A Hole in the Mouth

  Day 4 ‘Tis the dawn of the fourth day. I am Sraosha צ , last of the envoys of the Great One sent to this Earth. Diary mine –           A night of sleep, but sleep peppered with dreams. I dreamt in the eyes of a thief, first, one of the clay people that inhabited this Earth in the Last Days; I dreamt as he broke into the houses of the opulent and stole their food, and ran away desperately from their private armies. I dreamt as every heist became less successful; I dreamt as every time the thief became more mangled. In the end, he was nothing more than a collection of holes and seeping wounds; and the food was left to rot upon those streets.            I descended once again into the storage-room in search of Words in its library. In candlelight, I pored through the ancient texts – one, two whole, with nothing found; and then a third. An ancient composition in a half-forgotten langu...

Day 3 ‘Tis the dawn of the third day. I am Sraosha צ , last of the envoys of the Great One sent to this Earth. Diary mine –           Another sleepless night. When the thought of rest comes to mind, my body reacts – pain, first, then the spasms, then the palpitations. Sometimes I can drift closer to stillness, but these spells are temporary; as soon as my consciousness fades, the dreams begin, and I quickly jolt awake. Dreams – perhaps calling them so is inappropriate. Visions, more like; echoes of the blood spilled on this land. My eyes return four-hundred years to the birthplace of this city (the temple is, of course, in the periphery of a city); they see the slave-ships docking at the port and unloading hundreds of dark-skinned men and women onto cobble streets, gawked at and spit on and dragged by chain and rope to their fields. They see the once-lush forests of the place, marshlands and beaches, the people and the statues and the mus...

 Day 2 ‘Tis the dawn of the second day. I am Sraosha צ , last of the envoys of the Great One sent to this Earth. Diary mine –           I was not granted the pleasantry of sleep after struggling with my dreams. I have grown conscious of the forces of Terror beyond these old, bloated walls; the rotten petrol smell of that man on the black horse invades my nostrils, carried by the old, dead wind. He is quite far, I suppose; perhaps the smell is conjured by my mind, and not truly his. I would not know.           When I desisted returning to sleep, I decided it was time to roam – to explore this temple more, now that it was made my living-place. The main building is small and austere; a pulpit afront stained glass in rainbow-colored concentric circles, and a few rows of old wooden benches. Mine is the foremost, to the right. Upon that one I sleep. There is a trapdoor near the pulpit; beneath...

Day 1 ‘Tis the dawn of the first day. I am Sraosha צ , last of the envoys of the Great One sent to this Earth. ‘Though the world lieth in ruin, the Almighty hath graced me with a temple replete with ancient Scripture, or so do I believe; no message hath to me been spoken, in any event, but Its Providence is felt everywhere. This shall be the last haven in this world against the Terror, and the birthplace of the land’s long-term Resurrection. Sraosha; that is the name I had been given when created. The Master’s Children raised me from that pallid lake in the Upper Kingdom, where all our kind are born; I yet remember the mirthful singing of the Saints as I arose, wings yet tender and frail. I remember – I remember the Bearer of the Sun lowering its wings above my head, the three claws gently falling on my hair, and the word that would be made my name spewed from its youthful throat. Sraosha; I am told it had once meant “conscience” in one of the languages spoken by Bet-Chavvah. I am ...