I stood to the side, a column malachite and obsidian at my back. A daily hour of observation served as both my job and duties to my faith. 

People came up, a line that always wove out the door, its completion temporary at best. A coin would drop into the golden orb with a slot, they would write their name in the book, and step forward into the chamber beyond. Some would exit with smiles and serenity while others emerged shaken and pale. No two the same. 

I was grateful my position no longer required me to stand by the doorway. Too many had sunk to their knees, in subjugation and thanks, sometimes in pleas for what they were given to not be the truth. I had no taste for it either way. 

Those that rushed ahead of others, coins in hand, eager to give what was required for an audience, however momentary, would find their coin immediately vended back to them. Their gift, the payment due, rejected. Those were the noisy days. 

I pushed away from the column and walked towards the podium stand, the golden ball with the coin slot at the top. The entry-way had closed for the day, only the last stragglers would be given the chance to appeal. I watched as a man came up and signed the book but offered no coin to the orb. I met his eyes for a moment, my gaze then dipping to the book of names scrawled in a multitude of handwriting, “S’iam, good sir, you must offer coinage to be seen.”

No movement was made and my gaze lifted again. 

“S’iam, good Lord, but I refuse. A deity of worth has more use for faith than for that of coin. We pay but no miracles happen.”

I paused, scrutinizing his face, noting his expression never changed - solemn. Sure. He’d come knowing he never intended to offer anything. I reached forward and took the quill from its stand and scratched the man’s name out, striking the curves of the letters from the page. The woman beside him gasped and began to pray rapidly in whispers.

“Faith is for the faithful. Exchanges are made in the name of faith. If you wish to receive without a gift, time will be your balance to pay. Wait until called.”

I watched as he stepped aside, the two behind him, the woman first, quickly filling his place, dropping a coin in with a clink, scribbling her name, and following another behind the deep emerald and black curtain. Both came and went, less silent upon arrival than departure. 

My duties continued, the hourglass turning seven more times before I returned to the waiting man, the grand room now empty of all but myself, him, and the opulence built into the very architecture, “Have you attended before?”

The man looked up, his cheeks worn, eyes deepened not by age but by wariness, “When I was a boy, my father came. He brought me with him and I waited until he returned. He was smiling. I thought good fortune had been told would come. That was the day he murdered my mother and baby sister.”

It took all of my resolve to not visibly react to the story. My mouth remained straight, but inside, I wondered what could make a man wait years to return if he linked a place of faith to the decimation of his family, “And now?”

“I need to know who, or what, lit the spark for my mother’s funeral pyre while she still breathed and nursed.”

This man could take tonight either way. Revelations often came in heart-shaped boxes that still cut like a blade. I crooked one finger as I turned, gesturing for him to follow me at pace. Pushing the curtain aside, darkness enveloped where candles dared not echo from the main chamber, blue light pulsing at the far end made the hallway more akin to a tunnel that never saw the light of day. 

We drew closer, the light’s steady pulsing softened — recognition of a familiar presence returning home. I smiled; this was always the reaction. Composing myself once more, though my features could not be seen in the darkness, I turned to the man, “What do you see?”

There was a pause, stillness in the air, two hearts beating, but each only heard their own, “A golden light, but I do not understand the source.”

I moved away from him, trailing my fingers over stone wall, counting the indentations between bricks until I felt the sconce and the long matches that were stored in it, the torch unlit beside it. I lifted one match, pinching the wood a couple inches from the end before striking it against the wall, a flame bursting to life, “Did your father ever say what he saw?”

My eyes adjusted quickly but the other man shielded his as they contracted to limit the new light.

“No,” A pause from the man, “Where did the golden light go?”

“What golden light?”

“The light — it was like a candleflame. It was here, but now gone.”

“For me, the light is blue.”

Incredulation slipped into his cords, “Blue…?”

“There is no light, you see. Not really. Acknowledgment and faith come from within, not from outside one’s self. You will see what you believe, hear what you believe, and in the darkness of the hollow chamber, senses deprived until you seek, you will advise yourself.”

“There’s nothing here?”

“I never said that.” In the dim light of the torch welded to the wall, I drew closer to him once more, stopping short, “If I were a man of faith, and I am, I will be kind and offer a coin of truth for your empty hand - your father found himself. A man left to hear what he wanted to hear from the source of authority he thought he needed to hear. His faith approved his thoughts and he acted on them. That is what is found here. The realization that if you believe something enough to act on it, you will make it truth.”

I watched him shatter. As the moments ticked by, recognition warred with pain in eyes so dark, the torch could only echo in the sheen as tears filled his lashline and then spilled in tender rivulets down his cheeks. His knees hit the onyx floor first, his hands following after.

The hardship of those unwilling to pay for the chamber was to have the illusionment of faith confirmed or broken. It was up to the faithful to determine what they walked out still possessing.