Chapter Ten #2
“Thank you for the history lesson earlier. I didn’t get it yesterday.
I was in a selfish cloud, thinking about myself.
I understand why this town is so fiercely protected.
This morning, I felt what they went through, that pull toward the unknown, the risk in searching, that joy in finding it.
I… I honestly thank you for that. I’ll never tell anyone about this place.
” For the first time on their walk, Issac caught up with the pace and slid his hand into Schuyler’s, keeping his momentum.
“Still not sure why all of that made me so horny?”
“Well, the bloody massacre of our enemies in that chroma-rainbow color scheme always gets me hot.” Schuyler looked down at their hands wrapped around each other, swinging softly—not an action he often participated in.
In Bairwick, no one cared at all. In the outside world, with his ex, when he really wanted to, he couldn’t.
He relished the experience now, squeezing Issac’s hand gently.
Their conversation covered their past relationships.
Issac spoke of his two previous boyfriends, and Schuyler talked about his ex—and Dev.
Their talking lulled only when the sounds of the forest they travelled through grew louder.
The cicadas laid the base, continuing their unending diatribe, joined by other buzzing insects, birds, and the high-pitched cries and screams of macaws filling the trees, alongside the monkeys who rustled in them.
A sloth yelled at them from a banana tree across the river, refusing to move but demanding their attention.
There were howls, hoots, and whines—loud, pained, and eerie whines, which made Issac nearly stop.
Schuyler remained unphased, keeping their hands together and them moving.
“That’s Liberace and Bea, they’re Chupacabras, a female and a male, but…
they’re both gay, so they won’t mate. That’s their sexual frustration you’re hearing. ”
“What kind of forest is this?” Issac questioned Bea and Liberace’s increased howling whines.
“The area around the convent we are going to is a biological preserve. The Hermanas rescue animals and cryptids, especially those close to extinction, and bring them here to live safely. There are elephants, big cats, woolly mammoths, dodo birds, rhinos, Mothmen, skin walkers, that Golden Toad that went extinct in the 80s, and, allegedly, a bisexual werewolf, though I’ve never seen him, and I do enjoy me a hairy man. ”
“Is this why you didn’t port us directly to the convent?”
“No, the sisters forbid that. They like their privacy, and ya can’t have that if witches just be showin’ up,” Schuyler explained, redirecting Issac’s attention from the trees to the two baby Sasquatches crossing the path ahead of them.
He whipped out his phone trying to take a picture, but they were too fast.
Issac moved forward, more aware of the wildlife growing active around them—the vine-covered trees and thick brush they passed through—as he listened to Schuyler.
“The Hermanas of the Moon are a cloister of witch-nuns. Their primary call is to serve the Earth. And believe me, I do mean serve. You’ll see.
They cherish their solitude, so they found this spot far from the town with all this untouched forest and built their convent.
This trail, if your intention is to seek council, like we are, is a delightful journey.
“If your intention was to join their cloister, to relinquish life as you know it, to become as devout to the Goddesses and Earth as they are, this becomes a test of determination.”
A half mile later the forest receded into a large clearing, where a simple one-story stone convent sat peacefully with vibrantly colored stained glass breaking up the monotonous masonry. The earthy trail ended, giving way to a gravel road which led to the front door.
Schuyler approached the double wooden doors and knocked. He waited for Issac to jump back at what occurred next, a female figure appeared emerging out of doors still wrapped within wood.
“Why do you seek the Hermanas of the Moon?” The sentry asked in a distant, cold, distorted voice.”
“Council,” Schuyler replied politely, “with Sister Superiora, por favor.”
“And who seeks this council with our blessed Sister midday, with no appointment?” The wood covering the sentry’s face dissipated as soon as Schuyler announced himself and a woman’s face emerged, smiling brightly. “Schuyler! ?Que Pasa?”
“Gianna!” He opened his arms as she stepped out of the wood.
When their embrace ended, he caught Issac’s face as his jaw dropped at the sight of the impeccable Sister.
The black-and-white habit’s tunic and scapular were snatched fiercely at the waist, creating a near-impossible hourglass figure.
The fabric itself, encrusted with diamond dust, generated non-stop reflective sparkle, especially with every movement.
Only Gianna’s perfectly beat face remained visible, as the habit’s veil wrapped around her neck and head, topped off by a stylish, wide-brimmed Bolero hat which sat delicately upon her head.
“I cannot see anything as Sentry. Come in, come in.” As she spun around in defiant elegance, the doors opened, and she led them inside.
“Are all of the nuns in this place serving cunt like she is?” Issac asked, once the doors closed behind him and they moved through the dark hallway of the convent. Schuyler laughed.
“Yes,” Hermana Gianna replied proudly. “We are ourselves under this Glamour, but for you, we are the beauty of all things.” She kept pushing them forward through the doorless and windowless stone hallway until they exited into the main atrium.
There, the true openness of the convent revealed itself.
There were many floors above them, and many below—far more than the simple stone facade would lead one to believe.
Hermana Gianna took them to the right, down another hall which opened into a courtyard.
Twenty-seven Sisters stood in the grassy spaces between the stone walkways, all of them still as statues, posing; their right hand extended up, their left away from them.
Heads turned to the cloudless sky above them.
“Perpetual Adoration,” Hermana Gianna explained before Issac could ask. “They are praying. Giving gratitude for all we are blessed with.”
One cue, all the Hermanas changed positions in perfect unison; both arms dropped to their sides, palms up and open, heads titled back toward the sky. They held the current pose for a few minutes, before shifting to another.
“It’s beautiful,” Issac commented, mesmerized by the Sisters as they continued, pose after pose.
“Gracias. They hear you and thank you, but cannot break prayer. The adoration lasts all day and night, and we have held it for hundreds of years. Please, come.” She ushered them through the courtyard, but Schuyler could have remained and watched the prayer for hours, as he had done before, finding a spot out of the way to admire and write.
“I thought he would like the scenic route,” she whispered to him as they exited. He thanked her.
They moved through a grand dining room, empty at the moment, but the ceiling rose over fifty feet into the air and was adorned with more stained glass.
Then she took them to a multi-floored library.
“Every book ever written is stored here,” she announced, pointing out the changes they’d made since Schuyler had last visited.
“You could spend three lifetimes here and still not read everything.”
“I’ll take that challenge,” Schuyler playfully said, wanting to sit at one of the tables and pour himself into book after book.
A few more turns down a couple of windowless hallways, they began to hear chanting carried on the air—a choir of feminine voices, soft at first, then growing louder as they approached the end of the hall.
Hermana Gianna stopped at the threshold, placed her finger to her lips, but motioned for them to enter.
The disembodied chanting echoed off the tiled walls as Schuyler and Issac entered the square room, which rose higher than the atrium and dipped lower.
In the center was a circular platform, smaller than the room itself, accessible by walkways from each side but without railings or guards protecting against the deep drop to the side.
The room was adorned with piercing white tiles from floor to ceiling.
On each were symbols of sacred geometry, runes, and iconography from every religion spanning centuries, many which were unknown, lost to time and history, but not to the Hermanas.
On the platform, three nuns were posed in prayer.
In the center, with her head tilted down and face hidden, arms stretched out, was Sister Superiora, who, through the Glamour, appeared over six feet tall.
Two other Hermanas knelt in front of her, their heads and outstretched hands dramatically cocked toward the side on which they sat beside her.
On silent cue, the two in front move, fluidly, turning inward, their inner arms reaching toward each other, hands opened, as Superiora’s arms swept inwards, her hands reaching for the heads of her charges beneath her.
As she did, the Hermanas’ heads moved in sync, appearing as if Sister Superiora scooped them up before bowing her own head.
All three paused together—silent. The chanting continued as they circled their heads three times to the right.
The kneeling sisters’ outer arms shot out diagonally, while their inner arms clutched to their chests.
Superiora’s arms crossed down between them before the sisters spun around; all three arms crossed, creating sharp, distinct lines.