In The Air [FICTOID]

The huge flock wheeled about in the sky, perfectly linked by their intricate movements.

Should be starlings, Rhys thought.

He tended the tiny herb garden in the rear of the abbey, the other monks feeling more comfortable with him out of sight.

The birds swooped and pirouetted around him, their iridescent feathers shimmering in the sunlight.

No, not starlings, Rhys thought.  Doves?  But when do doves have feathers like that?

The other monks, if asked, would deny any prejudice against Rhys, but if questioned -- say in the sanctity of the confessional -- might admit to an uneasy feeling that Rhys…well…Rhys ///judged/// them.

Rhys would deny it, of course, and sincerely apologize for anything he might have done to provoke such a reaction, but there it was, naked and out in the open.

The way Rhys had been twenty years ago when he showed up on the monastery’s threshold, one hand clutching his bleeding groin, the other holding his severed penis and testicles.

He never elaborated on what happened to him and soon speculation that he fell afoul of thieves or into the clutches of a seduced virgin’s vengeful kinfolk succumbed to the suspicion that he’d done it to himself, to become a eunuch of God for the world’s benefit and the world to come.

How can we compete with that? the other monks asked themselves, and so Rhys found himself assigned to the solitary task of tending the herb garden.

They look like a moonstone, Rhys thought, watching the birds spin in the sun.

© Buzz Dixon