Rose was in the doghouse again...literally.

It wasn't her first time, but she sincerely hoped it would be her last because it had become very uncomfortable since her growth spurt. The doghouse had been built for the commune's one-time dog. The commune's women, who Rose referred to as her Aunties, were known for spontaneous adoptions of various kinds (she had been one of them).  Wanting to try out something called "community service," several Aunties decided to volunteer at a shelter for animals when Rose was ten.  This turned out to be an entrepreneurial hoarder, and "in the animal's best interest" came home with a dog.  The next day they all built their new dog (unnamed as of yet due to multiple arguments and one fist fight) a doghouse in the central courtyard of their compound. The day after that the dog ran away. This was, more than likely, truly in the dog's best interest. 

The doghouse had a variety of uses, but primarily it was used for punishing the children. This meant Rose since she was usually the one causing trouble. She tried to remember why she'd been sent this time. It might have been because she fell asleep while Auntie Francis was droning about the salvation found in the worship of D'Lorde (only attainable after death).  It might have been for punching her cousin Peter when he pinched her to wake her up (she hadn't meant to - it was an involuntary reaction). Or, it might stem from Auntie Francis' chair magically moving out of the way when she tried to sit back down, causing her heels to fly over her head and expose her drawers to the class. If there was a strange occurrence, it was usually blamed on Rose.  She didn't know why, and she was too hot to ponder the reasons.

"Rose? RO-OOOOOOSE!"

"Here," she tried to say, but she was doubled up over her knees.

"ROSE!" Auntie Janette was getting miffed so Rose attempted leaving the doghouse without permission rather than get her angry.

Unfortunately, she was stuck. Her legs were definitely asleep, and her dress was soaked with sweat to the point where it had congealed with the sides of the doghouse. The vomit-inducing stench of teenage bodies being repeatedly hot-boxed as a punishment had seeped into the wood. The result was she was immobile, it was becoming tough to breathe, and oh god she was hot!

"ROSE YOU BETTER GET YOUR BUTT OUT HERE THIS INSTANT!"

A whooshing sound exploded around Rose, and Auntie Janette screeched.  Someone ran toward her yelling, "Get the buckets!" And Rose found herself suddenly drenched with icy-cold water and there was a loud sizzling sound.  It turned out the sizzling was coming from her.

Slowly Rose stood up and rubbed her legs, which both hurt and itched as the blood came back to them, and looked around the courtyard.  Then she looked down at where she stood.  All that remained of the doghouse was a pile of wet ash and steam rising from the ground.  Miraculously her clothes and hair survived the apparent spontaneous combustion.  The whole commune had run to the screeches of Auntie Janette, and they now circled Rose, mouths agape. Rose was beginning to feel self-conscious.

"Rose, are you hurt? What happened?" These questions from Auntie Janette seemed to break the spell and suddenly there was a rush of concern and confusion from the others.

Thankfully, Rose was not hurt, other than her legs still being a bit cramped. She had no idea what had happened. First, she was boiling in the doghouse and next it was a pile of ashes.  A small voice inside her said if she really wanted to know what happened she only needed to look a little deeper within herself, but she was frightened of that voice - it reminded her of screaming and pain - and had little desire to know the truth.*

After a lot of questioning and no small amount of prayer, their leader, Oren, proclaimed that it was clearly the work of D'Lorde, who wanted a miracle to be witnessed. Obviously, Rose's escape without harm was both a warning to them and a showing of true mercy. D'Lorde wanted them all to know he was with them and could destroy or save any of them at any moment.

In some ways, Oren was right about it being the work of D'Lorde. It was probably the closest he'd ever come to speaking the truth to his people, and it was completely by accident. What Oren didn't know - what none of the commune knew - was Rose was the daughter of The Dark Lord, known by their cult as D'Lorde (they believed - or assumed - he was the one true God), whose book was found by Oren in the ruins of the ancient castle where it lay hidden for seven centuries, awaiting the right moment to reappear.

The Book of D'Lorde sensed Rose's presence as she entered the current era with Gerald, and recognized an unprecedented opportunity.

Oren was a traveling salesman, and was failing at it (which is typical for most at the bottom of multilevel marketing schemes**).  In desperate need of a career change and lacking any of the moral scruples or real intelligence which would have led him to leave such a book where he found it, The Book of D'Lorde sensed his vulnerability and miraculously appeared at his time of greatest need.

Indeed the verbiage in the book was quite compelling and would have made a politician proclaiming funding to arms dealers was a form of "protection for victims' rights," chuckle in appreciation.  At once Oren realized this was his chance to create his own pyramid scheme in the form of a religious cult, whereas the leader, he would reap all the rewards rather than going into debt like he was currently.

Unfortunately, cults were all the rage and the market was becoming quite saturated. As he wandered from place to place, trying (and failing) to sell his goods (overpriced and poorly made washing tub cranks), he came upon a solution in the form of a small, and rather poor looking commune.

It was on the outskirts of the small town nestled at the foot of the castle ruins.  The town already had three surrounding cults, but the commune was a new thing. It was made up of people who had tried to join the other cults but were considered too poor or apathetic to let in, and so in retaliation, had banded together to form an anarcho-syndicate commune. 

When Oren asked why they chose that type of commune, since they clearly didn't know what anarcho-syndicalism was (nor could they pronounce it), they told him the other cults were getting a bad reputation (they weren't), and an anarcho-syndicate commune sounded impressive and less, well, "cult-y" (it didn't). Versed in recognizing both gullibility and branding opportunities, Oren diagnosed them as ripe for a leader who promised belonging, salvation, and a rich afterlife. He offered himself and his newly found Book of D'Lorde as the answer to their woes and was duly rewarded with his very own flock of sheep.***

The commune had made a good go at converting people to D'Lorde, since most of the passages in The Book sounded as if they were preaching love and peace in a very roundabout and sometimes not so loving and peaceful way. Any discrepancy could easily be explained away by metaphors not being understood correctly, as is often the case (they're tricky bastards).

They grew steadily and were efficient and frugal with their earnings, as well as somewhat enterprising in their money-making schemes. In bouts of spontaneous compassion, they adopted several children of varying ages, usually when Oren was out of town on a secret mission for D'Lorde, and Rose was among them. Oren disliked children and had no intention of ever fathering his own - unlike one of the neighboring communes where having children was a requirement.  However, he did recognize their evangelistic possibilities, so he allowed them to stay, and generally avoided them.

Until the day Rose set the doghouse on fire.

That night, as Oren was perusing The Book Of D'Lorde, he came across a passage he hadn't seen before.**** The passage spoke of several miracles which would illuminate the Child of D'Lorde.  The child would come into their birthright on the night of the Harvest moon when the planets aligned such that Justice's scales were tipped, and commence the Day of Judgement. The passage read thus:

When planets tip the starry scales
And the mother's face is shown
Then shall His child, lost in time
Ascend the fiery Throne.

Incineration of the home
Shall be their calling sign,
Fire shall ne'er rent the skin
Of D'Lorde's bloodline.

Where they go, there, death shall follow
Till they take their seat
Pronouncing judgement, blessings or beets
At their Father's feet. *****

True believers would, of course, be immediately taken to the afterlife where they would live like kings.  Non-believers would be treated to an eternity of daytime-TV soap operas, and force-fed canned beets. Oren actually read this passage twice to make sure there hadn't been a typo.  He had assumed eternal cane beatings, not canned beets, but on second thought he realized that an eternity of canned beets would be worse.

This was a problem for Oren. 

He was a non-believer.  And he despised canned beets (doesn't everybody?).  He couldn't have this child ruining everything he had worked hard - or rather his followers had worked hard - to build.  This had to be stopped.  He was pretty sure Rose's display in the courtyard counted as an "incineration of the home," and from what he knew of her history, it wasn't her first. He needed to get to the bottom of this, and so went in search of whatever he could find about the girl they had adopted, and if The Book had any ways of confirming the truth about who she was.

At that moment, only one person actually knew the truth about Rose, and he was getting drunk at a brothel several towns away, pretty confident he had escaped worse fate from the one he was currently living, but not completely convinced. Of course, Fate is...Fate... and cannot be so easily escaped by jumping several centuries into the future. Gerald didn't know it, but fate had found him and Rose once again, and this time it was determined that his great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-uncle twice removed's prophecy was finally going to be fulfilled.******

__________________________

Next time on The Dark Heir...
Fate catches up to Gerald.
Gerald complains a lot.
Gerald gives up drinking and accepts his fate.
_________________________

*
This may have something to do with growing up in a cult.  They tend to encourage neither inquisitiveness nor introspection.

**
MLMs - or direct sales - are really another term for pyramid schemes, but in the real world because of a case where AMWAY won against the FTC because the DeVos family was personal friends with President Ford, they have been allowed to skate by not classified as pyramid schemes, even though that's exactly what they are.

***
Both literal and figurative - The commune was raising sheep on the surrounding lands.

****
This is often the case with magical books.

*****
This is actually plagiarized from The Prophecies of Geraldo The Foreshadower, but The Book was on short notice.  It takes time to figure out original prophecy-sounding verbiage.  At least a day's notice.

******
Geraldo The Foreshadower didn't put timelines on any of his prophesies, so by the time the earth was good and truly destroyed approximately 1,404,475,573 later, his accuracy rate had jumped to an astonishing 79%.