Visions
For too
long have I delayed writing of the two most significant events
in my life. I feared to put them into words lest their power disappear
like a dream upon the morning. But over the years and months since,
they remain with me, as powerful as when I first experienced them.
The vision from my youth and the dream of the Gargoyle of Nowhere
have changed me, and I cannot yet say where they shall take me.
I am aware that these things are uncomfortable
to many, who would rather not read such intimate portraits of
another's inner life when they are often too confused to read
their own. Faith - even quiet, enduring faith - unnerves many,
for they either equate it with foolery or with the fires of the
punishing Inquisition. Most would prefer to leave spiritual matters
to experts. If this is so for you, reader, then read no further.
For I will write of naked experience and the raw power of the
Pancreator. If such beliefs make you nervous, turn the pages and
return to matters more mundane.
When I was little, I was fed on the
bread and milk of the Church. Raised in pious fashion on Midian,
I knew no other ambition than that of the vestry. My dear, sweet
mother wished only ordination for me, as did my well-placed uncle,
none other than the Archbishop of Byzantium Secundus. But the
Pancreator often has his own goals for our futures, and reveals
them in his own time.
I was 14 years old when I took vows
and received my novitiates' robes. My family connections ushered
me in early to such duties, for my friends were still altar boys
and cantors. I was neither bothered by this, nor was I overjoyed.
My career in the Church was a given, not something I looked forward
to with any excitement nor misgiving. This changed in the gardens
of Lady Tara Li Halan.
Walking there alone one afternoon on
a gray day, I came upon a dying wuwei bird. The mokuto neko which
had mauled it slipped away as I came down the path, leaving the
bird to weakly flutter in fear and pain. I bent down to watch
its last moments, more from curiosity than compassion. Dying animals
are no rare occurrence. But as I watched its weak struggles, I
realized that my presence caused it only more pain. Foolishly,
I reached down to stroke it, hoping to allay its fears. Birds,
of course, do not like being petted. I do not know what I was
thinking. Stupid boy.
Then, a remarkable thing occurred.
The bird stilled, not yet dead, but calm, as if it accepted my
weak gesture of peace. Its eyes looked into mine and I saw in
them an inner light. Indeed, I now saw a light limned about its
entire tiny body, a warm glow which spread outward. As I watched,
my vision became clearer, as if fogs rolled aside so that I could
truly see, for the first time, another being in its full glory.
The light radiated out and met another brilliance, a deeper, brighter
light descending from above. When the lights met, the entire area
was suffused with the glow, spreading all around, engulfing me
within it.
I gasped. Light now escaped from me,
as if a furnace burned in my breast and my flesh could not contain
the glow. I looked again at the dying bird and saw its light burst
from its heart and shoot into the sky. As it disappeared into
the heavy clouds, the radiance around me dimmed and returned to
gray. My own light retreated within once more.
I was exhausted. The world returned
to its previous state. The fog rolled in again, concealing the
secret luminosity of the world. The bird's body lay unmoving,
a dead husk.
I believe that I was gifted with a
vision of the Pancreator's Descent of Grace, and the Luminous
Return to the Empyrean of one of its divine creatures. But the
experience was different from what I was taught by my Orthodox
tutors. For the bird had revealed a flame within itself - and
its display had in turn revealed to me my own light, drawn outward
by the Pancreator's presence.
This holy vision changed my entire
outlook on my career, my very life. Yet I could not tell my teachers,
for it departed too far from their doctrines. I knew even then,
as a young boy, that my vision was truer than the theology carried
in books over a millennia. I knew then and there that I would
eventually leave my order to join the Eskatonics, whose own doctrines
spoke of the very thing I had experienced.
I have since spoken with many priests,
my age and older, and discovered that such a vision as was afforded
me is rare. Most travel through life with no such experience,
relying only on faith as proof of the Pancreator. I understood
why the Church was important to them; it was their only experience
of the divine, mediated through the accounts of those who had
touched Creation. I knew how truly blessed I was, that I had received
what so many others have not. I did not need books and debates;
the truth of the Pancreator resided in my memory, in my soul.
But I also knew that to count my self
above them for such a gift was wrong, and would lead only to hubris.
To the contrary, I believed myself humbled. Why was such vision
afforded me? Surely it meant that I must perform a duty for the
Pancreator, to give my life in service to him. I began to envy
those who were blind to visions, for they could choose their courses
as they saw fit, with no divine prodding to sway them. I began
to question all my actions in the light of my vision. I was paralyzed
with indecision, lest I choose wrongly.
Only time has allayed such fears in
me. Only the rhythms of the mundane over the months and years
have brought me to a sense of peace with my self. I must trust
my heart, my own light. Why else was my burning heart shown to
me if not for this meaning, that the truth lies within?
But I could not forget the heavens,
to which the dying soul of the bird had fled. My yearning for
the stars and for questing began there. It is still strong in
me. It is this yearning and the memory of that early vision which
prepared me for the quest given by the Gargoyle.
My Lady Erian Li Halan led me to Nowhere
to seek the famed oracle. With the rest of her entourage, we bought
access past Stigmata to Nowhere, realizing that we might not be
allowed to return should the garrison fear Symbiot taint among
us. But to Erian, it was worth the risk. Her lands were stolen
from her and she was rootless.
An old matron of her pious house had
told her of the Gargoyle, which had delivered to her grandfather
a vision long ago, one which revealed to him the secret needed
to rise to power within the family. Returning from that oracle,
her grandfather had, within a number of years, deftly rid himself
of all his rivals and uncannily predicted which of his allies
would betray him. Emboldened by this tale, Erian swore to seek
the oracle herself.
Once on Nowhere, we had to purchase
transportation and a guide to take us to the wastes, where the
Gargoyle had sat for more years than recorded history. Few ships
can risk landing in the wastes, lest the winds of the upper atmosphere
scour the vessel's hull and breach it. Yet the winds on the lower
plain are eerily still and dead. The atmosphere of the wasted
planet required that we wear breathing masks, although atmosphere
suits were not needed. After a journey of a week, we finally saw
the thing across the vast plain.
After setting up camp, we approached
and examined it. Its architecture was impressive, its sculpting
so lifelike that it seemed a creature frozen rather than carved.
But it did not move, and thus could not be alive as we know it.
I then performed a rite so that I might
view its occult properties. When I opened my eyes with the Second
Sight, I saw that it was staring at me. Its eyes had moved, rolling
in their massive sockets to peer down at me. I shuddered, for
its gaze was inhuman. No emotion could be read from it, except
perhaps that of fear.
I looked to Erian and saw that she
was the only one of my companions who remained. The others were
gone. Even the wastes were gone, replaced by lush grass over a
purplish-green plain dotted with groves of oddly shaped trees.
We stood in the Garden of Nowhere, the legendary state of the
planet long ago, before it was turned to waste by mysterious forces.
Erian looked up at the Gargoyle and
beseeched it. "Show me," she said, with a pride and
bearing which I hoped would not insult the artifact. But it was,
as ever, unmoved. Its eyes had rolled to gaze upon her, but its
silence was supernal.
"Blessed be the works of the Pancreator,"
I said in prayer. "Let wisdom come to those who are open
to it, whose cups are empty and whose minds are as guileless as
those of small children. Show us thy will so that we may complete
it."
I do not remember exactly what happened
next, but I know that I dreamed. I saw more than I can recall,
but what I saw was strange enough. I was back aboard the pilgrim
ship we had arrived in, but it was empty of pilgrims and my companions.
I found my way to the bridge and discovered that it, too, was
empty. Looking out the port, I saw that the ship approached a
jumpgate. Although no pilot had willed it so, the gate began to
open, space and light warping within its hoop to open a strange
portal to another star system. As the ship entered, I realized
with a shock of fear (in that form of dream logic where one knows
things which have not been told) that the Sathra Damper was disabled
and that my soul was at risk.
Instead of the fabled euphoria, however,
I saw a mist outside the ship. The pilot (yes, for there was now
a pilot there, as if he had always been there) turned to me and
asked me why it had taken me so long to get here. I replied that
I had been on the bridge since before the jump, but he said that
that was not what he meant.
The ship then exited another gate and
we were back in normal space. A ship awaited us, but it did not
belong to any noble house, guild or sect. It was Vau. The pilot
was gone again and the ship flew randomly. The Vau ship shot forth
a beam and caught my ship in a cocoon of light. I went to the
hatch to greet the visitors (which I knew would be coming).
I was then in a sumptuous dining-room,
eating with a Vau mandarin. Soldiers stood by the doors and half-naked
servants brought us plates of oddly colored plants and meats,
but they all tasted good. The mandarin turned to me and said,
"Now that you have truly traveled space, you must become
a priest."
I got up from the table and left the
room, returning (instantly in the way of dreams) to the bridge
of my ship (although it was now a different ship - the very one
we would later acquire from one of Erian's Hazat allies). Julia
Abrams flew the ship and asked me where I had found the strange
clothes which I wore. I realized that I was wearing Vau priestly
robes, and replied, "I earned them."
She told me to strap in, because we
were going to have to fight the Symbiots to get out of there.
"There" was a different place than I had been before.
We were now back in the Stigmata system, apparently pursued by
a Symbiot spacefighter. It was faster than us, and shot forth
a spiderweb from its guns. The web wrapped about our ship and
I could see tiny spiders crawling across our hull, strengthening
the web with their own silk. Our ship slowed to a crawl as the
web dragged us back.
The spiders were now in the ship, crawling
underfoot. I shooed them away, but Julia was frantic. I told her
to calm down, for we would all one day be food for the spiders.
I said that we must climb the web to get home. I led her to the
hatch and we crawled out onto the hull (without spacesuits!) and
grasped the sticky webbing around it. Using it as a ladder, we
climbed out into space, toward the sun. Julia complained about
the cold, but I said that the sun was hot and we'd be warm when
we would arrive there.
But as we got closer, it only got colder.
The sun seemed less bright. I knew that we had to connect the
web to the sun, but I did not know why. I then realized that my
own inner light would keep us warm. A small sun seemed to be inside
my breast, and it radiated heat into space. I then remembered
a Vau word to shape the light, and began to weave it into an extension
of the web, building a ladder from our ship to the sun.
I woke on the wastelands of Nowhere
at the foot of the Gargoyle. I had been unconscious for nearly
a day. Our guide had instructed Cardanzo and Julia to shade my
body, but told them that this coma was the way of visions.
Erian had dreamed also, but not the
same dream as I. Her dream was populated by famous figures of
her family's past, many from before the Conversion, when her relatives
were demons among men. She has yet to tell all that she saw, but
one of the elements of her dream was the discovery of a family
relic on some unnamed world. Whether this world is one of those
we know or a Lost World is unclear, as is the nature of the relic.
Erian seems to remember less of her dream than I, but traces of
it return to her in dreams.
As to the meaning of my dream, I cannot
say for sure. I am still trying to unravel it. Perhaps I must
bring the word of the Pancreator and the Holy Flame to the Vau
and Symbiots? But this seems too simple an explanation for such
a profound seeming vision - and profound for me it was, even if
such emotion is lost in dry writing.
Whomever reads this account in my journals,
temper any charge of heresy that you may have with the knowledge
that even the Prophet revered the Gargoyles, and believed that
they represented a purpose as yet to be revealed to Creation.