A/N: This is an idea I've had in my head for a long time, inspired by a particularly creepy daydream. I'm up to two parts, but would really like to know if it's a story worth continuing. A quick note of your opinion would be of great help. Enjoy!

Sine Qua Non- Without Which, Nothing.

I sit with my hands clasped in front of me. The harsh wood is familiar and my back arches automatically. Chin high, nose down, eyes wide, like my father taught me. This is the way that the pious sit, and if we are to live, we must live as they do.

We have been waiting for a long time. The priests are models of solemnity, though the same is not true for their charges. I can see heads bent with whispering and knees kicking beneath chairs. There are children as young as eleven years here.

I am sixteen years. There are many like me, maybe older. If we had not been set on this path we would be thinking thoughts of marriage and children by now. The girl next to me is beautiful. Even now I see heads turned in her direction in the boy's row. We sit separated, and this will be the last time I see boys my age. I look at their scruffy faces and have trouble feeling regret for this ghost future.

"We had better be properly accommodated," says the beautiful girl.

She tosses her hair when she says this, as if in disdain.

I am not sure if she is speaking to me. I make a noncommittal noise.

"Of course, that's just my anxiety talking," she says with a chiming laugh. "It's not as though we're orphans or anything. My father is Argosthenes!"

She turns to look at me. She is clearly looking for a reaction. I nod.

"He will be bereft without me, but the call was a great honor. I shall be the seventh in ten generations of my family."

I nod again.

She looks at me for the first time. Her blue eyes are sharp, like hard rocks.

"Are you mute?"

"No," I answer, taken aback.

She smiles and the sharpness is gone, washed away.

"Then what is your name? You mustn't let me chatter on!" she says with another little laugh.

"My name is Osanna," I reply.

"And I am Cassia. We shall be friends," she declares, taking my hand. "Now, tell me about you. Are you foreign?"

I am not surprised by the question. My dark hair is incongruent with the tawny heads around me.

"My mother was," I answer readily. I wouldn't mind having a friend in this strange place, and I feel somewhat honored that she has chosen me.

She purses her lips.

"How odd! They don't usually call upon foreign blood. Your father must be important…?"

I want to ask her how she knows that, but she has such an air of assurance that I'm sure I would just sound petulant. I don't really want to answer, but those hard blue eyes are fixed upon my face.

"He was a clergyman."

Cassia frowns and prepares to ask another question, but a priest is moving towards us and looking disapproving. She closes her mouth, but not without shooting him a defiant stare, as though she is a queen rather than a Chosen.

We sit in silence. I am hungry. The soup they gave us had a full skin on top. I want warm bread like my aunt used to make it. Instead I only have the crackers I saved, tucked into my long sleeves. I place one in my mouth now when the priest looks away. It is very stale.

What they saved on food, they have clearly spent on adorning us. My robes are golden, trimmed in purple. They shine, catching the light. The priests are dressed in sterile black, but the walls are golden and ornate. This, they say, is the temple of the Gods. We sit within their atrium. Surely this glory is unequaled. I have not felt much since leaving home, but I feel a little thrill now. I will be venturing into rooms seen by no one but the Chosen and the Blessed. This is a great privilege, they have told us.

Cassia still grasps my hand. The priest has moved on, and she looks at me once more, the hardness returned to her eyes.

"I've never had a real friend, you know, not even a sister."

I nod. She looks at me still, a false smile on her lips and a question in her eyes. I return her smile, conspiratorially.

"Me neither," I admit. I lived alone with my father, but my mother had long passed away. It is strange we are confessing these things to one another, but we do not know what we will be, who we will be hours from now. This may be our last opportunity to make these confessions before we transcend all. This they have not told us, but there is an atmosphere of it in the room.

"I think I'll miss my father, and my brothers," she thinks aloud. "They doted upon me."

I think back to my own father, wizened by years of bending over ancient scrolls. He still had a vitality though, and a rebellious spirit. This was odd in a man of the clergy. Practically a contradiction. He himself could never resolve it. In bringing me up, he would often sit back with a look of bewilderment on his face, as though I had only just made him realize what paradox his life was.

I remember the day when they came to take me away to this temple. It was only a week ago. I remember the anguish and fury on his face, yet another puzzle. Being Chosen was an honor. He should have been proud, grateful even. I did not, and still do not know what to feel about this.

And that, more than anything, was what drew me to Cassia. She clearly believed with every fiber of her being that this was the only possible way, and an honor at that. That assured me.

I watch the nearest priest receive a message from a boy in black. Is this the beginning?

The priest in turn delivers the message to another. This recipient pulls his sleeve up and reaches for the soft mallet that hangs from a Persian gong. The ring resonates in the small room like a thunder strike. Everyone is quiet as the waves recede into silence. Someone coughs.

I wait to see if there will be another speech, more pretty words. Instead the doors that dominate the East wall swing open, and we all look out into a cavernous hall. It is a thing of beauty, polished to the point of bedazzlement. Figures and scene, painstakingly carved, cover ever visible area. Marble floors glisten as if moist. I know that the seemingly endless walls are finite, ending with open balconies where onlookers will see us off on our journey into the depths of the temple. We have been told all of this.

The priest who delivered the message places his hand on a boy's shoulder. The boy is disheveled and nervous-looking, like some rodent. He jumps when he feels the hand. The priest speaks to him in a voice too quiet for me to hear, then waves incense about his figure, murmuring in somber tones. The boy stands and lowers his head, then walks through the archway into the unknown.

Things proceed quickly from thereon. One by one, moving from the archway, each figure stands and disappears into the hall. The priest places his hand on each, and I remember the plague games I used to play with my cousin. One touch, you've got it, you're dead.

I am a morbid one, father always told me that. I am also inquisitive while being reserved, and impartial. I have the perfect temperament for a scholar. Only, father wasn't very reserved. He had passions, like my Parthian mother. I wonder if they look for a certain temperament in finding their Chosen. Perhaps I am predisposed to easier contact and control. We shall see.

One by one, they disappear through the arch. Their shadows trail behind them, made long by the candlelight. Cassia's nails scratch the back of my hand as she waits, looking eager.

I have no conception of time in this part of the temple, which is unmarred by windows, or indeed, any contact with the outside world My only measurement of time is the number of heads that grace the chairs to my sides. They dwindle, and like a wick growing short, the priest draws closer to me. Finally he comes to Cassia, who has turned the back of my hand pink from her one sign of nervousness. She rises before his hand touches her, gracefully.

Some time later, when I have dozed into only a half waking state, the priest returns for me. I feel his hand on my shoulder before I see him, but I look up into his unreadable face. I stand, my legs twinging with lack of circulation, and follow his brisk steps through the archway.

My breath echoes in my ears it is so silent here. When the priest stops, I nearly walk into his back. He motions without the faintest trace of emotion, and I move forward, past him, and into the enveloping torchlight.