Blood Memory #04: The Iron Gates

Chapter one, Chaplain England.

They sent me to Tracy, DVI.

At that time, it was known as Gladiator School.

So I went to DVI and I got a job as the chaplain's clerk, which was a blessing.

How I got the job with him is he wanted his library refurbished.

And, you know, the bookshelves and murals on the wall and all that.

So I went in and I did that for him.

One day we had taken all the books off the shelves and put them in boxes and we had them stacked so now we were bringing the boxes back in and we were, I was handing him stacks of books as he was putting them on the shelf.

And he came to this one book, and he said, oh, this is one of my favorite books.

He said, I just love this book, this one particular passage.

And he flipped to it, and he said, here, read this.

This is just amazing.

And so I took the book from him, and I looked at it, and I said, yeah, that's pretty cool.

And he kind of looked at me like that, and he says, can you read? And I said, no, sir, I can't.

And he said, would you like to learn? I said, sure.

I had an agreement with Chaplain England.

Back then you weren't allowed to practice your ways, it was against the law.

And he was sensitive to that, being a man of the cloth.

The agreement was I would take care of the chapels, Catholic chapel and then Protestant chapel, and in between that was a garden, the same size as the chapels.

And he would give me the garden to practice my ways.

I went out and I built myself a prayer mound and a medicine wheel.

And I would go out and I would dance and sing and have ceremony in the garden.

And then I would come in and I would clean the chapels and have reading lessons.

Chapter