Chapter 9

Lying back on the couch he relaxed and held up the new design for the t-shirt. It included the eclipse, the church with the unusual spire and the chalice element from The Book. He wasn’t sure why, it just fitted. Around the edge he put a simplified version of the symbol in the shape of a door with a five pointed star inside the chief corner stone. He was pleased with his efforts.
He looked at the money collected from busking. It would cover the t-shirts he felt sure, but how was he going to pay the rent? He’d not thought about it till now. Just then his left palm started to itch and he felt an overwhelming urge to scratch it. The door knocked. Most unusual. He got up and opening it to discover the Priestess looking flustered, her car parked outside.
“This is crazy,” she said, “but I had no where else to go and I thought of you”.
“Come in, come in. Tell me all about it.”
They sat down with some tea and he prompted her to tell her story.
“Remember the guy you saw me with at the station that time?”
“Sure.”
“Well, we were trying to make our relationship work again after a break, that’s when you saw us. However, no matter how much we tried I couldn’t shift the feeling it wasn’t right any more. He was keen but I realised it wasn’t fair on him if it wasn’t mutual. So finally it all came to a head and today I said my truth and he flew into a rage and told me to leave. Now I’m homeless. Look I know its a lot to ask but could I stay on your sofa till I find a new place to live?”
“Better still,” he said, “you can have the spare room.”
He considered the turn of events and made up his mind on the spot, ”In fact I’m thinking of renting a room. We could give it try for a few weeks and see how it goes.”
“Ahh, that sounds too good to be true! I’m definitely interested,” she said excitedly.
“Excellent!”
They both thought, how serendipitous, exactly what I needed.

***
”How are you getting on with The Book?” she said after unpacking her things from the car.
“Well it is most interesting. There’s a change of tack, the next page has 4 symbols on it and the words ’23: The Elements’ underneath.”
He opened The Book and showed her the latest page.
“They look cool,” she said,” so the four elements are earth, fire, air and water presumably.”
“Yeah and we’ve got to work out which is which. Any ideas?”
“Well this one looks like the suit of spades from a pack of cards.”
“And which element would that be?”
“Not sure. What about that one? To me it looks like a cup, which holds water.”
“Yes, that makes sense for water. What could that be then?” he pointed to the circle, “it’s made up of the same knots as the slate carving.”
“It reminds me of a coin,” she said, “have you tried tracing the line, is that what we’re meant to do?”
“One moment,” he took out a pencil and traced the knotted line. “Amazing! It’s made up of a one single line. How on earth did they do that?”
“It can’t have been easy to devise that symbol from a single line. That can be no accident,” she said, “I think we’re meant to work out what these symbols mean.”
“Like homework. Yes, The Book is like that. It likes to set tasks. I mean, it hid itself for a week making me write everything out from memory. It then went on to recommend copying to make things my own.”
He found his copy with the addition of the sketches of the slate border, stain glass windows, and his dream with the figure of eight and key.
“I’ll make a sketch of the elements now while I’m thinking about it.”
He copied them from memory except for the circle of knots which he needed to look at The Book to get exactly right.
“What about the fonts?” she said, “have you discovered any new letters, do they make sense yet?”
“This is what we’ve got so far:”

A W E O R T G

“But there’s nothing on this page. The words ’23: The Elements’ are all in the same font.” She said. “Thats the first page without the irregular font on the second letter.”
“What if it’s there, but invisible?” he said feeling inspired.
“How do you mean?”
“Well, if these are the elements then whatever element this represents,” he said pointing to the triangle, “we could take the second letter of that word and add it to the others.”
“You know that does make sense. The Book is testing us. It likes to see if we’re going to play the game.”
“Ok, but what element is it?”

***

“Perhaps there are some more clues at the church,” he suggested.
“Right we need to go. Got any plans today?”
“Well I need to get some t-shits printed but they’re not open till tomorrow. We could go now.”
They arrived at the church just as the congregation were leaving. Some of them were gathered around the concert poster in the church foyer. The Reverend had been busy. They could hear a buzz of excitement and he felt sure they were talking about the forthcoming concert. It made him feel nervous and excited at the same time.

The Reverend was chatting to some parishioners. They waved hello as they passed and went into the church.
“Where do we start?” she said.
“How about the stained glass windows? That’s where the other clues were.”
They wandered in the easterly entrance, through the nave and paused right in the middle between the transepts and looked around. To their right the northerly window featured a large circle with earthy brown and ochre tones. It had all the elements of the Christ drama displayed in and around it. They looked to their left to the southern window and saw a large upward facing triangle, again depicting various scenes from the bible. There was a very strong red and orange energy to this window. Turning behind them to the east they saw a shepherd holding a staff on top of which was the spade symbol from the pack of playing cards. Finally, turning to the west there was a resplendent rose window glowing with soft blue tones in the centre of which was a chalice, the cup of Christ.

***

“Well we would never have seen those symbols there without The Book pointing them out,” he said.
“No, I’d never have guessed either. So which element is which?”
“There appears to be some distinct colours to each window.”
“Yes I see what you mean. The triangle is predominantly red, like fire, and the chalice window is blue, like water.”
“Well that makes sense. The triangle is fire and the chalice is water as we guessed. The brown colours of the circle could be earth and that makes the spade to be air. I wonder if the pack of cards is related to this somehow.” He pondered.
“In that case, fire is the first word and that makes ‘i’ the second letter.” He retrieved his notebook from his bag and added the new letter.

A W E O R T G I

“Still not making much sense though,” and they both laughed.
“There’s something else we’ve not yet found. I think The Book has brought us to this exact spot for a reason. Is there something else we’re meant to discover?”
They looked around. They were standing right in the centre of the church at the apex of the cardinal directions. He looked up to the underside of the spire and she looked down on the floor. They both gasped.
“Look!” they both said at the same time.
Above on the ceiling he could see a golden figure of eight and below she could see the carving of another knight holding a key to their breast.
“Wow the figure of eight and key, just like you dream!” she said.
“Just one moment. Look at the features. The lines are very pure and there’s an effeminate look to the face. Could this be a woman in armour?”
“And only the head of the order would be given such a position of honour,” she said.
“The high priestess,” he said and a shiver went down their spines.

***

He caught the attention of the Reverend on the way out and thanked him for putting up the posters and he mentioned about JJ recording the concert.

The Priestess then went off for the afternoon so he went back to the house to make notes and play some guitar. His mind drifted to the music and his vision of the goddess from the lake during the last full moon. He thought about The Shaman and how he used the moon. It struck him they were due to meet on the next half moon and he hadn’t seen the moon for a few days. A sudden panic came over him that he’d missed it. He’d be so annoyed with himself if he didn’t take this golden opportunity. How was he going to check the phase of the moon if he couldn’t see it. The moon diary of course. Thank goodness he thought, and opened it to check the moon’s phase. The half moon was tomorrow, he was in tune and had remembered at just the right time. He was looking forward to his next lesson with The Shaman at noon. He noticed then that if something was taken away from him, it immediately became apparent if it he valued it or not. The exact same feeling as when he thought he’d lost The Book.

***

The next day he didn’t see the Priestess in the morning. She’d left early for work. He took the new t-shirt design into town to get the job underway. The printers loved it and wanted to sell some in their shop. They also wanted a poster for the window as all the staff enjoyed the music and were coming to the concert. Everyone had been talking about it, there was a real buzz in town. This was totally unexpected and he was taken aback by the spontaneous offers of help. It warmed his heart.
“Thinking about it,” the young man serving said, “I could bring the t-shirts on Sunday, make a display and help sell them for you, if it’s ok with the church of course. If you sell out I can take details and then print them to order. I really think everyone would want one. They’re very beautiful.”
“Fantastic idea. I’ll definitely take you up on that,” he handed him the money from the busking to pay for the job.
“T-shirts and now posters, I’m going to have to think of some new designs,” he smiled.
“Well if they are as good as this, keep ’em coming,” the shop assistant said enthusiastically.
He left the printers bursting with ideas for t-shirts. They involved using the four elements from The Book. He could see them clearly in his mind’s eye. They looked great.

***

It was almost noon and had just started raining as he made his way to meet the Shaman in the park.
Arriving he stood in silence with the Shaman under the lightning-struck oak. It was fully raining now but the Shaman didn’t move. His instinct to protect himself from the rain was causing a bit of anxiety. As he began to get wet it really made him wonder what was the source of his discomfort. What was so bad about getting wet? It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t even cold, so why didn’t he like it. Where did that anxiety come from? In the distance he noticed some parents with their child going for a walk. The adults sheltered under an umbrella to protect them from the rain yet the child dashed about excitedly jumping in all the puddles. He thought he could notice an extra twinkle in the Shaman’s eyes.

He let go of all the tension in his body. He thought it was the rain making him tense but he was wrong. He was making himself tense. It was a choice. In fact he could choose to be happy. He then remembered a time when rain did make him happy.

The Shaman very slowly took one step forward and moved his arms. He copied precisely. After a short pause the Shaman moved his weight back to the previous position and his arms went back the way they had come, as if time had gone in reverse. He copied The Shaman precisely and observed the feelings in his body as he slowly shifted positions. It was very hypnotising and at one point he could have sworn his arms were floating at the same time as feeling deeply rooted to the Earth. A most curious magical sensation. Out of nowhere he thought about the number 23 from The Book. Why 23, what was special about 23.
The Shaman felt the change in concentration and brought the movements to a stop. He then bowed and said, “New moon, dusk,” and left him at the oak to ponder the elemental number.

***

There were quite a few things he didn’t understand, but he’d learnt to trust that as long as he made an effort, and tried not to overly push or become obsessive, things had a tendency to resolve when the time was right. It was also enjoyable that way and this was another sign he was on the right path. It was fun.
He left the number 23 for another day and headed back to his house to dry off. He decided to ask The Book about using the element symbols for his t-shirts designs, he felt sure it would have something to say.

He opened The Book and turned to the next page and read:

‘Ideas come from where
Intent is a mysterious force
Poverty and riches
Success and failure
Look different from the inside out’

Just then the Priestess came in.
“Ah another page from The Book. What does it say? Is there still a different font?” she said excitedly.
He passed her The Book to read then he wrote out the page in his own notebook.
“The next letter is D.” He wrote out the letters,

A W E O R T G I D

“Still nothing is jumping out at me,” she said, “what did you have on your mind when you opened The Book this time?”
“I was thinking about using the element symbols in my t-shirt designs but wanted to check what The Book said about it.”
“Good idea, but being a magical book it’s always going to give you more than you expect,” she observed.
“It seems that it’s all about my intent then.”
“Yes,” she agreed, “and that two things externally can look the same, but The Book points out that it’s the invisible intent that makes all the difference. That’s what I’d say.”
He paused and thought about everything she’d said.
“I guess it’s down to me then,” he mused, “it could be right for me to make the t-shirts, if I have the right intent.”
“So what is your intent?” she enquired.

***

“What is my intent?” he pondered out loud, “well, to be truthful there were two things that happened simultaneously when I thought about the t-shirts. One was that I could ‘see’ the designs in my mind’s eye and the second was that I thought they’d make some money. There, that’s the truth.”
“No shame in wanting to make some money,” she said, “I think its about the honesty of your intent as well. I think what The Book is saying is it’s important not to lie to yourself about your motives.”
“I do think they look good and you’d earn some money too,” she concluded.
“Yes that feels right. It’s about being clear,” he agreed.
“There, you’ve got your answer. The Book has given you the green light. So show me what the designs are going to look like. I want to know!” and playfully threw a cushion at him.
“Well do you remember we saw a woman wearing a queen of hearts t-shirt the other day? Well that gave me an idea of using the element symbols from The Book instead of the traditional playing card suits. He made a quick sketch of the four elements with a Q for the Queen.
“Well you could also add the Jack and King and complete the set.”
“12 designs in all,” he concluded.
“Something for everyone, and maybe an additional t-shirt with all four elements. That makes 13.”
“Excellent. The printers I think would be willing to print to order. They were very friendly when I was there the other day.”
“Ideal, you only need to invest in a few t-shirts to start with and see how they go, then add in the other elements if there’s a demand.”
“Yes, that feels right. I’ll start with the chalice and Queen.”

***

***

***

Continues in Chapter 10…