Chapter 19:

"He's stronger," Braith said.  "I can feel him.  The God is strengthened by the four hundred boys we cut today, strengthened all the more, since they were nobly born."

Dylan was exhausted.  He'd cut over forty boys, himself, that day.  Islwyn had just been the first. 

He didn't know yet how many would accept his leadership, but he thought that more would now they'd been cut. 

What other option -- other than death -- did they have?  Most of their parents had been executed, their sisters sold into slavery; and without balls, they were no longer nobles. 

Without balls they were no better than any of the boys who had been born slave.

Dylan, knew what their balls meant to the boys and had regretted having to castrate them.  As Emrys, he would have rather died than lose his balls. 

It was different now, though.  They weren't losing their balls, they were giving them to the God, who was already gaining strength from their sacrifice.  That's difficult to explain, though, to a boy from whom you've just taken his cock and balls.

The other boys doing the castrations, Urien especially, had enjoyed castrating the nobles. 

With that one cut, the nobles had been brought down to their level.  They were all -- former nobles and slaves -- every last one of them -- cock-less and ball-less.  Not one of them could fuck. 

They had to spend the night at the castle.  The newly cut boys were unable to walk, much less to travel. 

Actually, Dylan thought they probably have to kill them all.  They couldn't leave them behind for them to fall into Cadell's hands. 

Even though they were no longer suitable sacrifices, they would likely suffer a worse fate than having their throats slit.  At least, their cocks and balls had been dedicated to the God.  They were part of the hundred fory-four thousand.  Once he was restored, the God would look favorably on them.

On the morrow, they would have to leave.  Heddwynn and the wizard would be returning with the army.  At least, it was two days ride to Dolbadarn.  The army wouldn't arrive until the next evening, even if they traveled all night.

Dylan and Braith spent the night in the prince's rooms.  Actually, neither of them had been there as Dylan and Braith. 

Dylan had always been Emrys, and Braith had always been the beautiful jilly boy, one they'd never bothered to name. 

Tonight was different from those other nights in another way.  Those other people had spent the night fucking.  Dylan, like the other boys, couldn't fuck.  They cuddled instead, falling to sleep in each other's arms.

The next morning, when Dylan inspected the cut boys, he realized that none of them would be able to walk -- certainly wouldn't be able to keep up with a fleeing army. 

They would have to kill them.  He could see no other alternative.  They weren't well enough to travel, and he couldn't leave them behind alive. 

He didn't like to make such a decision.  As Emrys, he had once been one of them and was, to some extent related to all of them by blood.  They were all the God's children.

He was giving the order to kill them to Pedr when Braith walked up.  "You're going to kill them all?" she said, a horrified look on her face.  Megan, too, had known many of them.

"I have no choice," said Dylan.  "They can't travel, and we can't wait for them to heal."

"I can heal them," said Braith.  The God is much stronger in me today, since the boys were cut.  I'm certain I can heal them, but first, let me heal your scar."

"No," said Dylan.  "It stays as it is.  It's a symbol of my sacrifice.  It's the great seal of my sacrifice to the God. You may heal all the cut boys so they can walk, but don't take away all their pain and don't take away their scars.  The scars are a badge of honor.  They're evidence of our sacrifice to the God."

"Isn't that you no longer have a cock and balls enough evidence of your sacrifice?" said Braith.  He'd missed Dylan's cock the night before, the first night they'd slept together since Dylan had cut himself. 

"At least let me heal your pee hole, so you don't have to hold it open to pee."  Dylan had been peeing through the quill of a feather, his pee hole had closed so much.

"All right," said Dylan.  "You may do that much."

He did, and Dylan was able to empty his bladder fully for the first time since he'd been cut.

* * *

Dylan had taken Islwyn and some of the other nobles aside.  "Will you join us?" he asked Islwyn. 

"You cut us all, taking away our birthright, our nobility, our right to afterlife, and you ask us to join you?" asked Islwyn.

"I saved you from a fate, far worse from being cut, a fate far worse than death."

"You could have let us go," said Islwyn.  "You didn't have to cut us."

"The God ordered it."

"Why would the God order his children cut?" asked Islwyn.  "Cutting is for slaves and priests, not for nobles."

"We failed the God," said Dylan.  "We were to have cut all those of the race of man.  They should have been wiped out years ago.  But, wanting slaves, we kept some whole.  Too, all noble boys -- other than the first born -- should have been cut as a sacrifice to the God."

"Cut?" said Islwyn, "that would have made them no better than slaves."  Islwyn had been a second son.

"Those were the God's instructions when he gave this world to us," said Dylan,  "We disobeyed him.  That gave the Dark Lord power over him.  Now, to save the God, all nobles must give him their cocks and balls."

"All nobles?" said Islwyn.  "Are you mad.  That will mean the extinction of our people."

"No," said Dylan, "it will mean the coming of the God's kingdom on Earth.  If we cut off enough cocks and balls, the Dark Lord will be defeated, and the God will come to the earth to live.  Heaven will be here on earth, and all those giving their cocks and balls will be foremost among those in heaven.  The God has no cock and balls.  We call the God he, but he has no sex.  By castrating ourselves, we take on the God's form.  We are reborn in his image.  Our cocks and balls are what make us like the humans.  Only be freeing ourselves of them, can we rejoin the God."

"And the humans?" asked Islwyn, "does giving up their cocks and balls make them gods?"

"No," said Dylan.  "It just makes them castrated humans."

"But that's not what you tell them, is it?"

"No," said Dylan, "I tell them that they will also join the God, but you, of course, know better.  No human can ever join with the God."

"And if I were to tell them that?"

"I'd have to kill you," said Dylan, "but they wouldn't believe you, anyway.  They've accepted me as their leader.  I've saved them from the wizard.  I've let them cut nobles.  The would follow me anywhere."

"I thought you loved these humans," said Islwyn.

"As Dylan, I do.  As Dylan, I'm one of them.  It's Emrys that speaks to you now.  Once the God is restored, I will become Emrys again." 

He didn't tell Islwyn that he would also have his cock and balls back, the only one of all the nobles to have them.  The race of nobles would continue, with him as its father and Megan as it's mother. 

It would be a pure race, since both he and Megan would contained the essence of the God, he in the balls the God held in trust for him and Megan in her ovaries, ovaries that -- but for her mother's intervention -- would have been balls.

"What if I tell you I'll accept you a my leader, then go back on my word? asked Islwyn."

"You won't," said Dylan, "because you'll also take an oath to the God.  Those that won't, will be killed.  You can either go with me, fight to restore the God, becoming, one day, a god yourself, or you can remain here, a cut corpse, with no hope to the afterlife."

"What do you want from me?" asked Islwyn.

"I want you to convince the others," said Dylan.  "I want them to join me, but if they won't, I will kill them, every last one of them."

"We outnumber you," said Islwyn.

"But, we have the weapons," said Dylan, "besides -- can you fight as you are?  Few of you can even walk."  Islwyn had been carried to the room where they talked.

"And you swear that you tell me true?" asked Islwyn.

"I swear," said Dylan.  He swore as Dylan, not Emrys.  The word of a commoner never counted for anything.

"Then I'll join you," said Islwyn.

"Do you swear before the God that you'll be loyal to me, obeying me as you would your prince -- a prince with cock and balls?"

"I so swear," said Islwyn.

"So be it," said Dylan.  Walking to the door, he called in Braith, who'd been waiting outside.

"Hello, Islwyn," said Braith.

"Hello," said Islwyn, looking at the red haired jilly boy, who, if one looked closely, resembled Megan.  The color of the hair was the same.  "Are you really Megan?"

"I was Megan," Braith said.  "Now, I'm Braith.  Sometimes It's difficult to remember what it was like to be Megan, but I was Megan."

"Braith will heal you," said Dylan, "but he won't take away all the pain or prevent scarring.  This," he said, running his hand over his own scar seals our covenant with the God.  It shows everyone that we belong to the God."

Once Braith healed him, Islwyn was able to stand.  He winced whenever he took a step, but he could walk.  "Go talk to the others," said Dylan, "Convince them.  For their sakes, for their lives, for the God, convince them."