Diabolique (short story)

[RedGoblin]

Hey all, just wrote a little short story and thought I would share it. Its been awhile since I was here, or have done any writing, but this place has always been very friendly and all so...

Here it is. A little background fluff for a game I'm considering working on. Its a first draft so please don't be overly critical

It is with great woe that I write these; my final words. And though my end is imminent, it is not that which causes me distress, forcing my hand to paper, but that which will occur after my suffering has ended and the light has gone from my eyes. Firstly I apologize for my poor penmanship, but I scribe this letter to you with broken body and injured soul. I write in prayer that you who have found this, my last testament, be one of true faith, for if not then all is surely lost. I only hope that there is time enough to complete my brief memoir prior to being called before the corrupt powers that now pass judgment against the truly faithful.

Jacob Creed is my name, a prisoner of the Holy Mother Church; accused of witchcraft, murder, and heresy. And whilst these accusations are completely unjustified, I am sure I will be condemned for them. And if innocent, why then am I imprisoned you might ask, and rightly so. It is because I am a known and confessed Benandanti, a servant of God, born in the caul, to stand vigil against the forces of Hell; and commissioned by the Church herself. However, depending on how long this letter is lost, hidden within the confines of my cell, there is a good chance that you will not know the true purpose of the Benandanti, but instead will probably believe us evil and vile creatures not unlike those we were born to fight. It is my greatest and most desperate hope that the following will be received by an untainted soul, someone with the insight and faith to know that things are not as they should be and that the agents of the Abyss have infiltrated our most holy place and even now set in motion, acts that will assuredly bring damnation to all the world.

The Benandanti are not a people as one might consider. We come not from one nation, people or place, but instead are considered Benandanti by birth right. As I mentioned prior, we are born in the caul. This is when an infant enters the world still wrapped within their mothers birthing sac. All babies, prior to birth are bestowed with knowledge and gifts from god, however most have these things stolen from them within the first few moments of life. It is this birthing sac that makes one Benandanti, and keeps the newly born from having those gifts stolen by the agents of hell.

Parents of Benandanti were encouraged to bring their new born children before their local clergyman for a special baptism, and upon their Thirteenth birthday were to be enrolled in University to ensure a proper and formal education. After this education was complete we were to be commissioned into the Order of the Benandanti, to serve the people of the world by using our gifts to help hold the forces of hell at bay.

This was the way of things until but several months ago, after the sudden death of Pope Benedict XI; who was rumored to have been murdered. Shortly after his Coronation, Pope Clement V ordered a grand investigation into the church itself. He made evident his beliefs that the forces of hell were gaining a foothold among the people and that perhaps even some members of the church itself had succumb to the dark powers and their temptations. As a result he assembled a new order within the church, the Brothers of the Cleansing Flame. It was to be their task to head this Holy Inquisition and cleanse the countryside and church of the inevitable heresy that Pope Clement was sure of.

At first I thought it odd that this impending corruption had slipped past the Benandanti’s watchful eye. How was it that we could have been blind to such a widespread epidemic? Was it possible that agents of the Abyss had somehow learned how to trick even us?

It was with untold speed that the Inquisition began to uncover heretics among the population, sending thousands to cells to undergo trial and possible execution. It was shortly after the onset of the trails that I and other Benandanti became suspicious. Many people that we knew to be devout members of the church began to disappear with the sweeping capes of the Cleansing Flame. Removed from the world with little trace that they had ever even been, whole families seemed to disappear in the night, and panic gripped the country side. So much so that whether faithful or not, everyone watched their neighbor as if they were servants of the unholy, and even an ill perceived glance could be reason to send the agents of the Flame to your door.

Unfortunately the cells devoted to the condemned were off limits to everyone but the Brothers of the Inquisition, and no Benandanti were allowed access to see the accused. Within weeks of the first executions, the Holy Father declared that the condemned should be cleansed in public so that the faithful could see how real and deep this rampant evil had infested us. It is in hindsight now that I see the true purpose and path of all that was taking place, if only I hadn’t mistrusted my thoughts...

The Cleansing rituals viewed by the public are grotesque at best and attendance is an unspoken requirement. To not attend, one might as well proclaim that they are heretics themselves. Public crucifixions, burnings, hangings and disembowelments are but a few of the attractions that the attending masses get to witness, while agents of the Flame watch the crowds in anticipation, looking for even more heretics to condemn to the Ever Flame.

The Ever Flame was born in unison with the Brotherhood. I can only hope that who ever, is reading this, and whenever it is read, that you will not know what the Ever Flame is and that it has been extinguished. It lies in the center of the execution arena, a giant flame burning below a massive stone slab where Heretics are suspended above its heat and slowly roasted before the eyes of the attending masses. Regardless of what tortures the condemned are forced to endure, they all end suspended above the Ever Flame.

Of course it was only a matter of time before the Brothers of the Flame turned their cynical eye to us, and it wasn’t until then that we would come to know their true form of trial and judgment. The Benandanti had always called their local monasteries and abbeys home, living among the clergy in a minimalist lifestyle. And while no man is without sin of some kind, no sin deserves the vindication that the Benandanti received that night. It was a night of betrayal, I was saved only because my duties kept me away that night on watch, something drew me away from my bed, I think now that it was God himself. But on this night, the Brothers of the Flame descended upon the lodgings of all Benandanti, arresting them as heretics and traitors to the Holy Father and Mother Church.

It was when I returned to the Abbey that I bore witness to the suffering that the Brotherhood dealt to the accused. Hiding my identity with hood and cloak I made my way as close as possible to overhear the “trial”. They threatened and tortured my brothers and sisters without mercy, demanding that they admit to their conspiring with agents of the Devil. But to their honor, not one did I hear admit to such a despicable act, true or not. Anger and rage filled my soul, how dare they accuse us, born protectors of the faith, if only they knew the horrors we faced while they slept peaceful in their beds. And now here they are, under some misguided mans thumb, condemning the very people that have kept the gates of hell closed for millennia. They blamed us for this rampant heresy that seemingly plagued the land, insinuating that we knowingly allowed this all to transpire.

At nightfall they took them all, bound and gagged to the cells of the execution arena, where they would await their judgment and sentence from the Inquisitor and serve their punishment before the masses of the Auto-de-fe. It was the first Auto-de-fe that I would attend; the next and last will be that of my own execution, where I shall be tortured and desecrated for the misguided masses only to finally end suspended above the Ever Flame.

I hid myself amongst the crowds, and made way to a decent vantage point. The Grand Inquisitor and Pope Clement V himself were present on this day. The crowd was held in check by the crimson robed members of the Brotherhood as a lull fell over the crowd and the Grand Inquisitor began to speak. He welcomed them to what was to be the turning point in the battle against the Devil. That they had investigated their way to the source of the corruption and then he told them what that source was. The Benandanti! He claimed that we had been corrupted, how else could such an influx of heresy and evil been allowed to exist. How was it that their very protectors could not see the evil that they are born to see? He then called out for the traitors to be brought forward to receive their sentence. The gates opened, and they marched them out, all of my brothers and sisters. Their heads covered in sacks, their hands bound and tethered together, being led like sheep to be slaughtered. The people spit on them, threw rotten food at them, and condemned them without ever asking how or why. It was as if they had become hungry for the sacrifice to come.

It was then that the massacre began; one by one they removed the sacks from their heads. Their mouths had already been sewn shut. The Grand Inquisitor informed the people that the accused had had their mouths sewn so as not to be able to bewitch them. And that they would all have their eyes branded from their heads before they were impaled and committed to the Ever Flame in groups of eight.

I hung my head low beneath my cowl while tears ran down my face as the last of my friends were placed above the Ever Flame. It was here, at the end of the Benandanti that the Inquisitor stood and proclaimed, that before these final Heretics suffer the penalties of their actions that Pope Clement V had one other decree to make and wanted to make sure they heard it.

It was at this time that I turned my focus to the Grand Inquisitor and the Pope. As he decreed that all births would now require a member of the Brotherhood to be present, to ensure that any child born of the caul would be condemned before they too were able to be corrupted by the dark powers of hell.

Upon hearing this decree my heart took my judgment from me, and my eyes saw more true than ever before. I could see through their disguise, cleaver and powerful as they might be, I could now see them for what they were! I called from the stands pleading with the people to hear my words as I pulled pistol and blade from beneath my robes to banish them back from whence they came but I was taken by surprise, my eyes flashed and I awoke here in this cell, my mouth sewn shut, my body broken and my hope failing. If what I fear is true, then hell has come, and we have failed, and I pray that you who are reading this are a person of true faith...

They are coming now, in the name of the Father, and the son and the...

[Sculpta the squig]

Wow, creepy O_O

Squig

[Nathan Caroland]

That's really rather well done. Bravo!

Good to see you back for a bit RG.

[Sculpta the squig]

I think the "Ever Flame" should be hyphenated

Squig

[RedGoblin]

Thanks guys, I appreciate it. I'm writing another short in this world currently, will probably be a tad bit longer than this one.

Thanks for the suggestion on the "Ever Flame", I agree with you on that. Just have to go back and update the story.

The next short in this setting will give some back ground on Pope Clement V

Just an FYI: some of the figures in the story are real... Clement V and Benedict were real popes (Clement actually was the pope to decommission the Knights Templar and charge them for Heresy) Benedict, his predecessor was believed to have been assassinated. And the Benandanti are an actual people (Although I embellished them a little) and were tried by the inquisition, who wasnt sure what to do with them since they fought witches for god. Just thought I would share a little of my research with you since you took the time to read it.

Thanks again for reading guys, hoping to flesh out a nice setting for some games to take place in with these short stories.