A dove and a raven swooped across the sunset sky, bearing fate beneath their wings.

“They flew off in different directions,” Ileene said.

“No,” Tasha replied, “not just different directions. Opposite directions. The wings of night and day parted ways—three times in a row.”

The two Sisters of the Innocents of the Mountain sat beneath a sighing arch, atop the thickness of a wall, clothed in Dove robes, plain, but not uncomely garb. Stairs descended behind them, only to double back around to the front of the wall, and from there passed into the cloistered path and the courtyard beyond.

It was a perfect spot to watch the augury.

The first occurrence had been incidental, during the morning’s Dawnsight. Sensing its significance, one of the avions—Frederick was his name—had recommended Ileene return after Unction for an additional auguring. After the second auguring proved as auspicious as the first, it was decided that a third and final auguring would be held right before Convocation at sunset.

“So,” Ileene asked, “is it time?”

“Yes.” Tasha reached out and held her friend’s hands. “Your time has finally come, no doubt about it!” She smiled broadly.

All that was left was for the avion to come down from the aviary tower and greet Ileene and make it official.

The Crucible awaited her.

As soon as I’d touched the memory, I became aware of its every detail. In an instant, it went from being a story from another person’s life to something I knew like the back of my hand. I should have been overwhelmed by it—floored by it… but I wasn’t, and ironically enough, that effortlessness… that was overwhelming. Information poured into my mind. Every recollection; every sensation; I knew the ins and outs of Ileene’s most secret thoughts. I was there, but not: I was a ghost in her shell; a witness to her memories.

Talk about getting answers you didn’t want.

For once, I was happy to be a passive observer, because I don’t think I would have been able to maintain my composure had I been there in the flesh. I would have scoffed and screamed and wept.

For over a thousand years, the Monastery of Holy Beast’s Redoubt had kept a ruined vigil over the cliff-framed valley. The monastery rose again whenever history stirred, then once its purpose had been fulfilled, it sank back into its crumbling solitude. In its most recent awakening, nearly seven-hundred years ago, the monastery had teemed with Templars of the faith. Its stony halls were an invaluable staging ground for the soldiers’ hunt of the antinomian heretics. And then the old Innocents passed into history, and Holy Beast’s Redoubt fell back into stillness. Now, once again, the monastery had awoken. New Innocents had come, breathing new life into the hallowed grounds.

Beyond the courtyard lay a gentle hillside, terraced in fields traced by ancient walls. The walls’ time-gnawed stones bore the work weeds and water and wind. But now, the once-fallow gardens were splendid and full. Black, loamy earth greened with herbs and produce. Grains ripened on their chaff, swaying and golden. The new Innocents had built a home for themselves, here, in this place at the edge of time.

I imagined eyes watching from above; Ileene’s eyes.

It’s there. See it. Remember it.

The hillside below was rife with laughter. Children played. They gallivanted. Their fun scaled the walls, and ran up and down the winding paths. They made make-believe with the mountain’s debris. They scribbled games in the dusty earth while the Brothers and Sisters kept watch. It was joyous, guarding such a treasure. What was community for, if not to give children a safe place to play after a long day of good work? Soon, for the third and final time that day, the community would gather in the monastery’s chapel in solidarity and celebration, to commune with the day’s last Convocation.

To Ileene, the monastery had been more than even her hope’s deepest promises. It made her sea and sky, and salt and light. She was crystal, clear and resonant. But most of all, she was home.

Holy Beast Redoubt was a place at the edge of time and possibility. It should have long since collapsed. Over the course of a millennium, the timber in its structural supports had shriveled and blackened. Much of the abandoned stone had fallen halfway to ruin. Ileene saw herself in the complex—her former self. It was broken, just like she was broken.

But still, it endured. The chapel was stalwart and undefeated. It bowed to nothing and no one—not even time; only to the Godhead and the Persons of the Holy Triun. Once, just like the world, the Monastery had been a paradise, but then it had fallen into disrepair. And just like the world, it was destined to be Paradise once more.

And Ileene got to be part of that. What more could she ask for? She was finally, truly home.

Ileene let the silence wash over her as she sat beneath the arch. She breathed in deep, savoring the pure air and the children’s distant ruckus. She fixed these things in her memory, knowing it would be a long time until she would see them once more.

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What happened to the children who don’t attend Convocation, Ileene? What happened to Bethica, who giggled when Brother Almen read from the Testaments? What happened to Tomiss, who refused to hold a gun?

My questions disturbed Ileene’s thoughts, skipping across them like a stone across a pond. I could feel my prompts ripple through her, and I knew the exact moment when she pulled herself away from her recollections and paid a thought to what I’d said.

It was just one thought. A small thought. It was a moment of acknowledgement; of awareness. She paid heed to her memory of a moss-carpeted grove of elder oak growing into the masonry where the monastery’s side wall split out from the cliffs on the far end of the valley. There were patches on the ground there where the moss was thin and ratty. In one patch, the soil was still freshly upturned. In another, the moss had only just begun to reclaim the disturbed earth.

But then Ileene let herself drift back into the remembered moment.

Her past self turned to Tasha. They’d grown quite close over the past few months. Their backgrounds were similar. Even their struggles were of a kind, though they differed in the details. Tasha had been Ileene’s partner on her spiritual quest, and Ileene had done everything in her power to return the favor. She helped keep Tasha from breaking her fast, and stayed by Tasha’s side during the most difficult purgations. They’d both lost weight, though Tasha more so than Ileene.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Ileene said. “The power of our choices?” She looked over the hillside. “Just look at the children. They’re our choice. They’re here because of us. By our coming here, away from the world… we’ve given them the gift of life. Life and light. No consoles, no phone calls; no savage media, no political machines. I thought I was powerless in my old life. But nothing could have been further from the truth.”

“So true,” Tasha said, nodding in agreement. “So true. We only think we’re powerless, and that’s because we don’t see the eternities hidden in our choices. Every action reverberates. Our choices are the most powerful parts of our lives. It’s no wonder judgment awaits us all. We hold good and evil and sin and virtue in the palms of our hands.”

“That’s why the Angel’s gift of free will must be used properly,” Ileene said. “It’s only when we Choose the Right that we become what we were truly meant to be.” Ileene rested her chin on her knuckle, smiling as she gazed out over the scene. The shawl on her head kept the wind from tugging at her hair. “My whole life, I was so… lost. I was such a pessimist.” She shook her head and chuckled. “Nothing that I did felt right; college, volunteer work, joining the choir at our parish church—even though a rockslide would have a better voice than me… everything I did seemed to end in disaster. I blamed everyone—”

“—Everyone except yourself!” Tasha said, nodding vigorously.

“You know it!” Ileene said, with a smile. “I was too prideful to admit the truth. I blamed my problems on everyone and everything except myself, when the truth was, my choices were the problem. I’d been wasting my life by making the wrong ones. I felt I was entitled to get things I didn’t, and I wanted everything except what my soul truly needed. But now,” she nodded, “now I’ve finally made the right choice, and I’m free. I’ve learned. I’ve grown. The Godhead works in wondrous ways. I never would have thought all that heartache could have made me stronger. And yet, it did.”

Tasha beamed. “You chose the Light, Sister. Truth, Light, Life, and Love. We did it together.”

I’d known the words were coming, and still, they pained me. As much as I didn’t want to admit it—I didn’t want to give his vulgar, cartoonish point credit—this was a perfect example of what he’d meant.

It was abuse.

To the faith, every soul was mired in error, and only the cleansing power of the Angel’s Light could make them anew, and set everything right. You had to be torn down before you could be rebuilt. To believe otherwise—to think one’s self capable of working that transformation… such a belief was a sin. Pride was the greatest sin of all. But that wasn’t the truth, just like it wasn’t the truth that everyone was perfect, and that flaws were externalities.

Sometimes, the truth was at the edge; other times, it was in the middle, and it fell on us to learn to know the difference. If everyone had to be torn down, you would destroy the people who needed help to grow. If no one could be torn down, then no one would ever get set right when it was most needed.

Ileene, I thought, you and Tasha didn’t find a truth, you had it printed onto you. Think, Ileene. What’s left that was truly yours? That came from within you? Where have you been going? What have you been building toward? Or, perhaps, it is others who have been building you?

Ileene watched the setting Sun, revering it. Aching for it. She looked at Tasha. “Do you think I’ll miss it?”

“Maybe,” Tasha said, “but it’ll only be for a little while. The cells in the Crucible are ordinary meditation cells. The difference is in the time spent in confinement, that’s all. You remember what Eyvan said.”

Ileene nodded. “Of course.”

“And there’s no doubting the augury, now,” Tasha added. “The time has come.”

Ileene smiled. Her emotions were whirling. She felt like the peak of a great wave, bound for somewhere far across the sea. To somewhere beautiful.

She was proud and afraid and excited beyond measure.

Ileene glanced down at her belly and looked with anticipation, wondering how big she might get—and how soon. “I’m not just fighting for myself anymore,”

“Pray for a sharpshooter, Ileene,” Tasha said, looking her friend in the eye. “Whoever they will be, pray that they will be pure and bold. We can’t let the world turn its back on the Angel—now, more than ever. We can’t let the darkness win.”

Ileene looked Tasha in the eye. “Do you think I’ll vomit again tonight?”

Smiling back, Tasha giggled. “One can only hope! And to think, you get to pass on working in the fields! Lucky!” Tasha tugged playfully at Ileene’s robe, making Ileene laugh. She had to swat her hands at Tasha to keep her at bay.

They laughed, but, gradually, the two young women turned quiet and contemplative.

“I’ll miss this…” Ileene muttered.

“You’ll get it back soon.” Tasha ran her fingers through Ileene’s bangs from where they jutted out from her shawl. “And you’ll have so much more to enjoy along with it.” Tasha ran her fingers again, and again. She lingered, as if not wanting to let go.

But Ileene would not forget Brother Almen’s words: pregnancy’s pains and pangs were blessings; signs of chosen-ness, and the holiness of motherhood’s undertaking. Children were the army by which the righteous secured a blessèd futurity.

Praying for a sharpshooter?, I asked her. You’re hoping your child will be a good sniper? Is that what children are for? To be weapons of war? Remember what you felt; remember what it was like when your mother tried to mold you into who she wanted you to be. What’s stopping your child from feeling the same way? Is this mold really that different?

In the now of our experience, Ileene’s mind replied to me: No, it’s not the same—it’s not.