I can scarcely imagine the life Rodrick has told me, so different is it from my own. But I can imagine how it gave him the faith he clung to. Now that faith has deserted him. His own angel abandoned him in a rage. Pretentious of truth were shattered. He is more broken than I.
Writing that, I wonder if that is how I feel about myself. Where did the flaw come from? Was it with me from birth? Did that iron demon at the acropolis smite it into me? What fissure crumbled when my brother died so far from me?
He followed in his father’s footsteps, more than merely into the employ of the church. Born in the city between the twin lakes, he has few memories of that crowded city. What he left the city with were bonds of friendship, one of which I severed. He holds nothing against me for it.
The church of the sun god is an empire unto itself, and an empire is more than the nobles with their titles. The priesthood are but a tiny fraction, like the mortar between stones in a great wall which has held back the worst ravages of war. While it could be said that the foundation was the people themselves, the stones were men like Rodrick’s father, tacitos. Not solely working off the dispensation of tithes, they form a body of commerce covering every need the churches need. Farmers, candlestick makers, coopers, masons, and fighters. When their labor exceeds the needs of the church, they work for pay and thus live lives one step beneath the holy regalia and one step in freedom.
Some thirty years ago, a terror had crept into the minds of the central kingdom and all stemming from the witch Amelia. She had been burned at the stake already, but the rumors refused to die out. A woman with the power to deceive, to pry into the minds of others and twist them around. Her official crimes included swindling, seduction and adultery, assault on the office of the inquisition, arson, and finally murder.
Her list of rumored crimes grew with every tavern tale. There was hardly a merchant in the land who didn’t claim to have been robbed by her, even in cities she never visited. To explain these lies, the Amelias of the world proliferated and the finger of accusation pointed everywhere.
The church did what they could to quell the hysteria. The original witch’s power was rare to the point of mythological. Even the wizard lamented that her body had been burned before he could record just how her stigmata had worked. This all I knew. To this day, priests give the odd lecture on how stigmata work with some crude rules of judgment derived from the better learning of the inquisition. Mere words were not enough, and instead they had to offer sanctuary to those who needed it.
Naturally, not all sanctuary was given peacefully. There were those that felt the church was reneging on their responsibilities by sheltering witches and sought justice by their own hands. However, the church of the sun has never been a pacifist religion. Better to buy a sword than a cloak they say, and Rodrick thus learned the value of a sword in the night.
I don’t mean to say such events always ended in bloodshed, and even when it did that someone died. Often, the men of the church simply had to use their fists, as though putting down a tavern brawl. He did kill though, took his first life as a young man protecting a woman who didn’t even have a stigmata. She had tattooed herself with an imitation that she had claimed would cause backlash to anyone using a power on her. It was nothing but a bluff and the funny thing was that if her pursuers had put it to the test, they would have known.
This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
Some years later, he had a far more remarkable encounter with a woman who both did and did not have a stigmata. She could call upon a variety of magic seemingly at will, her mark shifting according to her needs unlike anything the gods had given before, which meant to some people that it had to be the work of devils. When word of this reached the ears of the angels, they didn’t even wait for the girl to seek sanctuary. Paladins were sent to find her, which sparked even more rumors about her.
Rodrick road through the night with his brothers in arms. She had already fled her hometown, her parent’s house ransacked. A tip from the city guard of the neighboring village brought him to a inn too late. The proprietor had been thrown through the window and was delirious. Instead, Rodrick got his hands upon an opportunist who had lingered, thinking it was a good chance to steal the inn’s wine. He beat the information out of the thief and soon was on the trail of the burgomeister and his pack of thugs, lanterns jangling from their horses in the night. He was bedecked in holy iconography like a hare’s white fur in the snow. Parley turned to steel and the fool girl came running out of a watermill to beg that they stop. It fell upon deaf ears as it became apparent the burgomeister was under no illusion of her being a witch. She was simply valuable.
Rodrick and Mihael, the man I traded my life with, didn’t back down. The thugs had no idea that the paladin could split the battlefield with his stigmata. He had the power to demand a duel, forcing the broad melee into a series of single combats, while Mihael skirted the edge of the barrier, weaving from thug to thug in a dance of blood. Given enough time, they would have killed them all, but the power could not protect the girl.
The burgomeister tried to grab her and flee, but Rodrick caught him with a duel and ran the man through. Putting his trust in his comrades, Rodrick threw the girl onto the man’s horse and rode off with her.
For the first time, as the sun was rising, he met the angel Aurum and delivered to him the girl that would come to be known as the living angel, Jean of Jeameaux.
He didn’t tell me much about her. He knew I would be writing this down. As payment for telling me all this, he made a rather simple request even as he knew that his tale had disappointed me. The man had never questioned the righteousness of his actions until the day he was told, by his own angel no less, to lead an insurrection against an ally. An entire lifetime of obedience prevented him from resisting. Now, Vi has made him an offer to become one of her wardens. I’m not certain the terms they negotiated, but he agreed. A paladin he is no more.
Perhaps he felt he was walking away from his faith, but he did suggest a question for me to ask the Shepherd. It means little to me, and yet it strikes my curiosity. There has been something left out of all the scriptures, but if anyone would know then it would be the Shepherd. Perhaps I will ask who killed the god of the sun.
----------------------------------------
The following is the payment Rodrick requested, a simple message.
Jean,
I’m sorry. You likely don’t understand why I turned my blade against the man who saved you. It was not him that I fought. When you judge a man, you must look at what he says he wants, the results of the actions he takes, and if someone else has subverted those aims. It seems I’ll not be able to protect you again. I’m sorry.