Category : Stories

Sub Category : Horror

Sanctus Oblivion (Forgotten Sanctuary)
For Devon the memories of going to his local church, in a rural town, with his mother were always fond moments.  He was a spiritual young boy who enjoyed the peace and tranquillity he felt as he entered the church hand in hand with his mother. At 6 years old he would beg his mother to go to church early with him every Sunday morning, so they could sit at his favourite seat, in his favourite aisle.  Devon’s father had died on his fifth birthday and the only hope that they could seek to find was with the church, prayer and faith in Heaven.  He was too young to know how hard his mother took the death of her husband. Nevertheless, Devon felt like he had lost something too, only he was able to be reconciled much faster than his mother. With sorrow in her heart, still she took her son to church every Sunday morning.  It was a ritual that Devon looked forward to immensely and a memory that would serve to bring him out of depression in his later life as a grown man.
 
They would walk to church and he knew every step and mis step the path would eventually lead to.  Hail, rain or shine they both sat at the back of the church every week.  The building was beautiful.  It was very tall and very elegantly decorated inside, for every different occasion.  With Christmas came beautiful wreaths, lights, candles and singing.  He especially loved the singing at Christmas time.  He valued all the time he had with his mother.  She was the most important woman in his life for a long time.  Only as Devon got older did he grasp the full understanding of his father’s passing.  There was no male role model for him to look up to.  A part of him was lost forever, not that he knew this right now.
His mother was warm, gentle and soft. She was respected and liked by her community.  She was very charitable and Christian in all sense of the word.  They never went without a meal and he never went without a hug.  This was all he wanted.  She worried about him constantly.  He never thought the Lord cruel for taking his father away from him. Still, he sang and enjoyed the experience he had in the church.  As his mother got older, she stopped taking him to church. At 10, this was a huge surprise for him to awake one morning to find his mother not dressed and ready for their journey to the place he loved best.  She couldn’t bring herself to go.  Devon sat on his mothers beside in silence, more in shock.  She told him she couldn’t go today but if he felt like it he could walk down the path to the church.  She told him to sit at the back, where they always sat and that he should pray extra hard today.  Devon had never ventured to the church without her.  She took his hand in hers and told him to stay close to the church folk that he knew and recognised and to come straight back. She looked outside and gazed at the darkening sky.  She handed Devon an umbrella.
With reluctance and a certain sadness, he wandered out of the house and down the road.  This morning it was raining.  It started out as a light drip-drip but soon lashed down onto the top of Devon’s umbrella and flowed down onto the ground.  Being Autumn, the leaves were turning a brown colour and falling from the trees, only to get trodden into the ground and buried beneath car tyres and footfall.  Devon thought this to be disheartening.  As he trudged down the path he didn’t see any life anywhere. Maybe he never even noticed the Autumnal death before, as he would always talk to his mother.  For the first time, he felt truly alone.  The sky above him felt black and as once the trees swayed peacefully to the sound of bird chorus they now were violently hit by lashings of rain.  The life force around him seemed to be choking the trees of all life. No small animals to be found around him, they all had probably run away and hid somewhere.  The view of the church was in the distance.  He could see the doors open but no one was around.  Maybe it was the rain, maybe it was the dark sky, maybe it was because he was alone, but he felt afraid.  Truly afraid for the first time in his life.  This fear was as if someone was right behind him.  Someone that he didn’t know and didn’t like.  His pace quickened.  He was close to the church door now.  The graveyard in front looked like it had been ruined by time.  He never even noticed how the gravestones were rotting, broken and some had collapsed entirely.  The people who were dead beneath the ground must be sad because no one paid attention to where they were buried.  The wind got colder and a sudden chill in the air sent electricity up his spine. As he passed the gravestones there was a vile stench in the air.  Either a rotting body or someone’s vomit had putrefied the air and left the atmosphere around the church very heavy.  He reached the church doors, finally.  The wind blew a whistle into the church as he opened the main doors into the hall where everyone was supposed to be gathered.  No one was there.  There were no seats.  It was just an empty church.  One of the windows down the back was broken and the alter was broken in half.  The ground beneath him began to rumble every few seconds.  He saw a dark figure in black come out from behind the alter.  The rumble of thunder shook the church to its foundations. Devon was frozen to the spot.