48
SCARLETT
I didn’t wantto walk into the next room, but since the only exit I’d seen so far was locked, I followed Xander down the short hallway with hopes there would be a different door in the next room that could be my way out.
Organ music wafted in the air, lending an eerie vibe. But with Xander’s back to me for the first time and with the music covering any other noise, I took the chance to quickly unzip my bag the rest of the way. After turning the volume of my phone all the way down, I held down the two side buttons that would make the emergency S.O.S call.
Please have service.
Please send help.
“Here we are.” Xander turned around to look at me just as I’d zipped my bag back up. “Welcome to the holiest place on earth. The place where the veil between mortal men and God is the thinnest.”
With my heart pulsing through my whole body, I took in everything there was to see. This second room was much larger than the first—about half the size of a basketball court. And while everything in the last room had been completely white, this reminded me of the medieval churches that I’d seen in movies.
The walls were made of gray stone. The main lighting came from sconces that resembled old-fashioned torches on the walls. To my left were several rows of dark, wooden pews—which I assumed meant that whatever ceremonies took place in here often had multiple people in attendance.
And at the very back of the room, in the center of the wall behind the pews, was a door.
Should I run for it now?
Would it be locked, too?
Xander must have seen me looking at the door because he said, “Don't worry, Scarlett. That door has been secured as well. No one else will stumble into the sacred ceremony we’re about to perform. Privacy is not an issue.”
A cold chill raced down my spine and the hairs on my arms raised.
He thought I was worried about someone coming in?
And did he actually think I would go along with his crazy plan once I saw this weird room?
I drew in a deep breath, hoping to calm myself enough to think. Maybe there was something in here that I could use to get away from him.
I moved my attention to what must be the front of the room, and if I’d been delusional enough to think that it would hold something better…I was wrong.
Because from what I saw, I was starting to wonder if my roommate during freshman year had been right all along and that I actually had been raised in a freaky, secret cult without knowing it.
My breathing became shallow, my heart racing, as I took in the stone steps that led up to a large platform that was about three feet off the ground. In the center of the platform was what I could only describe as a really big altar covered in a gold, satin cloth with red rose petals scattered around the edges.
Surrounding the altar were about a hundred flameless candles of varying height and width. And right behind the altar and candles was a huge, stained-glass window that I had never seen from the outside of the building before.
But even though I knew there had to be a solid wall behind the stained glass—there was no way I wouldn’t have noticed something like this from the outside—there had to be some sort of artificial lighting between the glass and the wall to make it look like it was backlit by the light of the full moon.
Xander gestured at the stained glass and said, “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
Though I felt like I might throw up from seeing all the candles and the altar the size of a bed, I knew that if I continued to engage him in conversation, the longer it would be before he could follow through with whatever ceremony he’d prepared for.
Hopefully, my S.O.S. went through.
Hopefully, the GPS system would lead the police right to me.
“It is beautiful,” I said, trying to sound like I was in awe instead of weirded out by the scene it was depicting. “But what is it?”
It didn’t look like any of the church art I’d seen before—paintings of Jehovah during his life in Israel or other important people from the Bible.
Instead, the stained glass featured a young woman in a white Regency-era nightgown, sitting on a large bed and looking up at a man dressed in white robes.
A man who, from his beard and long hair, I assumed must be the resurrected Jehovah.
