“This is how change gets made, isn’t it Carlowe? The numbers are big. His army is growing.”
“Yes, if he can keep control of it. Does he have crowds this large in Atlanta?”
“He has, a few times. I am surprised to see it here, but I am happy for him, aren’t you?”
“I am wary, Delilah. If this were a normal occurrence or a swell following a victory, I would be comfortable, but I feel like we should be very cautious.”
“I feel no fear. I feel pride that this many have come to hear him.”
“Undoubtedly you should feel proud that his cause could draw so many, but there is no shame in caution. Being mindful of your safety does not mean you doubt the intention of the group only that you recognize that there are factors that could lead to danger.” I said carefully. I had no wish to offend her and she tended to be quite temperamental where the cause was concerned.
“Why Carlowe, you must fancy me quite a bit to be looking after my safety!” she laughed. “I do like being on the arm of a fine gentleman,” she said sliding her arm through mine.
“I most certainly do not fancy you, Ms. Emerson.” I quipped, mimicking her southern drawl.
She pressed her face into my arm and we both had a small laugh until the crowd broke into applause and the Reverend took his microphone.
He started with a prayer.
The crowd bowed their heads in respect and most said the words along with him. I did not. Hearing my father revered in prayer made me want to scream out in revulsion. But I held my tongue and my silent refusal to bow went unnoticed.
The Reverend did indeed taper his speech to highlight just the most important aspects of what he wished to change in Albany. While he wanted total desegregation in the town, he put aside that burden and laid down the facts regarding how the Chief of Police was arresting nonviolent protesters and holding them hostage in jail cells far from their homes, far from their families for the crime of peacefully protesting the injustice of segregation. He incited the crowd with stories of fatherless children and mothers having to scrape by to feed their babies because justice could not be had. He looked out upon them and said he was pleased that even the conservatives had come to assist their brothers. He told them they could make a better world if they would register and vote and change the laws of this great land.
They cheered and jeered and praised God in turn.
He asked them to help him fulfill the Lord’s plan that all men should be equal.
He told them: “What I am saying is that I cannot be all that I am meant to be until you become all that you are meant to be, but you cannot be all you are meant to be unless I become what I am meant to be as well. We are all interconnected.”
He spoke the words to the masses, but the message was meant for me alone.
The crowd cheered and praised him.
He told them: “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend.”
Thunderous applause filled the air.
He told them: “Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
And the people sang.
CHAPTER 6: ALBANY, GEORGIA – JULY 23 - 24, 1962
I startled awake to the sound of machine gun fire and sirens in my head. I could smell the stench of war still lingering in my nostrils. “I only wanted the ending” I heard myself muttering.
I was lying in the arms of a gentle woman but clearly I had not left behind the brutal past.
The weekend had been peaceful.
Though the town was crowded with protesters holding their silent prayer vigils at various civic facilities, no fighting or provocations had occurred. Sunday masses proceeded as planned and my great dread of this large mob began to ease. At least I thought it did.
My dreams should have been a signal to remain wary.
Monday morning the violence began in earnest. The start of the business week was like a battle cry to all the soldiers who had been lying in wait for the first sign of the enemy and both sides attacked with a fury.
The Reverend called his disciples to him and tried hard to quell the raw emotions of his people. He begged them to remain passive, but it is not the nature of creation to remain passive when under threat of death. They fought and vandalized. They smashed windows and cars and heads. Screams of terror rang from all colors equally.
But blood is just one color and the red all ran together in the streets.
What had been a great success just two days prior, where in the large crowd sang the Father’s praise and all left that place safely with peace and hope in their hearts had now turned to a tide of bloodshed where hope of redemption and equality was all but lost.
Even peaceful prayer was not going to stay the hands of those whose fears had been renewed.
Behind closed doors I urged the Reverend to leave. Albany was lost.
But he insisted he had to make some sort of reparation. That if he turned tail and left in the wake of such destruction he affirmed that his people were to blame.
Now I understand pride perhaps more than any creature that has ever breathed with life. But I had no fear of my own ending so I could avenge myself to any length and never consider failure. I did not understand mortality. This man was risking everything, his life, his family, and the vague and prone to failure message of my father in order to defend a day of violence that may have been unjustly propagated, but wherein his people were certainly not innocent. He wanted to get to his pulpit and scold them like children while pointing the finger of shame and blame at the community and the time.
And he wondered why Albany refused to buckle.
Delilah and I returned to our room.
“He asked you to advise him. He praised your clarity and he refused to listen,” she said stroking my hair. “I have always thought him a very wise man, but now I am questioning his motives, Carlowe.”
“I do not want you to lose your faith in this movement. It has meant a lot to you for a long time.”
“But you asked me if his motives were pure and I thought they were. This time I think he wants the publicity. He is a very good speaker and he will spin this to look as though they were all innocent victims but I know better now.”
“He has a heavenly soul. He should be a man of pure intentions. It is mortal pride that tampers with his will.” I told her.
“Carlowe, can I tell you something honestly? Please don’t look at me with revulsion.”
“You can tell me anything.”
“Today I felt like a white woman. I felt ashamed to be part of that heritage. I saw James in the eyes of men. And I looked down on them,” she said as tears clung to her lashes.
“There is no shame in your heritage. You were made in love. What you saw was a flashback to the most painful time in your life. You said you built a castle to protect yourself from that sort of rage and today you might have gone home to your tower.” I told her taking her in my arms.
She wept for a few moments, but whether it was disappointment or relief she did not tell me.
“You saw anger. You felt shame. Do you feel fear, Delilah?”
“I do not acknowledge fear,” she sighed. “Fear is the destroyer of all things. But I am ready to leave this life of violence and uncertainty. You were correct; my life is different from theirs. This movement does not need me to continue. I would like to go back to Atlanta and perhaps continue my schooling. I could fight for justice in the way my daddy does, through the courts. I can make changes that are laws, Carlowe.”
“If that is your wish, Delilah, I support you. Do not do this because you think it is what I want.”
She ran her hands up my chest and backed me toward the bed. “I told you, this time I am going to do what I please if you don’t mind!” she smiled as she loosened my belt and untucked my shirt. Her hands were warm upon my skin and the world was a long way away as we took pleasure in each other.
>
But as we lay there satisfied, with the breath coming fast from our lungs and our bodies still joined she looked into my eyes and said, “we should attend the dinner tonight and then I will tell him that I intend to leave.”
“As you wish.”
She crossed her arms upon my chest and gazed at me. “Your eyes look like the sky at midnight, Carlowe. I think if I look deep enough I shall see past the stars all the way to Heaven.”
“I wish it were possible for you to find Heaven in my eyes, Delilah.” I sighed and I closed them picturing the place.
* * *
We dressed and we went to the restaurant to dine with the group.
Delilah was quite beautiful and there were many who felt jealousy looking upon her. I knew it would be in her best interest to leave this life behind and perhaps we could find some small span of time to have peace together.
There was a joy to her countenance that I wondered if she had ever felt before and she held my hand tightly as we left to meet one last time in the Hotel where The Reverend was staying.
But as we walked hand in hand a pace behind the group talking quietly, the world suddenly changed.
Shots rang out in the clear night.
There were screams and people ducking and diving for cover.
I was looking ahead of us at the group trying to see the damage.
Delilah gasped. “Oh! I wasn’t expecting that,” she said pressing her hands to her stomach. “It hurts,” she whispered as she stumbled awkwardly into me and fell to the ground.
“No!” I screamed out in agony.
She lay dying in my arms as the blood of mortality covered my hands. But her soul looked out at me through copper colored eyes that seemed clouded in pain to old to be from this wound.
“Again I leave this world without the thing I asked of you to leave behind. Again I leave without Glory, Gahi as you remain,” she gasped.
“You leave with Glory, my lady. You were woman enough. Your fire burned me. Your curse lives on.”
“I didn’t know then. I didn’t know you could not give me what I asked for. I would not hear you once you denied me. I take it back. I take it all back. I will ask the Father to take the curse away…” she gasped, as her body lay lifeless in my arms.
But her soul looked at me before it went on its way and in that moment it knew all there was to know. “Sammael, you are more than they thought. You are more than you know,” she whispered and she stroked my cheek.
And she was gone.
* * *
The guard had closed around the Reverend, protecting him from the threat. My hands were bloodied, my rage was alive and I shoved through his bodyguard to face him. I grabbed him by the lapels of his suit and looked into the soul within the man. The physical body meant nothing to me what I wanted was an answer from The Messenger.
“Why her?” I shouted. “Why did he take her?”
“The Lord works in his own ways, no one can know…” he started in his condescending oratory to soothe those left behind.
But I could not hear him. “Do not speak to me as a man!” I shouted. I could feel the brightness of my immortality glow with the rage in my eyes. But still The Messenger was mute.
I reached out with all my strength and I tore him from the mortal flesh. All those watching stood speechless in the presence of the Glory of Heaven.
“I did not think you had the strength to do that, Brother,” Gabriel said as I held him captive in my hand.
“You were not born of this body. Your hold was weak.” I said venomously.
“Still, you are not made in the same way I…” Gabriel started.
But I cut his questioning short. I wanted my answer. “Why did he take her? There were so many and he took only the one that meant something to me. You asked me for mercy and I agreed to uphold you! Why does he punish me?”
“I do not know what his lesson was, Sammael. I only know what it was my task to say to these people of this time.”
I screamed in rage. It was not enough. I wanted a reason. I wanted revenge. I closed my eyes and I pulled all the warmth that remained of The Messenger into myself. Then I cast the presence of Gabriel back into my father’s face. “Curse you! Curse your cruelty! This is my message to you!” I cried out.
I took the memories of the guards that stood and watched my tantrum, but I left the one man as he was. He still had the Glory he was born with. He was no longer a puppet of the Father, but he would find new fervor in what he saw and his desire to have back what was lost.
* * *
I did not stay to see her mortal body given to the dirt. I could not bear to watch. As the cover of darkness spread over the town I spread my wings and a Raven, the black bird of death flew off into the night. Carlo Ambrosi would never bee seen again.
This was not a lifetime, merely another death.
I never should have taken my father’s bait. I never should have given in to the temptation to hear his message to mankind. I was a fool.
I told myself I would deny this sojourn back into the mortal world.
I would never speak of it again. I would go back to the original plan, the original timeframe I worked out. I would become Arrio Dominic Thanos. I would be cold. I would be sterile. I would care for nothing and no one. I would find a new way to avenge myself upon this world, upon my father. I would not make the mistake of being merciful ever again. I would continue my war against him with a fitting name.
But for now I would return to the sand. The asp felt far less than man.
And I would mend my wounds as much as I could with warmth and time.
AFTERWARD: SUDAN, JULY 27, 1962
“It is a cruel tale, Brother.” Raphael said softly.
“You cannot think he does these things for any reason but spite. He has made me something I can’t overcome and even when I attempt atonement he smites me.”
“I don’t claim to know his reasons. I only came to give you peace.”
“Peace? What is peace? I will never know what it is to feel joy. I will never feel his precious gift of love. I would rather be completely empty than be what I am and know what it is that I lack.”
“There would be torment in emptiness as well, would there not?”
“I would prefer vacancy to grief.” I said looking up at him. “Can you take this memory from me? Let me forget this loss. Let me forget how his hatred burns.”
“I have never tried to do such a thing. Are you sure you wish to forget? There were moments filled with tenderness in this brief time.”
“It is especially those moments I need to forget, Raphael.”
He nodded and pressed his hand to my eyes. “Rest, Brother,” he said gently as he swept his fingers across my forehead.
And it was all gone.
AUTHOR INFORMATION:
This story was intended to be part of my novel, Forsaken, the sequel to my upcoming novel, Glory which is due out in June of 2013. However, in writing this particular flashback, giving depth to these characters became so involved that the story itself was too long to use as a memory. I decided to keep it as it was written and publish it as a novella, as it would lose too much of the emotional nature if it were trimmed down to fit within the novel.
While this story takes place chronologically before Glory, it was written after that book was completed. The memory, or lack there of, is important to the climax of Forsaken and the ultimate resolution of the 2 book series. I hereby offer it to you as introduction to the characters. I hope you will enjoy it.
I would also like to add that while this takes place during a specific time in history, this work is purely fictional.
Thank you for downloading the free eBook of The Messenger. It is a privilege to share this book with you. If you would like to share your thoughts and comments feel free to email me at:
[email protected] or check out my Author Page on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com
/MindyHaigAuthor
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Stay tuned for the release of Glory, coming in June of 2013
Please check out my other book, The Wishing Place, published in March of 2013.
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