Thomas Galilei Glimpses

[Thomas Galilei]

A cherry blossom, there, outside the church. Delivered, roots wrapped in sackcloth, waiting for Thomas' return.

Thomas exits the cab, licks the blood from his lips, and examines his tree. He touches a finger to a soft pink petal. Beautiful. Fragile. Fleeting. Like life itself.

Change. A word of God's provision from a simple Kine cabbie. God provides.

Thomas' blood stirs at he alignment of signs. It's time he knows. He feels it in the veins beneath his dead flesh, time to embrace his Bloodline.

He tenderly hefts the tree, carries it around his church to the plot he'd prepared behind it. There's a shovel waiting there.

Things are as convenient, now, as they'd been inconvenient, before. Thomas takes up the shovel and breaks earth, digs, and digs.

He sets the tree inside and replaces the soil around it, patting it down, and them sprays some water on it with a garden hose.

There. His own Eden. A place for prayer and meditation. A place for change.

He kneels before his new symbol. "Thus far hath the LORD brought me." He crosses himself, presses his forehead to the ground beneath the tree and kisses it, leaving his face on the grass. "I pledge myself to the loyal service of God, my Domain, and the Master that God chooses for me; to Kamen, the way of the Face, to calmness and self-control; and the melancholy observation of life's ephemeral passing . . ." His heart aches, with the words of his Oath, in light of the upcoming Monomancy. God has given Thomas great examples: Longinous, Fujita Kunimasa. As he kneels before the tree, he imagines he kneels before them as they kneel before God. "Amen."

Thomas rises, more a Servant than ever. Sotoha. Priest. Lord.

Change, God had said. And change, Thomas had--not into something different, but into something more.

[Thomas Galilei]

Thomas had mourned long enough; he carves a resting place for Travis's ashes with a garden trowel at the base of the cherry blossom behind his church.

Two weeks he'd spent, in silent reflection, in prayer and meditation. He'd watched until the last minute as his friend disintegrated. The priest's line was: Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, but it never came easy when the loss was personal.

He overturns the silver burial urn, emptying what remains of Michael Travis into a hole in the ground.

He hopes he isn't beginning a new tradition. The Monomancy, certainly, didn't seem to be nearing an end. He'd heard word how another was scheduled already, this time with Ms. Yui as contestant against another Thomas hadn't even had time to meet yet.

He replaces the soil over the ashes, pats it down with the back of the trowel.

Would Thomas next bury Ms. Yui's ashes beneath the tree, or perhaps the newcomer's? Before long, his cherry blossom might sit upon a mound of ashes.

Nothing to be done . . . yet. His was not inaction, but patience. He would not defy the Prince's law. Neither would he shirk the death rites his office is sworn to. No. But, and he clings to this hope, he would not remain powerless for long to change the river's course.

For now, he bids his friend farewell and stands. The ashes would give nutrients to the roots, help the tree grow--from death, new life. He dusts off his knees and makes his way back into the church. He'd mourned long enough.

It seems time to speak with Josephine about Midnight Mass. God had words for Sacramento, Thomas was sure of it.

Cayce