{"id":202,"date":"2012-08-30T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-08-30T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/9dc3bac9-ad0c-4b7d-b483-9c193878426c"},"modified":"2012-08-30T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-08-30T05:00:00","slug":"the-holy-man-and-his-shadow-a-story-of-redemption-in-three-parts-part-two-the-rapture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/?p=202","title":{"rendered":"The Holy Man and His Shadow, A Story of Redemption in Three Parts, Part Two: The Rapture"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Holy Man and His Shadow<\/span><\/p>\n

A Story of Redemption in Three Parts<\/span><\/p>\n

Part Two: The Rapture<\/span><\/p>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

That night,
\nthe holy man knelt alone on the hill top bound in his own shadow and in the
\nshadow of the holy book.  As the darkness
\naround him deepened, he began to hear noises; hooves clicking among the rocks;
\nheavy padded feet crushing the grass, wings fluttering like wind-tossed drapes;
\ndeep, guttural growls and puffed breath from enormous lungs; grunts, shrieks,
\nand even whispers.  He trembled and fell
\nto his side, arms bound behind him, eyes slammed shut.  And then he heard the sounds of roots lifting
\nfrom the ground and entire trees shuffling towards him.  The night itself seemed to yawn and roar, breaking
\naway from some ancient hinges; circling around him like a monster.  An ink colored river flowed towards him and
\nsoon surrounded him, lifting him ever so slightly from the ground.  He shook with panic, mumbling prayers and
\ncurses.  The gathered beasts and animals
\nsplashed in the river that now was carrying him down the hillside into the
\nvalley below.  Many times he rolled in
\nthe river, going face down into the black water thinking for sure he would
\ndrown, but at the last moment he would turn face up, gasp for air and then
\nscream as the river bore him faster and faster. 
\nThe beasts and creatures of the night ran through the river behind him,
\ngrowling and shouting with savage fury. 
\nBats and ravens clawed at him as he floated on the river.  Dark horses with flaring nostrils and flaming
\neyes trampled towards him.  He screamed
\nin terror as he saw trees running through the liquid-obsidian river towards him
\nwaving their branches as if caught in a storm. Voices from the blackness washed
\ninto his ears and tickled his mind with maddening sensations.  <\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

At last the
\nriver spilled him into a lake.  He
\ndescended down into the water, deeper and deeper, feeling his lungs about to
\nexplode.  He screamed a silent scream as
\nhe saw huge shapes swimming near him, some buffeting him and brushing him with enormous,
\nrough fins and tales.  Giant crabs and lobsters
\nsnapped at him with claws as big as sharks. 
\nAnd as he began to lose consciousness, the last thing he remembered
\nseeing before the end was a soft, blue light moving towards him like the dawn.<\/o:p><\/span><\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

Copyright Joseph Anthony of the Wonder Child Blog<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Holy Man and His Shadow A Story of Redemption in Three Parts Part Two: The Rapture That night, the holy man knelt alone on the hill top bound in his own shadow and in the shadow of the holy book.  As the darkness around him deepened, he began to hear noises; hooves clicking among […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thewonderchildblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}