Gods of Prophecy

She and Ravia did not change from temple robes to Barban garb, knowing that the Sibyl would shortly send for Baebelle. So, with a hollow-tummy sense of doom, they sat in their open room, waiting. Then Antonys came for her.

Like K’rinza, she was led to the Celestial Tower, up the steps, past the oak door, into the dim interior. There, unlike K’rinza, she was led downstairs, along a dim hall, to a dark door tooled in alto-relief, where two golden-robed Cenobites guarded. They opened the door. It let into a theater, 12 strides wide, bright lit by glow globes set about in sconces. An aisle sloped down, amid tiers of tables where sat blue-robed Celestials, near half a hundred, scribing Conclaval thoughts into journals on the slender table tops before them. Here was the entire Celestial College resident in the Temple. At the foot of the aisle, the Sibyl stared graven, aloof on a throne on a dais. Before the dais,.sideways to it, an empty chair.  

Too many to fight, of course, so I must pray for cleverness.

Antonys led Baebelle down the aisle steps, and seated her on the empty chair. Fear ran ice-cold through ghostly Behrtith. I sit in a pit, amid my enemies. Ah, Baebelle, if you cannot get us through this examination, who got us into it, I can only try to take the Sibyl with us when we go to the Gods.

The Sibyl inclined her head and spoke, her voice neutral. “Greetings, Virgin Baebelle. We have called you before us to inquire if you hear Communion.”

Baebelle’s voice filled –– and stilled –– the room. “Please, Sibyl, I do.”

“How so?” The Sibyl’s hard blue eyes bored glinting into Baebelle.

Sublime as a Goddess, Baebelle’s voice. “I sense darkness around my Mind, and hear Communion from it, to deliver it if there be one to listen.”

A voice spoke from the right of the College, Delseena, once her Cenobite tutor. Baebelle turned her head to watch her as she spoke and Behrtith saw, in that familiar face, the bitterness that pinched the corners of her mouth. Delseena said, “No, Virgin Baebelle, you do not speak the Oracle. Only the Sibyl speaks it. Thus, how can we know you hear Communion? What proof have we of it?”

Of course, Delseena. Of course, all of you. Only Margwehda and one other of you has ever heard a Celestial Voice. You have burned out your Passions as the ultimate sacrifice, and it has availed you not a whisper. Now a snippit of a Virgin, Passions alive in her, claims to hear Communion. Oh, Izshna, if I do not convince them, not even the Sibyl can save me.

In a sudden suspicion, she induced Baebelle to look back at Harla. In the person of Auerlayne, the Sibyl sat silent, withdrawn, naught but an observer. Oh my Gods, I pray to thee, Behrtith thought, as she saw Harla’s plan. The Sibyl left her on her own. If she could convince the Conclave, she would win. If not, she was dead. The Sibyl did not greatly care, either way.

Behrtith saw only one proof that the Celestials would believe, but before she could utter it, Baebelle did, and dulcetly. “If you would have your proof, then have me give the Oracle tomorrow morning, in place of the Sibyl.”

“Quite impossible,” Faylanza called out from high in the center, and a host of other Celestials of the Conclave burst into voice all at once, agreeing with her.

Antonys declared, “It would weaken the focus we show of our power.”

They’ve already decided. Near lost of the power of Prophecy, they insist that only the Sibyl shall have it. It’s the only thing they can abide. What do you do now, Baebelle? The darkness does not gather, and you can say no Oracle without it. Why do the Prophetic Gods desert you? In this dire moment, are those Gods too weak to face the might of a mere tri-perfection of Celestials?