When you are about to serve death, you must know death. One day you will accept non-life if you are worthy, but first, you should study the external, material manifestations of the power you want to dedicate yourself to... So I was taught, so I thought.
It was not too long after the beginning of my apprenticeship, but the mentor decided that it was time to test my faith and fortitude of the spirit and determine how afterwards I should be expelled or elevated among others, to bring me new secret knowledge or to remove them altogether. Before, we had been to the abandoned pogosts many times, but the teacher prepared for me a much more severe test than the contemplation of the split tombstones and attempts to catch the inner voices of the voices of the dead, lost control, entangled in the web of dense peace and firmly entangled in it...
Nausea, fear and disgust did not release me from the very moment we descended into the dank dungeon, where dozens of corpses were buried in disorder and not too long ago. And was it possible to say "buried" about bodies, barely sprinkled with earth? Disgustingly bloated, in spots, they were truly terrible, and the smell of decay was such that it nearly knocked me off my feet. In other corpses, worms and beetles wolfed...
It was not good for me, but I restrained myself, did not allow myself to run away or turn away, tried only to look less and to breathe less.
"Open your eyes, Lord Aranthir. Such is death, and Asha accepts this. Accept and you. Humble yourself before the will of the goddess. All living things will someday die and fall apart, it happens to everyone and always, because this is what the future wants. Her wisdom is great, and she turns everything for good. Taken from the spiritual world, let it return to the spiritual world, created from the dust and turn to dust, the dead, as well as the living, and serve the good."
The words of the teacher briefly sobered me. He was right: all that I saw, smelled, felt, happened only at the will of the great goddess. Everything was her will, everything was her wisdom. Therefore, it can not be otherwise. I suddenly saw with my inner gaze, how I break up and decompose myself, I saw the flesh rotting in the coffin, I felt the stench, I felt the insects devouring me...
Soon the mentor let me go, realizing that I could not stand it any longer. With difficulty I reached my cell, immediately gave the servants clothes that exuded a bad smell, and I tried to wash myself for a long time, to get rid of the ambree that was chasing me.
I lost a dream: when I squinted, how monstrous pictures of decomposition appeared before my eyes, swollen corpses stretched out their terrible hands to me, and the smell of death beat me again and again in my nostrils. But it was not the worst thing - a few days later, the mentor, noticing that I did not appear at the table, almost led me to a common table.
"Your disgust is betraying your obstinacy, Lord Aranthir," he said sternly. "You still do not accept the will of Asha - instead, you, more than many who love her, allow yourself to fall into pride and persist?!"
I flushed, but did not say anything - he again forced me to admit his rightness, and I, concealing shame and lightheadedness, pushed the plate towards me.
From that time he constantly sent me to such places, and often accompanied. We visited crypts and old cemeteries, in bones and columbaria, in huge necropolises and low underground labyrinths with internal walls lined with skulls. I saw skeletons in rags and mummies wrapped in rich fabrics, mountains of bones and heaps of dust, urns with gray ash and sacred vessels filled with precious balm containing the dead hearts of the deceased. I saw dismembered bodies and severed heads, dried human skin and carefully collected long hair - blond, black as resin, red, like the fire of a bonfire ... I saw sacred symbols and writings, candle sticks and scraps of shrouds, wooden fragments and stone crumbs , broken statues and fallen graves. I saw the rubbish, awakening between the exposed ribs, - in it still it was possible to recognize the remains of fragrant herbs; I saw posthumous offerings - the consequences of cruel and senseless grief: pitchers, purse, long empty (often alongside the looted corpses and corpses of unlucky robbers), women's dresses, exhausted by insects and covered with a thick layer of dust, children's toys ... It was hard to think about the fate of the buried, and about those whom they involuntarily or voluntarily left - even harder.
It was especially difficult for me to be there - in a dank underground, where corpses that were hardly covered with earth were rotting. I could not take anything calmly to the sight of them, nor to the monstrous miasma of this place, perhaps, therefore, the mentor brought me there again and again. But one day it happened - grace finally came upon me, Asha took pity on me and sent me understanding. That visit to the dungeon began in the same way as the others: half-buried and half-decayed bodies, cadaverous worms, dampness, darkness and stench; death was everywhere-on the skin, on my robe and in my hair, it permeated me, and I suddenly stopped resisting it. If this is the will of my mistress, then so be it. So, how should ... These events, these pictures, these smells are pleasing to Ashe, so let them become mine for her sake. I straightened and inhaled.
"Do you, Lord Aranthir, get used to what you always have to deal with?" Asked the tutor, who was watching me intently.
"I resigned, sir," I answered. "If this is Ashi's will, then can I go against the lady and her wishes? Since she, in her wisdom, arranged everything exactly like this, who am I to deny her established?"
These thoughts and words suddenly filled me with the courage, the most unknown, and the incomprehensible power that I did not know before. The tutor solemnly said:
"Sometimes, Lord Aranthir, in order to rise higher in the levels of knowledge, it is enough only to accept the truth. You will see this again and again."
To be continued
Thank you for reading!