Chapter 3 ~||~ Old Books

Meticulously illustrated pictures painted with a careful hand spanned pages upon pages in an epic tapestry of secret history. Large, flowery text occupied any blank spaces not crowded by ethereal paintings that it could. Kires saw more abstract shapes and figures more often than not, and he could make little sense of how the illustrations related to the text. He turned the pages slowly and carefully with a gloved hand, touching the brittle pages gently lest they crumble beneath his touch. The book was not normal - it radiated an enigmatic aura, one riddled with taboo.

"Keep reading." Elecia told him, her voice as faint as dead leaves skittering across the ground, cradled by the wind. He didn't know what was wrong with her, but she needed the curative release the other priestesses in the opposite side of the building could provide for her. That, and the boy couldn't help but feel anxious by standing in this disquieting, forbidden room. He shouldn't be here...

"Priestess Elecia, you can have someone read this to you later, but I need to get you to someone who can help you..."

She only looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, her dull gaze boring into him and commanding him to do as she willed. With a swallow, he obliged. "It will take a week before the Second Torch completely awakens and a moon cycle before full power is attained. Furthermore..."

He didn't get any farther when he saw her spasm again, weakly cough up more blood, and finally grow still. Taking the initiative, he tucked the antique book beneath an arm and picked up the High Black Priestess. "I've got to stop doing this," he sighed as he shifted her weight in his arms. "It's going to get me in trouble."

She was bigger than Cassia, but by no means fat. From the close-up view of her, he got the idea that she could snap the necks of any lowly priestesses who disobeyed her. Odd that she'd be so cold...Veiovis was a god of warmth, not one of destruction. Perhaps it had something to do with her being the Black Priestess, who had only scrying abilities, and powerful ones at that. He had often heard about how eccentric many of the priestesses who worked closely with scrying magic became.

And then, this was the person he was originally supposed to "kidnap." Cassia had been right to be angry...it was stupid, pointless, and reckless. He should have never of agreed to it. But then, the little games the Temple Guard played were everything to them, because it's the only thing they ever did. If he let them down, then he would have been disgraced and shunned. The last thing he wanted was to serve out the rest of his contract alone.

After he had fled from Cassia like the coward he was, he had been wandering around the Black Wing - perhaps a futile attempt to find answers. Her comment had been the greatest insult to him. But she didn't know that. No one did, save himself. And that's the way it would stay until he could get out of here. He cast a glance back into the room, looking at the strange sight of blackened mirrors and a pool of dark blood on the obsidian marble floor before turning to leave.

His trip to the Healing Chambers did not go unhindered. Immediately females in dun-colored robes began flocking around him, asking him the same questions over and over while staring at Elecia with worried faces. Apparently the High Priestess was obliged to be loved, sour disposition or no. He ignored the mob with an irritated silence and somehow managed to plow through them, into the Trine Belltower and then through part of the White Wing. More and more of them were attracted to him like flies to a ripe melon. The farther he got, the slower he moved. That is, before an authoritative voice boomed out above the ruckus, demanding the chattering priestesses let him through. He hurried on, reminding himself to thank Priestess Gelude for keeping her priestesses obedient under her vigilant leadership of the Temple. He couldn't be carrying women around for the rest of his life, after all.

The room was largely empty, with an unnecessarily low domed ceiling and long windows that reached the floor, letting generous amounts of light in. Beds, mostly empty, were a lot like wicker "nests" lined with soft linens and blankets and rumored to be extremely comfortable.

As soon as he had set Elecia down on one of the many unoccupied beds, he was brushed aside from some stern-faced women who huddled around the fallen High Priestess to go about their work. Heaving a sigh, he turned to leave. Yet before he could make a half-turn, he caught a glimpse of russet splashed across pristine white sheets. Pastel amethyst eyes swirling with impassiveness stared at him in a hauntingly detached fashion. Like looking into the face of a ghost.

He looked back at her like an accidental passerby, staring at the scene of a murder. "Cassia...?" With the spoken word of her name, the brief spell was broken, and he once again looked upon the face of his novice priestess acquaintance. He voiced his inner thoughts without thinking. "Why are you here? I'm sorry about earlier...I don't know what came over me."

The girl sat upright as he approached. "Kires...you came back."

"I'm sorry...what happened to you?" He couldn't help but catch the detachment in her demeanor.

"I...fainted."

"Fainted?"

She simply nodded. What in the world...? Something was definitely wrong with her. Most girls her age would be smiling reassuringly and babbling on about every single detail of what had transpired during the day. Only the day if he were lucky. "Cassia. Tell me what's wrong."

For the first time, her eyes showed emotion. But instead of anger, there was laughter in her eyes. "Are you trying to command me?"

"What...? No! But there's...you're acting weird!" Kires suddenly felt wholly uncomfortable standing there, like there were a thousand eyes lingering on him, waiting for him to make a false step, and he wanted nothing more than to dash like a rabbit back to the safety and comfort of its burrow. "Look, I'll just...talk to you later. I've got duty." He then turned and left in an utter state of confusion.

~||~ ~||~ ~||~ ~||~

Kires was forced to spit out his swig of fresh water as a hand abruptly smacked the back of his head. "Kires! You been hiding from us, man...?"

After a short intermission of coughing and sputtering in a vain attempt to expel the unwanted liquid from invading his lungs, he spoke. "Ah...hah...don't do that anymore." He looked up to the three other temple guards who stood in front of him. "Aren't you supposed to be on duty?"

"C'mon man." A tall blonde laughed at him while shoving a pinky into his ear. "Since when have any of us cared about 'duty'? Tell us how last night went."

A shorter male with a mop of messy brown hair grinned roguishly while sitting down on a stooping limestone pedestal, one of the three situated decoratively atop the Trine Belltower. "Yeah, let's hear it. We didn't think you'd have the guts to go through with it!"

Kires heaved a sigh, brushing a stray lock of sea blue hair from his tired face. The humid night hair clung to his face, making him feel uncomfortable. It was bad enough he had to stand here for three hours, but now this? "Nothing much happened. I must have taken the wrong way...because I ended up kidnapping the wrong person."

"What!? Who...?" The boy with long green hair bent towards him, genuinely interested.

"Just a novice priestess," he replied with a shrug. "It was a stupid mistake, now that I think about it."

"Hn..." the tallest squinted at him disapprovingly. "I didn't take you to be the absent-minded type..."

Kires rolled his eyes skyward, his voice responding with acute sarcasm, "Well, maybe someone gave me the wrong directions."

"Oy!" The tall blonde feigned a blow to the chest and spun around dramatically. "Don't blame it on me. I'm not the one who produced those directions...believe it or not, it was the Captain himself."

The three young men turned to stare.

"Are you insane?" Kires asked him slowly, a single brow arched in disbelief.

"I'm serious! He's actually the one who approached me with the idea. He told me he knew how bored we got, and told me the idea to kidnap Priestess Elecia as a joke - told me that she needed to be kept on her toes and wouldn't mind..."

"And you believed that? I can't see Elecia as the type to take a joke well."

"Hey, I don't question the Captain. And the High Priestess can't be all that bad, can she?"

"Hmph...personally, she gives me an uneasy feeling." Kires recalled the episode earlier that day. Certainly not the type of woman to pull pranks on.

"Huh? How would you know? Man, I've only seen her maybe once or twice, and it definitely wasn't up close...more like she was attending an event she had to be at. She is a busy lady, being the High Priestess and all...man, that's something you gotta admire."

He sighed and shrugged, letting the subject drop. Telling them what had happened? Out of the question. Carrying the High Priestess all the way to the Healing Chambers... They'd never let him live it down.

"Yeah, anyway! What are our plans for the Festival? It's only three days from now. Oh man, I'm really looking forward to mingling with some of the girls from town. The girls here in the Temple are just so uppity...'eh, Kires?" An elbow nudged him in the ribs suggestively, but he paid it no heed.

Who cared about festivals? Cassia was obviously not going to forgive him. He was about to loose the only person who could potentially have become his first real friend here.

~||~ ~||~ ~||~ ~||~

"You're really bad at this, aren't you?" An older woman's voice commented as she looked over Cassia's handiwork with a critical eye.

She set the fist-sized white ball she was sewing silver threads into on her lap and muttered, "They're only a little crooked. This is hard for me...I'm just not good at sewing."

"Well, you have another hundred of these to complete. Are you sure you won't bleed to death from needle pricks before your done?" The woman snorted skeptically, noting the girl's heavily bandaged hand.

"I thank you for your concern, elder priestess. But I must learn to overcome trials by my own means." That was polite temple lingo for "scram."

"Very well. Just make sure you get your quota done in time. The festival can't decorate itself."

Cassia waited until she had left before slumping down into her uncomfortable wooden chair. What a depressing day! She felt sick, like she were being crushed and her insides felt like they were being twisted and punched. And then, she had been put into odd moods...sometimes it felt like she wasn't in control of her speech at all, and was only detachedly listening to herself talk. She didn't know how she'd explain this all to Kires. She scarcely knew how to explain it to herself.

Scanning the room, she watched the other priestesses work busily on their mundane tasks while chatting with each other. She was either at the same or lower level than most people here. Extraordinarily average...and yet, how many of them had been rescued by Captain Feiner? Her face contorted with sourness - again, it was probably most of them. He was reputed to be an irresistible charmer. It was no wonder either - he was devilishly handsome and very talented. There was just some odd quality about him that attracted people, too...

"Did you hear about Priestess Elecia?"

"I did, I did! I heard she was possessed and fell off the Belltower!"

"Don't be absurd! No one could survive a fall from the Belltower...not even the High Priestess! Besides, I heard she was poisoned."

"You don't say! I've been told it was all a secret plot by some other priestesses because they were jealous."

"Did anyone hear about that boy who carried her to the Healing Chambers?"

"Yes....I think it's wonderful! The forbidden love of a handsome yet lowly temple guard and the High Priestess...it's so tragic!"

"I'm just so jealous of her! I want that to happen to me. But I'm such a nobody. Then again, one of the guards was eyeing me the other day..."

"You don't say! Who?"

"Well..."

"Come dearie, don't leave us in the dark! Tell us everything..."

Cassia then tuned out the conversation so it was blended back into the low buzz of other discussions going on in the room. Kires. She didn't even know the truth of what happened with Elecia...if she hadn't been behaving so strangely, maybe she would have found out. But still...the very sight of him carrying the aloof beauty that was the High Priestess made her stomach feel hollow. She would have to put it from her mind...it was almost time for the Festival of Veiovis. That had always been her favorite time of the year. Glittering decorations. Fresh honey bread, still hot so it melts in your mouth. The gaiety and wonder. The new, smiling faces...and best of all, the priestesses were allowed to wear whatever they wanted on this one fine day.

The morning would be filled with inspiring sermons, and then the feasting would begin. They would talk about how wonderfully the decorations came out and how good the food was. And then...

No, this year would be different. Cassia had distanced herself over the past year, and it was obvious she would be alone during festival time. She would probably end up eating her meal and slipping quietly back to the room. Anything was better than standing along at the fray of the crowd, watching and embarrassed...uncomfortable that she was the only one not talking to another person. Yes, that was how it would go. Maybe she wouldn't even go to the feast...skip that and only go to the oration dedicated to Veiovis. That would doubtlessly be awkward as well, but it was her obligation.

Obligations... That was all her life consisted of now. She should be grateful she isn't laying in a muddy ditch right now. She owed a great deal to this temple and it would be cowardly to complain.

Picking up the steel needle once more, Cassia began threading the decorative ball again. Although it was still crooked...