Chamber of the Bells - Volume I 'The Initiation'

Amber moaned through dry, slightly separated lips. Her eyelids fluttered, as swirling strips of brilliant color scrambled within her head. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, crinkling her brow and blending the colors to a muted gray. She was thirsty.

With great effort Amber raised her head. The walls tilted, then swayed in distortion, as she closed and reopened her eyes lazily, endeavoring to bring her surroundings into clear focus. A single burning torch, dimly lighting the room, cast threatening shadows across the floor; while just beneath it, the swinging pendulum of a large clock ticked loudly back and forth. She closed her eyes , and her head fell back in resignation. The torch light hurt her eyes, but the darkness was soothing.

The blackness became deeper. She felt as though she were falling further into herself, tumbling through emptiness in slow motion, drawn by an unknown inner magnet. A glowing red dot appeared behind her closed eyelids. Then, as her eyelids fluttered, the dot grew larger and exploded into a holocaust of flickering flames completely engulfing her mind. Slowly the intense flame dwindled, becoming a fuzzy red ball. She vigorously shook her head and the ball began to focus. The edges sharpened, then became clearly defined. She realized she was staring at the torch, bracketed to the stone wall. The ticking of the clock was comforting.

Amber fumbled through her fuliginous mind, searching all the corridors for vanished answers. Slowly, then more quickly, then rapidly, the separated pieces of her memory gathered together. In a consuming emergence of recall, she remembered the latest hours of her existence in the other world. Hours she had spent writing in her diary, before they came for her. Hours that had ended more than three weeks of complete freedom, following the previous full year of her remarkable captivity.

Amber thought of her diary. She thought of the parchment sheets and of the words she had written on them. She had placed the diary in a traveling case, to be brought with her as she returned to her golden cage; back here, where the Chamber Of The Bells awaits her entrance. The Chamber where she will be whipped and tortured for the pleasure of others. The infamous Chamber within the granite confines of the Ancient Underground Temple, beneath the plush ivy covered stone walls of the secluded Retreat.

She closed her eyes, once again sucking in, then forcefully exhaling a sighing breath of air, as she began to recall sitting within the unprotecting slats of her gazebo, writing in her diary. She had written almost frantically, trying to write as dashingly as her mind composed. A theory neglected now, would be a thought lost for all time. She remembered that the evening air had been cooling rapidly, and she had to hurry to finish before they arrived to take her away with them. She recalled the last events of that evening; was it last night, - or the night before? It mattered little! Her mind slashed through the barrier of darkness and time............................

Amber rested her back against the gazebo slats and looked through the arched opening. Her unobstructed view of the ocean, while it crashed against jagged rocks lining the deserted beach, was breathtaking. She relaxed now, she had finished the beginning of her diary in time. They had not yet arrived. She will have abundant time to complete the additional blank pages in the years that are yet to come. But those first few pages, those first few crucial pages, they had been completed. Those words for the Righteous Ones, words expressing her condemnation of them and her demand for them to destroy her diary, these writings were behind her now.

She thought about Rue, and of the profound things he had taught her. She thought of her equally profound love for him. Perhaps he was completely insane, and had swept her into his twisted world without her knowing how. Still, in the end, the truth is stronger than all lies, and the truth of the matter is, that she calmly sits waiting for them to come for her.

Again, she is haunted by the illusive truth of introspection. Have her own lustful desires consumed her; or is there something truly sacred to the seemingly demented and willing sacrifice of herself, in the Chamber Of The Bells for the continual Rituals Of Atonement For Sins? To find the answer to this question however, she knows returning to The Retreat is imperative.

Looking out across the ocean, with the full moon reflecting across the swelling surface, was relaxing and hypnotic. Amber fondled the expensive leather cover of the thickly bound, hand-crafted book. She had mentioned to Rue last month that a diary would be nice, but never expected anything as exquisite as this. She opened her diary and began to read the words she had just placed on the first few, but ever so important, pages.

DIARY OF AMBER

I start this diary by addressing all of you 'Righteous Ones'. You shallow, hypocritical, deceitful, - 'Righteous Ones', you that deny the existence of the thorn, when you consider the beauty of the rose.

My love brings a lantern to cast a light on your dark world, realizing the futility of it all! Because I know that those of you inhabiting it are blind!

How could any woman know she would be loved so passionately, so completely, by one such as he? Understand, he is more than my love, he is my everything, he is my life, and he made me 'woman'! It has been through him that I have understood the complete height, width, and depth, of my three dimensional being, and the awesome beauty of my body. They were wonderful gifts, 'My Body And Woman', - he knows us, us women!

You 'Righteous Ones', you who do not acknowledge him, or me, because you are not honest. You 'Righteous Ones', you arrogant hypocrites! You liars, you are the ones I talk to, listen! The unfortunate few who perceive far less are called insane! I say: It is not any different for those of us who perceive far more! No, as I think of it, I change my previous words, I do not talk 'to you', I talk 'past you'. To argue with you on Good and Evil would be futile, because you think there is neither, but when forced to choose, you always pick the wrong one! This is because you cannot discern between symbolism and substance. You are torn between what you really think and what you think you should think. But you must try to be honest!

The handful who have ventured to look where few dare, and have perceived, you will acknowledge him and them, and you know me. You know that I speak of the dark underside of the sex called woman. And I am only a woman! I say 'only', because I am 'complete' now! Anything else added would make me less than I am. As empathetic human beings we are not equal to men, we women, we are superior! But we are seldom honest.

I speak of a glowing, but well concealed, spark within our womb, for that is where a woman's soul resides. I speak of hidden, black desires, never talked about. I speak of being completely possessed!

A mystical part of us longs to be prepared for sacrifice and whipped, but the prospect of being damaged is abhorrent! But what if we could be whipped without damage? Why then, would we not ask to be stripped, naked and exposed, with our arms and legs stretched far apart, so we are 'Open' to all the emotions that can be inflicted upon us. To be taken under, until we sink deeper and deeper into the pleasures of our agony, and become nothing other than that which we are. In our writhing we will have no mind other than the absolute knowledge of our beauty and our suffering, and therefore will be the essence of woman.

You 'Righteous Ones', I am a woman. Even you with a small degree of honesty must admit that my entire being has been designed to endure and accept suffering. My natural mind associates pain with pleasure and suffering with sex. An ego