Rebekka Franck - 03 - Five, Six ... Grab Your Crucifix by Willow Rose Read Free Book Online Page B

for three hours to go whoever knows where, they continued the meetings, discussing how they could keep it all up. In his honor, they kept saying. They treated him like had he been the messiah himself.
    Hans Christian had at one point believed that he was Jesus who had come back to get all of them. Maybe the Priest had even believed it himself. But then he started telling people that he was the reincarnation of the prophet Isaiah. Hans Christian had never cared what he thought he was; to him he was a god. He was the most beautiful human being to have set his foot on this forsaken earth. Back when it had only been Hans Christian and him, Hans Christian had adored everything about him. Every word he spoke, every gesture, everything he did could only come straight from God.
    Hans Christian had worshipped the Priest. He had kissed his hand, he had let him drive out demons by beating him, he had let him tell him how he was supposed to live right, to be righteous. The Priest had explained to Hans Christian that he was and always would be a sinner and that he deserved to be punished for that. He had told him that he was evil, that within all humans lived evil demons that made us sin towards God. He had also explained to him how they needed to be driven, commanded out before anyone could be truly set free. Even if it was painful to the flesh, even if it meant suffering for hours on the cold stone floor while repenting for your sin, bleeding from the wounds the whip left on your back. Jesus had bled for us; it was only fair that we bled for him.
    All that Hans Christian had accepted but when it came to the youngsters in the camp he disagreed with the Priest on many things. He didn’t think they were evil, when Hans Christian looked into their eyes he saw no malice like the Priest did. He saw young people barely out of childhood who had been hurt, some of them gruesomely. Some of them had been misled, they had done stuff they never should have done, but they were not evil in Hans Christian’s eyes. They needed guidance and direction and they needed all the love the disciples could give them. They needed someone who understood them for once in their lives. These were troubled kids with many problems; they didn’t need to be told that they had evil living inside of them. On that subject Hans Christian had disagreed with the Priest and he had protested when he thought the Priest went too far with them. He had told him straight up that it was not right to punish them like that. But the Priest didn’t want to listen. He had a new apprentice now, Isabella, and she had new ideas, that the Priest wanted to try out. She was the one who had led the cleansing ceremony that night in 1998 when … Well after that it was like everything went in the wrong direction.
    Hans Christian sighed and sat heavily on his bed. It had gotten dark outside of his room. He wanted desperately to sleep but he felt bad inside. He felt bad because his best friend and great love had died the night before and he had watched it happen without doing anything. He felt a huge load of guilt. What if they had called for that ambulance? What if they, for once, had asked for help from the world outside? Could he have been saved?
    Hans Christian sighed again and put his head on the pillow. He closed his eyes gently and soon pictures of the Priest flickered before him. So many wonderful years they had had together building this church. Hans Christian had thought about leaving many times throughout the years and now he was thinking about it again. But where would he go? This was his home and had been for almost thirty years. He had helped built this camp, it was his and the thought of leaving it all in the hands of that woman was appalling to him. But without the Priest then what was the point? Leaving the church wasn’t an easy thing to do. Hans Christian would lose everything. His only friends and family, he wouldn’t have a job anymore and he would certainly miss the