Page 6 of Devil's Advocate
“Well, tonight it’ll make a few new ones.”She stretched her arms over her head, a gleam in her eyes.“And if we’re lucky, maybe that Jimmy guy will bring a few cute friends from campus.”
I chuckled.“You’re hopeless.”
* * *
We were already in motion when the room took its first breath.
Candles ran the length of the old drag stage.The velvet curtains drank in the golden light and gave it back dusky and red.The room held a sea of faces—some soft with wonder, some hard with defiance, all of them turned toward me like I might say something that would loosen a knot they’d been carrying for years.
I loved big rooms.I loved the charge that moved through a crowd right before a first kiss, a first truth, a first anything.It made my skin sing.
“Welcome,” I said, voice warm and low.“To those who are new—this isn’t a place to worship monsters.We don’t do monsters here.We do responsibility, consent, and choice.”Sarah’s eyebrows did a quick, satisfied little bounce.She loved when I hit the cadence just right.“Tonight is for anyone who needs a ritual to name the thing they’re becoming.”
A murmur moved through the room.The Chapel of Reason wasn’t a church like they were used to.It was more like a mirror.
I raised my right hand, palm open.“As is tradition, we begin with words that remind us of what we are not.”I let a smile tilt the corner of my mouth.“Not bowed, and not afraid.”
There was a hush.I gave them the invocation—measured, not chanted, letting each idea land: standing “unbowed and unfettered,” eating of knowledge rather than clinging to comforting delusions, judging people by actions instead of arbitrary norms, holding fast to what can be shown to be true.Refusing authority that violates sovereignty, and that sharp little blade: that what can’t bend must break, and what truth can destroy should not be spared.I closed with the customary seal, simple and clean.“It is done.”Then after a beat—“Hail Satan.”
“Hail Satan,” voices answered, some tentative, some hungry.
The lights dimmed, and the candles flared.
“Tonight we’re doing an affirmation,” I said.“No one’s obligated to participate.If you want to stay and simply witness, you’re welcome.If you want to step forward, you’ll have a choice of short vows.All consent, and no pressure.”
Sarah moved through the aisle like a red-haired comet, piercings winking as she handed small black cards down each row—two or three options of vows we’d written with the congregation: one for reclaiming bodily autonomy, one for breaking with old dogma, one for pledging compassion joined to reason.
“Begin,” I said, and they came forward in small groups, hesitant at first, like stepping into cold water.
The first was a woman in her fifties.Silver streaked through her dark hair, pulled back in a clip that trembled as much as her hands.She wore a cardigan the color of storm clouds and eyes that looked older than her face.She approached the stage clutching the small black vow card to her chest, lips moving silently over the words she’d already read a dozen times.
Sarah met her halfway down the aisle.“You’re all right,” she whispered, touching the woman’s wrist.
The woman nodded but didn’t speak.Her eyes lifted to me.Then, voice shaking, she read aloud:
“I claim ownership of myself.My body is not a sin, my thoughts not a trespass.”
Her voice cracked halfway through, but she didn’t stop.A single tear slipped down her cheek and fell onto the card, smudging the ink.
Sarah caught her hands, steadying them.They held on to each other for a heartbeat, two women bound by something deeper than language, until the older woman drew in a shaky breath and smiled.She stepped back into the crowd, and a few moments later came a boy who couldn’t have been more than twenty.
Skinny, pale, with a black hoodie pulled up like armor.His sneakers squeaked against the old floor.When he looked up, I saw the faint bruising of exhaustion under his eyes — the kind that doesn’t come from sleepless nights, but from living in fear for too long.
He didn’t climb onto the stage right away.He lingered at the steps, fingers flexing as if deciding whether to stay or run.
Sarah reached down, offering him a hand.“It’s okay,” she whispered.
He took it, came up beside me, and I could sense his fear.He lifted the vow card close to his chest and read in a whisper only those nearest could hear:
“I reject the guilt I did not earn.I am the sovereign of my own mind.I will not fear a god made of other people’s anger.”
The last line faltered.His mouth stayed open, as if he couldn’t quite believe he’d said it out loud.
Applause broke out in the back of the room — spontaneous, gentle.Someone said, “Hail compassion,” and the crowd murmured it back.
The boy gave a quick, wet laugh — part sob, part disbelief — then rubbed his sleeve across his eyes.
“You’re doing fine,” I told him quietly.
