The Blood That Bonds by Christopher Buecheler Page A

were
comfort eternal. He was so frightened. These periods of blankness
terrified him. There was nothing, except the knowledge of nothing,
and he thought for the first time in his mortal life that he might
be coming to understand what death was.
    Ah, if he could have cried out, he would
have wailed. Little heart racing at the thought that there was
nothing more, that there was no heaven, no God waiting for him at
the gates, ready to embrace him and comfort him and help him to
understand what it all meant, this mortal life.
    More grey. Then the vision.
    A doctor, a nurse, and his mother. She was
arguing, fighting, weeping again. The doctor looked sympathetic,
but firm.
    “ There is nothing we can
do. We have bled him, tried every potent tonic known to raise one
from unconsciousness. There is nothing we can do. He will drink
broth, if we pour it down his throat, but he does not awaken. There
is nothing we can do.” Over and over. A litany, a chant, a
curse.
    Behind them, like the coming of the dawn, a
light was growing, so bright it burned his eyes. How could they not
notice this? How could the go on squabbling with each other when
faced with such a thing?
    Through their arguing, he heard the sound,
building and building. A rushing, driving sound that seemed to
swell until it was near unbearable, as if all of the voices in the
world whispered at once. The light throbbed and pulsed. Theroen
wept. Fear, awe, confusion. Was this death, then? Perhaps his
acceptance into heaven after his stay in grey purgatory?
    Is that what you wish,
then? It was all voices, no voices, a
whisper on the wind, a chorus of screams. Theroen’s temples
throbbed with it.
    He tried to shake his head. No. No, this was
not what he wanted. Death? He was nine years old. There was still
so much to do, to explore, to see, to know.
    You would live?
    Thereon found he could answer the voice,
could have spoken to it all along.
    Yes. I would live. Until I am dragged,
kicking and screaming, to my death, I would live.
    So be it. Speak, Theroen. Call to them.
    I cannot.
    But he could, and did, opening his mouth,
stretching his throat, peering desperate from his bed as the light
and the noise receded.
    “ Mother …”
    The word cut across the room, stopping his
mother mid-sentence. She turned, the doctor and nurse staring with
frank disbelief. There were tears again, now, welling in his
mother’s eyes, but not those of anger and frustration and sorrow
shed just moments ago. Theroen sat up, blinked, tried his voice
again. He looked his mother in her eyes, took in her joyful weeping
with that same calm that would be with him for all his life. He
spoke from his bed, spoke for the first time since the horse had
hit him, spoke for the first time since he had descended into the
depths of coma, five months before.
    “ Mother, I wish to go to
church.”
     
    * * *
     
    “ From that day forward,
there was no question in my mind what I was meant to do. I was
meant to live, yes, but more than that; I was meant to communicate
what I had seen to others. I had been sent a vision from God. A
reprieve from death. You ask how I could be a priest? I ask you …
how could I not?”
    Two looked at him, somewhat astounded. A
vision from God? She knew how it would be considered in this modern
era: a vision from the subconscious. Nothing more.
    Thereon grinned, picking this thought from
her mind as he so frequently did.
    “ Is there any real
difference? I woke. I moved. I spoke. Are these things not
miraculous?” He paused, looked out the window, seemed to ponder for
a moment. He looked back at Two and shrugged.
    “ People do not survive
comas of that duration unfazed. There is brain damage, if not
death. Yet I was fine. More than fine; I awoke with the clearest
sense of purpose I was ever to feel, until the moment I first laid
eyes on you. Ten years old, I began my studies. Three years younger
than any before accepted to the clergy. Such was my fervor, so
substantial my knowledge of