Nightside 09 - Just Another Judgement Day

directly, and be pretty damned sure of an answer. St. Jude’s deals in truth, and justice, which is why most people have the good sense to steer clear of it.
    And only the truly desperate would ever use it for sanctuary.
    Which is why it really shouldn’t have surprised me to find one particular person already there, kneeling before the crude but functional altar, lit by the light of hundreds of candles. I knew him, and stopped just inside the doorway. Chandra stopped beside me, and looked dubiously at the old man in his torn and tattered robe.
    “That,” I said quietly, “is the Lord of Thorns. Once, and for a long time, the most powerful man in the Nightside. Overseer and Court of Last Resort, very powerful and very scary, he believed God had put him here to be the Nightside’s protector. Until Lilith came, and slapped him aside like he was nothing. He’s been trying to figure out his true role and purpose ever since. Be warned, Chandra. The Nightside does so love to break a hero.”
    “It hasn’t broken you,” said Chandra.
    “Exactly,” I said.
    Even though we’d been talking in low voices, the Lord of Thorns still heard us. He rose slowly and painfully to his feet, as though his many centuries of existence were finally catching up with him, and turned to face us with a certain wounded gravitas. He no longer had his staff of power, supposedly grown from a sliver off the original Tree of Life. Lilith broke it, when she broke him. I could remember when just his presence was enough to make me kneel to him, but he was just a man now. Someone had cut his Old Testament prophet’s hair and beard to more manageable proportions, and it looked like someone had been feeding him. People will adopt the strangest pets, in the Nightside.
    He came down the aisle to join us, taking his time, and I nodded respectfully.
    “Didn’t expect to see you still here,” I said.
    “I look after the church,” he said flatly. “Or it looks after me. It’s often hard to tell . . . I keep it clean, keep the candles lit . . . because someone has to, and I tell myself it’s all about learning patience and humility. I’m still waiting for an answer to my prayer, the question I put to God. If I’m not the Nightside’s Overseer, then what am I? What is my true nature and purpose?”
    “Isn’t that what every man would know of his god?” said Chandra.
    “Most people haven’t lived a lie for as many centuries as I have,” said the Lord of Thorns.
    “Have you regained any of your power?” I asked.
    “No,” said the Lord of Thorns, his voice quite matter-of-fact. “I’m just a man. I sometimes wonder if I’m supposed to work out the answer myself, before I can take up my old power and authority again. Right now I’d settle for a sign. Or even a hint.” He looked at me thoughtfully. “I could have returned to my old home, in the World Beneath. It has been largely rebuilt and repopulated, since the end of the Lilith War. But it wouldn’t feel right. It would feel too much like hiding. So here I stay, in the church named after the Patron Saint of Lost Causes. What are you doing here, John Taylor? Come to talk to God at last, and ask him what you’re supposed to be?”
    “I already know,” I said. “That’s my problem.”
    “A moment, please,” said Chandra. “Is this really a place where a man can speak directly with God? And get an answer? There are so many things I would dearly love to ask Him . . .”
    “This is the place,” said the Lord of Thorns. “Can’t you feel it?”
    “Yes . . .” said Chandra. “There are places such as this in India. Ancient and sacred places that feel like this . . . But I never considered myself worthy enough, holy enough, to approach them. But then, perhaps this is not a place to find my god.”
    “God is God,” said the Lord of Thorns. “You think he gives a damn what name we choose, just as long as we talk to him and listen for his answers? This is not a Christian place, though it currently uses Christian forms . . . It’s much older than that. This is the real thing, the pure pattern, just a man and his god, and nothing to separate them. Could anything be scarier?”
    Chandra looked at me. “You’ve been here before. Have you ever asked a question?”
    “No,” I said. “I’ve got more sense. The last thing any sensible man wants is God taking a keen interest in him. I have no wish to be given a quest, or a duty, or a destiny. I’m not a holy warrior, or