Avelynn by Marissa Campbell Read Free Book Online Page A

supported by arches and large square columns. The nave was long and narrow, the ceiling of which was painted in brilliant colors. Along the two longest walls, narrow windows sparkled with glass, filtering the weak winter sun. Each column, each polished surface was either etched or painted. Staircases led to private oratories upstairs with altars in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Michael, St. John the Baptist, and other holy apostles and martyrs. The wonderful thing about each of those private altars was the addition of the blessed gift of a bench to sit upon whilst one prayed. In the wide-open nave, not a bench was in sight, and parishioners had to stand throughout each successive mass.
    I yawned, eyes watering, and lolled my neck in an effort to revive my wavering attention. I had thought Demas’s late uncle, Ealhstan, was verbose and rambling, but this perception was thoroughly supplanted upon meeting the Bishop of Winchester, Ealhferth.
    The bishop was a corpulent little man, with piercing eyes far too small for his bulbous face. And since he spent the entire day lecturing on and ranting about humanity’s immorality, he was perpetually red-faced. He reminded me of a crazed boar in rutting season. The short, sparse, and rather prickly shoots of bristles of his tonsure and beard did little to assuage the image.
    I massaged the back of my neck, trying to work the strain out of the tight muscles. My back and legs ached from the interminable standing, and I still had another mass to go. I chanced a discreet look around the nave of the Minster. Everyone was wilted. Even King Aethelred’s shoulders were slumped in defeat. I shifted my weight onto my other leg and tried to stretch, earning a reproving glance from my father. I slumped back into dignified piousness.
    I returned my attention to the pulpit. Ealhferth was having quite a rant. “The Vikings have come as punishment for England’s sins. Repent. Repent, before the plague of heathens descends upon us!” On and on it went, spittle flying in a continuous stream onto the poor parishioners in the front rows. “It’s been four years since the Great Heathen Army descended upon this land. Hundreds of longships turned our horizon black as night, carrying the spawn of Satan forever to our shores. Northumbria has fallen, their lecherous ways leading them into the hands of the Devil. East Anglia has traded their virtuous robes for the cloths of sloth and greed, their saintly king tortured and defiled!”
    I rolled my eyes. All the panic over King Edmund’s death had come to nothing. The Vikings seemed content to settle down in East Anglia, marshaling out farmland and finding wives amongst Saxon women. They hadn’t made any threats toward Wessex, and while spying eyes always kept wary watch, life had slowly returned to normal.
    Ealhferth pointed a stubby, plump finger at his flock. “Wessex, your faith is being tested. Repent your sins, or feel the wrath of God!”
    I groaned, earning glances from a group of ladies in front of me and a murderous scowl from my father. I cast my eyes downward, affecting pious contrition. The Vikings were not God’s punishment for society’s or man’s weak, materialistic, and lascivious constitutions. They were not sent in retribution for not giving enough benefaction to the church, nor did they come as retaliation for celebrating and feasting for twelve nights at Christmastide, though the bishops would like everyone to believe that. The church’s edict was clear—too much of earthly pleasures and God would smite you where you stood. Or better yet, he’d send the Vikings to do it for him.
    The mass finally ended and everyone filed out of the Minster. I breathed in great gulps of cold, crisp air. While beautiful, Christian churches were suffocating. Unlike the Goddess faith—which celebrated the vastness of nature, in the vastness of nature—Christianity threw its