We made the rest of the climb without incident. When we reach the top, we enter the shrine through an entryway under the platform, which the stairs lead into. Once we emerged, I could see that it was a platform, much like the pit stop platform, only this one completely encircled the tree. There were actually two shrines here, or maybe they were closer to small monuments, one on either side. They were both small and each one sheltered a small statue of some kind; there wasn't room in there for much else. In fact, they provided more or less just a roof for the statues.

"Good afternoon Hailstone Priest." Lilac Governess addressed a person wearing yellow almost golden robes with bold black inlays. This striking garb must have been the most extravagant I had seen. Especially noteworthy were the prominent pauldrons and accompanying bountiful hood. Honestly, he looked kind of sinister, and the mask didn't help.

"Ah, Lilac Governess and company." He cast his gaze across the group. Despite his sinister appearance, he gave off nothing but warmth and kindness. "Glad to see you on your weekly visit." Did he just say "weekly" visit? Did that mean we came here every week?? Well, I guess I didn't have to walk up all those stairs, so I suppose I didn't mind. But I would eventually lose my piggybacking privileges, damn... On a side note, they employed a 10-day week, not a 7-day. Culturally I could understand not using 7 but why is everything always base ten?

"Of course. Which do the winds favor today?"

"The North. He has been especially benevolent this cycle." He raised his palms upward in a wide sweeping gesture as if to praise the sky, which I suppose was exactly what he was doing.

"Very good. We will need to praise him with double fervor!" I was sure I sensed some groans from the assembled children. Of course, Lilac Governess wouldn't miss this either. "I will have none of this! You are in the God of Clear Skies’ shrine! You will show respect!" The grumbles stopped, but I'm sure they just stopped projecting them.

Hailstone Priest just laughed, however. He apparently understood kids. "I see there is a new member of your flock. But he looks very young..." He rubbed his chin. "You didn't find a mate and have a child without me knowing, did you?" Was he joking? I couldn't tell.

"Of course not! You would know. I'm here every week!" I had no way of knowing, but I speculated that she must have been blushing under that mask.

"Yes, right you are," he replied with what sounded like a genuine realization as he his palm with his opposing fist.

"Anyways," she pulled me up and held me before him. "He is actually pretty intelligent. Right, Indigo?"

...Was she expecting me to say something? Why do people keep forcing me to make these awkward introductions? "Pleasure to me you. My name is Indigo, as she said. I guess we will be coming here every week, so I will see you quite a bit..." And awkward silence. I mean really, what else am I supposed to say? At any rate, it seemed whatever expectation Lilac Governess had of me was met.

"See?" She said as she set me on my own two legs.

"He is quite well-spoken." He remarked with an arm across his chest and a hand resting on his chin. I could feel the curiosity leaking out. "He doesn't look more than 1 cycle."

"That is correct, he has only had his first cycle recently." He nodded slightly.

"Well, I won't keep you any longer from your worship." He made an interesting gesture that involved pushing his palms together and then raising and letting them splay apart as he brought his elbows together, ultimately ending by allowing his arms to open. With that, he moved away to resume his priestly duties, whatever that entailed.

We made our way over to one of the shrines. The North one, I surmised based on their initial conversation. There wasn't much to these, they were pretty much just a small pavilion with a roof that slanted backward. Underneath, there was a small pedestal that supported a small statue of a man with a large beard and wearing only a loincloth. In his right and left hand, he held what I assumed to be the sun and the moon respectively. Looked straightforward enough.

As we approached, some of the children fell into line, assembling themselves into what looked like a predetermined arrangement. In this case an arch around the shrine. Of course, a number of them took no such initiative. However, with a little bit of prodding from Lilac Governess, they too begrudgingly fell into line. Lilac seemed to be pretty relaxed with her discipline. However, this seemed to be an exception from her usual light-handed approach to punishment. It looked like she really did take reverence to the God of Clear Skies very seriously after all.

Once everyone was in their place, she cast a meaningful glance over her charges then walked over to the statue, knelt down, and made that same arm gesture that Hailstone Priest had made. I guess this was some kind of religious observance, like the sign of the cross for Christians. She offered a short prayer, "O Lord, we come to offer our eternal gratitude for your continued benevolence." She lifted up the statue. There was apparently a recess underneath. From this recess, she removed a long stick-like object. Holding it with both hands, she raised it up while bowing her head. I noticed some of the other children bowing their heads as well. They were mostly the older children, but not all of these senior children were doing so. I couldn't help but think that this was a conscious choice. Luckily for them, Lilac Governess either didn't notice or didn't regard it as something that needed to be addressed.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

I should probably note at this point that the winds up here were quite intense. That made sense considering how high up we were. The tree branches I imagined dampened the intensity considerably, but even still, most light objects would be lost if they were not anchored. The winds were not just present on this upper level either, they had steadily been increasing more intense as we worked our way up the trunk. I was honestly nervous that someone would get blown off the stairs, but it seemed like nobody had any issues with it, although Lilac Governess insisted that the other junior member ride with her.

After the honorific gesture, she made her way over to one of the other corners of the platform. It wasn't so much a corner as another marker of a cardinal direction; the platform itself was round. What marked these east and west locations were two braziers, with a healthy fire burning in each. This was probably necessary, what with the strong winds and all. Still, despite the flames burning wildly in the wind, Lilac Governess managed to easily ignite the tip of the stick, the flame of which was immediately snuffed out by the wind. With smoke blowing away from the winds, She returned to the shrine.

It was becoming apparent that this wind was kind of a nuisance, at least for performing these worship rituals, I guess that is why they didn’t have too much up here, because it would very quickly end up down there, that is at the base of the tree. The statues were heavy, and the only things that might get blown away were those apparent incense sticks, but they were guarded by the statues. However, the wind was surely facilitating them burning down quicker than was intended, to say nothing of the fact that blowing away the smoke was probably not best practice

She resumed kneeling at the base of the shrine, and then, something remarkable happened. The wind stopped. As you can imagine I was quite startled. Was this the work of the God of Clear Skies? Perhaps a gesture of accepting the offering? Could it be something else? It seemed unlikely that by sheer coincidence the wind would stop. It took me a bit longer to realize than it should, as I was somehow transfixed on the steady curling of the smoke as it rose, undisturbed by the now absent tempest. As I followed the smoke upward, I noticed something. After it reached a certain height it was immediately blown away. It was then that I took a look around. The winds were still blowing, the branches were still swinging, and the braziers still danced with firelight. The winds hadn't stopped, they had only stopped right here! Around the shrine!

"Now please hear our continual gratitude." Apparently, Lilac Governess had been speaking, and I had completely been zoned out of everything happening outside of the wind phenomena. "Okay everyone, please show your gratitude to the God of Clear Skies." On her command, the world got a lot noisier. Everyone was practically shouting their prayers for the God of Clear Skies. I guess they thought they had to shout to be heard. All the thoughts I perceived were pretty childish. Well, more childish than the age range would suggest; I think the older children might be using the Whisper, which would make sense in this context.

While the children made their prayers, Lilac held the kneeling position with the burning incense held above her head. It must have been really tiring holding it up for so long because she was shaking pretty badly by the end. Once the incense had burned through, perhaps 10 minutes, it burned pretty quickly, Lilac Governess stood up and the winds came rushing back in, almost like what I envisioned when the Red Sea collapsed after Mose and company had made their way across. "Okay, let's head back," she said with a large exhale as one does after finishing a hard day's work.

On the way back, I got to ride passenger again, and of course, I wasn't going to let that little wind miracle go unexplained. "Oh, the wind? I suppose that would seem unusual if you hadn't seen it before."

As it turned out, It wasn't the work of some god or happenstance, it was Lilac Governess. She had learned to apply her fox magic to the very air itself! That had to be incredibly difficult.

"It's not that difficult actually," I got the feeling that she was flattered by my praise. Seemed a little immature to be flattered by a small child, but then again, now that I thought about it, it didn't seem that Lilac Governess was that old. She was still an apprentice until very recently; the full weight of the position had been forced upon her when the previous Governess had died. It was quite possible that Lilac Governess was still only in her mid-teens. However, I wasn't sure about the time frames for these apprenticeships.

"Really? I wouldn't even know where to begin." The conversation had somehow turned casual.

"Haha, Indigo, you can't even use fox magic yet, I think it will be a while before you should concern yourself with these things."

"Oh..." It had never occurred to me that she didn't know. I wasn't sure when children learned how to use fox magic, but I was definitely under the impression I was an early bloomer. "But I can Miss Lilac Governess."

"Oh? haha, can you?" She laughed. It was a light-hearted laugh with no derision intended.

"Yes." I looked over and spotted some leaves within my reach; my effective range was now around 3 feet. I plucked one of the leaves, brought it over, and hovered it before her face. "See?"

She responded in essentially a telepathic thought of one's eyes going wide with surprise. I made the leaf spin slowly around its axis. I could now do this as well too. She slowly reached up and grabbed the leaf stem. Holding it between her thumb and index finger, she slowly rotated the leaf. After a long moment of doing this, she turned back to me. I was now a little bit worried. "You really used fox magic, didn't you?" I just nodded nervously. "Since when?" Her thoughts were unadorned and didn't carry any sentiment. This was making me very uneasy. "Maybe, since I was 6 moons." ...Silence. "But I really couldn't do anything with it back then, just rustle some fabric!" I said in my defense. Couldn't tell you why I felt the need to defend myself.

"Could you be..." She looked up to the sky, still holding the leaf at chest level. Could I be... What? "The God of Clear Skies' Chosen?" ...The what now?

I was a bit nonplussed, but I didn't feel comfortable directly asking for more clarification, opting instead to convey my feelings of bewilderment, believing that should make my desire for more information known. Still staring at the sky, she quickly nodded as if coming to a decision. She looked back at me. "Okay, Indigo. From this day forward, you are my special student." There was real resolve in her words. What had I just gotten myself into?