Awaken

Chapter One: Friday, the 15th of September, 1851-1

Chapter One: Friday, the 15th of September, 1851

2:45 AM, The Cell of Sister Rose Carmelite Convent of Saint Teresa, Chester, England

Rose stared into the wolf's eyes, piercing blue-grey pools surrounded by thick black pelt. The creature rested on its haunches, its sides heaved silently, its tongue lolling from its mouth, teeth bared in a grin, the only sound the harsh repeated caw of an unseen raven. An open field of emerald green turf surrounded Rose and the wolf. Within the animal’s eyes scenes flickered as if they caught the movements of her or someone else behind her in the field. She knew to not look around but rather, look deeper.

She stared into the wolf’s eyes, feeling herself falling down into its world. Another world beyond the realm in which Rose dwelt and knew. There she was one of three; sisters, she was all yet none. She hovered between what they were as individuals, and a single unified being, greater and more terrifying.

The sisters gazed intently into the roiling cauldron they tended. Rose was drawn hypnotically down into the roiling fluid and found herself back in the field watching through the eyes of the wolf. In the predawn light, men wearing the kilts and accoutrements of Celtic clansmen were drawn up in a loosely organized mass on the far edge of the field, perhaps two or three hundred of them. Swords, spears and a few axes were held aloft catching the first light of the sun. Across the field from the warriors was not an army but a single man. All around him the grass withered and died and each step he took the blight spread. The man smiled, stopped, and casually seemed to raise his foot before stomping down. As his foot hit the ground a fissure opened and swiftly spread towards the clansmen, widening and deepening as it did. From its depth tongues of flame licked upwards and a roiling red glow lit the scene. The fissure widened as it raced across the field of green towards the clansmen. As it reached the first ranks of men it was fifty feet wide with smoke and fire erupting from its depths. The stunned silence of the clansmen turned to cries of fear and screams as those closest were engulfed by the chasm. Fear grew in Rose as she realized she was no longer an onlooker but stood in the throng of fear crazed men desperately trying to escape.

Rose was just another warrior struggling to flee the death that raced towards them, men falling screaming into its depth, the flames reaching for them. Pushing and shoving to escape, the body she inhabited strove to leave the field, when with heart stopping speed a terrifying apparition swooped down on the clansmen. The Banshee, clothed in ragged grey fabric, long white hair streaming behind it, soared over the fleeing men, who stopped their flight as the frightful visage of the Banshee loomed in front of them. Its mouth opened to let forth its shrill head splitting death scream. Rose felt the terror rise in her as she looked desperately for an escape path. Behind them the earth was swallowing her comrades while in front men reeled and fell to their knees as the scream drove thought from their minds. The scream grew in intensity, Rose fought silently to retain control of her mind…

Rose woke with a start, the Banshee’s scream ringing in her head. It took her a moment to realize that the noise in her head was the soft tolling of the bell for Laud, the early morning prayer. Her nightmare had been so vivid and real her heart was pounding still. This was not her first dream or vision in which the three sisters had appeared. Their power to control the arcane apparent to her, even from an early age. Her mother told her as she held her on her knee, soothing her weeping brought on by the dreams, that she was seeing the light of angels and there was nothing to fear from them. She had not had such visions for some time, when she thought about it she had not since she took her vows a year ago.

In the darkness of her cell, she fumbled to light the taper next to her bed. The simple bed was a slatted wooden frame supporting a slim wool filled cotton mattress. Despite being basic, it was a comfortable bed, best of all she didn’t have to share it with her younger sibling.

The small space around her was briefly illuminated as the match she struck flared. She lit the tallow candle, the wick catching in the flame of the match. The shadows were pushed back as the candle brightened. Like all monastic cells, the small stone room was austere with just the bed, a stool that doubled as a night table where a Bible sat, a small shelf, and a crucifix above the bed. Rose had only ever lived in two places in her life, for the first sixteen years it was in the tenant farmer house attached to the grain mill on the other side of the village. Her parents still lived there with her younger sister. Her second home was here; the Carmelite convent. Rose had lived in the convent on the outskirts of Chester for the past four years. Three years as a Novitiate, followed by one year as sister under simple orders. She removed her bed clothes and placed them on the shelf next to her habit that was folded neatly on a shelf. She donned the garb and then once dressed took her candle and opened the door of her cell. She joined the other sisters in the hallway.

The sisters formed up in two lines and made their way silently to the choir across the cloisters from the dormitory. They entered the side door and took their seats as the second round of bell ringing ceased.

The abbess took her place before the altar and opened the recitation of the morning psalm. Rose, like the rest of her sisters repeated the Latin phrases, thus beginning another day for Sister Rose Caldwell.