Beyond the Fire Read online

  Shinar shuddered. He hadn’t heard about the scriptures since he was a child. This book was hardening good people into rebellious traitors.

  “Do you have a copy of the scriptures?” Shinar asked.

  “No, sire. Copies are rare.”

  Shinar’s dark eyes nearly vanished under his furrowed brow, and his thin lips turned down as his shoulders slumped. They are rare indeed, he mused. Maybe I could crush this rebellion if I could get my hands on the book.

  “Do your followers have a copy?”

  Stafford made no reply.

  Shinar’s face grew red with anger at Stafford’s silence. “You refuse to speak? You are a fool!”

  Shinar turned to his council. “Do you know this man’s followers?”

  “We know some of them,” they answered.

  “Seize them! Bring them in chains to this court, and find their book!”

  “To hear is to obey, O King,” they fawned. “Now the Queen of Heaven will bless you and this land richly for your devotion.”

  Shinar smiled at their praise but turned his attention back to Josiah Stafford. “Send this man to the dungeon until I call for him.”

  “Yes, sire.”

  So began a great purging throughout all of Shingmar. Men were gathered from every walk of life. Homes were entered and searched. Every book and paper was examined as King Shinar sought to find this book of rebellion and trouble. His search affected every class of people in the land.

  However, months later, Shinar shook his head at the report. The number of dissidents had grown. Nearly fifty rebels were scheduled for court that very afternoon. Sometimes Shinar wished he could call off his search for the scriptures, but how could he explain that to his council? Maybe he could still get to the bottom of it.

  “Grekko! What is the schedule today?” Shinar asked.

  “We have more traitors to the crown, Your Highness.”

  Shinar groaned. “Why can’t someone capture the book that is causing all this grief?”

  “There is a conspiracy, sire,” the king’s chief aide responded. “The men and women of this movement are so careful of their document that whatever plan we devise to obtain it seems to be known to them in advance. The book shifts from one to another so quickly that we have not caught up with it.”

  “Women?” Shinar asked. “Are there women involved in this movement as well?”

  “Yes. The wives of many men we now hold in prison continue the movement.”

  “What is being done to quell their activity?”

  “Nothing, sire. We’ve had no direction from your throne.”

  “Good heavens.” Shinar sighed. “Do I need to hold your hand? We are trying to stop a rebellion here.”

  Grekko didn’t reply at once. “What is your desire, Majesty?”

  “The women who are actively involved with the movement shall be sent to the work farms. There they can grow food for themselves and for my court.”

  A sly smile spread across Grekko’s impudent face. “There are some lovely women among those involved, sire.”

  At first Shinar was irritated by what seemed to be a needless statement. Then slowly a grin spread across his fat face. “I think I understand. Bring the loveliest women here to the Temple of the Moon.” His smile spread to a low chuckle. “So they don’t want to worship the Lady. They will worship the Lady, all right!”

  The Building of Stonewall Prison

  “Put that stone over here, you swine!” A whip cracked harshly, and an old man winced as a red welt raised upon his back.

  King Shinar had ordered rebellious traitors removed from Shingmar, and forcing them to build their own prison on a distant island seemed a perfect punishment. Men who believed in the Holy Scriptures had been rounded up and shipped either to quarries to cut stone or to the island to build their own prison. Some men who were not even in the movement had been arrested and sent to prison if their wives were attractive enough to serve in the Temple of the Moon.

  The king’s chief aide, Grekko, came and went at will, and today he strode with cocky confidence before King Shinar. “The building of our island prison progresses nicely, Your Highness.”

  “Good! Good. How many prisoners are under your care?” Shinar asked.

  “There are five thousand at the island, sire, not counting those cutting stone in our quarries.”

  “Five thousand!” Shinar exclaimed. “Has the whole world gone mad?”

  Grekko wisely refrained from answering.

  “How many women and children work on our farms here?” the king asked.

  “There are at least ten thousand.” Grekko smiled.

  “Are they productive?”

  “Their labor fills our larders with abundance.”

  “Are we quelling the movement?”

  “No.” Grekko shook his head. “The harder we repress this movement, the more people get involved.”

  “Have you obtained the Holy Scriptures?”

  “No, sire.”

  “Get that book! I’m going to destroy it, if it’s the last thing I do!”

  There was no opportunity for prisoners at Stonewall Prison to openly worship God, but at night when they were chained to the walls of their cells, the guards could not stop them from reading or discussing the few pages of scripture that had been smuggled in and were carefully hidden from the guards during the day.

  One night the prisoners in one particular cell were preparing to listen to the Word of God when someone hissed a warning. “Someone is coming!”

  The men in the cell grew quiet, and footsteps could be heard in the corridor. Guards were the only people free to roam the hallways at night. Suddenly, a door opened into the cell, and Commandant Gaff stood silhouetted in the light.

  “Gentlemen,” he said, and everyone relaxed. Gaff was the only guard who treated the prisoners as though they were human and deserved dignity. Though the prisoners loved Gaff, the other prison guards hated him and wanted to overthrow his authority.

  Closing the door behind him, Gaff whispered into the darkness, “Are the scriptures being read here tonight?”

  “Yes,” Josiah Stafford whispered. “Would you care to join us?”

  “Please.”

  The moon shone through a tiny gap between stones in one wall, making a dim light in the darkened cell. Stafford studied the page before him and then spoke in little more than a whisper. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

  A slight movement outside prompted a quick “Shh!” Everyone held their breath.

  “Commandant?” It was the night watchman.

  Gaff spoke from inside the cell. “Yes, watchman. What do you need?”

  “Are you all right, sir?”

  “Yes,” Gaff answered. “I was just checking on the prisoners.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  They heard footsteps move farther down the corridor, which connected with the other cells deep inside the building.

  “That was close!” someone whispered.

  “Too close,” Gaff breathed. “I’ve got to stop coming like this. Will someone tell me where I can find Josiah Stafford?”

  A long silence ensued. The man who had been reading finally spoke. “I am Josiah Stafford.”

  The commander stepped toward the man who had spoken. “Sir,” Gaff said, “forgive me.” Though it was too dark for most in the cell to see, the commandant knelt before the most hated of all the prisoners.

  “Forgive you of what, Commandant?”

  “I need to be forgiven for the chains you wear and the scars upon your back. I feel responsible for the hatred among the guards and the wrongs done to everyone imprisoned here. Your only crime is trusting in the hope the scriptures give.”

  “My friend, you are the one ray of hope many of us have. If
it were not for your gentle hand, many of us would have perished at the hands of the officers long before now.”

  “Maybe to perish would be better than to rot here.”

  “It may seem that way, but the Almighty One has given us life and hope. He will not leave us or forsake us.”

  “Josiah,” Gaff began, “I have come to inform you that I will no longer bear the responsibility of your confinement and hard labor. I am leaving my post.”

  A low murmur filled the room. The men knew their conditions would worsen as soon as Gaff was gone.

  “I wish you would reconsider,” Stafford said quietly. “Our burdens will surely become harder if you leave.”

  “Resentment grows daily among the guards,” Gaff said. “I feel that soon I shall be one of you, confined to these walls and unable to lessen your burden anyway. Tonight I plan to stroll outside the fortress walls. When I’m out of sight, I’ll swim the river and make my escape. But before I do, what last favor can I do for you?”

  Josiah remained quiet for a long while. Finally, he broke the silence. “Master Gaff, I respect your decision. There is one thing that troubles everyone here, and we are powerless to change it. Our latest arrivals tell us that our wives and children suffer terribly at home. King Shinar has driven them from our homes, and they labor long and hard in work camps. In these camps they produce abundant food for the castle, but the women and children live on barely a morsel themselves. Will you return to Shingmar and help them escape their bondage?”

  “Sir, I have no ship, and the mountains are impassable. I will be an outlaw, marked for desertion of my duties, and if I’m caught, I’ll be executed!”

  “You have planned your escape. Maybe you can devise a plan for our families as well. We will not bind you with an oath to help them, but we pray you will remember us always and travel in the power of the Holy Spirit.”

  It was a hot afternoon in Shingmar, and Suzanne was hoeing weeds in long rows of corn as she watched a ragged man slowly approach the field where she labored.

  “Madame?” The man tipped his hat to Suzanne. “Might I inquire if this is a labor camp of King Shinar?”

  “You might, but I’ll not be telling,” Suzanne responded, even though she knew her saucy remark would have incurred a beating in some circles.

  “Madame,” he began again. “I don’t blame you for not wishing to speak to a stranger, but I have a duty to fulfill for some men I once knew. I think you might be able to help me.”

  Suzanne made an ugly face and said, “I’m not pretty at all. You needn’t take me to your precious altar to serve in the worship of the Lady!”

  “What are you talking about?” the ragged man asked.

  “Oh, that’s right!” Suzanne retorted. “Pretend you do not know!”

  “I have no idea what you are talking about. The men I spoke of are in Stonewall Prison.”

  The young woman’s face blanched at the name of the prison. Its fame was spreading across all Shingmar as the vilest and most oppressive place dissenters were sent. “You know people there?” she asked incredulously.

  “I do. They asked me to help their wives and children.”

  “How do I know you aren’t one of the king’s men trying to trick me into revealing our leaders and our books?”

  “If I were indeed your enemy, you’ve already said too much.”

  Suzanne’s dark eyes flashed angrily.

  “Back to work!” the ragged man said loudly. Then whispering, he said, “Your foreman is watching.”

  Suzanne blushed deeply, knowing a whip could soon be on her back. It was forbidden to talk to strangers.

  Having seen the hovels in the distance, the man whispered, “We’ll talk more tonight.”

  Suzanne glared angrily at the man as he walked toward the foreman, but she did not expect to see the stranger again.

  Later that night, after Suzanne had put her children to bed, she heard a soft tap on her door. These homes had no locks, so Suzanne had propped chairs against the doors before going to bed. Now she slid a chair carefully to one side before lifting the latch.

  She gripped a broom handle tightly. It would be her best defense, she assured herself. Easing the door open, she was startled when a hand and foot shot through the opening. Despite her efforts, she couldn’t hold the door shut. The children, she thought in horror. What if the children should awaken?

  She jabbed savagely at the growing shape of a man slipping through her doorway.

  “Stop it!” the man hissed.

  It was the same man she had seen during the afternoon. He wrenched the broom handle from her hand. Angered, she pummeled him savagely with her fists.

  He finally had to wrestle Suzanne to the floor, pinning her beneath his considerable weight. “Stop fighting me! Are you going to listen or not?”

  She was exhausted and pinned so effectively that she could not move.

  “I was hoping I could talk to you again,” the ragged man said.

  “All right.” Her breath came in puffs. “Talk.”

  Talk he did, and in the days to come, not just with her. Gaff spoke with many of the women in that particular work camp.

  Some days later, while Suzanne hoed in the fields, she eyed the snowcapped peaks of the Guardian Range in the distance. She could scarcely believe that one day soon she would take her children over those peaks.

  “It’s impossible!” some had cried.

  “Don’t be a fool,” others had exclaimed. “The man is leading you to your death.”

  Suzanne’s decision to follow Gaff might have been wrong, but she wasn’t alone. The number of people going with her was astounding. How could one man make such arrangements? How could he have all the right connections?

  Liz hoed nearby in a long row of corn. “You’d better keep hoeing, Suzanne. The foreman is watching.” Her voice was low and tense, but her eyes understood. Suzanne rubbed her back as if to soothe an ache and then bent over the hoe again. The two women worked silently side by side until the foreman had passed.

  “Do you think it will work?” Liz asked.

  “I hope so.”

  “But what is to keep the authorities from chasing us down and bringing us back here—or worse, to the Temple of the Moon?”

  “Gaff says we will be hidden along the way.”

  “It will be hard to hide that many people.”

  Suzanne shrugged. “Gaff thinks he has the connections. Besides, it’s only forty miles to the foot of the pass. He’s sure the authorities will never think of looking there. They think it’s impossible to cross those mountains. It is impossible to live there. That’s why we have to pack so much.”

  “Do your children understand?”

  “They think it will be fun. I hope they’ll still think so after a few miles.”

  “Look out. The foreman is coming back. See you this evening.”

  “Right.”

  It was the dark of the moon three nights later when Gaff’s first pilgrimage began its journey. Having worked all day and walked all night, women and children were silently herded into a large barn. Two more nights and they would begin the greatest challenge they had ever faced: scaling the impassable Guardian Range. They spoke little as they dropped into soft piles of hay.

  “Cover up!” Gaff’s voice was soft but urgent. “You will be missed when you do not show up to work this morning, and they will come searching for you.”

  He helped tuck a youngster into a hollow part of a fresh stack of hay. “There you are. Everyone, listen! I’m going out, but I will return near sundown. Stay silent! If someone should come into this barn, remain calm. Don’t speak, cry out in fear, or move. Not only are your lives in danger but so is the man who owns this barn. Take courage. We’ve made good progress. Rest, for tonight we move nearer our goal.”

  With that, he was gone, and the people
drifted silently into an exhausted sleep. Only a few hours later, voices startled the pilgrims into wakefulness. Daylight filtered between the boards covering the barn, and they could hear a voice outside: “Have you seen any women or children passing by?”

  “No, sir.” The farmer spoke the truth, for Gaff had arranged many escape routes and no one knew which route he would take.

  “A number of prisoners fled with their children during the night, and we believe they are hiding somewhere in the area.”

  “Have a look around if you like,” the farmer said. “I’m not aware of anyone passing during the night, and I haven’t seen anything today.”

  The heavy barn doors creaked upon their hinges, and light poured into the barn’s dark interior. A group of six armed men strode into the cavernous building. Mounds of fresh hay covered the floor.

  “It looks like you’ve had a good crop,” said one of the men.

  “We’ve had good rains.”

  “The Lady has blessed us.”

  “Ah.” The old farmer choked on something and began to cough.

  “Are you all right, old man?”

  “Yes,” the farmer said. “Just a bit of dust, you know.” He turned and left the guards inside the barn. He hoped they wouldn’t see the small foot sticking out of one pile of hay.

  The men searched the corners of the barn briefly, and satisfied with their search, they came back to the old man outside. “Thank you. If you see anything, report it to us immediately.” They mounted their horses and rode on down the road.

  Breathing deeply, the old man turned and swung the heavy barn doors shut once again.

  The rest of the day was uneventful, and that night the group traveled many more miles. Within two days, they reached the foot of the Guardian Mountains.

  After several hours of hard climbing, the group paused at the edge of a sheer cliff. “Everyone must stay together,” Gaff ordered. A chilly wind bit through their clothing, numbing their fingers and chilling their souls. The group huddled tightly together seeking warmth for their first night under the stars had been bone-chilling as winds swept off the permanent caps of snow above them.