The Record of the Saints Caliber (2 page)

Rook took a few hurried steps and tugged on his mother’s damp cloak. “Momma,” he said softly. “Are they gonna have food today?”

“I don’t know, hun,” rasped his mother. Her eyes, eerily dark and sunken upon her pale face, looked ahead but didn’t seem to see anything. She had been doing that a lot lately, the looking without seeing. She sniffled. Rook had also noticed her hair and nails had become brittle as of late. A finger, more bone than flesh, gently stroked the tears from Ursula’s face. Momma was beginning to look a lot like father had before he died. “We’ll see, sweetie.” she said softly. “We’ll see.”

Ursula was still screaming and doing a good job of drowning out the tolling bells. Rook sidled up next to his mother. “Momma,” he said. “You can use my cloak.”

She turned to him and looked down at him, her thin, blue lips pursed into a tender smile. She seemed to see him now, to really see him with those sunken, brown eyes of her’s. Her face was quite white and her thin hair was pulled back in an old, red bonnet. “It’s ok sweetie, she’s just a little hungry, that’s all.” Rook’s mom had told him that her breasts were no longer producing milk. They had been relying on their paltry milk rations to feed Ursula, but even those had been cut. Ursula had been living on little more than barley water for two days, made from the last bits of their moldy grain.

They hurried through the streets and as they came upon the town square Rook noticed more and more families flooding out of the foggy alleys and side streets. Few were better dressed than Rook and his mother, but were perhaps made better off by the fact that their families were whole. A little girl walked hand-in-hand across the way with her own mother and father, gazing with sunken eyes at Rook’s mom, perhaps trying to see who was making such a fuss.

Past the fog a dark shadow now came into view that stretched up into the misty, gray heavens. It was tall, looming and dark and from it emanated the haunting bells that echoed in the streets; streets that seemed lifeless despite the people upon them. The church stood at the outskirts of a small political district neither Rook nor any of his family or friends had ever been privy to. Beyond the church no citizen was allowed to go, and there was something about this area of the city Rook had always resented. Here, the roads were paved with brick, not dirt. The buildings beyond the church all had chimneys alive with smoke and their windows shown like eerie will-o-wisps thru the fog, aglow with gaslight. The haunting church bells tolled again and from its highest tower, barely visible through the fog, Rook could make out the giant face of the clock. The black hands stood in contrast against the white face, the hour of 7:00 a.m. just minutes away.

They hurried past the fountain of the town square, which had not flowed with water since Rook could remember, and the church emerged from the fog. Its sharp spires clawed at the gray skies and Rook had always thought the entire complex looked like a gaudy crown placed on the land. Beyond it, like stark sentinels of some ancient emperor, loomed the rigid brick buildings of the church officials and the lords and nobles who ran the city. They were the only buildings in town that were not in some state of gross disrepair. From somewhere beyond the high, stone walls Rook could hear the bawling of a cow and thought how pleasant it must be to be one of the nobles and have access to milk each day. Through the stained glass windows that depicted the loving goddess, Aeoria, Rook could see the gaslights burning brightly and thought about how warm it would be inside.

As they made their way toward the stone steps that ascended to the church’s heavy double-doors Rook became aware of the black shadows strolling the roads. Immediately he averted his gaze from them. He clenched his eyes closed and tried to mentally block his previous thoughts of contempt for the clergy and chided himself for coveting the church. If he had ruined their chance of getting some food and warmth this morning he would never forgive himself. He opened his eyes and kept them plastered on the church as he walked, holding his mother’s hand.

Through the corner of his eye he could see one of the Sin Eaters on patrol as it strolled about the churchyard in its black robes. Sin Eaters always unnerved Rook, even more than the Oracles. They looked like ravens—maybe vultures would be more accurate—with their hunched forms, black robes, and beaked leather masks. It held its gloved hands together at its chest, the long sleeves of its robes draping nearly to the street. Despite the fog, the emerald lenses of its goggles gleamed as it stared at him. Rook wondered if it had heard his sinful thoughts.

As they approached the stone steps of the church Rook felt that he could relax. The Sin Eaters would have pulled them aside earlier if they were going to. At the top of the stairs was a set of large, wooden doors where a kindly old man of the clergy was standing and greeting people as they came. He wore bright crimson robes, trimmed in gold. Around his neck hung the golden star of Aeoria, and he held a golden scepter as he stood smiling and greeting. “Welcome, my child, welcome,” he was saying.

Rook and his mother came up the steps and baby Ursula ceased her crying, as if she could sense the impending warmth that escaped the open doors. The old man greeted them, and Rook’s mother softly thanked him as he bid them enter.

Inside, the pews were already filling up. The cavernous cathedral was well lit by lamps flickering with gaslight on every stone pillar. Marvelous stained glass windows lined the walls and were even cast in a delicate glow through the murky fog outside. Rook could not immediately smell any food, but the thick aroma of incense was pleasing and he breathed in deeply. At the front of the cathedral was a massive mural made of glass tiles depicting the goddess Aeoria in her grand heaven, surrounded by the black and white coils of two titanic dragons. The mural was framed by the towering brass pipes of the organ and they seemed to sparkle with the gaslight. An altar in the form of a glass coffin filled with roses took center stage, a symbol of their goddess’s eternal slumber. At either side of the podium stood an Oracle; a figure dressed in flowing black robes who looked straight out upon the crowds through a polished, silver mask. The pair stood straight and rigid, the full pews and burning flames of the lamps reflecting in their mirror masks. Like the Sin Eaters, Rook often wondered who—or maybe what—looked at him from beyond the faceless masks. Part of him felt he would be better off not knowing, part of him wondering why a person so close to Aeoria’s eternal love would hide their face.

Rook’s mom slid into a pew toward the center of the immense chamber and Rook slid in next to her. Beside them sat Mister Brumal and his wife Camellia and their two sons. They lived just a few houses down from them. Last summer Rook had seen their boys working with their father in the fields and hoped that this year he could get a spot in the fields too. The farmlands were mostly all dedicated to the kingdom of Jerusa and the crops grown were to feed the King and his nobility, the army, and the clergy. However, working the fields allowed you to have a larger share of the community fields allotted for the citizens. This extra allotment of space might allow for another row or two of corn or potatoes, hardly worth the time and labor tending the fields of the kingdom. But Brumal’s family was lucky, for not only did they have the extra share from both their boys working the fields, but Mister Brumal had a bow and often poached wild turkeys, squirrels and rabbits from the nearby woods.

This, of course, was secret knowledge. Rook wasn’t supposed to know they had this bow, but he had found out after seeing Mister Brumal give his mother an extra rabbit they had shot. Nobody was supposed to have any weapons or hunting equipment anymore. It was last year, at the onset of winter, when the soldiers came through and said that due to a shortage of game throughout the kingdom, all bows were to be forfeited and hunting was forbidden until the summer. The church did a good job of helping to round up the bows and arrows but many, like Mister Brumal, hid theirs. And it was a good thing too. Summer never saw the return of any bows or any rights to hunting, and this was now the second year without being able to hunt. The rations given by the church were hardly enough.

Brumal and Camellia would often share the meat they acquired, partly out of kindness and partly to keep those who knew about it quiet. Having the bow alone would get Mister Brumal hung. Poaching would surely see his whole family hung. When King Gatima decreed there was a shortage of something, it was a decree not to be ignored. There seemed to be a shortage of lots of things these days. A month ago soldiers had come through and said that King Gatima was requisitioning all weapons and one tool per family due to a steel shortage.

Rook and his mother exchanged friendly good mornings with Brumal’s family and Camellia remarked how well their mother, Rook and Ursula looked this morning. Rook’s mom replied in kind. If starvation and poverty were the in-fashion, everybody in the church looked stunning this morning. Rook sat up on his knees and rubbed a finger on Ursula’s rosy little cheeks. Her eyes were squinched shut, her dark eyebrows furled, her tiny little lips puffed out. She looked content and cozy, wrapped in momma’s tattered scarf. Rook smiled down at her.

“She looks like you, you know,” said his mother, smiling down at her too. “Already her hair is as black as yours and your father’s. She has your eyes too. Those black-blue eyes you and your father have.”

Just then the organ music began to play and the mumblings amongst the pews settled. Rook and his mother straightened in their seat as the priest walked forth and took his place at the podium. Father Tarask was an older man with salt and pepper hair and soft features. He was plump and his red robes hung loosely upon his bulbous body, his jowls wiggling as he addressed the audience. He spoke in a loud and commanding voice that reverberated through the stone chamber, and instructed all to rise as he said the morning prayer. Rook couldn’t understand the ancient language recited during the prayer—none in the church, save the clergy, really could—but he and his mother voiced the prayer along with him. It was the typical prayer, supposedly asking Aeoria to forgive them of their sins and to bless them with her love and grace this day.

After the prayer the congregation all took their seats and Rook sat next to his mother as she cradled and rocked little Ursula in her arms. Normally Rook didn’t much care for the boring services. Usually he spent the hour daydreaming and hoping that food would be handed out after mass. He would gaze upon the stained glass windows, especially the ones that depicted the heroes of the Saints Caliber. His favorite was Saint Bryant of the Horn. Saint Bryant was boldly depicted in his black armor of star-metal, his arms spread wide as children gathered around him, bread and fruit in abundance for all. Rook’s favorite tales of him involved how he single-handedly slew the Cerberus, and how he would bring candies and gifts to the people of the towns he visited. The most famous tale was of how he bravely held the lines of Sanctuary against the hordes of Apollyon. Saint Bryant had died a hero that day, but was better known for spreading bounty and abundance to the towns and villages he visited during his life. Rook often wondered what it must have been like back then, before the Great Falling, when there was food enough for all and Aeoria still favored all of mankind with her love.

Today, however, Rook would not be daydreaming. The topic that Father Tarask was speaking on was persevering in the face of turmoil, and he was illustrating the point by speaking about the Saints Caliber. Rook leaned forward in his seat, lost in the stories being told. Father Tarask spoke about how times were indeed tough right now, tougher now than they had been in the last six-hundred years since the Great Falling. But even now, promised Father Tarask, the Saints Caliber were fighting the hordes of Apollyon to win back the love of the goddess. “And all of you,” declared Father Tarask becoming quite animated at the podium. “By coming to worship our loving Aeoria in the face of all this strife, are telling her that you believe! That you believe in her love! That you believe she will again bless us with abundance and prosperity! For it is you—all of you!—who continue to show your love to Aeoria, in the face of strife, that will see the sun rise upon a new dawn! And for us here today, I can assure you that Holy Father Admael will send the Saints Caliber forth and they will smite the evil of Apollyon and bring abundance, love and wealth back to the lands of Jerusa!”

Father Tarask brought the mass to an end with a final prayer to Aeoria and the music of the great brass pipe-organ began to reverberate. A man called out asking if there would be food today and a wave of murmurings spread across the congregation.

Father Tarask held up his hands and said, “I know it has been a trying winter for all of us. We had to give up more of the community fields last summer than any of us had hoped. But spring is now upon us! Soon we shall plant crops again! Soon fields shall bloom and life and prosperity shall return to us! Certainly King Gatima will call an end to the shortages this summer and allow us to reclaim more of the fields for our own families.”

“That’s what you said last year and the year before!” cried the man. “My wife and daughter are at home too weak to move! I lost a son this winter to starvation! Everybody here today has lost somebody to hunger!” Here the man tore off his dirty shirt which was little more than patchwork cloth. His stomach was sunken and filthy, his ribs clearly visible beneath the skin. “We go hungry while you stand up there fat as the hogs you keep hidden from us!”

Father Tarask held up his hands and began addressing the audience, urging them to remain seated and calm, but his words were being drowned out by the mumblings of the audience. Rook could feel something happening; a palpable tension building amongst the people.