The Book of Josiah - Chapter 22

   The elevators reached the inner sanctum with a satisfied ping.
    The doors slid open gently, revealing rows of silent black guns. Like a machine, the Security forces marched into the room and took up commanding positions, crouching behind steel pews, pointing their guns at their designated targets. Elijah’s guards had scattered too - they were outnumbered two to one but had had time to prepare their barricades. Elijah, however, had not moved an inch. He simply stood behind the altar, silver robes unmoving, an icon of steel - even his eyes were still. He watched and waited.
    Then she made her entrance, her robes the colour of bronze and blood, sweeping behind her like the trail of a comet.
    “Where is he?” Elisha demanded imperiously.
    Josiah hardly dared to breathe. The smallest sound could give him away. Amber too was perfectly still, looking pale and anxious. A thin wooden wall was all that stood between them and a violent death.
    “Where is who, Arch-Lector?” Elijah replied, a quiet smile on his lips.
    Their lives were in Elijah’s hands. Elijah, who had been about to cut off Amber’s ear, who thought he was the messiah! But there had been no other option. At least Elijah wanted him to live. Even so he would probably never leave here alive, he knew that now. But Amber… If it came down to it, he would choose her. ‘And if you have no choice?’ he asked himself, unbidden.
    Josiah put his eye back to the narrow slit in the wall and watched.
    “I am in no mood for games, Lector. Where is Josiah?”
    “I have not seen him.”
    Elisha laughed coldly.
    “You would not wish me to spill blood in the inner sanctum, would you?”
    “Everything with you is about blood,” Elijah retorted harshly, “did you learn nothing from me? All those years I was your master, did you never listen?”
    “I did listen, and I learnt that you are at best misguided, at worst a heretic - ‘For this shall be my blood of the new testament, shed for the remission of sins’.”
    “You quote the book but have not yet discerned its meaning - ‘neither shalt thou stand by the blood of thy neighbour’.”
    “You think you are wise, and yet it is not you that is Arch-Lector. ‘On this day, atonement shall be made for us, to cleanse us of our sins. And Aaron shall bring the bullock of the sin offering, which is for himself’.”
    “‘Choose life, so that you and your people may live.’”
    “‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’!”
    “‘Thou shalt not kill’!”
    “Not kill?” asked Elisha, and Josiah could picture her lips twitching, “I think it’s a little late for that.”

The Book of Josiah - Chapter 17

    Darkness dissolved into light.
    From nothingness all he could see was fire, fire burning hot and bright. And yet he was cold. And could not move.
    The light was fleeting, the warmth fading - the darkness more than real.
    Steel chains bound his arms and legs, rusted links wore at his wrists and ankles. The constant sound of dripping water played out a never-ending riff. Water swirled and danced around the stone cobbles and pooled around his feet, covered with the filth of eternity. And yet his mouth was dry beyond enduring. And the water was out of reach.
    If he felt anything, it was abject terror.
    He knew he was alone despite the darkness. No, it wasn’t dark. Fire burned in braziers, fixed at equal intervals along the wall, flickering like ghosts, more dead than alive. And the walls stretched beyond the end of the world, beyond the brink of forever.
    And then he was in the jungle, running, running. The unbearable green burnt his eyes, the cascading water plunged his hair to rivers, the undergrowth tore at his tattered clothes. But he was running, and nothing else mattered.
    He was a jaguar, fleet of foot, king of the jungle, deadly hunter. His claws were like steel vices, his teeth like industrial diamonds. And his prey was close. The infuriating stench of its sweat filled his mind with visions of death and blood, of red and green.
    The water did not matter, the thickness of the air he fought was irrelevant - the only thing in the world was his prey. He had to run.
    And then he was the prey and was still running, running, fighting the pain of a broken arm - he knew that a piece of metal was stuck in his flesh. Cold sweat mingled with the gushing water but there was no oblivion.
    His antlers caught a branch and he was slowed for an instant - the pause was deadly - the hunter was upon him.
    This is a dream, he thought, and smiled to himself. There is no pain and no water. With a leap he sailed high into the air and left the hunter far behind. This is a dream, and here I can fly.
    But he could not fly, and so he fell down with the rain, faster than teardrops, plummeting to the green earth and the dark ribbon of silver. The ribbon rushed to meet him, its waters closed over his head.
    This is a dream, he thought, and I can swim. And so he did. But he saw that fish too can swim, and they gathered around him, sunlight flashed off bared fangs. Then all around him, the water turned from green to red.
    He was the hunter, laughing at his folly.
    He was the hunted, crying into blood.
    He was the fish, extracting his pound of flesh.
    He is you, and you are me, and I am everyone.
    “You are not My people. And you are not forgiven.”

*  *  *

    “Well Mr Smith, this is a pleasant surprise.”