The Heirophant

For the first week, the city streets were clean and beautiful. They sparkled under the sun, the white marble was covered in a delicate sheen of gloss, as if they were polished every night before the sun rose. The citizens were pristine and glorious, adorned in fine fabrics and elegant accessories, and along with the monoliths that lined the streets, they supported the infinite weight of the sky above.

The second week I found the streets were cold and distant. The eyes of aristocrats would lock in on me for a wayward instant, brows concealed by hats and lips by scarves, before darting on to the next novel oddity. The sun felt harsh and foreign. My lips were again crisscrossed by gentle fissures, blood trickling across them the way a river cuts a canyon. The weight of the sky, resting squarely upon my back, went unnoticed by the giants and skyscrapers alike. They drifted above the clouds I was sweltering beneath.

By the third week, I had enough. I made my way back to the gate and gazed at it, no more than a dozen paces from the thick walls that kept out the slums. I was invisible here, travelers passed by without meeting my wandering eyes, and I was not tempted by the wafting smell of baked bread or grilled meats. As I took a step towards the gate, a murmur passed through the gilded streets. A man in a simple black cloak had entered onto the marble pavement out of one of the smaller towers that lined the road.

His hat lay flat against bare skin, covering only the top of his head, and around his neck a chain cast out of steel or perhaps iron rested just above a thin rope belt. Surrounding him, standing back several arms lengths was a strange and assorted mob. They orbited him like planets around the sun, none daring to approach him yet none leaving from the circle they had formed around him. They were a blur of different backgrounds and appearances. I could identify a merchant by his clean and bright suit, an artisan by his spectacles and neat collar, and a scholar with a heavy, rectangular bag, but there were also others dressed the same as the priest. Just under a third were wearing the same dark robes, simple hats, and rope belts.

I felt myself pulled into the orbit of the crowd, as others on the street gravitated towards the mass. We shuffled to get a better look at him, yet it seemed as if the space between us and the man was growing. By the time he started to speak, the number of apostles in the crowd had shrunk to one tenth of the total throng, and we were each standing nearly fifteen feet away from the man wearing the chain.

A calm and weathered face looked out across the crowd. Low bags hung from gentle eyes, sitting atop a densely creased mouth.  His voice carried across the empty space surrounding him, and the crowd settled into a low murmur to hear his words.

    “Thank you, brothers, sisters, and friends for joining us today. We are blessed by your presence and by your open ears. The Glorious One smiles upon you all from his throne and as he walks among you. He has ordained me with a sacred duty to the people, to whom I am gratefully bound. May his guidance never waver, and his might never fail.” Despite the quiet tone of his voice, I could hear the message easily in the crowd. His head bobbed slightly as he spoke, as if the words were being pushed straight from his mind to his mouth without a second thought. The crowd shifted as we awaited what he would say next.

“The Emperor has consulted The Stars and has determined that the empire is in grave danger. He has had a vision of Death, and is awaiting my guidance in The Tower presently. It pains me to leave you like this, but my duty is first to the empire.” his face strained as he said these words, the lines around his mouth warping into new creases that formed a fresh and unfamiliar pattern. The grimace went unnoticed by the crowd as a frantic buzz ran through us.

“The Emperor? The Stars? Death? These are common words, the kinds of things I hear when I must pass by the slums.”

“Well the empire is certainly in danger, the priest has gone mad!”

“No, this must be how the priest shows us how bad it really is, he is really quite a clever and learned man.“

“Are you out of your mind? Did you even hear what he said?”

“Of course I heard it, but these are quite complicated times, there’s a meaning beneath the meaning of course.”

The murmur grew into a swelling rabble, an energetic swarm of growing panic. It was certainly a grave sign, and also a trick by the priest, and of course the natural result of the war, and but just another bad report that would be forgotten by next spring. My head ached with a smoldering fire, a coal stuck in the small spot where my neck connects to my skull, growing with burning intensity as the crowd’s confusion piled up. I pushed towards the center, hoping to get a clearer view of the priest. Cloaked, robed, and suited bodies shifted and pulled as anxious merchants sought out nervous traders, apostles milled with an urgent fever, and panicking artisans fled to sell wares before the news spread. I found myself struggling to make my way towards the priest. Eyes would pick apart each detail on my face, indicate no direction, and then would be swept away by a new wave of panic and confusion. Minutes passed in this frantic dance, and the weight of the sky fell on me again, heavier and harder. An apostle moved from my way and a path illuminated by light shown into the center, still empty in the priest’s strange aura. I thrust myself into the baren space and found myself in a new orbit, still swirling in confusion. The sun burned my eyes, and the pavement shone with the same bright intensity. I looked up.

I was alone with the priest. We were surrounded, yes, but alone. He turned to me slowly, a humble presence amidst the adorned mob. He had been silently guiding the throng towards the tower, but upon my intrusion, their curious eyes had turned towards the center and waited, silent and still. They bored into me as if the priest was no more interesting than the pavement below him. I had thrust myself into a flock of owls and vultures. I was not sure which I was, but it seemed that the priest was neither.

The smile lines deepened upon his face. “What is it child?” he said in a gentle and patronizing tone, “What would you like to say?” The crowd stayed silent, but expressions shifted like leaves in the wind. I saw noses furl. Eyes cracked into condescension. Mouths bowed in sympathy. Some hands twitched alone; others folded into one another. My own mouth was dry, my hands clammy. His smile deepened, and my resolve returned.

“What is the empire?” I managed to blurt out the words that had been eating at me since I had entered the city. There were some snickers, and some of the bowed lips deepened.

The priest did not move and silence filled the space again. He inspired a rapt kind of attention, was measured in every respect, and as he spoke his answer flowed like water poured into a cup. “It is the foundation of our lives. It is the bedrock of our wealth. It is the reason for our love. It is the cradle of our soul. What more is there?” He spread his hands in a humble surrender, but behind his eyes, in the half centimeter between his right eyelashes and his brow, there was another answer I could not yet read. He continued, “If we were to lose it, we would be left with nothing. The glorious and mighty emperor will save it. It is his duty, just as it is our duty to follow.” A red vein peeked from beneath his brown iris. The bags under his eyes flattened for a moment. His nostrils flared long.

In some strange, private way, surrounded by his followers and devotees, he was praying. I opened my mouth again.

“Is he alone?”

The question might have been meaningless to the priest. His eyes had flattened against his wrinkled face, his expression utterly silent. His lips were pressed gently in a subtle line. His nose sat plain and wide. A moment passed. The crowd did not stir.

The smile lines broke again, but now the deep creases shot up to touch the corner of his eyes. Clear brown discs, shining with the light of afternoon were painted under with a dark and unknown depth, acknowledging the secret I had shared. Far above, a bright red bird cut across a pale white cloud. The weight on my back shifted, just enough for me to catch my breath.

“My child, we are never alone.”