In the fullness of my years, I reflect on the life Eloei has given me, and I am moved with gratitude. To those who follow, heed my words: that which you think is impossible is indeed possible, and that which is inconceivable to you is attainable. When your struggle is at hand, know that you can overcome it; and if not, you can survive it; and if not, you will be at peace. So prolong not your discouragement, but rekindle the hope of your soul. If only you knew the tribulations of your ancestors, all who faced impossible odds in their own times, yet the bloodline endured because you were meant to live.

-The Testament of Kahlo Hadrizeen, First Prophet of Eloei, Chapter 99, Verses 3-16

Sea of Qarda

They were many days at sea, Lanor and all her loyalists who had escaped Rayyaq Raleed with her. The day came when she lost track how long they’d been adrift. Sometimes the waves were choppy, jostling the goghla, and Lanor feared that one strong squall would be enough to tip the whole thing over into the ocean. Even when the winds were still, she never got used to the unceasing rhythm of the waves.

At least a moon had passed and they still had not made landfall. They ate like beggars, methodically picking through the freshest foods first, those likeliest to spoil. They rationed it. They denied themselves. When the ship’s food was half gone and only dry stores remained, they even took to fishing with crude, makeshift nets made of spare robes and other garments. They had nothing but wine left to drink by the end of it. One day, when it rained, Lanor sat out on the deck with her mouth open until she’d drunk her fill.

You will deliver us, Lanor thought. It was not a plea or even a demand of Eloei, but a statement of fact, a product of her careful reason. You would not have brought us this far only to abandon us now. Even when the journey distressed her body, her mind remained resolute.

The morning moon supervised the sunrise when they finally saw the coast. “Land!” one of the deckhands shouted, and the goghla’s upper deck became a flurry of activity, of flinging ropes and changing sails, and the travel-weary passengers gathered in the hall between quarters. Lanor padded up the damp wooden stairs to the upper deck.

“There it is,” Hasjal marveled alongside her. The Stone Continent, so named for its craggy coastlines and sheer, brutal cliffs, loomed in the distance. “See the trees? They look so dreary, like Dhasherah. And it’s so cold here...”

“It really is an ugly place,” Lanor admitted. Hasjal shot her a half-smirking, half-worried glance, as if he’d prepared the whole continent himself for her approval. “...but a home for our people will be a beautiful thing.”

Hasjal nodded. “The colors and splendor of Qarda are not taken from us forever. We’ll return one day, Eloei willing.”

Lanor prayed that He was.

When they finally made landfall on the beach, the sun was halfway into its morning ascent. They stripped the ship of all their belongings and valuables, left it nothing but bare wood and furled sails. Hasjal and his deckhands secured the goghla as best they could, but without a proper dock, a ship of its size was not likely to remain tethered for long. The Synod cleric leaned his head against it and stroked the wooden hull like it was an old horse about to be killed. Then the loyalists began their march inland.

By midday, their trek into the woods brought them to a trickling stream clear as crystal. They drank of the cool water and then drank some more, until their bellies sloshed with it, and then they filled their waterskins. One of the clerics consecrated a handful of it so that everyone could dip their fingers and say their own kohfar.

Lanor pressed her forehead to the foreign soil in prayer. Mount Tulaylal was more than an ocean away now, but Eloei was with them to the corners of the earth. They sat by the stream afterward and listened to the flat calls of Dridic birds that were nothing like the jungle breeds back home.

Later in the day, they came upon a broad swath of farmland where workers harvested root vegetables from the soil, picked wicker baskets full of ripe apples hanging weightily from trees. Even the food here had a dingy tint to it, a far cry from the spectrum of bright colors she usually saw on her plate. Lanor looked upon the sweaty, gaunt faces of the workers, fearing the worst.

“Slaves?” she whispered to Hasjal. “Are we certain this isn’t Grackenwell?”

Hasjal smiled and shook his head. “I’m sure, Prophetess. There is no slavery in this Land of Tithe—I promise you that.” Then he called out to the workers from the edge of the forest and approached them, speaking in a language she didn’t understand. It must have been Stonish. She couldn’t speak a word of it, but she recognized the guttural tongue fraught with harsh sounds and devoid of the poetic resonance of Qardish. One of the field hands answered Hasjal and made a sweeping gesture with his dirt-caked arm.

“Eloei has put us through great tribulations,” Hasjal said when he came back to the group. “But He will not test us forever, Prophetess, if I may be so bold as to speak this way. Come, everyone. We are welcome here.”

A burdensome weight of worry fell from Lanor’s shoulders. It was replaced by the pressing weight of questions still unanswered. There was never a shortage of those.

***

For all their religious conviction in the wake of Rayyaq Raleed’s civil war, Lanor and her loyalists only had six copies of the Testament of Kahlo Hadrizeen among the lot of them. In Qarda, the book had been ubiquitous as ripe fruit, no farther than a turn of the head and a short walk to pluck one up whenever one needed. The familiarities of home were more precious than ever now.

They’d been living in the Dridic town of Pitloch for just under a moon by this point. All the former deckhands of the goghla and other men of lower castes did menial labor in the town, helped with the harvest, milked cows and goats, hauled stones, or whatever needed to be done. Even the clerics pitched in; they viewed it as namza, charitable aid to the poor, even though they were receiving compensation for it. Lanor overlooked their doctrinal inconsistency. Surely they knew better than her, and if this was what motivated them to help earn the group’s keep as refugees, so be it.

No one recognized her, and certainly not any of the clerics or anyone else. They didn’t know she was the deposed hierophant of Qarda, that she was the wealthiest, most powerful person in the world not so long ago. Her loyalists strived to keep it that way. They hid her away from the public’s prying eyes; when her absence was noted from the chores around Pitloch, the clerics told the natives that she was a wealthy but grieving orphan escaping the chaos that had descended on their capital city—technically the truth—and the subject was never broached again.

One night, Lanor sat in her squalid room in the village inn, reading one of the copies of the Testament by candlelight, the glow of which threw into sharp relief all the dirt and dust that smudged every surface. She’d opened the tome to an eerily relevant passage on community. The section was titled, by the ancient clerics after their analyses, Kahlo Rebuilds. It detailed the First Prophet’s struggles to amass a new band of disciples after his former flock’s slaughter at the hands of the pagan Tomeless of Ralaheed.

“How sweet the raindrop on the lips of the thirsty,” it read, “but no village is built on the banks of a raindrop. How noble the individual, and how sturdy the house he has built, but consider what a village can build together.”

“One of my favorite passages,” Hasjal said from the open doorway.

Lanor had sensed his approach by the creaking of the old floorboards. “You can read it from there?”

“I can tell by the shapes on the page.”

She beckoned him into the room. “Come in. Sit.”

He smiled and took a seat on the shabby featherbed across the room, folding his hands and sitting upright respectfully in the presence of a hierophant. “I used to read that verse every time I felt that I was the only sane man in the entire Synod. It helps with perspective.”

Lanor tapped a pensive finger on her chin, studying the verse. “Can I be frank with you?”

Hasjal nodded fervently. “Of course, Hierophant Lanor. I am a loyal—”

If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

“Not as your hierophant.” She smiled tiredly, remembering her handmaiden Sashani. “Just for a moment, can you think of me as nothing more than an orphan girl doing her best?”

This gave him pause, but he considered it a moment, and this time his nods were slower, more thoughtful. “Yes.”

“I’m very grateful for our community of Eloheed that still remains. And I’m grateful to you and the other clerics for helping to get us here. I couldn’t do this alone. Any of it. I wasn’t ready for the hierophany, much less what came after it... so it means a great deal to me, everything you’ve done to save our lives.”

Hasjal shook his head. “My Prophetess, if I may, it was Eloei—”

“No,” she cut him off. “It was you.” He drew back from her candor, a flicker of uncertainty in his eyes. “I see now that Eloei’s greatest wish is to enable us to realize our full potential. It always has been. He helped us. He gave us the power—a miracle, to be sure. But it was you who offered your house to us as refuge. It was me who held back Ghamal’s forces. It was you and the other clerics—Zumhir, Rashaj, all of you—who made difficult decisions, sacrificed for the good of others, and brought us here. We mustn’t mistake Eloei’s encouragement for His direct action.”

Hasjal took a moment to absorb her words. She could tell by the lingering uncertainty on his face that these were not the easily digestible maxims he expected of his hierophant. He looked down at his hands as he spoke, lacing and unlacing his fingers. “I’ve seen what you can do, Prophetess. Far be it from a lone Synod cleric to question you so informally. But...” He turned his gaze across the room, wincing at the impropriety of what he wanted to say. “Forget it. Please forgive me for my doubt. I will petition the Lord Above Lords for forgiveness as well.”

“There is no sin in doubt,” said Lanor. She waited for him to meet her gaze. Again, there was that look of expectation in his eyes, like she were talking to a boy half her own age. “Ghamal and his loyalists have no doubt. Look at what they’ve done to Qarda in just a year.”

Hasjal closed his eyes, shivered suddenly from a chill he’d gotten. He rolled up the sleeve on his gray-and-black shegehref to show her his forearm prickling with gooseflesh. “You asked me to think of you as nothing more than an orphan girl. Yet you seem so keen on astounding me with your wisdom. What are we to make of you, Prophetess? It’s as if you’ve come into this world to upset centuries of tradition. To rewrite the Testament itself!”

“I would never try to rewrite the Testament. I’m only trying to reveal what’s been there all along. I think this is what Eloei wants, too. My visions...” She trailed off then, and in a flash, her confidence evaporated. She was reminded how small and insignificant she’d always felt, even before her father’s murder, when she was only the crown priestess. The veneer of divinity fell away; she felt her mortal blood once more.

“You’ve spoken a little of your visions,” said Hasjal. “Has Eloei visited you again since we fled?”

Lanor shook her head. “No. I’m not sure why.”

He nodded, his gaze falling slightly in disappointment. “Eloei works in mysterious ways. We have seen more of miracles in this year than many hierophants reported in their entire lives.”

She wanted to tell him what Eloei had told her in her last vision, about how He was limited in the truths He could reveal to her, but even her young and pliable mind could make little sense of this paradox. How could an omnipotent being be limited? Who, or what, was this Third that could permit or forbid Eloei from doing anything?

Lanor feared telling Hasjal the whole truth; he could barely cope with her bold statements made without precedent. This? This would break him—or worse, turn him against her altogether, painting her a heretic. The time was not yet right.

Please, Eloei, she prayed in private. Show more of Your signs to us. Make the others see as I have seen. Then they will understand. Silence elapsed.

In time, the topic of conversation passed, and Lanor opted to speak of more earthly things. “Remind me, what are our next steps?”

The cleric, too, seemed relieved to consider matters that were more tangible, more within the scope of his influence. “Of course. The veracidins have already been sent west to Tern to speak with the queen. They will herald our arrival. As you well know, we recovered the gold and other valuables from the goghla, so we have those resources to forge an alliance with Dridon.”

“To bribe her?”

He arched an eyebrow. “A bribe? No, of course not. A show of good faith. This gold can pay for many swords and many men to wield them. We have nothing else to offer to make the bargain agreeable for them—Dridon is a Land of Tithe. It’s not as if we can ask them to give more than they’ve already been giving to Qarda.”

His logic satisfied her. “All right. Then what?”

“Eloei willing, we’ve found the first of our allies against Ghamal’s treacherous army. Dridon may be our only ally, though. Grackenwell has been busy conquering in our absence, and Zan Vayonado has been decimated. Myrenthos would surely be glad to see our two factions eat each other alive...” Hasjal scowled, shaking his head bitterly. “There’s no telling how many of our loyalists remain in the army, among the paladins, or even the scattered veracidins—we won’t know this with certainty for at least another moon or two, even with their missive relays.”

“Surely some remain.”

Hasjal nodded reassuringly. “Oh, surely, my Prophetess.”

Lanor breathed in deep, then relaxed her shoulders in a shuddering sigh. It was getting late; the golden hour had just passed. “I wish only for a sign from Eloei that we’re on the right path. That this is all only temporary... I think communing with Him directly in my visions has spoiled me.” She laughed despite herself.

Just then, a distant crack of thunder.

She and Hasjal exchanged an excited glance. “Glory be to Eloei,” he breathed. “I didn’t see any clouds.”

There was another thunderclap—then another. Lanor rose from her rickety wooden chair and crossed the room toward the window, reaching out her hands to open the shutters.

That was when the northern wall of the room exploded in a mess of cinders and splintered wood.

“Hierophant!” Hasjal screamed. He jumped from the bed and threw his body on top of hers, shielding her from the wreckage, the charred chunks of wood and the remnants of the thatched roof smoldering like tinder. The faint smoke made them cough.

“Eloei save us!” said a voice from the hallway. “Exalted Prophetess! What happened?”

They both scrambled to their feet. Hasjal led her and one of his former deckhands down the corridor of the inn, banging on the doors of rooms that contained their people. The paladins standing guard—stripped of their usual gold regalia, to keep a lower profile—trotted along and ahead of them to protect Lanor.

“What’s happening?” she hissed. “What was that?”

“Cannons,” Hasjal answered gravely. “From the North.”

“The North? You mean Grackenwell?” He nodded. “How?”

“My cousin was one of the fighting Eloheed sent to conquer Holcort.” He shot her a look then that struck her with guilt, but she knew he was only glaring his disapproval of Ghamal’s treachery. “He saw many men torn asunder by these cannons. It happened just as he recounted—he heard their approach before he saw their handiwork.”

“They can’t know I’m here! Can they? Were the veracidins intercepted?”

Hasjal shook his head. “Irrelevant. They’re trained to obey the will of their hierophant above even the wills of their own bodies. Even their own survival. Veracidins can endure extreme pain... even torture. It wasn’t them.”

“Then how? What do we do?”

Three more clerics gathered around him to discuss their next move. Lanor scanned the small entry room of the inn, but the table where the innkeeper welcomed guests was empty, and the innkeeper’s room was open and empty also. There were no other Stonish guests. That meant they could speak freely in the confines of these walls without fearing detection.

“Down the road from here lives a winemaker,” said Hasjal. “He has a cellar. If we gather only our most valuable—”

Crack! Another explosion ripped through the building. The deckhand standing next to Hasjal went down in the wake of the explosion, a ball of black iron barreling through his leg and out the other wall of the inn. The deckhand cried out in pain; the lower half of his right leg had been amputated, a smear of blood around the wound.

“Eloei!” the wounded man wailed. Hasjal hooked an arm under the man’s shoulder to keep him from falling. “Oh, Eloei... help me! Please help me!” Lanor was closest—she supported his other shoulder, and his bulging eyes locked with hers. “Oh, Prophetess, I beg you, don’t leave me—!”

“I won’t!” she assured him. “Hasjal! Where do we go?”

Another peal of thunder—this time, the faint crack of another Pitloch building crumbling outside. “Away. Forget the winemaker! We need to get far away from here!”

Lanor and her loyalists took only what they had managed to grab in the chaos. She knew they left behind a great deal in the inn—at least one copy of the Testament, food, clothing, and precious riches from Rayyaq Raleed meant for Dridon’s queen. They would have to come back for it.

But when they escaped into the woods, and when they spent the night treating the deckhand’s amputated leg, and when veracidins found them at dawn the next day and told them of Grackenwell’s war against Dridon, plans changed. Pitloch became a smoking ruin ravaged by cannon fire and pillaged for slaves. Even the gold, even the copies of the Testament still in the half-burned remnants of the inn... nothing that remained was worth risking their lives.

Lanor realized they would never come back for their belongings. They were lost to the fires and to the slavers now. They set out south to escape the spread of Grackenwell’s conquest.

“How far south?” Lanor asked, the apprehension thick in her voice, so unbecoming of her station.

“Far enough that we can be sure,” Hasjal answered her. The light of hope behind his eyes was dimming by the day. “To the outlands. To the Southern Frost, if we must. This war, too, will pass. But we are not safe here until it does.”

They fled south, fled and fled and fled, the sun rising and setting left to right over their heads. It was painfully reminiscent of their initial escape from Rayyaq Raleed. Lanor longed for the day when she could plant her feet in one place again, to stop this running once and for all.

The day she would either rule or die.