Uncount­ed steps passed beneath the young knight’s feet.

He climbed, head bowed to the shin­ing mar­ble steps. Rain­bow flecks played over his curly hair and ivory cloak, shed by ascend­ing stained glass arch­es. His spurs clicked with every step. His lips shift­ed, part­ed in a breath­less chant:

A hun­dred steps fur­ther, he stopped, leaned heav­i­ly beside a win­dow arch. His plumed helm rose and fell, tucked against his heav­ing breast­plate. With a hand­ful of white silk cloak, he wiped his brow. Pant­i­ng, he peered through a semi-opaque pane.

Some half a league below, a mil­i­tary pro­ces­sion of immense scale crept down the cypress-lined prom­e­nade. Thou­sands of red pen­nants snapped over the point­ed helms of sol­diers, whipped by autumn breeze. Thou­sands of brass-shod boots crashed in uni­son over old-city pavers and dried leaves.

It was an opu­lence of mil­i­taria and faith com­bined: Black oxide gun­springs, parade bright, tucked smart­ly to uni­form breasts bla­zoned with the sev­en-point­ed spear over the sev­en-pin­na­cled crown of Empire. ¶ Prelates, in their breast­plates and crim­son stoles, bear­ing huge gis­armes dan­gling with censers shed­ding myrrh and lab­danum. Priests of the Refec­tive Order in car­riages passed knot­ted hol­i­day loaves rich with spices and nuts to young has­ta­ti, who fer­ried them to the beam­ing pub­lic.

At the pro­ces­sion’s head rode gleam­ing knights. Each bestride a mon­strous destri­er, clad in lam­i­nat­ed, whirring clock­work steel lay­ered with crim­son capes and sash­es of office. The roil­ing crowd, wav­ing and cheer­ing, loved these rid­ers most of all. Sweet ros­es thrown by the mass­es crushed under high-step­ping hooves and steelshod boots. From such a height, the thun­der of their steps and accom­pa­ny­ing drums was a low roar.

The knight’s gaze fol­lowed those rid­ers, watched the stel­late spears embla­zoned on their cer­e­mo­ni­al shields: the sym­bol on his own cape.

He sighed.

With a start, he resumed his climb. Again, he chant­ed, filled the heli­cal stair with repeat­ed bars of prayer and the rhyth­mic click of met­al boots. A vein pulsed above his eye. He churned on, sore­ly belt­ed his prayer through grit­ted teeth. When at last the stair end­ed, he near­ly top­pled, expect­ing anoth­er step.

Before him was a high, small room. Vault­ed and airy. Through the right wall was set a deep win­dow, its panes uncol­ored and droop­ing in their lead­ing. The old glass was cov­ered by thin bars of new, dark steel, anchored to the wall. Through these fell a shaft of light, bathing the small mar­ble altar in the room’s cen­ter. Past this hung a cur­tain embla­zoned with the star-head­ed spear.

Clum­sy from the climb, the knight dropped sharply to kneel before the altar. His hel­met clunked to the dusty mar­ble floor. He swal­lowed, bowed his head, clasped his uneasy hands.

“Avetha,” he recit­ed, hoarse­ly. “Sis­ter Lord, for­give my tres­pass: I have broached Alta­mo­ra to com­mit myself to thee. I am a cheva­lier new­ly made. Accept me now as you did the palatines of old. Lau­date Aveth, Deus in ter­ra...”

Glit­ter­ing dust fell as he prayed, cut into a grid by the win­dow bars. Square lines of shad­ow pat­terned the altar and the man’s white cloak.

Cloth rus­tled. A shad­ow passed over the altar. The knight’s head jerked up. A dark-haired girl had emerged from behind the cur­tain. She was bare­foot, and wore the long-sleeved robe of an altar atten­dant, a neo­phyte. She fixed the knight with a curi­ous gaze. “Who are you?” she said, qui­et.

“Sis­ter, I am Edwind Melvyno Kréc de Car­ro,” said the knight, stand­ing hur­ried­ly. “Sent to bid my troth as a cheva­lier to the Lord.”

The neo­phyte stepped for­ward. “It has been a thou­sand years and more since a holy sol­dier was sworn under Her name.” She said it with weight, play­ing on the sig­nif­i­cance.

“Her return,” said Kréc. “Is a high mir­a­cle. I am hon­ored to be the first.”

“Do you think Aveth will accept you, Sir Kréc? After all this time?”

Krec’s brow flut­tered, pinched. “It is my dear­est wish that she would,” said he. He clenched a met­al fist over his heart. The met­al creaked.

“Why would she?”

“I have devot­ed my life to human­i­ty. By Her grace and strength, I have trained to fight the ene­mies of Man for my whole life. For her.”

She blinked. “And what will your Lord do, if she accepts you?”

Krec blinked at her, quizzi­cal. “She will take my hand and pro­vide me a gift of wis­dom, as she gave to the palatines of old.” He squared his shoul­ders and frowned. “Who are you to ask?”

The girl smiled. “For­give my pry­ing.” She lift­ed a hand at the win­dow well. “Wait with me here, Sir Kréc. You will meet your Lord soon.”

Togeth­er, they went to the sill, sat in its deep recess. Kréc set­tled, his armor clack­ing on the steel bars. The girl set­tled, legs tucked to the stone, back against the arch­ing well. Pale light illu­mi­nat­ed half her face. She peered at him. Kréc stared, brow knit­ted, at their shad­ows imposed over the small alter. They sat a moment in silence.

“Have you met the Lord?” Kréc said sharply, voice sud­den­ly hoarse.

“I have.”

Kréc’s eyes were bright, anx­ious. “Is she as the priests say?” he asked, thick­ly.

The girl cocked her head, curi­ous. “Maybe. How do they describe her?”

“I...” said the Knight, trail­ing. He looked again at the altar. “I find I no longer remem­ber what they say. I have only my own mind’s por­trait.” He looked at her, smiled wry­ly. “The image of my Lord is mine only, I sup­pose.”

“Describe her your­self, then.”

Kréc shut his eyes, tipped his head to the vault­ed roof. “She is like a wise old­er sis­ter. I speak to her, and know I will receive praise or crit­i­cism as I deserve. Either way, it’s her inter­est to guide me. She is lov­ing.” He shift­ed. “Her pres­ence is larg­er than she is, and her gaze hum­bles even the proud­est man. She has eyes like green gar­nets, as the monks paint­ed her in the fres­coes of Bansa Abbey,” he said, turn­ing. “Like yours.”

The girl smiled at him. “When do you see her?”

“When I pray,” said the knight, imme­di­ate­ly. “I have prayed to the Lord every day since I first learned how.” He frowned, con­sid­ered how their criss­crossed shad­ows fell across the altar.

“It is odd,” he said. “I am only now about to meet the Lord, but I feel as though I’ve known her all my life.”

At this, they sat in silence. The girl hooked a pair of fin­gers over the win­dow bars, peered over and far away. “Do you know, Sir knight...” she said. Her voice was stronger than before, deep­er.

“At night, far away, I can see fires on the hill­tops, beyond the lights of the city. I can smell frank­in­cense and myrrh, even in this mile-high minarette.” She looked to the man, and Kréc shiv­ered to meet her gaze. “And burn­ing flesh.”

Kréc swal­lowed. “Sor­cer­ers, apos­tates.”

“Still human,” said the girl, soft­ly. Her fin­ger­tips slipped from the bars.

“There’s a parade, down there,” she said, smil­ing thin­ly. “I imag­ine it’s for you.”

Kréc looked mild­ly affront­ed. “It is for the Lord Aveth. Her sec­ond com­ing is the rea­son for my errand, greater than all of us. Did­n’t you attend the pro­ces­sion?”

“No,” said the girl. She ran a fin­ger down a steel bar. Its image float­ed in the cloudy, ancient glass behind. “I do not leave this tow­er. “It’s,” she paused. “A long way down.”

Far below, the sound of drums, boots, and cheer­ing were a dis­tant roar. Kréc watched the girl, saw her face reflect­ed in the glass as she looked down at the world, judg­ing.

“Do you think…” she said, hug­ging her knees. “That Aveth fears what her race have wrought?”

The knight looked at her, hor­ror smear­ing his face. “Such an idea is blas­phe­my. The Lord is fear­some, not fear­ful. All of faith­ful human­i­ty knows that her eyes fol­low them, judg­ing.”

“Per­haps,” said the girl with the green eyes. “She’s no longer the Lord you all knew.”

Kréc shift­ed, dropped from the sill. His steel plates clat­tered, glit­tered in the pale beam of light. He looked to the neo­phyte, face twist­ed in con­cern.

“Who are you to say such things? You speak as if you do not even hold the faith,” said Kréc. “As a sol­dier of the Lord, I would clap you in irons for speak­ing such words,” he said, voice break­ing. “Yet I would not, can­not. I feel as if I have known you, of old.”

Slow­ly, she slipped from her perch, bare feet pat­ter­ing on the mar­ble floor. In the light, she was lumi­nes­cent. Straight­ened, she was some­how greater than the knight. Her hair was black and lumi­nous. Her eyes flash­ing gar­nets. He cowed under her gaze.

“You have known me, Sir Knight,” said she, tak­ing Kréc’s steel-clad hand.

“Since the day you learned to pray.”

Bread­crumbs land­ed on the gar­den lawn among coo­ing, appre­cia­tive doves. They milled about the black, point­ed shoes of a thin woman, whose sun­hat so sur­passed her in width that she resem­bled an umbrel­la. She stood amid rows of cypress trees, fed birds from a paper sack

Past league-long rows of skin­ny conifers loomed Pala­tine Chapel, its titan­ic spires super­im­posed against the clear, hot sky. The lilt of a far­away choir float­ed over the grass. Beyond that, even grander, loomed an ivory minaret. Colos­sal, many-arched, its pin­na­cle lost in a haze of heat and sun.

Anoth­er shad­ow crept over the green, came to rest beside the first. The woman in the wide hat glanced to it, tossed anoth­er hand­ful of bread­crumbs. Beside her, the sec­ond shad­ow, a grey-haired man in a vic­ar’s suit, cleared his throat ner­vous­ly.

“The doves in Sorelle sing sweet­er,” he said.

The woman glanced at him. “But the birds of Botan­dale are best.”

At this, the man nod­ded, smiled slight­ly. “Good day, Mas­ter Dime.”

“Good day, Shapiro.”

“Are we well alone?” asked Shapiro.

“Yes. This park is desert­ed dur­ing Sorens­day ser­vices. I’ve scout­ed it for two months,” said Dime. She grasped a hand­ful from the crin­kling bag, threw it. The doves skit­tered excit­ed­ly to the fall­en crumbs.

“Good,” nod­ded Shapiro. “I must say, your Alagóran is excel­lent, for a Firl. Have you been in Car­ro long?”

“Since a year before Parou­sia.”

“You fell right into this assign­ment, then,” said the vic­ar, shak­ing his head.

“Indeed. What have you gleaned, regard­ing our sub­ject?”

“Here,” said Shapiro, extend­ing his hand. Dime prof­fered the bag of crumbs. The man took it in both hands, fold­ed some­thing into her palm: A rolled, wax cylin­der. “Every­thing I’ve found since the shrove parade.” he said. “The rumors have shown some truth.”

Shapiro gazed up at the dis­tant spire, squint­ed against the sun. “I acquired a builder’s plan for the tow­er. It was labeled for burn­ing. Dat­ed a month after she was rec­og­nized by the Court. Full refur­bish­ment and restora­tion of the upper suite; instal­la­tion of a pul­ley sys­tem; addi­tion of hid­den guard cat­walks to the super­struc­ture; among oth­er things.”

“Any men­tion of cost? How much of the Prince’s trea­sury did they sink into that?” said Dime, tip­ping her head as well. The broad sun­hat shed a band of shade over her eyes.

“None. Would you spare any expense, for your Lord?” asked Shapiro.

“I have no such thing, Vic­ar,” said the woman.

“True,” gri­maced the man. “Though I nev­er thought I would say such a thing, I think I now come to under­stand the Firl­ish mind­set.”

“How so?” said Dime, squint­ing at him. The vic­ar was silent for a time. He pro­duced a flo­ral ker­chief, dabbed sweat from his grey hair­line.

“I have served the Church for longer than you have lived,” he said, final­ly. “I have prayed to Aveth for decades, hap­py in her silence.” He shut his eyes, lis­tened to the far­away choir. “Now, she has returned. My faith should be stronger than ever. Instead, I pray no more.” Dime stud­ied his face, watched the crow’s feet deep­en on his skin.

“While oth­ers wor­ship, I pass secrets to Firl­ish spies, but I hold no shame.” The vic­ar opened his eyes. “In those notes,” he said, point­ing with a wob­bling hand. “There is a guards’ record from the tow­er.”

He swal­lowed dry­ly. “Last month: Five escape attempts. They’ve installed bars on the upper win­dows. My Lord is a pris­on­er. She does not speak to me. She is no more pow­er­ful than you or I.”

Far off, the choir hit a soar­ing high note, fad­ed. Doves war­bled soft­ly at the old man’s feet. “That, Mas­ter Dime, is why I under­stand you.”

“I’m sor­ry,” said Dime. Shapiro met her eye, smiled sad­ly.

“The ser­vice is end­ing,” said the old vic­ar, soft­ly, prof­fer­ing the spy her sack of crumbs. “Until next we meet.”

The doves flut­tered, flew with the vic­ar’s depart­ing shad­ow.

Parousia

Just two years ago, the Lord her­self returned to the world.

Her fol­low­ers rejoiced, prayed with greater sure­ty. Her Church wel­comed a gold­en age, hailed the event as right­eous val­i­da­tion of faith. Her North­ern skep­tics sneered, decried a hoax of epic pro­por­tions.

Up and down the Coast, folk flock to the Avethan faith, heart­ened by the ancient reli­gion’s renewed legit­imiza­tion. Peas­ants, hope­ful, clasp dirty palms in hes­i­tant prayer. Com­mon folk, curi­ous, attend mass, fill their heads with the catch­ing pow­er of frank­in­cense and chant­ed psalms. Mon­archs, inspired by the pious High Prince of Alagór, offer their ringed hands to the Lord. Every­where, cau­tious souls raise prayers to Aveth, hope­ful she might hear.

Aveth

Aveth is the chief reli­gion of Alagór and its sur­round­ing states. * It is a monothe­is­tic, humanocen­tric faith defined by its fol­low­ers’ recog­ni­tion of a mer­ci­ful, all-know­ing, unique being known epony­mous­ly as Aveth. 

Avethans believe their Lord lives on high, observ­ing, judg­ing, and influ­enc­ing human lives. She is known as a mer­ci­ful, just, sis­ter­ly fig­ure to all of humankind. ** She is said to bestow for­tune on those who live by her dic­tates and scorn those who do not. †

The Writ

The faith­ful know Aveth’s dic­tates by a book called the Lord’s Writ. This sev­en-hun­dred and sev­en­ty-sev­en page tome is regard­ed as the unal­tered and final rev­e­la­tion of the Lord. †† With­in these pages, the canon of Aveth and human­i­ty’s ori­gin is detailed. It is, as Avethans would have it, the sto­ry of the Coast and the World.

The open­ing of the Writ, known as Legionar­ies, describes, some 1,100 years ago, the time before Aveth’s birth: A dark age of the world, a time of war held between titan­ic pow­ers. Fell ser­pents, giants, and tran­shu­man sor­cer­ers man­u­fac­tured atroc­i­ties and com­bats of unthink­able scale, con­sum­ing uncount­ed mil­lions of lives like easy chat­tel. In this time, in the final year of the sec­ond mil­len­ni­um, a girl was born to an unnamed slave. Only after gain­ing twen­ty years, a legion of fol­low­ers, and a dozen ser­pents dead on her spear did the girl gain her holy name.

The charis­mat­ic Aveth gained fol­low­ers and influ­ence over a decades-long mil­i­tary cam­paign. Uncount­ed fiery, coil­ing ser­pents and titan­ic, steel-clad sor­cer­ers, thought invin­ci­ble, died on her star-head­ed spear. ‡ By a half-cen­tu­ry’s end, she had built an empire for human­i­ty.

Toward the mid­dle por­tion of the Writ, in a sec­tion known as Reign­doms, the Lord suc­cumbed to wounds sus­tained while slay­ing the ser­pent Mur­mil­lo. Her fol­low­ers mourned for only a day, how­ev­er, as the corpse of Aveth, lain in state, dis­ap­peared, leav­ing behind only her spear. This event was declared a mir­a­cle, how­ev­er, for Aveth had proph­e­sied that she would die in ser­vice to her peo­ple, that she would return again when need­ed most. Thus, wor­ship of the Lord con­tin­ued for a thou­sand years and beyond.

Dic­tates

Mod­ern fol­low­ers of Aveth ascribe to a set of dic­tates set forth by the Writ. These dic­tates com­mand that a fol­low­er:

• Rec­og­nize Aveth as the one true Lord (to whom all are sub­servient;) and
• pray to Her, and only Her, that she might hear them (in week­ly mass and dai­ly prayer;) and
• rec­og­nize human­i­ty as the sole, true peo­ple of the World; and
• final­ly, serve only human­i­ty and the Church in their pur­suits (char­i­ty and con­quest.)

These tenets, broad as they are, vary in their inter­pre­ta­tion depend­ing on the pre­sid­ing region­al arm of the Church. Many Avethans give alms as part of their ser­vice to human­i­ty. Oth­ers join the Alagóri­an mil­i­tary. Many hold one fact as truth: If the faith­ful uphold these dic­tates, they will be favored in the eyes of the Lord, and be grant­ed Par­adise after death. ‡‡

Con­spir­a­cies

Now, a thou­sand years after her death, the Lord has returned. By what means, few can guess. Pop­u­lar opin­ion says the leg­endary and fear­ful Holy Inqui­si­tion, a force of secret police and assas­sins sup­pos­ed­ly formed in ancient times by the dead­ly Lord her­self, was respon­si­ble for car­ry­ing out the true details of her res­ur­rec­tion. §

When the Lord came to the cap­i­tal of Alagór in the com­pa­ny of an Inquisi­to­r­i­al army, many expect­ed the High Prince to abdi­cate his throne, that the Lord might again rule her peo­ple. §§

Instead, no such abdi­ca­tion occurred. It is said that the Lord met for an after­noon with the Prince, the Lord Inquisi­tor, and the heads of state and Church in the roy­al palace of Cair Elise. 

The sub­ject of this meet­ing is a mat­ter of debate. Offi­cial­ly, the state says the Lord put a series of ques­tions to these pow­er­ful fig­ures, made a vari­ety of benev­o­lent orders, includ­ing the dis­so­lu­tion of the Inqui­si­tion and ces­sa­tion of polit­i­cal aggres­sion toward apos­tate states. She took the hands of the lead­ers of the land, ascend­ed to Alta­mo­ra to guide her sub­jects from on high as they ruled below. ‖ Rumor sug­gests oth­er­wise. 

Some months after the parou­sia, an inter­view with a notable Alagóri­an expa­tri­ate appeared in Emper­oussin papers. The inter­vie­wee, for­mer­ly a high priest of Aveth, described the meet­ing at Cair Elise as a trav­es­ty. The Lord, described by the priest as no more than a wil­lowy teenag­er, was aghast by state of the world, con­demned the heads of the Church and Inqui­si­tion as liars.

The priest sug­gest­ed two pos­si­bil­i­ties: Either Aveth is a unwill­ing pris­on­er, con­tained by cor­rupt lead­ers, or she is a will­ing clois­ter, ter­ri­fied by her cho­sen peo­ple. Folk whis­per these pos­si­bil­i­ties only in secret, fear­ing, even now, the lin­ger­ing blades of the Inqui­si­tion.

What­ev­er the truth may be, these years are a gold­en age for Aveth. The faith pros­pers, draws new souls with every sun­rise. Few (even athe­ist Firls) doubt the Lord’s return. 

The peo­ple’s faith is strong, sound in the returned Aveth. Mil­lions pray to the Lord on high. Few, how­ev­er, ask whether She, in her mile-high spire, is the same woman who died a thou­sand years ago.

notes

I blew the “princess in the high­est room of the tallest tow­er,” thing way out of pro­por­tion, in ret­ro­spect. Now she’s the Catholic church.