Previously…
Then she saw her father and knew this was
actually what it had been all about: the final confrontation. And he didn’t
disappoint. He was full steam ahead, bearing down on them like a battleship.
Beulah stopped and waited for the
inevitable, resigned to her fate. Samuel walked straight over to her and
slapped her in the face…in public…in front of her boyfriend. She hardly
flinched. In fact there was a faint smile of victory on her face, which turned
Samuels’s blood to lava. Not wanting to kill his daughter, he turned and
punched Jack in the nose and knocked the big jock on his behind.
And this was the moment she
lost her innocence. This was the moment the old, childish Beulah died, and
Beulah the hard-bitten bitch was born. And now...
To calm his fevered brain from the blood-letting
nightmares ahead and behind, he sits and watches the old lady as she sleeps,
her arduous breathing rattling through her ribs…in, out, in, out, each one
seemingly her last. She is very precious to him.
Then, in what seems like no time at all, the
messenger is up again and loading the camel. The night is still and he moves in
whispers, trying to give the old lady a few extra minutes of sleep. But soon
they are ready and have to wake her. Sleepily she allows herself to be hoisted
onto the camel and clings to the saddle pommel. Silently they move off down the
road, the sacrificial fires still burning brightly ahead of them in the pre-dawn
darkness.
The boy walks next to the old lady's foot as
it bumps against the camel’s side. He feels happy there. Warm. He can feel she
is his only link to what he can't remember…to something he loves. He strokes
the camel’s fur near her foot. It is amazingly soft. He listens mesmerically to
the quiet puft, puft of the camel’s feet padding in the dirt and falls asleep
on his feet.
When he opens his eyes he is in another
world. It is daylight and they have stopped moving. In front of them stands the
wall…a great, red, sandstone wall…and the biggest wooden gate he has ever seen.
It is easily two hundred feet high and a hundred feet wide. On the door is painted
from side to side, an eye. An eye with a pink eyelid, white and blue eyeball,
and a black iris. It seems to stare them through and through. It stares
unblinkingly at the whole land as if keeping watch for any intruders. The boy
finds it very personal and unsettling, asking him questions he cannot answer,
making him squirm under its all-seeing gaze. He tells himself he is being silly
and purposefully looks away, concentrating on the structure above the door. The
wall is so massive that on the huge arch above the gate there is a giant temple
in the shape of a pyramid, built with snow white marble, that glints and
glitters in the sunlight. It shimmers and shifts as if it is taking place in
some higher realm. There are steps cut in the front and sides of the temple that
slope upwards towards the peak. He shades his eyes against the sun and squints
to try and see the top. The fires are still burning along the top of the wall,
plumes of black smoke rising at regular intervals into the hot blue sky. There
is one central column of white smoke twirling up from a brazier at the very top
of the temple. This was no doubt to guide and assist the liberated soul on its
journey upwards.
As he looks
on, thousands of men dressed in long black robes appear along the battlements
of the walls, their number stretching out of sight on either side. As one they
lift their trumpets and send a blast of coppery noise out towards the little
trio who stand dwarfed by the gigantic proceedings in front of them. Simultaneously
a line of men in white robes appear on either side of the steps at the bottom
of the temple and begin climbing upwards. A little swirl of white near the
centre of the stone steps catches the boy’s eye. He sees it is a young girl in
a diaphanous white robe, as light as a cloud, drifting up the central
staircase. He feels a pain strike at his heart. She looks so beautiful, even
from this distance. He turns to the messenger frantically.
“Is she the one? The sacrifice?”
“Yes.”
“You must stop them. She mustn't die for me.
You must stop them.”
“There is nothing I can do. I told you.
There is nothing anyone can do to stop it. It has been preordained.”
“But they are going to kill her.”
“She has been trained for this moment. For
her it is a great honour to be able to give her life for one such as you. She
has been looking forward to this moment for many years…preparing herself and keeping herself pure. She will bring much glory on her family and her name will
live forever. She will become one of the immortals.”
The boy looks towards her again, his
forehead wrinkled with anxiety.
“They mustn't do it,” he says and begins
running towards the gate.
“Stop it!” He shouts, waving his arms to get
their attention. “Stop it…..Please.” But they are too high and far away to
hear, and would not have heeded his call anyway.
The white robed priests have reached the
top. They array themselves around the altar and wait for the girl to arrive.
The trumpets strike another golden chord into the dawn, and simultaneously
Clytemnestra bawls out her song of agony as if in sympathy. Senjur taps the boy
on his shoulder and points behind them. There, not far off, is a burbling cloud
of dust, churning its way towards them at an alarming speed. The camel hucks and
bucks and frets at her bridle; mad, black eyes rolling in her head. She is
nearly out of her mind with panic. The boy feels much the same.
He turns to look at the temple again. The
girl has reached the top and a priest, for so he looks, being garbed in red and
gold, is performing some kind of a blessing over her. Then, though he can only
barely see this against the glare of the sun, the girl lets her robe drop to
the floor and climbs onto the marble white slab of the altar.
“GGGAAAARRRRRRR.” The camel expresses the
boy’s feelings absolutely. He is struck immobile and mute now…the terrible
scene too much for his little mind.
A knife flashes in the sunlight but the boy
falls to his knees and sees no more. He doesn't see the blood begin to flow
down the chutes at the sides of the temple and run towards the pillars of the
gate. He doesn’t see the blood drip down onto the ancient hinges. He doesn’t
see the devil huntress riding hard through the cloud of dust behind them.
“It won't be long now,” says Senjur, holding
the frantic camel fast. “We must get ready to run.”
With a great clang, the bolts slide back and
the gates begin ponderously to open. With one flowing movement, Senjur
hoists the boy to his feet.
“Run. Don’t let her have died in vain.” The
boy wipes his tears and moves towards the gate, but the camel has gone into
meltdown. Her wobbly knees know not whence nor where. They are no longer
connected to her brain. Her toes dig into the sand and she refuses to move.
Undaunted, Senjur goes round the back of her and taking her tail gently in his
hand he bites down hard. Clytemnestra takes off like a racing camel. Had the
old woman not been wedged in between the humps she would have flown off the
back. The camel outstrips the boy in mere yards, heading like hell for the
gates of doom.
Behind them come the demon woman and her
Gravidores, running at such a pace that the backwash of their saliva looks like
a comet trail behind them, racing to get to the boy before he reaches the gate.
