The Ghenid climbed the stairs to the temple. She is tall, as all her kind are - over 6 ft, her fur tawny golden brown with black spotting in circles, darker furred muzzle, and a red dyed mane showing brown roots, tied and braided . Dressed in white leather armor and the short white cloak of the city Watch. Scuffed boots made for her recurved digitigrade stance. She stops outside the doors, her red and orange colored eyes looking up, blinking at the sunburst inlay of crystal and tile. Wide rounded ears up and focused forward, then down, she bows, ears drooping, to the scowling doormen in their robes of white and yellow. She pulls from a pocket a leather cap and sets it on her head, bowing again as she enters the building, stared at on each side.
The Church is lit with lanterns and large windows of stained glass showing the Father Sun and Mother Earth, her sisters and the garden paradise for humans. Then the Red God seducing the Mother, and his monstrous offspring with her, destroying the paradise and driving humans into misery before the Sun and His children rise and do battle with the Red God and the monsters and abominations. She walks silently past the wooden pew benches, the statues of the Dead Gods and demigods, the children of the Sun - their alcoves lit with candles, and small offerings before them. The musky sweet smell of the incense burning in the sand filled trays. A bit of dustiness and scent of human sweat and bee's wax. She reaches the front altar to the Sun and the pulpit where 2 priests and a guard of the Order of the Sons oversee several youths who are scrubbing the floors, cleaning and polishing the woodwork.
She kneels before the priests, whispering a prayer and waits for them to turn to her. They couldn't miss her approach as tall and dressed as she was. They pointedly ignored her for several minutes and one finally turns with a sneer " What do you want beast?"
She replies "I have come.. to ask the Patriarch about his goodly works.. to turn my slave." Her high pitched voice sounds whiney and breathy in the otherwise quiet church.
"Stay here and reflect on your evil and failings, while I ask." replies the priest. He walks to a door to the left of the pulpit and passes within.
She stays kneeling, head bowed reflecting on her actions of late. Had she been evil? Had she broken her vows of obedience and loyalty? She had given up command in the Watch, becoming part of a special unit of investigators under human command, it being wrong for her to dare command the Chosen children of the Sun. It was awkward and strange still to defer to males at all times and not just higher officers.
"His holiness will see you, beast" Hisses the priest as he returns.
She bows silently, and rises to follow the priest to the door. "You, scrub where the Patriarch's dog has defiled the ground!" growls the man of the Order of the Sons to one of the boys, as she passes the door.
She follows the priest down a narrow hall, past a few closed doors and into the Patriarch's office, bright with sunlight from a skylight and a magical lantern hanging above a secretary desk holding the Holy Book of the Sun. The wide desk with neat scrolls and papers and an inkwell and quill. A large stuffed and padded chair. Behind the desk is a wall of books, scrolls and hangings of the Sun and symbols and heraldry of the Kingdoms of the Isle of Man, Lyr. The Patriarch stands, in his golden and white robes trimmed with red, his hat with the Golden Sun covers his head with whisps of gray hair sticking out the sides and back. He holds out his hand. It is brown, wrinkled bare skin dominated by the sunburst ring of gold and rubies on the smallest finger. She kneels, bending and kissing the ring, saying "Thank you Holy Father."
It was wonderful that the Patriarch, the leader of the local church and the highest official in the region had taken interest and mercy in her case.
Speaking quietly as the priest departs, closing the door behind him. "Your holiness, I have come to ask about the turning of the male I brought. The slave." She has brought others of her kind these past few weeks, to be converted and learn the Law and way of the Sun. She owes the Patriarch more than she can hope to repay. Only the Light of the Sun could break the Soul Chains of the Oangs, the matriarchs, and the Grandmothers of her kind. The Chains that would have been used to compel her obedience and betrayal of the city.
The old man nods. "Yes, you have done well. We have driven away the evil spirit familiar. He says he will accept the Church but he does not know the rules. You will need to keep your virtue and faith to guide him. You have not laid with him, have you?"
Snorting she replies "Him? No, your Holiness!"
"Good," says the Patriarch. "Such relations are reserved for the holy union of marriage and for the bringing forth of children. It would be wrong for you to produce monster children to worry men. And the church would not sanction a marriage of your kind."
"No your holiness. I know this, I have only been with a Minotaur, also of the watch."
"Oh, NO! I forget you are offspring of the Red God and don't know better to resist the bestial urges of the Mother or to not engage in such perversion!"
She looks at him alarmed, eyes wide, ears down and mouth agape.
"Such laying together of different kinds is very wrong. It is a violation of the true and right proper unity of kinds, something you monsters do not know. But now you strive to follow the Father and must put aside such vile, perverted and impure notions!"
Her head bowed, looking at the floor with half closed eyes, "Yes Holy father." she whispers, blinking.
"What do you say?" asks the Patriarch.
She swallows the lump in her throat, then louder "Yes, Holy father."
