sacrifice’s blood. “Can you feel her?” she asked. “Can you hear her?”

Those wide blue eyes stared up at her, but there was no fear in them now. “Yes,” the congregation’s newest convert whispered reverently, trembling from a mixture of adrenaline and the atmosphere within the church. Her excitement was genuine. She could feel the darkness whispering to her like a lover she’d been too long without“I can hear Her. It’s so beautiful.” Tears spilled from her eyes. “She’s so beautiful.”

The priestess smiled, brushing the young woman’s cheeks with the back of her hand. “Yes,” she agreed. “She is.” She turned to the congregation, introducing them to the newest member of their faith. It was exactly as she’d told Jackson’s cousin. The only privilege in this world was to hear the Lady’s call. Some never would. Some might reject it, but for tonight, their flock had cast off dead weight and had become stronger.

Just like the darkness enveloping Chicago their faith grew,and the holy work would continue.