It is not much, I know.

  But the magics are strong,

and I am weak.   

-Note within the hidden journal.

Celeste stood proudly in front of the several neatly organized piles of books. Gardinal hadn't understood her sudden interest in all matters Korek. She thought it best that Arabella and Valleresa be tight lipped on their excursion into Korek town. Knowing would only distress her dear guardian.

“Alright, Gardinal you can be on that pile, Valleresa and Arabella over there, Kriss you can do that one, and Vallerian.” Celeste looked around. “Where did Vallerian go?”

“Today's his day to go out into the city Your Radiance.” Gardinal responded stiffly. Gardinal seemed to have some distrust towards the count still, as for why Celeste wasn't sure. He had made mistakes in the past, but Celeste had seen the man trying, and that was all anyone could ask. To try and be better.

“Well then, no point in waiting. We can all take a bit of Vallerian's pile. As a group, we might make some sense of this in only a day or two!” Celeste beamed at the prospect, two or three days of dedicated research? She was almost shaking in excitement.

“Um... Cele.... Your Radiance?” Kriss asked sheepishly. Celeste turned to her friend, to see him uncharacteristically abashed.

“Yes?” Celeste asked with concern. She was particularly looking forward to doing some research with Kriss. From the conversations they'd had these past few days together, Celeste was eager to get his perspective on the topics.

“I umm... I just...”

“We can't read Your Radiance.” Arabella cut in, her face bright red with embarrassment. “It's not something you pick up on the streets you see.”

At that, Celeste felt her own cheeks burn. Arabella and Kriss both kept their eyes downcast, and Celeste wished she could shrink away.

“Of... of course... I... I had forgotten. I didn't...” Celeste began to stutter, she was at a loss for words. How had she been so blind? Of course those two wouldn't know how to read or write. When would they have had the chance? Celeste felt like a complete fool. “I'm so sorry.” She began, her lips trembling. She had embarrassed her friends with her carelessness.

“Radiance. Why don't you and brother Gardinal start on the books, while I work with Arabella and Kriss on teaching them to read and write?” Valleresa cut in, laying a comforting hand on Celeste's shoulder. “It won't take long, I'm sure.” Valleresa smiled warmly. Celeste wanted to hug the woman. Looking to Arabella and Kriss, both seemed nervously excited at the prospect.

“What a wonderful idea sister.” Celeste said, thankful for her friend's quick wit. “Come Brother Gardinal, we have much work to do if we are to get through these with just us!” Celeste dove into the books, pulling the top one off her pile and flipping through the pages.

“I'm still not exactly sure what we're looking for.” Gardinal groaned, but they set to work.

***

Now a week into her research, with furniture pushed to the walls of Gardinal’s sitting room, Celeste sat in the centre of the room, wading in a sea of knowledge. Books towered around her in high piles, many teetering a bit too far one way or another. Every now and then a pile would topple onto Celeste right when she was getting somewhere in her research. She would grumble, and one of the men would have to come over and unearth her from beneath the books. She was on the verge of something, she knew it, if she could only get past all the awful nonsense contained within these tomes.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“No, Arabella, the wily fox is spelled with only one ‘l’.” Valleresa admonished. “What you wrote is something… very different.” She snickered as Arabella harrumphed.

“Why do all these words have to be spelled so similarly?” Arabella complained. “And I don’t see how me learning all of this will be of any use.”

“Perhaps you won’t forget the apples next time you go to market if you can read my list.” Vallerian remarked, sitting at the windowsill in Celeste’s usual spot with Charlotte perched atop his crooked knee. She cawed and Vallerian nodded. “And the meat scraps. You forgot those as well.”

“I didn’t forget! They didn’t have any at the market!” she complained, and Vallerian just waved her off. Arabella grew red, when a large, callused hand fell on her arm.

“Arabella it's actually quite easy.” Kriss said, leaning over the small bit of parchment she was working on. “You just got to really think about how the word sounds when you say it. The writing does just represent our own voice.” Kriss started showing her how to sound out the words, as Valleresa watched in surprise.

Celeste smiled watching her friends work away. They seemed to have come far these past few days and listening to them work was a pleasure in and of itself. Valleresa often lost her patience with Arabella, but Kriss had been learning so quickly that he had started to assist Valleresa with explaining it to their other sister.

Celeste looked at him for a moment, getting lost at the sight of her oldest friend. Kriss had a look of intense concentration as he tried to explain some spelling errors to Arabella, ones that it seemed Valleresa hadn’t even noticed. The picture of a determined teacher at work was ruined by the smudge of ink across his brow. It seemed as quickly as he had been picking it up, Kriss still lacked the practical experience that a decade of writing and reading had given Celeste and Valleresa. Always watch for smudging, she thought, then chuckled.

Vallerian, of course, just sat and made jests at everyone else's expense. Doing so while playing with Charlotte. She smiled. It was good to count him among her friends once more. From the few nights he had prayed with everyone else, she was beginning to think she might finally be having an effect on the man. How wonderful an inspiration that would be, to have brought someone back from such darkness. That, above all else, was the business of the faith. No lost causes. Looking over the mountain of tomes, she refused to see her research as a lost cause either. No matter how dreadfully it was going.

After tearing through more than half the books that first day, Celeste realized she had not gathered nearly enough research material. So she had sent Gardinal, Valleresa, and Vallerian each out in turn to gather more. Now she seemed to be in possession of every treatise and tale with even a passing reference to the Korek. At least every one in the city. All that, yet she felt no closer to finding what she needed.

Unfortunately, what she needed was unclear. The temple had failed the Korek, and now she wanted to meet the people on their level to fold them back into the faith. To do so, she needed to understand the Korek. There had been something in the way the old woman had spoken, the way she had carried herself, that had revealed a deep intelligence. Celeste knew she had to approach the Korek as the intelligent, complex people that they were if she was to have any chance at uniting the people of Southshore in faith. If she was to save them from drifting towards the Chaos. Celeste shuddered at the memory of how the Chaos had felt in the baby. The awful, filthy sensation that clawed away at the infants soul. Shaking her head, Celeste banished the image from her thoughts.

Celeste let her eyes wander back over the piles of books. She had to admit that it was far more difficult than she had expected. Nearly a week of research had left her with barely more knowledge about the Korek than she had started with. Sure, she had picked up a few phrases, basic sentence structure, and even some expletives. Those had been particularly exciting; her father had never let her use any of those before. She mused for some time on whether swearing in Koreki would be permitted. Her Father would surely not be familiar, would he?

“You’re distracting yourself, Celeste.” She whispered an admonishment to herself.