Arzen Therdain left the ceremony chamber holding two buckets filled with varying blocks of cheese. The Welcoming was only a few days away and he had so much more to do. The ceremony chamber needed to be inspected, the dining hall rearranged to accommodate all of the guests and distinguished patrons, and the dueling room worked over and the blades polished.

“Be an acolyte. You won’t worry about having to train for a meaningless army,” Farz had told him two years past. 

Yeah, that was a good idea, Arzen thought. It was hard to believe those two years since he joined the Church had already passed. There was nothing less noble of entering into the priesthood, of course. Tindari was a kingdom on a church’s foundation, so whether you took up the blades and competed in the Rival Wars or pursued the endless ranks of the Church in a ridiculous looking white garb, you were seen as equal in the eyes of respect. 

Farz was slowly gaining more and more of a reputation as an excellent bladesman, and his accolades were spreading higher and higher among the ranks of both the bladesmen and the Church. High enough, in fact, that Arzen learned of a dinner invitation to Kimeri’s meeting quarters extended to Farz last night. He still wasn’t sure how much it affected him, and he didn’t want to think about it too much.

Arzen pushed passed the dining hall and made his way to the dueling room. Farz was returning a pair of blades into their wall sheaths when he noticed Arzen.

“Your holiness,” he said with a wink.

“Be it forged by our Lords,” Arzen said. He smirked and moved to the wall. Each dueling room had one of these walls. Adjacent to the entrance, it held blade pairs embedded into it. “You’re trying to wear yourself out before the Welcoming Duels, aren’t you?”

“No, I’m trying to wear myself out for this meeting tomorrow night with your father,” Farz said. “He’s not the easiest man to sit at a table with, being the Di’atolah and all.”

“He’s still just as much of a man as you and I, Farz. Don’t worry about it too much”

Farz sighed. “You grew up with him; we both know that not to be true in the slightest.”

“I wasn’t raised by that man, Farz. I lived under him for a time and now I’m here, but he had no influence on who I am today,” Arzen said. “I won’t speak on him as a father.”

“I’m sorry for bringing it up, friend,” Farz said. He seemed to hesitate for a moment. “And I’m sorry to also have to mention that he wanted me to inform you that you will also be attending the dinner.”

“You’re not serious. Farz, I will not be near that man!” Arzen said, raising his voice just below a yell. He took a deep breath and submitted to it. “How mandatory is this?”

Farz walked over to his bag laying against a resting bench and reaches into it. He leans back up, holding a piece of parchment folded neatly. “It looks like you don’t have much of an option. It’s signed by your father and witnessed by the Church. You’re gonna have to be there,” Farz said.

Arzen snatched the order from Farz and scanned it over. Tomorrow night, half hand before sundown. He felt the tension and pressure in his jaw and shoulders building up. This was no way for an acolyte to act, Arzen thought. An acolyte is to understand and feel every emotion that arises without warning. Taking it into account and placing it upon the shoulders of the Carrions, a rank of gods beyond that hold the sole purpose of easing the weight of life on those condemned to the mortal worlds. 

Life would have been much easier for him if his father hadn’t been who he is. The Di’atolah was the highest-ranking bladesman in the House of Blades. Sitting directly under the Head of the Church, his father was renowned across the entirety of the kingdom. Yet few people knew of Arzen’s existence, much less his parentage. 

Arzen was born in the capital of Tindari approximately twenty years ago; however, he wasn’t aware of his father’s identity, nor prestige, until he reached the age to begin home visitations. It was Tindari customs for the Church to raise all potential acolytes in seclusion from their parents from birth until their tenth year. The parents then decide if their child is fit for acceptance in their eyes and in the eyes of the public. That decision varies in weight depending on the religious class level the parents fall under.

Arzen was the son of Kimeri so that weight was the weight of the entire House of Blades. Unfortunately, Arzen spent his early wielding years doing the exact opposite of his peers. He refused to pick up the blades. Therefore, his father refused him public acknowledgment. 

Following a denial of parentage, the judgment was then cast upon the Church to decide to eventually take the child into the Acolyte Services or push them into the Labor Unions’ hands. Showing a high level of enthusiasm and focus within Church studies, he was graciously accepted into the Acolyte Adolescence Program. 

There, he studied logic, design, mathematics, and, above all, theology. He knew every edict declared through the Church from the Establishment to the First Welcoming. All the while, he saw his father only on two occasions during the eight years before he was inducted as an official acolyte: the day his father came to visit after the death of Arzen’s mother, where his father spoke to him in private, devoid of all emotion, and then the day prior to his induction to put his faith in Arzen reaching as high as Head of State before his own death.

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An easy feat, I’m sure, Father, Arzen thought to himself. His stress was starting to get to him, which meant it was time to work. “I’m heading over to see what they need over at the Ceremony Chamber if you’re interested in coming and watching the acolytes scramble around,” he told Farz.

“Any other time and I would, but Malit is on his way here for some duels,” Farz said. “Just don’t pass out this year, kid. You don’t want that to hang over your head any more than it did.”

“Than it did? You’re still bringing it up.” Arzen rolled his eyes, “Alright, I’ll make sure to stay extra focused this time. I’ll see you tomorrow night, I guess.” 

Arzen proceeded out of the room and into the central hallway. His sandals made no noise when they came in contact with the golden marble floor beneath him. This place always enticed his sense of curiosity. A flooring that allowed no sound to escape, ceilings that reached the twenty-fourth floor without support, and an ominous feeling of being observed, even in the darkest corners of the Church. It tipped the scales of his mind between awe and fear.

He rounded the last corner and entered the Ceremony Hall. He shuffled passed many lower-year acolytes bustling from area to area to finish whatever task was set upon them by the priests. Arzen could tell the newer acolytes apart from the older ones by the stress intertwined in their actions. The Church was not an easy place to live. In his early years, he constantly battled fits of anxiety and burden coming from the seemingly overwhelming amount of work he was assigned on a day-to-day basis. There was a purpose in it though. They meant to break you, and in turn, rebuild you. That was their old adage, and as far as he could tell, they weren’t too far off from the truth.

He neared the ceremony stands where High Priest Terris stood, politely barking down at acolytes not to make whatever mistakes they were making at that moment. For a man his height, his voice could carry through a room quite well.

“High Priest Terris, what could I assist with in the hall today?” Arzen asked him.

The High Priest glanced down his pedestal at Arzen. His look betrayed his smile in such a way that Arzen felt uneasy about what he might be considering. 

“Young acolyte, could you make your way into the goblet and take the ashen rags to it? I will not have an unknown chemical or residue causing an explosion of fire as it had at the last Welcoming. I’d ask one of these foo-, erm, lower-years, to take care of it, but we both know where’d that end up,” he said.

“Absolutely, High Priest, I’ll head to the changing rooms and find some cleaning gear on the way there.”

“I’m gonna insist you take the time to do it now. We don’t want to waste any time at this point. Plus, you wouldn’t mind getting a little dirty, would you, acolyte? You are his son, are you not?” The High Priest had a sharp tone to his voice. One of almost disgust.

“Absolutely, High Priest. We must ensure everything is perfect and timely for the Welcoming. I’ll get right to it,” Arzen said. As he walked away, he looked back at the High Priest and caught the smallest hint of hatred in his eyes. Throughout the years, he had grown accustomed to it. The High Priest grew up with his “father” in their childhood. However, one took the road of the church and the other of the blade. The dynamic reminded Arzen much of the one he had with Farz. However, he’d never leave the room for hate to grow between them as it had done Kimeri and Terris. 

I will be the brunt of his trauma as long as either of us lives, Arzen thought to himself.

 At the center of the Ceremony Hall stood a goblet. Arzen gazed up at the brim of the top, a black obsidian color almost void of light coated its surface. He circled to the beginning of the steps that spiraled up the side of the container. Three full rotations to the top. This would put it to be about four, maybe five, times my height, he thought. He climbed onto the first step located on the inside of the glass and made his way down. The crusted inside was much less appealing to the eyes than the outside surface of the goblet. Was it ash that caked the inner surface? To his memory, he had never seen the Church place anything within the goblet to actually burn. Before letting himself ponder on it anymore, he pulled out his cleaning cloths and got to work. 

The majority of it only took about three hours; however, Arzen was now coated in a heavy black coat of ash. To his surprise, he smelled nothing of the sort. But the eyes couldn’t betray the mind in this. He was covered in the stuff. He ran his palm across the surface of the bottom to ensure his work was thorough. A slight seam crossed under his finger. Immediately, he was worried if he’d somehow cracked the exterior of the goblet. There’s no way. It’s obsidian. I couldn’t have possibly done this, he thought.

He traced it across the bottom of the bowl and found it made a perfect circle just inches outside the first step to climb out. It was strange to him. He could almost feel a yearning coming from under it. A curiosity that drowned his thoughts out. He could figure out if it could open. He had done the task with speed and precision. The High Priest would expect him to be in the goblet for another half hour, at the least. “It can open,” he whispered to himself. He wanted to figure it out. It was a puzzle, and what puzzle was not meant to be solved? 

He jolted as he heard the High Priest bellow into the Ceremony Hall, “The Father of All, we bless you and your campaign to return our heavenly creators from their eternal slumber!” 

Arzen fell to his knees, his forehead planted firmly to the cold surface of the goblet. The temptation to unlock what mystery laid beneath rivaled his devotion to the Church. Then, he found himself on the verge of laughing. 

“Why are you prostrate? No one can see you here. Yet, you bow. Is this the Devotion of Man? Is this who you worship? A simple human with extravagant garments?” he thought. Wait. That was far from something he would think. Those weren’t his thoughts at all. Beads of sweat began to form on his forehead.

The High Priest dismissed all acolytes from the room in a sharp, hurried manner. Arzen wasn’t sure if he should announce his presence or stay as still as possible. Eavesdropping would be far from the proper etiquette of an acolyte of the Church. The Father of All began to speak, and Arzen knew his time to be known was now gone.