These days, Skyler spent his time wandering Rhydin's streets without much to do. He had no job, and he stole his food and clothing. He got drunk often and picked fights. One day during his wanderings, Skyler met a boy named Spike who was Skyler's own age. Spike was a reprobate as well. Together they got into plenty of trouble and did a lot of rabble-rousing.

One afternoon, they came across a young man named Garland who was standing on a street corner rambling like a madman. A small crowd had gathered around. Everyone found Garland's rants severely annoying and offensive. He spoke of spirits, laws, punishments, and made all sorts of accusations.

Spike whispered to Skyler, "This freak is blaspheming. He ought to be silenced." Skyler agreed, then began to heckle Garland. The crowd joined in, and eventually they became violent. They took up rocks and stoned Garland to death. Somehow, Garland seemed to die peacefully. He looked up at the sky and had a serene look on his face, even as the rocks broke his bones.

The crowd took off their coats and laid them at Skyler's feet. "Thank you for convincing us to purge our town of this madman," they said. "He had friends that are just as dangerous. Someone should stop them from spreading their poisonous ideas."

Skyler approved of their killing him. "It had to be done. If there are more like him, I should stop them. Let's go, Spike." So Skyler and Spike mounted their horses and left town at a gallop.

Skyler was blind and sick. He neither ate nor drank. As he lay still in bed, aching and dehydrating, the voice that had assaulted him on the road filled his mind with visions and knowledge and understanding. He prayed to the voice, repented, surrendered, and realized how evil his previous actions had been.

At last, after three days, a hooded man entered the hideout and came to Skyler's bedside. The man knelt down and placed his hands on Skyler's chest and forehead. "Mashiach, who appeared to you on the road, sent me here so you could be filled with the Paraclete." The scales that covered Skyler's eyes immediately fell away. He blinked slowly. His electric blue eye color had returned, but they were sharper and shrewder than before, as if the soul behind them contained extensive wisdom. Skyler's face had also changed. The fresh-faced youthfulness that had characterized him for so long had faded. Now, his visage was more sober and ascetic, and he appeared to have aged several years.

Skyler stood up, ate, and regained his strength.

One day, while Skyler was wandering and teaching, he noticed a brothel which sat on the corner of two streets. He entered the building, stood in the foyer, and began sharing his knowledge with a woman he met near the front door.

The passion in his voice carried throughout the house. One by one, the doors of the bedrooms opened. The occupants — some prostitutes and some johns — gathered in the upstairs hall and peered over the railing at him as he preached.

". . . and each and every one of you can live forever, but you must stop the evil you are doing in this house and turn to the righteous One, the One who made you. That is the only way, I assure you."

"Get out of here you judgmental ass!" shouted a woman. "Who says you have the answers" How do you know there's only one way?"

"There is but one way," Skyler said. "And that is asking for and receiving the grace of the Mashiach. Any other method that someone tries to tell you is sham, a farce, a lie."

Another prostitute from upstairs scowled at him. "Your ideas are so arrogant! What's with you being so exclusive" Why is it your way or no way' Why are you so close-minded?"

"I do not make the law," Skyler said. "Argue with the One who did. But imagine you were a literature teacher, and you tasked your student to extrapolate a poem to earn his merit in your course. But instead, the student presented you with a painting. Would you accept his submission?"

The woman was taken aback and said no more.

He continued. "You see, in the beginning, the Creator made man and woman and we were perfect. But then we did evil. We fell. The relationships between man and the Creator, with each other, and with nature, were all broken. There is only one way for us to find our way back. Follow me outside and I will demonstrate my meaning."

Eight of the brothel's occupants, six women and two men, followed Skyler into the backyard. An old, dried up drinking well sat in the center of the yard. He instructed them to stand in a circle around the well with him. "You," Skyler gestured to the woman at his immediate right, "please draw up a bucket of water."

The woman scoffed. "There's no point, you clown. This well has been dry for over ten years. Why do you think we have to walk six blocks and lug back a jug of water three times a day?"

"Do as I say," Skyler told her, politely.

So the woman lowered the bucket into the well. Hollow, empty noises rattled up from the hole as the bucket clanked on its way down. A loud thud resounded from the darkness below as the bucket touched solid ground and the rope went slack. Then she drew the bucket back to the surface, where everyone gathered could see that it was as dry as a bone. "Told ya, weirdo," she said.

Skyler pointed at a man across from him. "You sir. Perhaps my friend here simply has no skill in water-drawing. Please try to draw up a bucket."

"I'm losing patience with you," the man said. "Obviously the well is dry." Nonetheless, he grasped the rope and lowered the bucket into the well. The same hollow sounds echoed in the deep hole, and the bucket was as empty and dry as before when he withdrew it. "See" What are you trying to prove" You are nothing but a scheming charleton!"

Skyler said to them, "no one here can draw water from this well, but I can. Just so, there is only one way to live forever, only one way to draw each of you into eternity, and that is through the One I told you about."

"You can't draw any water from that well, you fool! There's no water down there!" shouted one of the prostitutes.

Skyler regarded her. Sensing the Paraclete coursing through his body, he closed his eyes and said, "Creator, I have faith that the Mashiach bought and paid for my soul with blood, that I am now His slave, and that He connects me to You. Please show these people what I have told them: that there is only one person who can draw water from this well, just as there is only one way to reach you."

Skyler stepped forward and seized the rope. He dangled the bucket over the well and dropped it. It plummeted into the darkness, and then a loud, wet, plop sound arose from the hole. The group gasped. Skyler began to draw the bucket up, his slender arms pumping rhythmically, his back straining, the rope groaning with the burden. At last the bucket emerged, sloshing and overflowing with water.

The group circling the well gaped at Skyler, some of them in admiration, some in abhorrence. ". . . how" How!" one of the women stammered, her face panic-stricken. "This is some twisted sorcery!" another woman shouted. "No, he's telling the truth! He's proved it!" said another.

Skyler said to them, "What the Creator did here through me was nothing. If you had faith the size of a seed, you could command that mountain to leap into the sea." He pointed fiercely at the distant horizon where a high mountain met the sky.

Just then, the earth began to shake beneath their feet. The stones of the well rattled. The sound of a rushing deluge developed within the well, and suddenly a geyser of water burst forth. The stream was so thick and powerful that the stones of well burst apart. The geyser shot high into the air, thrice as high as any rooftop nearby. The backyard of the brothel quickly flooded. The six prostitutes, two johns, and Skyler were swept from their feet and washed across the yard.

No one was hurt, but all except Skyler were shocked and dismayed. He led them away from the flooding yard. They all stood on the street and watched the water from the geyser flood the brothel, flowing through the back door and filling the lower floor. More prostitutes and their customers ran shouting from the house, joining the group on the street.

"Your Creator is the Creator," a man said to Skyler.

"I believe now," a woman said to him. "I have faith in what you tell us."

Many citizens, having heard the deluge and the uproar, came running from all directions and gathered around Skyler and the group of prostitutes he had just taught. "You, you are Skyler, the wise teacher and prophet," remarked an upper class woman in the crowd. "You teach of being good and righteous. Why do you offer these whores your gifts" Surely they are not worthy."

"Wrong," Skyler admonished, turning to her. Behind him, the geyser continued to erupt, but his voice carried over the thundering noise. "The only ones not worthy are those who hear this news and reject it." The backyard of the brothel was now shoulder-high with water, putting great pressure against the wall of the house. "Prostitutes are in no danger of finding life so satisfactory that they can't turn to the Mashiach: the proud and the self-righteous are in that danger." A cacophonous crack resonated throughout the neighborhood as the wall of the house buckled. The second story collapsed upon the first, the roof and walls crumbling. "The Mashiach uses many broken vessels to fulfill His sovereign purposes. Neither your evil ways nor mine are less evil than theirs."

The geyser suddenly ceased, and the high waters that had filled the brothel's backyard washed the remnants of the house into the street and then faded away. "Now, none of these women or men will ever participate in the sex trade again," Skyler prophesized. "The Creator has helped them understand their own corruption and worked in their lives for good. His change isn't always painless. Some of these may now even go hungry for a time, but it is better for us to lose our hands or eyes than our whole bodies to be cast away."

All the members of the crowd were astounded by Skyler's words. He left the flooded ruins behind, and they all followed him.