The Education of Brother Thaddius and other tales of DemonWars

PART 1: THE POWER VOID

The great hall of St.-Mere-Abelle had remained untouched in the hours since the battle. Even the bodies remained, exactly where they fell. Braumin Herde and the other masters had ordered this — they wanted every monk at the monastery to see the harsh reality of this most awful day.

Father Abbot Fio Bou-raiy lay crumpled on the floor just before the throne, a hole blown through his head. The result of a hurtling lodestone, certainly, and the reality of a gem propelled so powerfully by someone considered an enemy of the Church stung Brother Thaddius profoundly, a poignant reminder to him of the madness.

Before the throne, the gigantic circular stained-glass window was no more than twisted metal and shattered shards. A dragon had flown through that window, so the story went.

A dragon! Never in his life had Brother Thaddius expected to see such a beast, never had he even believed that such beasts existed.

Most of the other brothers who were now filtering through the great hall on their way to the front doors of the monastery focused on that window, of course. It was a recent construction, a beautiful depiction of the petrified arm of Brother Avelyn, standing defiantly in the midst of the carnage of the Barbican volcanic explosion. Now it was gone, so suddenly, so violently, so…amazingly.

For one of the other brothers, however, the window seemed to hold little interest. Brother Thaddius smiled as he watched the stocky monk, a bruiser named Mars, standing before the sweeping stairway that led up to the balcony encircling the room. On those stairs lay two bodies: a woman Thaddius did not know and Marcalo De’Unnero.

Thaddius moved over to stand beside Brother Mars, measuring the intensity on the monk’s face. Thaddius knew him well, for though Mars was several years older than Thaddius, they had come into the mother abbey in the same month, Thaddius as a newly-ordained monk and Mars transferring in from St. Gwendolyn. Because of that circumstance, Mars had made more acquaintances among Thaddius’s peers than among those of his age.

It hadn’t taken Brother Thaddius long to figure out that he didn’t much like the man. For Mars was everything Thaddius was not. He was handsome and powerful, as solid as stone and as good a fighter as any brother of the class.

But he could barely light an oil-soaked rag with a ruby, and anyone needing magical healing from Brother Mars’s soul stone would surely perish. By Thaddius’s estimation, brothers like Mars were the reason the Abellican Church was in such disarray and dire straights. The man was not worthy to be a brother.

A situation that might soon be remedied, Thaddius understood as he noted the moisture gather in Brother Mars’s eyes as he stared at the face-down body of Marcalo De’Unnero.

“They know the truth of your loyalties,” Thaddius remarked quietly, and Brother Mars turned to him with a start.

“I…of what do you speak, brother?” the man replied.

“Your loyalty to De’Unnero. To the heretic. It is obvious. It has been obvious for a long while. The masters know, and so does everyone in the room who sees you now, your hero dead before you.”

“You presume much, brother,” Mars answered.

“I think not,” Thaddius was quick to reply. “There were many here at St.-Mere-Abelle, serving under Father Abbot Bou-raiy who were intrigued with the vision of Marcalo De’Unnero. I can name myself among those. It is no secret, nor does it need to be, for we brothers are expected to question and explore. But some, it would clearly seem, moved beyond simple intrigue. Some brothers here were loyal not to the Father Abbot, but to the man they thought should hold the title. This man, De’Unnero.”

Brother Mars did not reply, and stared stoically straight ahead, all signs of his grief gone.

“They know, brother,” Thaddius said. “You are my classmate, perhaps a friend, and so I tell you this with confidence that you will pretend this conversation never happened. Surely you are smart enough to realize that Bishop Braumin has spent many weeks studying the remaining brothers of the Order, and that he will claim the position as Father Abbot — who else could it be? — and among his first duties will be a purge. Bishop Braumin hated Marcalo De’Unnero above all, of course, and he will surely root out any followers of the heretic.”

Brother Mars chewed his lip for a bit, trying to find some response to that reasonable claim. He turned back to Thaddius, to find that the small man had simply walked away.

Bishop Braumin Herde stood as if in a daze in the blasted and bloodied courtyard of St.-Mere-Abelle. All about him, his fellow monks worked frantically with magical hematite, the soul stones, to bring healing to scores, hundreds, of injured warriors who had done battle this dark day within the abbey and on the fields beyond her shattered gates. Those brothers didn’t ask the allegiance of those they healed; the battle had been settled in no uncertain terms when Prince Midalis and his closest allies had defeated King Aydrian.

Still, so many had died, and would die, and Braumin could only shake his head at the horrors of war, and all the misery that had plagued Honce-the-Bear in the last decades.

But in that darkness, Bishop Braumin had found, too, hope.

Now Midalis would be King of Honce-the-Bear — he already was in the eyes of those huddled about St.-Mere-Abelle. Indeed, even by Aydrian, who had laid claim to the throne!

Many times in the course of that morning, had those healing brothers turned to Bishop Braumin with their gemstones, and truly it appeared as if Braumin could use more of the soul stone magic. He was a muscular man, not tall and no longer young, having passed his fortieth year. Usually he seemed as solid as any, strong of frame and with determined features, but now his jaw hung crooked, and Bishop Braumin stood crooked, favoring ribs that had been pulverized by the heavy kick of Marcalo De’Unnero. He was missing a few teeth from the right side of his mouth, too, from a punch that had knocked him nearly senseless.

De’Unnero had almost killed him with that strike; indeed, that apostate monk could hit with the force of a fomorian giant!

What a day it had been! Four armies joined in furious combat on the fields about the ancient and huge monastery.

What a day it had been! A dragon — a true dragon! — had crashed through the huge circular stained glass window of the great foyer of St.-Mere-Abelle, only to be thrown back out by the demonic power of Aydrian possessed, a bolt of searing white lightning that seemed as if it was still resonating within the deep stones of the high seaside cliff wall that held St.-Mere-Abelle.

What a day it had been! The great warrior, the ranger Nightbird, had been pulled from the grave and summoned halfway across Honce by the dark power of Aydrian, to fight by Aydrian’s side as a horrid zombie.

But love had conquered the darkness of demonic powers, and Elbryan Wyndon, the ranger the elves had named Nightbird, had been coaxed from his state of undeath by Jilseponie, the wonderful Pony, the woman who had loved him for so many years, the woman who had been his wife, and who had given birth to his child soon after his death those two decades before.

And that child, tainted by the demon dactyl, had taken the throne of Honce-the-Bear. By sheer force and unrivaled power, that child had become King Aydrian.

Bishop Braumin Herde had watched the conclusion of the titanic battle within the monastery this day. Laid low by Aydrian’s second, the apostate De’Unnero, the Bishop had managed to hold onto consciousness just enough to witness the glory, the beauty, of Elbryan and Pony expelling the demon from their son’s heart and soul.

And so the battle had ended, so abruptly. De’Unnero was dead, killed by Pony, as was the woman, the bard, who had come in beside De’Unnero and Aydrian. Indeed, for some reason Bishop Braumin had not yet discerned, De’Unnero himself had killed the woman in the last fleeting moments of his own life.

And the demon was gone, expelled from this young man it had taken as host. The light had returned to the shining eyes of young Ardrian Wyndon, but with it, too, had come the sorrow of great regret. Bishop Braumin glanced over at the broken young man, sitting in the shadow of the wall with the centaur, Bradwarden, and Belli-mar Juraviel of the Touel’alfar.

“A centaur,” Braumin whispered. “And an elf, with wings, fighting for St.-Mere-Abelle.” He shook his head.

What a day it had been!

What might brothers reading the accounts of this battle a century hence think of the tale, he wondered? Would the reclusive elves, the Touel’alfar and the Doc’alfar, certain to return to their hidden lands and magical shadows, be forgotten again in the lands of men by that time? Would the rare centaurs be no more, again, than fireside tales?

And would the lessons of the travesty of Aydrian Boudabras be forgotten, only to be painfully realized once more in the land of Honce?

With that dark thought in mind, Bishop Braumin moved a bit closer to eavesdrop on the two most important people in Honce, Prince Midalis who would soon be King, and Pony, perhaps the most powerful person in the world (and if not her, then surely her son Aydrian, who was under her control once more, it seemed).

“I have so much to do, so much to repair,” he heard Midalis admit to Pony, and it was hard to dispute the remark, for not far from where they stood, many of Midalis’s soldiers piled the dead beside a hole that would become a common grave.

So many dead.

“You have pardoned Duke Kalas?” Pony asked him.

“It will be done,” the soon-to-be King replied. “In time. I want him to consider long and hard all that he has done. But yes, I will pardon him. I will invite him into my Court, to serve me as he served my brother. He was deceived by Aydrian…”

Braumin held his breath as Pony’s eyes flashed, but Midalis calmed her with a warm smile

“He was deceived by the same demon that stole from you your son,” he corrected, and Pony nodded.

“A wise choice,” Pony replied. “Vengeance breeds resentment.”

How true, Bishop Braumin silently noted, for that lesson would be something that he would need to keep in mind in the coming days, he knew, and he feared. He would have to rise above his very human emotions.

“Jilseponie would serve me well,” he heard Midalis say, drawing him from his contemplation.

Pony smiled and managed a little laugh. Braumin held his breath, knowing what was coming. “Jilseponie is dead,” she said, and though it was a joke, Braumin couldn’t miss the fact that her expression became more serious suddenly, as if she noted some definite truth in her own words, an epiphany she would not escape.

And how it pained the gentle monk to hear such talk from this woman!

“Twice I have personally cheated death,” Pony went on. “In the Moorlands and on the beach of Pireth Dancard. I should have died, but Elbryan would not let me.”

“Then credit Elbryan with saving the kingdom,” Midalis was quick to say.

“But that was not his purpose,” Pony explained. “He saved me to save my son, and so I shall. And then I will join him. As I rightfully should have already joined him.”

Midalis stammered for a response, and Braumin surely understood that shock, given the woman’s startling remarks. This woman, Pony, the most powerful gemstone user in the world, trained and skilled in the elven sword dance, a woman who was younger by perhaps a decade than Braumin Herde, had just claimed that she would not live much longer!

“You will leave us now?” Braumin heard Midalis ask when he turned his focus back to the conversation, and the monk held his breath. He did not want her to go.

“My time here is ended,” Pony replied. She hugged Midalis. “Rule well — I know you shall! For me, I will spend my time in Dundalis, back home again. How long ago, it seems, when Elbryan and I would run carelessly about the caribou moss, awaiting the hunters’ return or hoping for a glimpse of the Halo.”

Pony stepped back and motioned to the side, to her son and his two companions sitting in the shade of the wall.

Braumin’s gaze went that way. The centaur stood up — Pony had healed his broken leg so completely that he barely limped now, only hours later. Yet another reminder of the power of this woman, Braumin thought.

He couldn’t help himself. “Wait!” he called and he ran over to Pony and Midalis. “Wait, I beg!”

Pony greeted him with a great hug.

“I cannot believe you are leaving us,” the monk said, and he wouldn’t let her go. He wanted to say so much more! He wanted to tell her that he and his brothers had discussed the prospect of handing her the Abellican Church, to serve as the first Mother Abbess! It would be a monumental action. It would change the world! Surely she could not refuse such an opportunity…

Before Bishop Braumin could begin to spout out the many thoughts swirling in his mind, though, Pony replied, “You have your church to restore, and I have my son to save.”

It wasn’t just what she said, but how she had expressed it, and that included a bit of magic, Braumin realized, as the woman used her soul stone to speak within his heart and mind.

You have your church to restore.

You. Bishop Braumin. Pony wasn’t simply making an off-handed and obvious remark about the state of the world, she was charging Braumin with this most important duty. She was giving him her blessing — nay, her demand — that repairing the broken Abellican Church, the institution that had suffered so greatly under the De’Unneran Heresy, fell squarely upon the shoulders of Bishop Braumin Herde.

And indeed, this would prove a heavy burden, the monk knew. The Abellican Church lay in ruins. So many brothers had been killed or driven out by De’Unnero’s minions, and many of those minions, fanatically loyal to the vile man, remained in positions of power at various chapels and even abbeys! Other chapels were empty and in disrepair, and even one of the great abbeys, St. Gwendolyn by the Sea, was now by all reports a deserted and haunted place.

Braumin Herde gave a great sigh. A sniffle from behind turned him to regard his dearest friend, Master Marlboro Viscenti, standing there with his head bowed.

“What better place to save him than St.-Mere-Abelle?” Braumin slyly remarked, more for Viscenti’s sensibilities than his own.

For Braumin already knew the answer, and he was already nodding as Pony replied, “Dundalis.”

True to her word, Pony left later that same day, with Bradwarden, Juraviel and her son Aydrian, bound for the Timberlands and the town of Dundalis.

From a high window in the monastery, Bishop Braumin and Master Viscenti watched them go, and knew the truth: Pony would never return to Honce-the-Bear.

“We have a lot of work to do, my friend,” Braumin remarked, trying to sound as optimistic as he could manage — and surely he thought the attempt pitiful. “I fear that our struggle has only just begun.”

“No,” Viscenti said, draping an arm about his friend’s broad shoulders. When Braumin turned to regard him, he found Viscenti staring at him intently, and nodding.

“No,” the skinny man said again. “The demon is expelled and King Midalis will help us as we help him. A lot to do, yes, but we go with honest hearts and a desire to do good things. We will prevail.”

It wasn’t often that Viscenti served as the calming and optimistic voice.

Braumin was glad that this was one of those rare occasions. He dropped his hand over Viscenti’s, and looked back out at the distant procession, hearing again the words of Pony, the charge that he must fix the Abellican Church.

He straightened his shoulders and steeled his broken jaw.

He knew what must first be done.

Brother Mars hunched low and tried to remain inconspicuous as he went about his work in tending the wounded soldiers, and traveled the battlefield perimeter as far as possible from St.-Mere-Abelle’s wall. Normally, he was an imposing man, solid as a monastery wall, so it was said, and never one to shy from confrontation. But now, at this time, after the whispers of Brother Thaddius in the great hall of the monastery, after this disastrous battle, the man believed that a low profile alone could save him.

They knew.

It all made sense now. The masters of St.-Mere-Abelle had placed him in the background of the great battle, out of the way manning one of the high catapults. By all rights, Mars should have been on the front lines, for despite his young age and short training, few at the monastery, few in all the Church, could outfight him.

But no, they knew the truth of his loyalties, as Brother Thaddius had warned.

And it was the truth, the man admitted to himself out there on the bloodstained field. Mars had thrown his loyalty to Marcalo De’Unnero. He had remained under the command of Father Abbot Fio Bou-raiy as a spy, mostly, for his heart lay with the vision of De’Unnero, even if some of the man’s tactics seemed a bit extreme.

De’Unnero did not believe that the sacred gemstones should be out of Church control, or that their blessing should be offered so liberally to the common folk of Honce-the-Bear.

De’Unnero did not believe that the peasants should be coddled. No, loyalty to God was a difficult and demanding task, one requiring vigilance and sacrifice.

To Brother Mars, Father Abbot Fio Bou-raiy and those others, Bishop Braumin and his allies, were weak and soft.

But they had won the day, and so, Brother Mars lamented, the Abellican Church might never recover.

More immediate concerns weighed on Brother Mars this day, however, concerns for his own future, or lack thereof. The masters suspected his turn from their way and toward De’Unnero. They surely would not tolerate him now with De’Unnero dead and the cause so badly disrupted.

He thought of his coming fate — and he was certain things would fall this way — with him in the dungeons of St.-Mere-Abelle, chained to the wall and fed food not fit for the rats. Even though he was outside of the monastery at that time, hoisting another wounded soldier over his shoulder to carry to the brothers with the soul stones, Mars felt as if the walls were closing in around him, suffocating him, damning him.

He knew what he must do. He kept at his work until the call for Vespers, the sunlight fast fading. Off in a far corner of the battlefield, he stripped off his bloody robes and threw on the shirt of a man killed in the battle. He crawled to the farthest point where he could remain undercover and as soon as darkness fell, he put his feet under him and ran off into the night.

He didn’t stop running until he came upon the town of St.-Mere-Abelle, some three miles inland.

The place was overfilled with soldiers, men from every corner of Honce, and more than a few from Alpinador, even. Mars understood the nature of war, and knew enough to realize that many of these people would remain in St.-Mere-Abelle, would make of it their home.

So would he.

Doors of the common rooms, taverns, and inns of the town were thrown wide by order of Prince Midalis, who was surely soon to be crowned King of Honce-the-Bear.

From one of those rooms, where songs of lament, of loss, of victory and of hope all blended together in the many toasts and laments offered by the men, Brother Mars stared up the long hill toward the silhouette of the dark monastery beneath the starry skies.

Not so long ago, his heart had leaped with joy at the whispers that Marcalo De’Unnero approached St.-Mere-Abelle and would claim the Church as his own. How thrilled was Mars to believe that he could throw off his façade, discard this lie his life had become, and proclaim openly his support for De’Unnero! How he had hoped that he would stand beside that man, the greatest warrior the Abellican Order had ever known, to reshape the Order into one of sacrifice and valor and utter devotion!

Guilt brought many pained squints to Mars’s eyes that night as he replayed the disastrous battle. He should have been stronger. He should have gone to Marcalo De’Unnero in the great hall and fought beside the man.

He conjured the image, burned forever into his memory, of De’Unnero lying dead on the stairs beside the woman called Sadye. Brother Mars should have been there, fighting with his idol, dying beside De’Unnero if that, too was God’s will.

He should have.

But he had failed.

At first glance, the brown-skinned man seemed quite out of place in this monastery, the mother abbey of the Abellican Church, but Pagonel walked with a quiet confidence and ease, and if he was out of place, no one had bothered to tell him.

He was a small man, well into middle age, thin and wiry, though not a nervous and excitable type like Brother Viscenti. He walked in sandals, or barefoot, as he was now, and in either case, a shadow made no less noise than he. He wore a tan tunic and loose-fitting pants, tied at the waist with a red sash, the Sash of Life, the highest rank of the Jhesta Tu mystics of Behren.

He stood in a grand hallway now, the Court of Saints, lined on one side by windows looking out over All Saints Bay, and on the opposite wall by grand paintings of the heroes of the Abellican Order, amazing works of arts that each stood twice the height of Pagonel. Few who were not of the Abellican Order had ever seen this place, but Bishop Braumin had offered Pagonel free rein of St.-Mere-Abelle, naming the mystic as one of the true heroes of the battle that had, in Braumin’s words, “defined the world.”

Pagonel hadn’t even really fought in that battle, not conventionally at least, although if he had, then surely many would have fallen before him. He was Jhesta Tu, and a grandmaster of that martial art. An Allheart Knight’s shining armor would not protect him from the lethal hands of Pagonel, for the mystic could strike with the speed of a viper and the strength of a tiger. A warrior’s sword would never get close to striking him, for Pagonel could move like the mongoose, faster than the sword hand, faster than the eye.

But no, he hadn’t fought in the battle, other than to fight against the battle. When Midalis and Aydrian and their closest cohorts had engaged in their duel in the great hall of the monastery, Pagonel, riding the dragon Agradelious, had flown low about the larger battlefield, calling for peace, insisting that the victor would emerge from within St.-Mere-Abelle, no matter the outcome on the field. He had saved many men and women that day outside of St.-Mere-Abelle, and in the aftermath, many indeed had come to him with their thanks and praise.

None of that had been lost on Bishop Braumin. On Braumin’s word, Pagonel could go where he pleased in St.-Mere-Abelle, and could stay as guest of the Church for as long as he desired.

Truly the mystic had been pleasantly surprised by what he had found in the quieter corners of the great monastery, whose walls ran a mile long atop the cliff wall, and where secret stairways led to quiet rooms full of wondrous treasures — of sculpture, painting, glassworks, tapestries, and jewelry design.

As in this hall, lined with huge paintings meticulously and lovingly crafted.

Lovingly.

Pagonel could see that truth in every delicate stroke, in the favorable and painstaking use of light, in the frames, even, wrought of gold and as artistic as the paintings themselves.

One in particular caught the mystic’s eye and held him, and not only because of the subject — the only woman depicted in any of the hall’s masterpieces — but because of the sheer grace in the form, her form. She was dressed in a long white gown, her heavy crimson cape flying about her shoulders as she moved and played a beautiful morin khuur of burnished, shining wood, her fingers gracefully working the bow across the four strings.

The light in the hallway, dying as the sun set in the west, was not favorable at that time of day, but Pagonel remained, transfixed, until darkness filled the hall, and then some more.

A young brother entered the far end of the hall, a small man and exceptionally thin, given the way his robe seemed to flop about him with every step. Pagonel watched him closely as he lifted his hand and placed a tiny, glowing diamond upon a platter lined with crystal. He chanted quietly and moved along, placing a second enchanted diamond near to the middle of the room.

Again he moved down the hall, chanting, but his prayer was surely interrupted when he noted Pagonel standing before the one of the paintings.

“Master Pagonel,” he said with a seemingly polite bow, though the perceptive mystic caught a bit on unease accompanying the dip, for it was not offered sincerely and more out of necessity. “I am sorry if I have disturbed you.”

“Far from it,” the mystic replied. “I welcome the light, that I might continue to stare at this most lovely figure.”

The young brother, his narrow features seeming sharper in the diamond light, stared at the image before the man. “St. Gwendolyn,” he explained.

“I have heard this name.”

“A great warrior, so the legend claims,” the brother explained, moving near to the mystic.

“Legend? Is she not sainted, and does such an action not declare the legend as fact?”

The small man shrugged as if it did not matter.

“She has an interesting choice of weapon,” Pagonel said, motioning back to the picture and the woman. “One might expect a bow of a different sort on a battlefield.”

“St. Gwendolyn was known as a fine musician,” the monk explained.

“The morin khuur,” Pagonel replied. “A most difficult instrument to master.”

“Morin khuur?”

Pagonel pointed to the instrument, then turned his fingers to match the pose of Gwendolyn as she handled the bow.

“It is a violin,” the young monk explained.

“Ah,” said the mystic. “In To’gai, they have such an instrument and name it morin khuur.”

The monk nodded, and again, to perceptive Pagonel, he seemed as annoyed as enlightened by the news. The furrow in this one’s brow came quite easily, Pagonel noted, as if he was not a content man, by any means. He was young, quite young, perhaps in his early twenties and surely no aged master of the abbey, and yet he was handling the magical gemstones with ease and proficiency, as the lighted diamonds clearly reminded.

“Tell me of St. Gwendolyn,” Pagonel bade him. “A warrior, you say.”

“With her violin,” the monk explained. “So says the legend that when a band of powries gained the beach along the Mantis Arm and came at the brothers and sisters of her chapel, Gwendolyn took up her instrument and boldly ran to the front of the line. And so she played, and so she danced.”

“Danced?” There was more intrigue than surprise in Pagonel’s voice, as if he suspected where this might be going.

“Danced all about her line, all about the powrie line,” the monk went on. “They could not turn their attention from her, mesmerized by her movements and the beauty of her song, so it is said. But neither could they catch up to her with their knives and spiked clubs, no matter how furiously they turned in pursuit.”

“And thus they were not prepared when Gwendolyn’s allies struck them dead,” Pagonel finished, smiling and nodding at the monk.

“The powries were chased back to their boats,” said the monk. “The town was saved. It is considered a miracle in the Church, indeed, the miracle which allowed for the canonization of St. Gwendolyn.”

“You do not agree.”

The monk shrugged. “It is a fine tale, and one catered to admit a woman among the saints — a necessary action, I expect. Perhaps St. Gwendolyn was clever, and her ruse helped save the day from the powries. More likely, she bought the defenders enough space to launch some lightning or fire at the dwarves, driving them from the beach.”

“Ah,” the mystic said, nodding in understanding. “And there is the true miracle, of course, the barrage of magical energy from the sacred Ring Stones.”

The young monk didn’t reply, and stood impassively, as if the truth should be self-evident.

Pagonel nodded and turned his full attention to the painting once more, enchanted by the beautiful face, the thick black hair and the graceful twist of this exquisite woman. The movement was so extreme and in balance, the cloak flying wildly, and yet obviously she remained in complete control. The artist had done his work well, the mystic knew, for he felt as if he understood St. Gwendolyn, and felt, too, that she would have made a wonderful Jhesta Tu.

Might Gwendolyn still have a lesson for the Abellican Order, Pagonel wondered?

He turned to the young monk. “What is your name?”

“Brother Thaddius,” the man answered.

Pagonel smiled and nodded. “These are the Saints of the Abellican Church?”

He nodded.

“Tell me of them,” the mystic asked.

“I have my duties…”

“Bishop Braumin and the others will forgive you for indulging in my demands. I expect that this is important. So please, young Brother Thaddius, indulge me.”

“What am I to do?” Braumin asked Viscenti a few nights later in the private quarters of Fio Bouraiy, where the two were separating dead Bou-raiy’s private items from the robes and gemstones reserved for the office of the Father Abbot..

“It falls to you,” Viscneti replied. “Of that, there is no doubt.”

“It?”

“Everything,” said Viscenti. “I do not envy you, but know that I will be there standing behind you, whatever course you chart.”

“A bold claim!”

“If not Braumin Herde — Bishop Braumin Herde — then who?” Viscenti asked. “Is there an abbot left alive after the De’Unneran Heresy?”

“Haney in St. Belfour.”

Viscenti snorted and shook his head. “A fine man, but one who was not even ready for that position, let alone this great responsibility we see before us. Besides, he is a Vanguardsman, as is Midalis who will be King.”

“Perhaps an important relationship then.”

Again, the skinny, nervous man snickered. “Midalis would not have it,” he declared, and Braumin couldn’t disagree. “Our new King is no fool and having a Vanguardsman as King and as Father Abbot would surely reek of invasion to the folk of Honce proper! Duke Kalas would not stand for it, nor would the other nobles.

“Abbot Haney would be the wrong choice, in any case,” Brother Viscenti went on. “He has no first-hand understanding of De’Unnero or his potential followers. He does not understand what drove the heretic, or even, I fear, the true beauty of Avelyn. He is no disciple of Master Jojonah!”

That last statement, spoken so powerfully, jolted Braumin upright. Just hearing the name of Jojonah bolstered him and reminded him of the whole point of…everything. Master Jojonah had trained Brother Avelyn, and had shown a young Brother Braumin and some other even younger brothers the truth of the Abellican Church, as opposed to the course Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart and his protégée De’Unnero had charted for Order.

Master Jojonah had been burned at the stake clinging to his beliefs, had gone willingly into the arms of God — and had charged Brother Braumin with carrying on his bold course. So many others, too, had died for those beliefs. Braumin thought of brave brother Romeo Mullahy, who had leaped from the cliff at the Barbacan, the ultimate defiance of Marcalo De’Unnero, an action that had shaken De’Unnero’s followers and resonated within those who had opposed him.

And Brother Castinagis, one of Braumin’s dearest friends. The excitable fellow had never wavered, even in the face of certain death.

De’Unnero had burned him in his chapel in Caer Tinella.

“He is a good man,” Braumin at last replied. “He witnessed the miracle of Aida…”

“He is not even as worldly as Master Dellman, who serves him!” Viscenti interrupted. “Were he to ascend, then to those outside the Church, it would seem a power play by King Midalis, forcing his hand over the Abellican Church even as he strengthens his hold on Honce. We have walked that dark road already, my friend.”

Braumin Herde kept his gaze low, chewing his lips, and he nodded in agreement.

“Nay,” said Viscenti, “It falls to you. Only you. St.-Mere-Abelle is yours, surely. The Order is yours to chart.”

Braumin Herde shrugged, and it seemed more a shudder. “I want her back,” he said quietly.

Viscenti nodded and wore a wistful expression suddenly, clearly recognizing that his friend was speaking of Jilseponie.

“I feel as if I best serve the Church by enlisting our southern friends to fly me on their dragon to the Timberlands, that I might drag Pony back to St.-Mere-Abelle to save us all.”

“That we will not do,” came another voice, wholly unexpected, and both monks jumped and spun about to see Pagonel standing quietly in the shadows of the room.

“How did you get in here?” Viscenti shouted as much as asked.

“Have I upset you, brother?” the mystic asked. “I was offered free travel through the monastery, so I was told…”

“No, no,” Braumin put in, and he dropped his hand on Viscenti’s shoulder to calm the man. “Of course, you are welcome wherever you will go. You merely startled us, that is all.”

The mystic bowed.

“And heard us, no doubt,” said Viscenti.

“I took great comfort in your advice to Bishop Braumin,” Pagonel admitted. He stepped up before Braumin Herde. “I take less comfort in your expressed fears.”

The monk stared at him hard.

“I will not take you to Jilseponie, nor to her should you go,” Pagonel insisted. “She has done enough. Her tale is written, for the wider world at least. Besides, I have witnessed the power of Aydrian and believe that Jilseponie would best serve the world if she can instill in her son a sense of morality and duty akin to that she and her dead Elbryan once knew. You wish to go to her, to beg her to return and assume the lead in your wounded Order. This is understandable, but not practical.”

Clearly overwhelmed, Bishop Braumin fell back and into a chair, nearly tumbling off the side of it as he landed hard and off-balance. “What am I to do?”

“Summon a College of Abbots,” said Master Viscenti. “I will nominate you as Father Abbot — none will oppose!”

“Abbots?” Braumin asked incredulously. “Myself and Abbot Haney are all that remain, I fear!”

“Then bring them all in, all together,” said Pagonel. “Summon every brother from every chapel and every abbey.” He lifted a fist up before him, fingers clutched. “This is the strongest position for the hand,” he explained. “Bring your Church in close and move outward one piece at a time.”

Braumin didn’t respond, but hardly seemed convinced.

“Brynn Dharielle and the dragon will fly south in the morning, going home,” the mystic explained. “I was to go with them, but I have quite enjoyed my journey through the catacombs of this wondrous place. With your permission, I will remain longer.”

Braumin Herde looked at the man curiously.

“Call them in,” Pagonel bade him. “I will stand beside you, if you so desire.”

“You have a plan,” said Viscenti, and it seemed as much an accusation as a question.

The mystic glanced over at him and smiled. “Our Orders are not so different, my friend. This I have come to understand. Perhaps there are lessons the Jhesta Tu have learned which will now be of use to Father Abbot Braumin Herde.”

He looked to Braumin.

The man who would rule the Abellican Church nodded. He summoned again the memories of Jojonah, and Mullahy, Castinagis and the others, and silently vowed to find the courage to lead. If Midalis would rebuild the kingdom, then Braumin Herde would rebuild the Abellican Church.