Page 22 of Heartless Heathens

It made plenty of sense.

I headed for the hallway and pushed open my bedroom door, digging in my closet through unpacked boxes to find what I knew was surely there, under all the bullshit. I pulled the long rope out and walked back into the Mass room.

Before she could turn back to look at me I had already wrapped the rope around her chest and arms, not just once, but twice over. I looped it into a knot and pulled her off the stool with a yank and she yelped loudly before falling onto the floor on her chest.

“What are you doing?” Felix asked me, that scowled engraved deep on his forehead anytime I did something less than gentle to this girl.

He helped her up, caressing her face with the back of his hand softly.

“Getting the answers we need so we can get the fuck out of here,” I told him, pulling on the rope once again. “Let’s go, Romina. Let’s see if Daddy will claim you.”

“W-What?” She asked with a trembling voice.

“Lie to me, I dare you.” I held my face just a mere centimeter away from hers.

She didn’t respond but she didn’t look away, some sort of seed of bravery growing in her spine. It was enough to confirm my suspicions.

She didn’t challenge me and walked behind a few steps while I dragged her with the rope. I ignored Felix’s protests while he slung the words savage and monster at me for dragging the girl a mile across campus barefoot.

I wasn’t the monster here.

No, that was another man.

Theangryonepulledon the rope anytime I walked too slow for his liking. My legs trembled beneath me, not from exhaustion but from fear and uncertainty about what was to come. How could he have known what Father Frollo was to me? And what would that mean for me now that the ones he called heathens had me right in their clutches?

My throat burned something fierce, and my neck hurt from the feel of the wind grazing it. I didn’t bother pleading and begging these cruel men to let me go. Not only because I wasn’t sure if I could make out the words, but because I knew they wouldn’t listen. The one who introduced himself as Felix seemed kind, but Father Frollo had always said it was the kind ones who tricked you, used you so that they could fulfill their own dark purposes.

I saw a sweetness in his brown eyes.

Was it tainted with something more sinister?

Somehow that was more frightening than the one who didn’t bother to hide his barred teeth from me.

One was a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

The other was a crow waiting to peck at the meat hanging from my bones after the one with sharp teeth finished ripping me apart.

My feet were sore and blistering, not just from this walk but from running aimlessly through the woods without bothering to mind the thorns and stickers that sharply dug into my heels with every step.

I was regretting all of my decisions.

Once we came to a stop, I stood there, the smallest I’d ever felt in my entire existence, toppled by the frame of the gargantuan cathedral and all its golden divinity. I’d never once stepped foot inside, it was not meant for me, as Father Frollo would say. Nevermind that I was to stay hidden and undiscovered by the staff and students here, but a creature of sin like me was never meant to tarnish the halls and floors of this devout monstrosity.

There was something rather obtuse about creating a single place where God could be found. I had never been meant to step inside here according to him. Never to find God. I don’t think God had been looking for me anyway.

It was gloriously macabre.

Decorated with nearly faceless representations of the Godly men depicted as Saints in all of Father Frollo’s sacred books. The holy kings stood over twenty feet tall, bathed in gold as they looked down over the campus with their critical eyes. They passed judgment on anyone the headmaster deemed unworthy of God’s love and forgiveness. Their sculpted bodies lined the building all the way to the center, where a grand arch opened into the cathedral. Over the arch, way up high, was a balcony.

“ARCHBISHOP!” The bellow came from the one with drawings covering all of his skin, even down to the tips of his fingers.

I felt my legs weakening beneath me and my heart pounded inside of my throat. Would Father Frollo expose the truth and risk everything he’d worked to build while keeping me hidden? Was I worthy enough to protect? Would he save me from these heathens?

“Come claim your millstone holy man.” The deep boom of his voice echoed from his chest, and I shrank into the smallest version of myself.

Then he appeared, wearing white robes in the center of the balcony, high above us. A depiction of a savior. Something fluttered in my chest, some hope that he might rescue me from them.

“What’s the meaning of this madness Santorini?” Though his voice was nowhere near commanding or as loud as the one who bound me, he showed no fear.