Chapter 102

A collective hush had fallen over the Alstromeria, and with it, the entire city of Darnell, capital of the entire Anglish Empire, the Empire of the Golden Lady, whose might touched five continents. In the Grand Cathedral itself, where priestesses, acolytes, cardinals and clerics once strode confidently from one place to another, filled with confidence and surety of purpose, now the halls rang empty. Paladins who once guarded the corridors and courts with eyes up and alert now stood with faces masked behind helmets. Nobles who once fingered chins, stroked beards, strutted about self-importantly, playing their little games and silent wars as they each jostled for authority and prestige now stayed home, indoors, and whispered to each other.

In many cathedrals across the city, great steel bells rang every hour. A golden bell was rang to call the people to pray; a steel bell was rang to mourn and remember the fallen.

Everyone, everywhere held their breath and tried to make sense of the revelations that had been announced from the Book of the Golden Lady: An Apostle, a Living Saint, had walked amongst the people. Darnell remembered the Night of Miracles, where people across the city were visited with dreams, portents, revelations, miracles. Eyes turned to the Grand Cathedral for guidance, wisdom, knowledge. Who was it that had brought such terror and wonder into their lives?

In the Preux Academia, a young woman with chocolate skin and a dazzling smile looked up from her books, and thought to herself, I met her.

In the Garrison, an old, scarred paladin beat her students with indifference, but her heart beat with pride. That one of her students had been fit to be chosen by the Golden Lady Herself!

In many ways, a great many people were still existing in shock, punch-drunk from the realization that the Golden Lady had chosen an Apostle to walk amongst them... and that Apostle had in turn died for them, redeeming them in the eyes of their Goddess.

From human to elf to orc, everyone had their own version of the same story: The Terror of the Long Night. A shared memory of torment known only as the Void of Oblivion, the absolute utter absence of life and light and warmth; the death of dreams and hope. No matter who they were, everyone strove to be welcomed into the embrace of their Gods or Goddesses, because the fear of being lost to that … utter emptiness… was too great.

This is probably what it’s like, Olivia thought to herself as she traversed the grounds of the Grand Cathedral. A void of her own was in her heart, the loss of Katarina seemed like a lidless eye, an inescapable vortex seemed to have opened in her chest with the loss of her lover. It drained the taste of food, the color from things, the delight from life.

She’d been ordered- told, really- to visit the Baptistry, and upon reflection it seemed a good idea. Olivia was in a torment of her own making, and the Baptistry was a place where you went to cleanse and heal your soul. Olivia hated and feared going to sleep; in her sleep Katarina visited her in her dreams, laughing, teasing, joking, loving. In the morning the bed was empty, her room cold and empty and lifeless. She hated sleeping, but she hated waking even more. She wanted to escape to her dreams, but her dreams were a torture in and of itself. Fearing to sleep, to dream, fearing to wake, to live. It was tearing her apart.

The mark on her hand felt weird to her. Unlike Katarina, who was covered in scars of all sorts and shapes, she had lived a life free from worry of such things. She kept running her fingers over it, feeling the strange thickness, the weird numbness, the feeling that that it was both was and wasn’t a part of her.

In the Baptistry, she knew, she’d have to speak with a confessor, a priestess that would use hypnotic drugs and musical tones to calm and open the mind so that the those that availed themselves of the service would be relaxed, open, their minds pliant and easily guided towards reconciliation and healing. Afterwords, she would be allowed access to the Baptismal font, a pool of water where she would be ritualistically purified of her problems and born anew under the Light of the Golden Lady.

Her Confessor was a woman a few years older than she was; the room comfortable and filled with cushions, lamps with fragrant oils, and wall hangings with simple patterns of interlinking rings, or wavy lines. The woman greeted Olivia warmly and encouraged her to get comfortable.

"Before we begin…" Olivia began, and then trailed off. "I’m on the Book of the Golden Lady. There are a number of sensitive topics that have been Sealed to the Book and Sealed to the Emerald that … can’t be heard by anyone else. I … need assurances that some of the things I say won’t be overheard."

The woman smiled at her. "Never worry about that. Privacy and confidentiality is sacrosanct, here."

Olivia gave her an unhappy look. "I’m shaming myself by saying this, but I once listened in on a confession." She shook her head. "Please. You want me to feel comfortable, please make sure that no one is listening outside."

The woman gave her a shocked, guarded look at Olivia’s admission to having listened in on a confession, but summoned an acolyte and murmured some instructions in her ear.

"There. We won’t be disturbed, or intruded upon." The Confessor urged, and sprinkled some incense into a brazier. "Why don’t we get started?"

It is not duty that guides my steps, but love.

It is not vengeance that guide my blade, but righteousness.

It is not avarice that guide my labor, but compassion.

"What is this?" Celeste demanded. "What are we to make of this?"

The Grand Cardinal rolled her eyes at Celeste’s outburst.

For those who dare the path of Glory, raise your torch fearlessly in the night. Present it boldly and do not waver.

"This is senseless. Pointless homilies to feed the masses." Celeste complained.

For those that lead, let she who is unafraid place her hand against the Bright writ of the Primordial Spirit and swear her oath. Let her true feelings find her path. Devote yourself to me, learn from me, and obey me. Do not forget song, do not forget love, do not forget prayer, and do not forget me.

"Well Celeste, are you ready?" The Grand Cardinal dared. Celeste raised her hands defensively.

"You’re not afraid, are you?" The Grand Cardinal challenged.

"You first, Your Grace." Celeste replied.

Francesca eyed the emerald plate, and the tight rows of golden script that hurt the eye to look at. She took a deep breath and whispered a prayer to the Goddess. During the Night of Miracles she had been put on trial and found wanting, her efforts lacking. Would the Golden Lady accept her once more? She placed her hand on the tablet, a little surprised at its cool, glossy feel. She nearly expected to catch aflame.

"I pledge myself to uphold the high purpose of this office to which I have been selected. Serving in every way by word and deed to make its ideals the ideals of the Golden Lady. To the glory of character, to the strength of leadership, to the power of wisdom, and to the love of service, I pledge my vows."

The emerald plate flashed a brilliant green for a split-second, bathing the conference room an eerie color before winking out.

Francesca lifted her hand from the tablet. Emblazoned on the back of her hand was a scar in the shape of a lily. She took a step back, and stumbled. Her heart hammered in her chest, spots dancing in her eyes.

"By the Goddess." She breathed.

Celeste shook her head. "I can’t do it. She will find me wanting and turn me to ash or something." She babbled.

"So you’re stepping down from your position, then?" Francesca asked. Celeste froze at that.

"I didn’t say that." She prevaricated. "This will take some thought."

Yuriko gave her a sidelong look, and stepped around to the plate. "I have no fear whatsoever. Let the Golden Lady hear my vow and judge me accordingly." She slapped her slim hand on the plate and repeated the Grand Cardinal’s vow. Again, the plate flashed. Yuriko examined the mark on her hand.

"Fascinating." She murmured, and then glanced at the others.

Gabrielle stepped forward. "I am afraid." She admitted to the others, with a glance to Yuriko. "For many reasons. I am not as compassionate as Olivia, or as wise and far-seeing as the Grand Cardinal. I am not as single-mindedly devoted to my people as Yuriko. But I can see the truth of this. I hope the Golden Lady sees my value."

She placed her hand on the emerald plate, and whispered a prayer to the Golden Lady, and then recited her vow. The plate flashed and Gabrielle jumped.

"Oh!" She exclaimed. "You never said that-" She cut herself off, blushing. "Nevermind."

"I wonder what would have happened if Phoebe were here." Gabrielle mused to the Grand Cardinal as she helped the larger woman up.

"Olivia, would you?" Celeste asked the other woman.

"I don’t know if I should." Olivia replied in a shaky voice. "I have never had a vision, a dream, premonition. I’ve always worried whether I was truly doing the Golden Lady’s work." She paused. "Here I am with all this wealth and authority, and people in this very city are starving to death. Am I doing the greatest good?" She asked rhetorically. "I hope that there is at least some spark of worth in me that the Golden Lady sees." She placed her hand on the plate, a thought that Katarina had handled the plates herself bringing a smile to her face. She recited the vow and jumped at the feeling of an electric shock. She took her hand away and smiled at the mark on her hand.

"Well, Celeste?" Gabrielle encouraged.

"It seems I have no choice." Celeste muttered. "I don’t see why this should even be done. We swore vows when we took our office. Should that not be sufficient?"

"Not according to the Golden Lady." Gabrielle replied.

"Says you." Celeste disputed. "Who knows, this could have been concocted by that Witch Hunter."

"You could try translating it yourself." The Grand Cardinal offered solicitously.

Celeste slapped her hand down on the plate. She opened her mouth to speak-

It happened so quickly it took them long moments to process what happened through the numbing fog of shock.

In the first second, a torrent of emerald-green fire raced up Celeste’s arm to her body. She didn’t have time to scream or even pull away. A second later, all the flesh exploded off her body in a roaring inferno, pieces of tissue and viscera disintegrating in green flames. A second later, Celeste’s bones tumbled to the floor, the divine power transmogrifying them into emerald.

Olivia let out a shriek, Yuriko turned away, and Gabrielle jolted in shock, one hand over her belly, the other covering her mouth as if to be sick.

"Well." The Grand Cardinal muttered. "Now we know what happens when you fail." She grimaced as the emerald skull shifted and seemed to look up at her.

"Now we have three vacancies." Gabrielle observed. "We lost Constance, Phoebe, and now Celeste."

"Yes, but filling them will be ... a lot more interesting." Yuriko replied clinically. "There’s also the cost if we fail."

Olivia looked a question to the tiny woman.

"A vow unkept between people is just that, a promise broken. We, each of us have sworn to the Golden Lady ... by way of the tablet, to fulfill our duties, and we have been branded in return." Yuriko explained. "I cannot help but fear when one so marked does not fulfill her oaths."

"One slip..." Francesca murmured and glanced down. She wished the blasted thing would stop staring at her, but she was loathe to kick it away.

"The Golden Lady wants change. Let’s bring change."

Olivia sat in the pool at the top of the Baptistry. She couldn’t float like Katarina, and she didn’t know how to swim. The water was clean and warm and pleasant against her skin. She splashed water against her shoulders, and adjusted her position so that she was submerged up to her neck. The incence had dome something to her mind, it was difficult to focus, to concentrate. Thoughts, half started, drifted into incoherence and it was difficult to hold on to any one idea or concept. Everything kept slipping away from her.

Her eyelids heavy, she closed her eyes and dank deeper into the water.

"Hey now, careful." A familiar voice murmured in her ear. She fancied she could feel her lover's exhalation against her ear as she spoke. "You can’t fall asleep here, you’ll drown."

Warm, familiar arms wrapped themselves around her from behind, pulling her into a warm, familiar embrace. How many times had Katarina held her like this? She couldn’t remember.

"I don’t care." Olivia replied, knowing it for a dream. If she died in her dream, would it go on, endlessly? It didn’t seem to matter; she couldn’t find a reason to care.

"Relax your legs." Katarina murmured in her ear. "Your hips, your back. Let the muscles unwind and relax. You’ve been under a lot of stress lately my love."

Olivia relaxed against the other woman’s embrace, feeling Katarina guiding her arms to spread out wide.

"Your body wants to float. It’s buoyant, like a ship. Take a deep breath and hold it."

Olivia did as her dead lover urged- she would willingly follow her anywhere, even the Void of Oblivion- and was surprised in a strangely vague and disconnected way when her whole body lifted up to the surface.

"You see? You can float as easily as anyone." Katarina approved. "Slow, deep breaths will keep you from sinking. If you tense up, you’ll sink. Relax, my love, relax…"

Olivia drifted on her back in the pool. Overhead, the ceiling was painted in the colors of the sky, a golden sun blazoned in the center. Her breathing was slow and even. As she breathed out, her body would sink, but as she breathed in, her body would rise up again. She could do this forever.

She turned her head; Katarina sat on the edge of the pool, naked as the day she was born. Fully half of her hair had been transformed into a golden blonde as rich as the sun picked out in gold leaf on the ceiling. Her eyes were a disconcertingly rich color of green, the green of emeralds, of new spring, but it was Katarina. She was there, idly kicking her feet in the water. Olivia closed her eyes, her heart a hard, hot stone in her chest. Katarina was dead.

She opened them again, and Katarina was gone. Olivia tensed, and her body sank beneath the water, and sudden panic seized Olivia, she scrambled for footing and flailed about. Water went up her nose and she choked, coughing. Her foot hit bottom and she instinctively kicked, her head broke the surface of the waters and she found her feet, coughing and choking and straining to breathe as she expelled the water from her lungs.

"No more of that, please." She croaked in complaint, and struggled out of the pool. On a low table were a pile of towels, a thick, fluffy robe, and her clothes, folded neatly beside.

She dried her hair and then her body and as she wrapped the robe around herself, she considered the pool. The surface still quaked and heaved from her frantic thrashing about. A trail of wet footsteps she’d made as she left the pool and walked over to the table followed her.

She looked to where she’d imagined Katarina sitting, kicking her feet in the water unconcernedly like a child at play.

A set of footsteps led away from the spot and to the edge of the Baptistry, as if she’d simply gotten up, walked to the edge, and leapt over the railing.

Ghosts didn’t leave footprints.

Katarina was dead. What had happened was a comfortable delusion.

Olivia felt her eyes burn with tears. Everything, all of it was false, lies. She was deluding herself. Katarina wasn’t here. She wasn’t alive. Dead people don’t come back.

When she got back to her quarters, she threw herself on the massive bed and sobbed into Katarina’s shirt. Wholly embarrassing, potentially damning, she slept with Katarina’s shirt like some child in need of a comfort blanket. She didn’t care. She just wanted her lover to not be dead.

Evening found Olivia at her table, idly sorting through the things of Katarina’s she’d managed to keep. The two were lovers; it was inevitable that some of Olivia’s things would end up in Katarina’s apartment; likewise some of Katarina’s things ended up in her own.

Katarina had an entire sackful of magical trinkets and baubles; Olivia had once sat at Katarina’s table as the woman somehow sorted and catalogued them. Olivia sat up straight.

She catalogued them. Where was that book? Olivia rushed to the armoire where Katarina occasionally kept her things in Olivia’s apartments and groaned. A number of backpacks, a pair of saddlebags, a duffle, and a satchel were stacked neatly within.

Olivia began going through them, one at a time. The satchel held a sewing kit, a leatherworking kit, and a small pouch with a handful of old blackened copper tokens. Olivia barked a dry sob at this. The woman was nobility, was more than worth her weight in steel, and she carried around a handful of pennies.

It was in one of the backpacks that Olivia found a number of books. The first was the inventory of all of the magical items. Their form and description, and whatever ability Katarina could sense in them. All very dry and utilitarian. It made for very poor reading.

The second book was an indifferently kept journal. One page vehemently swearing she would never take off her coat or hat because they belonged to her master, the next page a detailed drawing of a plant that she’d eaten and consequently gotten the runs from. AVOID! In big bold letters and circled twice.

After a scrawled wish for a better whetstone was the following:

The Church sees me as a tool. That’s fair; I can be the tool that strikes down the Witch. But I will not allow myself to become political leverage. Never again.

Olivia’s eyes widened at the next part.

...it was my Master who taught me the correct way to pray to the Golden Lady. ‘Forget the Invocations, Declarations, and Petitions.’ he said. ‘I reckon she started listening after you stopped fucking around with your sacraments and entreaties and started praying for what you wanted.’ and this has been true. When I have invoked Her name and have prayed, I have been answered, although sometimes not in the way I expected....

Olivia’s eyes opened wide at this, and she glanced at the empty bed. The Church had very specific rote prayers they used to communicate with the Goddess, prayers they did not deviate from. There were very specific prayers for specific things, and it was required to follow them explicitly. There were rules for stepping outside of those prayers, as well. The cardinal of those rules was that you could not pray for yourself. Katarina had been taught- taught- to ignore those rules!

But things had changed. With the revelations from Katarina's translations, the priestesses could heal with their prayers again. The clerics' call for righeous indignation against ther foes were answered. Slowly, gradually, they were relearning how to communicate with their Goddess, and in turn were recieving the gifts they'd lost. With a great deal of difficulty, Olivia turned back to the book.

...and I’ve never prayed for anything I cannot accomplish on my own. I think a clear line needs to be drawn between ‘what i can accomplish on my own’ and praying for the things beyond my grasp. If I can reach out and pick up the cup, what point is there to pray for it? I cannot allow myself to fall into the sins of indolence and laziness.

"Well, at least she wasn’t stupid about it." Olivia muttered dryly. She flipped through several pages with maps of places she'd never seen.

...the Golden Lady is a goddess of infinite love, compassion, and understanding, and so it stands to reason that there should be no fear within me to Name Her, but I find that I can’t.

Olivia shuddered at this declaration. She wasn’t certain if it was heretical, but at the very least Katarina deserved a thorough and complete whipping. You couldn't just arbitrarily name the Goddess, that was blasphemy!

...Alicia says I should hold no fear to address the Golden Lady by Name.

"Alicia?" Olivia asked the air. "Was she receiving visions from the Saint?"

There was a thick book with a leather and wooden binding on the Lady Cardinal’s desk that caught Olivia’s eye, and it was to this that Olivia finally directed her attentions. She recognized this book; Katarina had somehow recorded Olivia's vow in it. She picked it up and began to read.

Dawn found Olivia with her arms wrapped around herself, shuddering and quaking with uncountable emotions. Awe, terror, love, sadness, confusion, anger, amusement, and threaded through all of them, the sick feeling of depression. Her stomach was churning and boiling. She couldn’t muster the strength to turn the page; helplessly she watched as her hand, seemingly of its own accord, turned it. The reports of the Cultus Sancte were dry, fussy, and analytical. It was their job to chronicle what a person did, and those reports were bone-dry. Katarina dispatched these witches during this time. Katarina dispatched a heretical sect. Katarina visited this city. That village.

Here in this book however, Olivia could see it all, hear it all. Everything was recorded here. Everything. Ten years of conversations. Ten years of Katarina muttering and talking to herself. Ten years of prayers, songs, and invective. Over and over and over, the same repeated phrase, varying little, but carrying the some tone of utter, undeniable condemnation: "By the Blessed name of the Golden Lady; for the crimes of heresy, mutation, and witchcraft, I condemn you as guilty. In the name of the Goddess of the Dawn, the Golden Lady, I sentence you to die." Dozens, no, hundreds of times.

If Olivia had at any point any doubts as to her love for the woman, they were wholly dispelled. Katarina was at turns strong, and weak, arrogant and humble, aloof and personable. She was hilarious, she was heartbreaking. Most of all, it seemed as though the Witch Hunter was desperately lonely.

And then, as she read, an icicle of terror wormed its way into her heart.

[Unknown]: "These things must be done in order: First you take the communion. Then you receive the oath."

[Katarina]: "What comes after that?"

[Unknown]: "Everything else."

[Katarina]: "Tell me about the ‘everything else’ you just mentioned. I want to know everything."

[Unknown]: "The oath, first."

[Katarina]: "I’m not swearing an oath until I know what it entails."

[Unknown]: "It’s not your oath I need to hear, Katarina. It’s my oath to you. The same oath I have sworn to all the others who have sought after me."

[Unknown]: "You are surprised that I swear an oath to the people who seek me?" She asked. "If a Goddess should be needed, the Goddess should be the first servant, just as the mother cares for her child."

[Unknown]: "You’re not stupid, Katarina. You understand what I mean."

[Unknown]: "Now hear my oath, and then sleep for real. We will not speak again like this for some time."

[Unknown]: "I kill, I give life. I injure, I heal. There are none who escape from my hands. There are none who escape from my eyes. May it be so that you are shattered. I welcome the defeated, the aged. Surrender to me, learn from me, obey me. May you be at rest. Do not forget the song, do not forget the prayer, do not forget me. I relieve you of all burdens. May it be so that there is no deception. Retaliation unto forgiveness, betrayal unto belief, despair unto hope, darkness unto light, death unto life. May you rest in my hands. Let there be a mark of your sins. Eternal life is found only in death. Forgiveness is before you, and so my incarnation vows."