User:JohnB/Fanfiction/The Late Comer

Belvis was a neophyte at the Holomayan monastery.

Now, let it be known that many monks at the monastery are there because they have turned their backs on the world, a dark valley of trial and travail. However, Belvis was different. He didn't want the trial and travail, but he didn't want the monk's simplistic rejection of everything either. There was more to life than inward contemplation.

Truth be told, he didn't know why he chose this path in life. Every day was the same--up at sunrise, morning meditation, a light breakfast of a crust of bread and gruel, chores, a light lunch of a crust of bread and gruel, study, a light dinner of a crust of bread and gruel, evening chants, to bed at sundown. The evening chants were to him the most difficult to get through. Each brother sat in his assigned place, put his cowl over his head, and intoned the endless call-and-response antiphonies in unison. Many a yawn came out of Belvis instead. This was not overlooked by the abbot. Anyone who was not in the mood to sing praises to each of the saints in turn--Rilm, Roris, Seryn, Veloth, Aralor, Delyn, Felms, Llothis, Meris, Nerevar, and Olms--had no place in a monastery.

However, the abbot's role was to teach and guide his spiritual children, so he decided what the young, restless buck needed was an assignment that took him away from the monastery for a while. He was tasked with gathering victuals for the kitchen, so he set off to the mainland with a large basket strapped on like a backpack and a sickle in hand to gather wickwheat for their bread. Yet one who is negligent in small tasks is bound to be negligent in larger.

He remained close enough to the monastery to return in good time for vespers. That gave him plenty of time to wander about cutting handfuls of wickwheat and tossing them into the basket on his back. The whole job stank of nuisance so he stopped at a lone tree to take a break in the shade. He took the half-full basket off his back and tossed it irritably onto the ground, and sitting down with his back against the tree trunk, he took swig of water from his canteen and fell into a reverie over all the might-have-beens had he chosen a different path in life.

The vesper bell intoned, and he jumped up from his slumber. The basket was nowhere to be seen. He rushed back to the monastery so as not to miss the evening chants. He entered the main hall and strode as if nothing had happened toward his place. The chanting hushed and all eyes were on him. When he came to his place, he found it was occupied by somebody else.

"Brother, go find your own place. This is mine."

A totally unrecognizable face looked up at him from under the cowl.

"Who are you?!" came the response.

An elderly monk approached.

"Yes, who are you?"

"Belvis, and you?"

"Why, I am the abbot of this monastery!"

There was an uproar of laughter, so the abbot bade the brethren maintain their rule of silence.

"Where is Gilvas Barelo?! He sent me out just this morning to collect wickwheat. Surely somebody here knows me."

All the cowled heads shook in unison.

The abbot ordered one of them to go fetch an ancient tome, The Chronicle of Holamayan, from his office.

"This is the first year of the fourth era, which means we have to go back to Barelo's stewardship in the second era. The intervening third era was--ye gods--433 years long!"

He paged backward through the thick tome and ran his finger down the entries in Barelo's archaic script.

"Ah, here it is: 'Brother Belvis has absconded--may the gods strike him down for his impiety'."

At that very moment Belvis's face began to disintegrate, and a cry of horror went up as his cowled robe fell to the floor like a sack of bones and ashes.