Chapter 196 — The First Church
Blade of Dawn · Page 1 of 3
The territory had gained a mysterious new guest, but for most people this was merely a bit of idle gossip to chew over after a meal; in truth it swayed the common folk far less than the news that a new house had gone up in some district or other—especially now, when so many had their eyes fixed on a new building on the east side of Knight Street.
The first church in the Cecil Territory was finally about to be built.
The priest Wright had spent over two months before he finally passed the lord's assessment, obtained permission to preach on Cecil soil, and was granted a plot of land along with the materials and manpower needed to build a church. The reverend gentleman was plainly overjoyed at this; he immediately threw himself into the work with tremendous zeal and efficiency, raising the little church from the ground at an astonishing speed—though this had something to do with his two months of hauling bricks about the territory, which had left him rather deft at the trade.
The newly completed little church looked plain from the outside. It had all the spires, turrets, and prayer halls that a Church of the Shining Stars required, but everything was built for practicality and sufficiency, with none of that lavish air of gold-leaf and silver inlay plastered over the walls that the churches of the central regions displayed. Even so, it was still a fine new house by any measure: with the small square before it and the neat rows of brick-and-tile houses of Knight Street behind it, the territory's first block worthy of the name "modern town" was at last beginning to take shape.
And before the church formally opened its doors, the lord arranged a small "inauguration ceremony" especially for it.
To the territory's inhabitants this was a rather curious formality—the great man of the territory appearing in person to organize an event for the opening of a building was a rare thing in the past.
Elsewhere, the appearance of a new facility never came with any specific, solemn rite. Usually there were only crude customs folk had agreed upon over the years: before a craftsman's shop opened, a clay jar full of ale would be smashed at the door—partly to celebrate, but really to use the aroma of the ale as advertisement, so people would know a new shop had opened here; when a new church of some faith was completed, the priests and clerics within would organize religious activities of their own, with the priest preaching at the door and handing out wheat cakes and the like; and when princes and nobles opened a horse yard or a theater, there might indeed be some celebration—but those were dances and wine parties for the upper crust, having nothing at all to do with the common folk.
The ceremony Gao Yang had arranged, called "cutting the ribbon," struck people as novel and utterly baffling.
But the common folk of this age did not ponder deeply on matters that seemed to have nothing to do with their own lives. The lord's arrangements were right, whatever they were; and besides, for them, any fresh happening in the territory was reason enough for joy—especially when it was a church that would make life more convenient.
A great crowd had gathered in the small square before the church, gazing curiously at the still-closed doors and at the lord and his party standing before them: Gao Yang, Heidi, and Rebecca were there, with the unmistakably conspicuous Mr. Wright the priest beside them, and beyond them a few soldiers charged with keeping order.
To suit the popular taste and customs of this world—and, more importantly, to produce a stronger "symbolic meaning"—Gao Yang had redesigned the whole so-called "ribbon-cutting" procedure. He had ordered colorful knotted cords tied across the church doors, and a rope barrier set up on the steps leading to the entrance, to signify that the building was still sealed off. Only when the sun reached its highest point did he appear, to open the church in his capacity as lord.