At the appointed time the venator arrived at the house of knez, accompanied by Ahyq and Ulhon. There was already a party waiting for him: Azandahy, who greeted Sumiaton with a stinging look, another member of High Crew who bore an absent expression, and a warrior in full dreavlyani armour.

“Good evening, fellow crewmen,” said the hunter, “You are the entourage for today, I suppose. But where is our master?”

“Can’t you even spot me by the posture? Than is not the keen hunter’s eye that I know,” came a shrug from under warrior’s aventail.

“What’s with the masquerade?” raised his brow Sumiaton, while his two companions bowed respectfully to their lord.

“This is supposed to be a covert business,” told disguised Azytenisar, “Besides, recently I gained too much of a popularity among people. They tend to prostrate themselves as I pass by, that is getting rather annoying.”

The venator did not answer anything, only snorted quietly.

“Lead at once,” ordered him knez. And so the hunter did.

Six men did not travel far. They crossed three streets and walked up the fourth one for a short time, before Sumiaton stopped in front of a certain fence. There was a two storey house visible behind it. He approached gates and pushed them in. Kinani entered into the small courtyard, which was covered in dirt, broken branches, and other stuff, which was apparently left there by rain and snow.

“What is this place and why is it abandoned?” asked Azytenisar, circling the desolation around with a long look.

“That was a house of a goldsmith,” told the Venator, “The successful one, he was quite popular with the men of wealth in Khladnetz, crafted a lot of trinkets for their wives. When the recent war hung above the city as a raised sword, he ran away, taking his whole family and all belongings. My sources tell that he resides in a town called Kriva Bashta now. My comrades searched through the house in his absence and found something interesting inside. Come in and see.”

“Firstly,” knez lifted his hand, halting his companions, “I don’t want to know what you and your friends were searching for in the empty house of the goldsmith. Secondly, never again do such a thing without my permission. No man should have right to walk into the house of another one and perform search there without my decree. People should feel secure in their own homes, unless you want a rebellion.”

Sumiaton hesitated for a moment, but then bowed.

“I understand. Still, come in, please.”

They walked in and the hunter led them through the house. It looked just as deserted inside as from the outside. They reached what was supposed to be kitchen. The Venator nodded to Ahyq and the warrior pushed a massive barrel which was situated in the corner of the room. A trapdoor was revealed where it previously stood. Sumiaton opened it, displaying wooden stairs beneath. Ulhon produced a torch from his sack and ignited it. Taking the torch, the hunter led the party down the stairs.

There was a whole chamber beneath the level of the ground. The ceiling was high enough so that no man needed to hunch. The floor was covered with rugs. Azandahy kneeled and studied the rug under his feet. It was old and worn down, with fur being especially flat in a certain spot.

“It is where men kneeled regularly,” told Azytenisar who noticed the object of his subject’s attention. Houselord pointed his hand forward, “Before this.”

Everyone looked into the center of the room. There was a massive silhouette, eight cubits high and almost four wide. It consisted of simple curved lines, almost geometrical shapes. It was a stylized sculpture carved from a single tree trunk, yet still recognizable at the first look. A calmly sitting feline creature, all its paws placed together, its spine and neck straight, its tail coiled around the body, its eyes gazing directly forward.

A statue of a guardian it was. Before the carved figure were placed many bowls of various shapes. The glittered in the light of the torch, making obvious the precious metal that they were made from.

“So strange,” broke the silence Ahyq. Everyone looked at him, “I mean, we always leave windows in our shrines, so that we can see the stars. But they worship underground, in dungeons.”

“They are forced here by us,” told Azytenisar, “They like the night sky just as much as you do, trust me. It is we who won’t allow them to pray under it.”

Knez removed his helmet and gazed at the statue with a thoughtful look.

“What makes you think that this is dangerous? I knew such places existed. That is to be expected.”

The Venator approached the statue. He reached to its bottom with a hand and retrieved a piece of parchment that was tucked between the base of the idol and the floor. Azytenisar glanced there and noticed many more similar parchments there. Sumiaton brought it close to the torch and read aloud.

“O mighty guardian. You left us for whatever sins we have committed. We are unworthy of your attention. And now we are stepping into the war that would have been abhorrent to you. But I know that you are the merciful lord. This conflict is born of human undoings, and you were the one to save us from them. People will die, we will understand the wrongness of our decisions and the greatness of your wisdom again. That is the inevitable future.

But you were the merciful lord. So, please, I beg you, show mercy to my son, Dalnoglyad, who is forced to fight in this war. Because of decisions of mighty men, he has no choice. But neither he, nor his family wanted it. See him through, o mighty guardian. I will be eternally grateful to you, bringing most generous sacrifices every seventh day until the end of my life.”

He looked Azytenisar in the eyes.

“You heard it. These are the kind of people who worship this wooden idol. They are against your decisions. They talk to the absent lord. How long will it take for the carved tree to talk back? To tell them to remove the man who forces them into wrong ways. This is dangerous. This faith must be rooted out before it is too late.”

“You are too straightforward,” shook his head the lord of Abeneewy, “For now they have the relief of talking to a statue. Leave it to them, while doing right things, while making the city strong and prosperous. While doing what I am doing. And they will see that their lives are getting better, with or without the idol. Then it will gradually turn into the routine ritual without much devotion. And then it will be of no harm. But remove the faith from them now and they will have no way to vent out the frustration caused by changes. They will turn to violence. That is not the solution.”

“So you would not act?” asked Sumiaton.

“I told my will,” knez was resolute.

“This faith is dangerous. It is only the matter of time until they try something. You don’t want to cause more violence right after the war, I understand, but the measures must be taken.”

“I told my will,” repeated Azytenisar, iron in his voice.

The venator stopped talking for a moment.

“I warned you, remember this,” told Sumiaton. He was not complaining, but some degree of disappointment could be heard in his words.

“Thank you for your efforts, but decisions in this city are all mine to make,” knez uttered calmly, “If we are done hear, allow me to return to the business of ruling it.”

There was silence as an answer to his words and Azytenisar left the chamber of worship alongside his two bodyguards. So did Sumiaton not before long.

Azytenisar lied in the dark, covered with a warm blanket. For some reason drevlyani supplied him with a giant square shaped bed. It was pointless for so many reasons: his wife was left behind on Isary, knez himself was not the kind of man who needed luxury. He would have been fine with a simple sleeping place, all that space only took away comfort. He rolled again and again, switching positions and parts of the bed, not getting soothed at all.

Not only physical sensations troubled houselord. Thoughts raced through his mind: of reports of troops from neighbouring states moving, of predictions of harvest in Khladnetz, of works on restoring fortifications. The sky was not clear at all, that would be the right saying, he thought. He needed Ymdaton’s caravan to return as soon as possible. The city needed reinforcements, it needed resources, it needed High Crew defending it.

When he finally fallen into sleep, his darkened thoughts found their way into his dreams, as rain might leak through a decrepit roof. Lines of trees passed by at the left and at the right. There was no beginning and no end to them. Only the road between, by which the procession of burdened animals passed. Azytenisar rode amongst them.

His bakhmat advanced in a steady stride. Beside him were his trusty warriors, saddled upon similar beasts. It was bizarre to see crewmen riding mounts en masse. Still, he felt so assured and powerful among the ranks of High Crew. These were his best warriors, with them at his side there was no task too difficult.

Everything was fine except the smell. It perturbed his nostrils, forcing knez to glance around, searching for a torch in someone’s hand. There was none. Soon they left the forest, which ended abruptly, giving way to marshes. Behind the soaked grounds there glittered an immense body of the water.

Lake Volnitza, so great and majestic that it could have been a sea in its own right. On the shore a town could be seen, protected by wooden walls just as Khladnetz was. Darkened clouds were rising and taking off from the city. Reddish glares danced upon its roofs. There was the source of the smell. Suddenly he felt a strong hand upon his shoulder.

“My lord, it is burning! My lord! My lord!” came the voice from his side.

Azytenisar turned his head and his cheek met a surface of a pillow, bringing him back into the waking world. With unfocused eyes he looked at the one who was talking to him. It was Azandahy. The warrior was grabbing him by the shoulder, his whole appearance signaling inner protest against such familiarity towards his lord. Still, there was a resolution in his eyes, which told of a dire situation which forced him to put aside formalities.

“The house is burning, my lord. We should get out at once,” repeated he.