grip restoring him. 'Now I'll give those psalm-singing, drink-dopers something to pray about. They better pray I don't carve all of them into legs of lamb.'
Breathing deeply through his mouth, he let his strength return. Shaking his head from side to side to clear the fog from it, he moved to the door. Raising the latch, he stuck his head out and glanced down the hall. The lamps in the iron brackets were out; cracks of bright light told him it was day outside.
'Where in the Hades are they? Is everyone here mad? What do I mean by everyone?' He stopped and thought, 'The only bastard I've seen is that damned so-called Elder and that sucker certainly doesn't behave in a Christian manner. Where are they?'
Making his way on still unsteady legs, he held his short sword ready, wondering if Jugotai was still on the loose.
'Probably,' thought Casca. 'The little desert rat has more sense than I do.'
The large door swung open on greased hinges and Casca slipped out looking to see if his horse was there. No luck. Staying close to the sides of the building, he kept to the shadows until he came close to a patch of boulders and brush. Bending low to the ground, he raced across and threw himself to the gravel behind the boulders leaving a skin mark running from his ankle to his knee.
He saw nothing. Only the dry wind whispered through the brush and the rocks. It was close to midday. Crawling backwards, he kept his eye on the temple until he was certain he couldn't be seen from that direction and headed for high ground. If Jugotai was anywhere around, that's where he would find him.
Climbing over rocks and boulders, he reached a small plateau and there lay flat on his stomach, letting his gaze run over the countryside, searching for any sign of movement. As far as he could see from his aerial perch, there was nothing but the wild country and the temple in the gorge below.
'There! A movement.' Wiping a trickle of sweat from his eyes, he saw something move again. One man and then another and another, all in brown robes, their hands moving and bodies twisting, came into view. The man in front was carrying something on his shoulders. A log? The trail made a turn and Casca started. The man in front was carrying a cross. Distant sounds reached him, but they were too far away to make out. Watching their direction, Casca looked ahead and picked up the trail where it reached a small mound. Working his way carefully, he sped ahead of the group and found a sheltered spot underneath some brush that also provided protection. From this spot he could see where the trail stopped. Settling himself down, he wished for water or anything to quench his thirst.
For now he would have to wait and hope Jugotai was nearby; if he was, then they would have to figure out what to do next, especially about Casca's horse.
Eight
The column of hooded figures wound its way to the place of fulfillment. The devotees whipped themselves and their brothers with flails of thorns and cried out in ecstasy, the pain a drug to bring them closer to God, filling them with the pain of Jesus. They were as one with him in his agony.
They cried and wailed in fanatic fervor. The fortunate one chosen to represent Jesus as they relived his last moments, was the most ecstatic of all. His eyes glazed, he frothed at the mouth and spoke in tongues as he labored under the weight of the cross he bore on his shoulders, the wreath of thorns stuck in his forehead let trickles of blood run their sticky course down his cheeks and clotted in the hairs of his thin beard.
God was with him. The spirit of Jesus walked with him. He knew the glory of the Messiah's pain.
Laboriously, he carried his instrument of death to the crest of the mount and there lay his burden down as his brethren begged him to forgive their sins and transgressions. Placing himself on the cross, he stretched his arms, resting them on the crossbeams, the feel of the rough wood on his skin sensual. He opened his eyes wide and screamed in pleasure, the knowledge of his certain salvation was manifest when the first spike was driven through the space between the wrist bones into the roughened wood of the cross; then again and once more he screamed as the last spike nailed his feet together. He cried out to the glory of the Lord God and to the honor that was his, to be able to experience all that the Lord Jesus did on this Holy of Holy days, to ascend and sit at the feet of the master, to be one with God himself.
His brethren whipped themselves even more, many laying their backs open to the bone. They wailed as the cross was set into place. The scenario was almost complete. The crucified supplicant prayed not to die before the allotted time had passed. He must feel every second and minute of the divine agony, until the final great moment which was yet to come.
The Guardians of the Blood of the Lamb threw back their hoods from their rough homespun cloaks, exposing tear-streaked faces in contorted caricatures of ecstasy as they wept for the Lamb.
'Longinus,' they began to chant, the name echoing from the nearby hills. 'Longinus.' Over and over, in rhythm with their own heartbeats, they chanted.
Casca felt a shiver run over him as his name was called. From his place of concealment, everything was visible; the bushes he was hiding behind served only to keep him from the eyes of the Guardians. But why were they calling his name?
The answer was not long in coming. Elder Dacort approached the crucified sobbing man, wearing the uniform of the legion of two hundred years ago, complete with trappings and insignia of the Legion, the Jerusalum Garrison. His red army cloak billowed in the wind, Casca noted that the Galdius Iberius was in the proper position on the priest's right side and then in the monk's left hand he saw the filum.
'The spear, Longinus,' the monks wailed. 'Have mercy!'
Elder Dacort stood at the surrogate Christ's left side and raised the spear, his face wild, long beard whipping in the growing wind. Even from this distance, Casca could see the weapon clearly, His mark was on it, where in practice, a careless lunge had left a deep scar in the wooden haft running a foot up to the base of the metal blade.
'It's mine. It's my spear. Where did they get it, and how?'
The brother on the cross looked at his executioner in delirious pleasure. The time was near. Raising his eyes to the heavens he cried out, 'O my father, why hast thou forsaken me,' and shivered in pleasure.
As the mock Roman drove the spear into his side, some words were lost to Casca as the wind blew them away but several came through clear enough to make his stomach jerk in fear… 'As you are, so you shall remain.
The spear was withdrawn from the man's side and blood poured forth, covering the weapon for a foot or more down the blade.
The brethren crawled on their bellies, moaning as they slid over the stones to the base of the cross, then rising up high enough to lick blood off the weapon and fall into a fit approaching a religious orgasm. Each in his turn, drank the blood of the crucified Lamb.
The blessed one on the cross shivered and died, his body hanging with limp arms outstretched at the shoulder sockets.
Elder Dacort in his Roman uniform held the spear above his head. Crying out, his voice almost a shriek: 'Behold, the spear of Longinus, the spawn of Satan. Through the Blood of the Lamb, was he given life.. life to walk the earth until the master returns. The founder of our order, Izram the Syrian, who came to join the master and became the thirteenth disciple, was at the Mount of Skulls and heard the words of the Lord Jesus that condemned the Roman dog to life. It was Izram who witnessed the blood of the Lamb touching the dog's tongue and thereby transforming him into the undying beast he is now and Izram who bought the Roman's spear from his comrades after the beast was sentenced to the mines. Izram founded our holy order and gave unto us the keeping of the most holy of relics, the instrument of our Lord's death… the spear of Longinus… Longinus, who must walk the earth until the master comes again. May his every moment be filled with pain unbearable, prolonged through the centuries; may worms nest in his eyes and rats live in his bowels. Longinus lives through the blood of the Lamb as we shall live in Paradise through the blood of our blessed martyred brother, who has become one with the Lord Jesus. Behold the spear of the murderer, the holiest relic in our world, the gateway to heaven.'
