Flerovius searched the room in a panic, perhaps she had just hopped from his pocket and was looking around for something to burn.

His fear rose like the flames he hoped wouldn’t be coming from these records kept since before his great great grandfather.

“Phoenix, Phoenix, where are you?”

He didn’t want to yell, if word got out that he lost his god within a day of starting his job he’d never live it down.

Once every corner and shelf was checked, even a few shelves that were hidden by false bricks, places that he knew around the room and had hidden bottles of alcohol in during his youth, he went down the hall; he had never taken a second look at the hidden scrolls that he didn’t remember being there when he was younger.

The priestess who looked at him like a pile of pig slop was right outside the room.

“Is there anything I might do to assist you?”

“What? No, It’s just… I need to go somewhere.”

“Of course, I’m certain you are quite busy with your duties, after all, the morning message is nearly due.”

He froze in place and gripped his head, thinking about the risks.

“Phoenix hopped from my pocket while I was sleeping and I don’t know where she went.”

She started walking without a word.

In a boiling bird bath, Phoenix was being watched by the other priestesses.

They stared at him with less venom than the day before.

The oldest of them, who was 90 but didn’t look a day past 60 due to the treatments by the last Phoenix, approached him.

“I am glad to see your sense in allowing young Caecilia to be the Henmother like Pyren would’ve wanted.

There was some… worry, when you didn’t ask us any questions about our positions here.

Did he explain before his passing?”

He looked at the elder and then to the younger woman.

“Hold faith, as he always said.”

The woman gently smiled and nodded her head.

“Phoenix is nearly done with her bath, then Caecilia will preen her. Have you prepared a morning message?”

He hid it well, but he was terrified about giving the address for the day.

“Were any letters delivered that I need to look at?”

“Yes, many of them. We’ve sorted them as Pyren wanted. You are keeping his system, yes?”

“Of course.”

Despite his inclinations, Flerovius was a bright mind, and what he read the day before had kept with him.

Pyren let the priestesses read each letter that was brought to him and then they sorted them.

It was not by importance of the person, many times he had ignored the letters from city leaders, but by what they were requesting and why.

Pyren often spent most of his day writing out these replies. In his youth, he would agonize for hours, barely getting any work done but sending back the best letters he could, but after some time he could glance over them and then write a reply without pause.

Flerovius, was not his grandfather, and the mountain that had piled up while he was away on campaign with the army seemed insurmountable.

“Blessings of a good harvest, kind words for my grandmother, what is all this?”

To the young man however, this system seemed to be nothing but discord.

He skipped past the letters that wouldn’t have taken more than a few minutes to reply to, and he instead looked at the letters from men of importance.

Caecilia set a cup of tea on his desk and asked the temple guards to step outside and close the door behind them.

“That isn’t what he would’ve done. These are only kept so you can feed them to her.”

“What?”

“I didn’t tell them that you passed out drunk. I told them that you slept in the records room because you were tired after a long day. You have no idea what you are doing, but it doesn’t need to appear that way.”

“Is that why they didn't look at me like I was a rat in their grain?”

“Do what you will, I will care for her and do the duties which you will not.

This stack here, these are from people who need to be replied to.

From front to back is the order of importance. Start here, this girl’s handwriting shows she is young, that and the flowers she drew on the paper. Her grandmother passed recently, though she doesn’t mention it here.”

“But this one is from the city councilors. And this one is from Pyris.”

“Pyren never once replied to Pyris when I was here, he would speak in person if he wanted.”

“Then why does Pyris write him?”

“If Pyris never wrote to his friend and High Priest, the people around him would question why.”

“I should at least write back to the councilors, right?”

“Only these three, the rest are in the burn pile.”

“Why?”

“Councilor Byron lost his son in battle. Councilor Aurelius’ wife has been sick, and Phoenix needs to be brought to her so she may be healed. Lastly, Councilor Filoni is a lonely old man without any remaining family, he needs these kind words to brighten his days.”

“But-”

“The people pay taxes that keep this temple kept.

The general protects the people and keeps the councilors in check.

The councilors keep some order by creation of laws and merchantry, but they are not our greatest focus.”

“That seems like a rather cold way to look at it.”

She upturned her lip in a sneer.

“I thought how best to explain it in words even you would understand.”

Flerovius wrote only two replies before she removed him from the seat and took over.

Phoenix was set in a blackened stone box, and when she chirped that she was hungry, Caecilia would set one of the scrolls in the box with her.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

He stood there with some amazement at her quick quill strokes, and what he read of her writing, she never replied the exact same thing twice.

“Did you take the quill from me because-”

“You would’ve told these people all the same hollow words.

Now, don’t distract me, the morning bells shall ring soon, and the message must be delivered after.”

He silently watched her mouth the words she read, sometimes smiling or frowning, then stopped for never more than a minute before she wrote out the reply.

Pyren worked like a machine, not having the stops she did, and she knew this, but she would never rush her duties.

One put a treated wick in the candle so it burned with a mindful pace, letting one savor the scents mixed with the wax.

Flerovius’ method was more like tossing the candle in a fire because technically it was meant to burn.

With the ringing of the bell, Flerovius picked up Phoenix and put her in the pocket made for her.

“Stop.”

“What now?”

She brushed off a few stray pieces of ash and hair from his robe.

“I will correct the rest of it later, you aren’t quite as tall as Pyren was, and you are dragging the robe across the ground.”

“I need a drink before we go.”

She handed him the tea and he drank it down without a thought, though he hated the taste of flowers.

Suddenly it was like he was ten years old again, peeling oranges for them.

The sweetness he so loved was nothing but pith to him now.

She cocked her head to the side much like Phoenix did when she saw his gaze had hardened, and he seemed nearly ready to vomit.

“Do you dislike it? You said before you didn’t want floral flavors, so I-”

“Never bring me anything with oranges again.”

Before she had a chance to process his sudden change and apologize, he was already walking down the tall stone halls.

Morning message was a short thing, the intent wasn’t to spend hours going over old stories, that happened at a different time, and didn’t always involve the High Priest, whose job was primarily to care for Phoenix.

A series of magical pipes carried the voice of the High Priest throughout the city; an artifact of what was no longer.

Perhaps it was in his blood, but no matter how scared he was of speaking, he could always put on a face.

He didn’t need to clear his throat, there was no awkward silence before he started and there would be no pauses he didn’t intend for in his speech.

“I am certain you’ve all heard, but Pyren, my grandfather, has passed away.

He lived a long life, even for a High Priest, 146 years of age, but he was no immortal.

While his flesh went with the pyre, his soul has lit the flames of hope in many thousands of people, his warmth has reached deeply in this city and its people.

I am certain you’ve also heard that Phoenix has been reborn.”

He held her high in his palms, and she seemed to have some understanding of what was happening, Phoenixes were very intelligent, more so than humans.

So she raised her wings high and spit forth a small fire, causing gasps and some tears in the crowd.

Had she been a week older, it could’ve been far more impressive.

“Pyren died of the flesh, but his soul lives on, Phoenix died of the flesh, yet her soul remained.

As my grandfather so loved to say, hold faith. Here I hold ours.”

He stepped back and went inside.

The people didn’t cheer, that wasn’t customary, instead they prayed in silence for however long they felt was right.

They often left in groups, some said only a quick prayer, some stayed for a dozen moments, and some stood for minutes on end.

Nobody complained, there were no looks of confusion, and many of the people stayed for quite a while, so he considered his speech a success.

Yet Caecilia eyed him like a hawk as he came in.

The other priestesses went about their business, keeping the temple maintained, tending to the duties assigned to them such as reading the letters that came in, checking the mouse traps, teaching the children of the city both the faith and of the more normal classes to live one's life, basic addition and subtraction, writing and reading.

For Caecilia, she was to be the teacher of Phoenix.

She couldn’t speak, regardless of what she was viewed as, she was a fowl, and her throat would never be able to make the sounds of a human.

So instead Phoenix would need to learn to write.

Her mother learned to carve fire into the air, but for a younger Phoenix, the common way to communicate was through a series of wooden plates.

“A, this is A. Now, which one of these plates is the A?”

Phoenix cocked her head, trying to digest the instructions, then she picked the wrong plate.

“I don’t think she understands. What I read yesterday says that until she is at least two weeks old, she is unlikely to be able to figure out letters. Right now we should be focusing on getting her to understand our words so teaching her other things is easier.”

“I am not teaching her letters, I am teaching her to associate my words with something. I just happen to be using letters to do this.”

“She will understand objects, things that are clearly different, better than plates with symbols on them.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize you had become an expert overnight. He taught me many things before he left for the war, and of them was how to care for her when she returned.”

He furrowed his brows.

“Did you know?”

“Of course, I was the only one who did.”

“Why would he tell you?”

“Because he trusted me with everything. Have you ever thought about why I, who is far more suited for the role, and who has lived with him for nearly a decade, being groomed for my work, isn’t allowed to be the High Priest?”

Flerovius shrugged his shoulders, it was what it was, that is all he thought about it, his nonchalance bothered her, but she already had such low expectations for him that it was only annoyance rather than anger.

She decided that it wasn’t even a conversation worth having with him, since clearly he didn’t care, and he would still let her take care of Phoenix.

When it was nearly evening, a guest stopped by the temple, he brought a guard with him, and was also guided by one of the temple guards.

His armor was bronze but with golden gilding overtop, a gladius at his side and orange plumage on his helmet.

They always made Flerovius uneasy, their faces covered up with masks, wearing an orange toga over their armor made to look like a naked body, all the same build, he never could tell them apart from one another.

“Flero, been a little while.”

The man hugged Flerovius tightly then patted his shoulders and looked over him.

“You got bigger, they make you work out when you’re with the army? Is this-”

He reached down to touch Phoenix, who was sleeping in a smoldering nest on Flerovius’ desk, and Caecilla smacked his hand with a swatch.

“Do not lay a hand on her. Smelling like a tavern, clothes from the day prior.”

“You-”

The guard moved between them and grabbed the man’s hand, the man’s guard reached for his sword, but found himself frozen in fear; Flerovius stepped between them.

“Bellus, why don’t we step outside?”

“I want an apology from this-”

“You came into this temple, and attempted to handle our god, you have no right to this, nor to any apology from me.”

Flerovius cautiously grabbed the guard’s hand, and he released him without question; they served the temple, and he was the high priest.

“She isn’t worth the trouble, you know how priestesses are, uptight like their spines one big branch.”

The young man chuckled and let it go, it was like his best friend said, no sense getting so fired up over some woman who doesn’t know how to have fun.

Phoenix jumped from her nest down to the floor and followed after them.

“No no no, stay here.”

Phoenix pecked at her hand and ran to Flerovius, who picked her up and placed her into the pocket she so liked.

The two men walked the streets trading stories back and forth.

Bellus was the second son of a wealthy merchant, someone connected enough that consequences didn’t exist, and neither did responsibility, who had lived his life knowing he was just the back up in case the first one failed.

“How is Dellen?”

“You know him, always with his head in a ledger, looking at maps for better trade routes.

Building cities made my grandfather rich, rebuilding them is going to make him richer.

So, I have a few women friends that would love to spend some time together, unless the army sucked the fun out of you.”

“HA. I wasn’t a soldier, I was just tagging along with… with grandpa.”

“Let’s wipe that sullen look off your face with booze and fine women.”

They walked into the tavern where said women were waiting.

The most well endowed of them rubbed on his robe.

“I’ve never been with a priest.”

Phoenix poked her head up.

“My, she’s so cute.”

The other two women got closer as well, then a few women at the bar came by.

Were Caecilia to know what thoughts ran through his head, her words as a lady of the faith would make the most lowly women of the night blush.