I stand next to my father before representatives from the Knights Templar and Freemasons.
Old money. Old blood. Old wisdom stood before me — all of which I possessed — but today, I would be judged.
I stare at the floor before me, illuminated by torches.
The figures before me ask in unison:
"Which path will you walk: the Prophet, the General, or the Warrior?"
I mull it over in my mind, breathing in the burning wood, my breath echoing throughout the vast expanse of the chamber.
"You mean to ask under whom you wish to train?"
I think about the obsession with knowledge I had during my childhood.
To me, the answer was obvious.
I met their gaze — cold, unmoving, impartial — my life and family legacy being weighed on a scale.
Then I said, "these are not equal in weight to each other. What is a general without the prophet's vision to guide him?
What is the warrior without the general's vision to guide him?
Yet, from the bottom up, the general cannot exist where there is no warrior,
and the prophet cannot exist without a boundary that carves out a history for a people."
One of them smiles softly — faintly, but enough for me to register.
They remain silent.
"What is a higher virtue," they pause, "mercy or justice?"
I ponder for a bit, running calculations in my head — but it just confuses me.
So I decide to just speak… from the heart.
"Justice says: 'This is mine. You cannot have it. Give it back.'
If we really practice what we preach, we are modern men.
And modern man believes that everyone is entitled, by birthright, to dignity.
Like all things, it is a finite resource.
Dignity is a social construct — yes.
But all social constructs are derived from functionality.
And since there are only so many people to appraise,
and only so many people who can praise,
it becomes a finite resource.
We think there is only so much dignity to go around.
And this —
this is how you rob a man of his dignity:
You make others think less of him, and through that, he thinks less of himself.
And from this, we derive… justice."
"But we can also choose otherwise," I pause. "We can choose to give up dignity — to give up territory we have every right to claim.
This is what we call grace… or mercy."
"But if you ask me what I personally value…
It's mercy.
But I also understand — there's very little room in this world for it."
They remain silent as the scribes record my words.
A moment passes.
Then a voice cuts through the stillness:
"Recite Verse 3 from Book 2 of the Sacred Text."
I parse through my memory.
Then I utter:
"Time, by which we measure movement, is the source of divinity in the human spirit.
The understanding of continuity allows me to lift myself out of the physical hell that results from a mind confined to the present moment.
It allows me to imagine tomorrow and yesterday — for better or worse.
It allows me to have compassion for those I have not felt with my eyes.
O Father, O Mother, forever in an eternal dance of chaos and order,
and I, trapped in your belly between you two…
Time, by which we measure movement, is the source of divinity in the human spirit.
The understanding of continuity allows me to lift myself out of the physical hell that results from a mind confined to the present moment.
It allows me to imagine tomorrow and yesterday — for better or worse.
It allows me to have compassion for those I have not felt with my eyes.
O Father, O Mother, forever in an eternal dance of chaos and order,
and I, trapped in your belly between you two…"
"As above, so below. So within, so without."
Silence Echoes throughout the chamber as the scribes record my words , once …more
"Chiara D'Alessi," one of the elders says.
"Six years ago, you were told of this day. For six years, you were tasked with cultivating knowledge to bring to this Order... What fruit have you borne?"
I inhale, slowly. Then I begin.
"From the moment there was a spoken word," I say, my voice steady, "man declared war against his mother, Nature — tearing down her forests, uprooting her gardens, and ripping mountains and stone from the earth in an attempt to make her in his image. And now that he has conquered Nature, his hubris declares war against his father, the Spirit."
I glance up at them, just briefly.
"All in the name of Progress — a mistress who cares for no one except for the one married to her last. And many men have conjoined themselves with such a mistress. He constructs abominations to pacify himself, to reduce himself to the state of an infant with drugs like opium and hashish. And now that he has conquered his father, he sets his aims on himself."
A flicker of surprise passes through the chamber, but no one interrupts.
"Man creates cradles of stability to protect himself from his mother's whims. Through his understanding of continuity, he's able to develop a sense of permanence in relation to his environment."
I begin pacing slowly, my tone deepening.
"This is the will of man: to maintain the continuity — or rather, the establishment of boundaries. This is that. I am me. He is him. That animal is different from me. Because of this, he can create structures throughout time."
I stop walking, then look up again.
"But man betrays himself when he indulges in instant gratification. This is why it is seen as the ultimate vice — because it contradicts the very foundation upon which man realizes his will to power, to dominance over Nature."
"Continue," one of the figures states plainly.
I nod once and take a breath.
"I believe there is an objective morality," I say, "but rationality has suppressed it."
I look down, collecting my thoughts as I continue.
"I ask myself: what is an emotion? A push or pull toward an object. You ask yourself, 'Is this good for me?' But in humans, there is an inherent erosion of boundaries between themselves. We are our group, and they are their group. We are our beliefs, and we are what we do — and they are what they do. And so we ask ourselves, 'What is good for us?'"
I see a few of the scribes glance up from their parchment.
"Secondly," I go on, "looking at it like this — the emotional component is often labeled as subjective, but it is, in fact, a product of the pressure of natural selection — a very real phenomenon."
My voice rises, not with passion, but clarity.
"Emotions are instinctual attractions and repulsions with subcategories: love, hate, avarice, humility — the list goes on. While the emotional component may very well be subjective, the realm that precedes it — where everything must answer to functionality as the arbiter — is, by its very definition, objective."
I pause, making eye contact now.
"It is removed. Detached. Impartial through its unfairness. And in this sense, instinct is subject to Nature, and Nature is objective. All life has a desire to reproduce and to facilitate goodness for itself, and emotions arise from this drive — through Nature — as a mechanism of refinement."
Then I let the silence stretch for just a second before adding:
"If there is no push and pull, no attraction, the mind is not willed to move the body. And an inert body is a dead one."
One of the Templars leans forward.
"And what are the implications of this?" he asks.
I meet his gaze.
"Does the modern man realize," I ask, "that by partaking in the Tree of Knowledge — his rationalism, his objectivity — he has suppressed his limbic system, and thus the very thing that animates his vessel: his emotions, his instincts?"
I let the words hang.
"He has committed spiritual suicide."
The chamber shifts. The air gets heavier. But I'm not done.
"After spiritually castrating himself, he tries to lay with his women," I say, "but he is not endowed with the life force she craves. Such a tragedy."
A sharp breath comes from somewhere in the shadows.
"And the devil laughs — and I laugh next to him."
Still, no one interrupts. So I go deeper.
"He projects his own insecurities onto her nature, mentally masturbating with his theories on sexuality, and attempts to devalue the woman in an attempt to rectify his soul — to escape from what is necessary."
I glance to the scribes. Even they seem stunned now.
"They demonize sex. Lust. And as a result, walk around as incomplete men."
I take another breath and say what I know to be true.
"To be a man is to realize your potential. To realize yourself and the world. To reign in the chaos and establish order. To look at yourself and love yourself through the woman — within and without you."
I raise my voice slightly.
"The women without you become the women within you. In other words, to desire an image of yourself — and as a result, such desire moves you toward that image of the best you."
I soften then, just slightly.
"That is the nature of the feminine: the union of the objects, both concrete and abstract. It has many degrees and forms — love, lust, desire, attraction."
I speak slower now, as though baring something sacred.
"Men do not have an inherent attachment to life or this earth. They are married to the Father — the Spirit. Therefore, when a man marries me, he is not only marrying himself to me — laying with me — but he is conjoining his dopamine circuitry with the earth itself. Thus, he tethers his spirit to the world."
I take one final breath.
"And thus, when I marry a man, I marry myself to God — to Logos — thereby tethering my spirit to God."
A pause. Then:
One of them turns to the one beside him, and — for the first time — smiles. It breaks a sacred formality.
"Chiara D'Alessi," they say in unison, "we welcome you to the Order."
I start to rise, but the head Templar speaks before I can stand.
He waves off the scribes.
"Off the record..." he says, tone shifting.
He leans forward, almost whispering.
"Why did you… choose this knowledge? Of all the things in the cosmos?"
I don't hesitate. My voice softens, vulnerable but certain.
"I wanted to know if love was real," I say.
And I smile — softly.