Chapter 11 - Sanctuary

Will's father had just left to break the horrible news to Matilda. It was quiet in the ground floor of their sanctuary. Will resumed his quiet sobbing. He didn't want the others to hear him. Will thought about his mother and grandmother. He thought about his uncles. He thought about his missed chance at being a big brother.

It was too quiet.

He wanted to concentrate on something else, take his mind off of his losses. He finished the tome in front of him. It was a religious text about Christ. Will found it to be fascinating. One man having influence over so many people even after his death.

He got up from his seat and fingered through some of the books. Many of them were religious. He began exploring the first floor. It was larger than the home he grew up in, spanning an area forty feet by forty feet. The central tree took up an area of about ten feet. Around it's base were arranged shelves and the ladder that ascended up it. Will circled it many times, trying to see how the second floor was supported. The boards of which were anchored to the thick branches of the tree.

Then Will noticed a spot above the shelves but below the ceiling. It was a nook. He couldn't reach it. He continued exploring the first floor. He admired how the branches that made up the encircling wall were grown in a living Celtic knot, woven together when they were still green.

His little brain began seeing a recurring pattern in the walls knot work. It was very ornate and beautiful. Will found some sheets of paper and a quill and he began drawing the design. It took him a few hours.

Tuck and the other woke long before Will finished his drawing. They came to see what he was working on. Tuck looked at the drawing. He'd seen it before but he couldn't place where. "What inspired this, young Will?" Tuck asked.

Will looked up and pointed at the wall. Tuck turned and, with a moment of concentration, he too could make out the detail of the knot. Then it dawned on him, where he'd seen the design. He rushed over to the shelf and searched until he found a book with the design on the cover. He placed it in front of Will. He explained, "This book is a collection of scrolls found here at the sanctuary. They aren't in any language I can read." He opened the book and showed the pages to Will.

Will glanced at the pages. The writing intrigued him. He continued working on the drawing until he had it completed then he turned his attention to the book. While looking through it, he said to Tuck, "There's a nook," pointing in the direction of the crevice.

John reached into the nook and pulled out a scroll. "It would seem young Will's eye for detail has led to the discovery of something that was overlooked before," he said. He gently unrolled it and saw that it had a rudimentary map drawn on it. It was really just a continuous line that started at one point, crossed itself a few times then ended on an ex. "A treasure map?" John asked.

Tuck looked at it. "It has no point of reference," he declared, tossing the map down next to Will.

The men all went out to hunt, leaving Will to his thoughts. He studied the strange book. His mind began letter substituting. He's not looking at it long before a word stands out to him. Beltain. Then another word. Samhain. He knows these words, they're festivals. Why are they in this book?

He knew that the festivals were all pagan traditions. His mother had taught him that their ancestors believed that the world around them was somehow divine and should be respected and even praised.

He needed a break from the book. As he sets the book down he picks up the map. He saw instantly it wasn't a map. He'd just drawn this shape even though it was hidden amongst other shapes. He saw it instantly. He looked at the "map" and his drawing and saw that it was a key. He noted the line of the knot that it depicted then went to the wall. He went down the wall from weave to weave trying to see if there was something different about one of the knots. To his surprise, there was. It was on the back wall. The portion of the knot that was notated in the "map" went to the floor.

Will crouched and dusted the dirt floor where the branch went in. The branch was buried a couple of inches underneath. Excited, Will began scraping up the dirt. The branch went a few feet away from the wall then went in a big arc, as if it was going around something.

"Tuck!" Will yelled."John, Layne, Smith!!! Come see this!"

The men came in and found Will digging around on the floor. John wasted no time. He knew that Will's mind was a gifted one and that if Will was excited about something, so should he. He began digging with him. Inches beneath their feet was a round stone with the knotted design on it.

"I can't believe it," Tuck said, amused. "The boy is here a day and he starts showing me around the place."



John, Layne and Smith worked at getting the stone moved. It eventually lifted out of it's nesting. Beneath was a deep, dark hole. Tuck grabbed a couple of candles and lit one with the oven fire that they had started for dinner. John dropped into the hole and Smith followed.

"What's down there?" Tuck asked. He seemed very anxious.

John waited a moment. He had found a torch and lit it. "It's a cave system. Looks like this tunnel was hand dug but it leads into a lower chamber."

Tuck and Will followed. The tunnel was lined with soil and reinforced by wood and stone. The ceiling was a mess of tangled roots. The men weren't sure which way to go until Will pointed out that there came a fresh breeze from one direction. They followed it.

Shortly they came into a large chamber. The walls were stone and Will could tell it was a natural cave system. He could hear a small stream and realized that this was where fresh water was obtained. He looked around at the walls. At some point this had been used a lot. He thought about all the people that may have lived in the sanctuary. They were all gone but had left behind an echo. One that he heard. "We should pay our respects and get some fresh water," Will uttered as he began to drink from the little stream.

He looked around the room again. He could make out a faint ledge that was long. Perhaps for seating. He strode over to it and sat then looked at the wall opposite. "It was a school," he said. "A secret school."

Tuck agreed, "Yeah, the pagans were rounded up and slaughtered by people who supposedly knew better. They would have had to teach their rites in secret."

Layne and John looked around with their torches. They followed the stream and saw that it went deeper into the cave. They went upstream and found a small opening where the water was coming in from.

John waded into the stream and looked out the opening. "This was a means of escape," he said.

Will and Tuck headed back up through the hole. Will got the book with the design on the cover and looked through it again. "It's in code," he said to Tuck.

"What do you mean?" Tuck asked.

"It's in an old language in code. See here?" Will showed the book to Tuck and showed him the words Beltain and Samhain.

"Can you read it?" Tuck asked excitedly.

"I can but I wouldn't know what I'm saying," Will said.

John and Layne came back up and closed the hole back over with the stone. John wasn't surprised to learn that Will had figured out how to read the book. Will didn't surprise him much with that brain of his.



Later that night, Will began reading the book aloud to Tuck. Tuck wrote down what Will said but he translated it so that Will could read it again and know what it was. After a couple hours, they finished.

Will made short work of reading the translation. It spoke of animal totems and Will silently noted the wolf and fox. Both of them were intelligent and cunning. The wolf, however, was also feared amongst the pagans for it's ability to kill and destroy for the sake of those it loved. In essence, burn everything around it in revenge. The fox on the other hand, was adaptive and was sought out as a teacher. Will made up his mind at that moment.

"We should share our knowledge with the others," he suggested to Tuck.

Tuck looked at him with a smile. "I like that. I think we should begin quickly. Start a new school. Shape new minds and let them see the world the way it really is."

Tuck and Will sat up discussing the school late into the night. John, Layne and Smith retired to the second floor.



The following morning, Will made his way to the top floor. It was a training area with straw filled mats lining the walls and a rack with old weapons. He picked up a sword and began swinging it.

John came up to see what he was up to and saw Will clumsily thrusting the sword about. "It's only partially strength," John said, startling Will. He showed him how to grip the sword and swing.

Will was a quick learner and his muscles memorized movements easily. There was hand to hand techniques that John showed him on that first day. They spent the day running through scenarios of combat. One on one. Two on one. Three or more on one. John explained that the more opponents wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes it meant that they were confusing each other in their attack and this could be exploited and even forced to happen. Feigning a weakness would force them all to attack a single spot giving the defender a point to attack from. Will realized that much of combat was mental and he enjoyed the figuring out of strategies.



As the day came to a close Will's father returned. He had a new horse and a new bow. It looked very fancy, being made out of wood, bone and leather. In the quiver, were seven red arrows. Will knew who they were for.

"Aunt Matilda is going to help us?" Will said.

Thomas crouched to get at eye level of his son, "I have to do this alone. I don't want to chance losing you."

Will understood and offered little protest. He showed his father the sanctuary's underground. The secret school where he and Tuck planned on showing the under-privileged how the world really was. Thomas liked this plan. He liked the idea of spreading knowledge like a plague, a plague that would destroy the machine.

John asked, "How do you plan on dealing with Cornelius?"

Thomas had been thinking about that the whole ride back to the sanctuary. "I'm going to visit a death on him that will make others think twice before choosing a sacrificial lamb out of another farmer."

Thomas relished that thought.

Comics, "Alan Moore", "Captain America", "Robin Hood", "Ivanhoe", "Green Arrow", "Kevin Smith", "Tarzan",