The Forsaken

By Patrick Best

WHEN A PRIEST DREAMS OF THE DEVIL

Father Jacob is a young priest that begins experiencing nightly visions. Some are of the Virgin Mary. Some are of the baby Jesus. But one day the visions suddenly turn into nightmare....He begins having dreams where he receives word that the son of a family that visits his church is the anti-Christ and must be killed. He begins stalking the teenage boy from afar and observes him commit treacherous acts. The messages and dreams intensify as the priest must decide whether he is receiving a message from God or is he simply going crazy?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trellis Publishing
• Release date: Jun 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201263102

Book preview

THE FORSAKEN

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PATRICK BEST

TABLE OF CONTENTS

THE FORSAKEN

ONE DARK PARTY

The church had never been so full, yet, to Father Jacob Gleick, it had never felt so empty. St. Mary’s was just large enough for a small congregation of two hundred and fifty souls. Crudely made stained-glass windows on the side of the building and a larger, more finely detailed window behind a modest altar and life-sized porcelain crucifix filled the hall with cold light. The smaller windows depicted the dove, the cross, blank-faced saints and other simple designs in blue and gold. The Virgin Mary occupied the large window, with the infant Christ in her arms. The hair on the back of Jacob’s neck was standing on end. He felt like he could feel the eyes of Mary and her two sons, the child and the martyr, watching his every movement. He thought he saw one of the featureless saints moving in one of the smaller windows.

Jacob struggled to remain calm.

This morning, I’d like to talk to you about the nature of sin, Jacob said, standing over his lectern, running a trembling hand through his grey hair.

Jacob’s words echoed within the stone walls.

Sin is God’s gift to mankind, he said. That’s right. Sin is, in fact, a blessing. It is God’s gift to humanity.

In the faces of the congregation was no-one he recognized. Their faces, pale in the blue light shining through the scene of the Virgin Mary behind him, were devoid of emotion. There was no joy and no understanding - this was normal - but there was not even a trace of recognition. Their eyes were fixed on him, but they did not seem to even acknowledge that he was speaking. His unfamiliar congregation looked upon him as if he were a statue of a person they had never heard of.

Without sin, Jacob continued, there would be no goodness in the world. We are all of us sinners first. Through God’s love, as we learn by committing our sins and being forgiven, we are made perfect.

They were unmoved, unblinking. Their complete silence and their utter stillness was deafening, distracting.

Without anger, there can, uh, Jacob said, stumbling. Without anger, there can be no forgiveness. Without hate, there can be no love. Without greed, there can be no generosity.

Someone giggled. Jacob looked up at the congregation over the top of his reading glasses, his face flush with embarrassment.

The light shines in the darkness, Jacob said, louder, and the darkness has not overcome it.

The laughter came once more.

Is something funny? he said, more pleading than angry.

A boy in the front row tried to hunch down to avoid being seen. He looked up and met Father Jacob’s gaze, and a mischievous smile broke across the boy’s face. He was ten years old with curly black hair. He wore a waistcoat over a pastel blue shirt and black tie. One of his eyes was green, the other blue. The boy grinned behind his hands. The adults either side of him, a man and a woman, stared up at Jacob with unflinching resolve. Jacob frowned and looked down at his script to find his place. He searched and searched, but the words were unrecognizable to him. Panic began to take hold. Looking up, he saw a man stand and turn towards the door. Another person stood. And another. And another, as Jacob grasped for words.

Where- he managed, as everyone else stood in unison, blank-faced, turning their backs to him to head for the exit. Where are you going? I haven’t finished!

Jacob turned his script face down with shaking hands.

The boy in the front row laughed and looked around as the church emptied.

Wait! Jacob said, addressing the congregation as they filed out the doors. He stepped from behind his lectern and followed them outside, pleading his case. Come back! There’s more!

Jacob knew he was dreaming and he knew this was where he always woke.

But tonight, he didn’t.

The dream propelled him forward after the moving crowd as they abandoned him. He pulled them back, grabbing at their arms, but they did not relent in their slow escape. Their eyes did not drift from the door.

Outside, the crowd dispersed and headed in all directions. Jacob followed them into the sun and watched in horror as their flesh began to turn to cinders and crumble away from their bones. In the biting winds of a bleak January morning, Jacob’s fire-ravaged congregation got down on their hands and knees in the cemetery that surrounded St. Mary’s. They crawled and tumbled into yawning holes in the ground, screaming as their bodies warped and fragmented under invisible fires as