The stirring sounds of people waking up had just started to ramp up for the day by the the time I had finally finished pouring what healing I could into the girl. It had taken all night and I had to keep extending just up to the point of utter exhaustion to knit back together what I could. She would still have long days of healing ahead of her and she would need to dodge Aela’s wrath to avoid re-breaking her bones, but if she was smart she would be fine. Unfortunately she had not shown a great aptitude of doing what was good for her prior to now. As for me, I was now back to being nearly as exhausted as I had been when I arrived, but perhaps it would be worth it. I was a marvel to her now, I had done what had only ever been taught to her as a power only blessed by the gods themselves. When she left, now no longer limping as she walked, I gave her strict instructions to avoid bringing me anything or coming to see me during the day, only at night so that she would be less likely to be caught and have a better chance at recovery.

The lock on my door clicked open gently and the door opened, I cracked open my eyes to see an older woman I had never seen before carrying in my breakfast tray. Her dark hair, streaked with silver, was pulled up into a tight bun and the lines around her lips accentuated her slight frown. She seemed surprised to see me still in bed, but set the tray on the desk and walked from the room wordlessly, re-locking the door before walking away. I was glad to see that the girl was taking my words seriously. I hoped that if she was smart enough to lay low, perhaps Aela would not notice that she was so much more recovered than she should be. I didn’t want to even try to imagine how much worse the punishment would be for her sneaking into my room during the night after being taught a lesson by her. The girl would be lucky to be left alive, or unlucky depending on how creative Aela was feeling.

Breakfast smelled decent, a bit more savory than normal, I assumed that the celebrations for the new “saint” were continuing and therefore much better food was floating around the kitchen. I considered ignoring my rumbling stomach in favor of more sleep, though ultimately I knew that would be counter productive. I would be able to recover my magic faster with nutrients to fuel myself. Healing was a skill that I had never developed overmuch and therefore it was taxing on my abilities, but given the day to rest I should be fine soon enough.

In the middle of my meal I heard stomping footsteps down the hallway towards my door. I let out a low groan and shoved as much of the remaining bread and butter into my mouth and chewed quickly in case I wasn’t going to have a chance to return to it. The lock clicked and the door swung open, revealing Aela in a much fancier outfit than I was used to seeing her in. She was dressed in an ornately embroidered blouse depicting several suns sewn in gold thread around the collar and the ends of her sleeves along with a pair of crisply pressed white linen trousers. The outfit spoke of celebration but also a demand for unquestioned recognition of her authority.

“I have a gift for you today,” she said with a hint of mirth in her voice, though her face down turned as soon as her eyes had settled on me. “You are weaker. Why?”

“I am old,” I answered plainly. “Surely you must understand that I will have good and bad days at my age.”

The subtle sparkle that had been in her eye had been replaced with a look of suspicion and anger. “You have used your magic, a great extent of it when you should have had no reason to.”

I gave a wry half-smile and shrugged. “I felt ill in the night, very ill, and I feared it as the end, so I used my healing skills to right myself. I am not proficient in the skills, so it took quite a bit out of me.”

Her eyes trained on my face, looking for any sign of deception, but I had been lying for longer than she had been alive and I knew exactly how to deceive people into believing me. It wasn’t even a particularly hard lie to pass off for truth, I was old, did feel ill, and I did heal, the rest was just a minor embellishment to the truth really.

“I will let this pass for now,” she grumbled, “we have somewhere to be, so you better throw yourself together. It cannot wait, the events are already scheduled and I will not allow them to be delayed by your trickery.”

I did not like that I was going anywhere. I hated being trapped in this room as a prisoner, but I knew that leaving these walls likely meant I was going to end up interrogated or forced into some brain washing attempt. Either way, I supposed I didn’t have a choice, dragging my feet wasn’t going to stop Aela from getting what she wanted in the end.

“Move!” she shouted when I didn’t immediately get to my feet. “I know you’re an expert at changing your appearance, put yourself in something presentable. My definition of presentable,” she sneered, “not the revealing outfits that make you look like the seasoned tart you are.”

She was really testing my patience and willpower. I wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of a reaction, I knew it was likely part of her intent, she would have loved a chance to take a swing at me. I had never been her favorite person, even when we were on the same side.

Aela and her twin sister had been Evonia’s first borns and therefore incredibly dotted upon, especially since they had very much taken on Evonia’s refined appearance. From birth they had possessed very sharp and noble features and were both very beautiful children that everyone in the castle had dotted upon. Like living dolls, if anything was being withheld from them all they needed to do was well up their eyes with tears and people would reconsider. Punishments never lasted very long, no matter how serious the infraction. In addition, they took to magic like ducks to water, easily attaining their milestones faster than we predicted. The combination made them the apples of their mother’s eyes, but only when they were younger, once they started to grow into their adolescence, the years of being allowed full run of the castle and the people inside it began to rear its ugly head. They listened to no one, talked back to everyone, skipped their lessons, and even used their powers to try to get their way against their mother and I. Basically, everyone who did not bend to their every whim was deserving of their fury.

I had spoken out against the spoiling early, being very vocal that they would not learn lessons important to their growth towards being effective rulers long before the effects were felt. That made me an enemy in their eyes, the one person who did not bend to their will when they puffed out their lips and stamped their feet. It was easy in their child minds to point towards me as the big, bad, unfair aunt who hated them having fun or getting what they felt they deserved and when Evonia finally caught onto the fact that I was right, it was easy enough for them to come to the conclusion that it was due to my brainwashing their mother. I wondered if they had since ever stopped to consider that Evonia was perhaps one of the people least likely to be susceptible to such things. I guessed probably not, they both seemed solidly set on the idea that I had been the sole reason their free ticket to do whatever they wanted had been revoked.

When their mother had decided they were best off not becoming the heirs and asked them to stay as stewardesses until another heir had been named, they had turned on both of us. Vowing revenge at all costs and since their mother was now dead and buried, all their anger and need for vengeance was centered squarely on me. I was the last symbol of all that had been taken from them and the charmed life I had always railed against. I couldn't exactly blame their anger, they had expected their entire lives up to that point to take the throne, everyone had, but their nasty demeanor had ensured that would have been a terrible mistake.

“I suppose that will do,” she said with a snort.

I had willed my remaining magic to make a rather boring shift dress in an off white. I refused to do the starched, bright white they all seemed to adore.

“Much more suitable for a woman of your advanced age.”

“May I ask where we are going?” I asked, ignoring the jab. I don’t know why she seemed intent to focus on the fact I was old so often, it did not hurt me to hear it. I felt it deep in my bones, it was something I had accepted a while ago.

“We are to watch a saint be anointed.”

“The little girl,” I said with a soft snort, “that is how you have decided to explain her power. No mention of the fae?”

Aela narrowed her eyes and sniffed through her nose. “You know nothing of the workings of the gods.”

“I beg to differ, I just know in this case that gods had nothing to do with her gifts unless the Church is calling the fae gods now.”

“I would not expect someone as foul as you to understand any of it,” she said with an irritated twitch of her hand.

Interesting. I could tell that she wanted to backhand me for speaking back to her, but she had withheld the violence. She quite obviously was not opposed to violence, Gloria had not been spared any of it, that meant she was not yet off her leash with me and they wanted me whole and healthy. Why, though? I could not figure out what purpose they might have invented for an old woman who had despised them for her whole life. Surely they should just want to throw me onto a pyre and wash their hands of my meddling.

“No more talking,” she growled and marched from the room and gave me a menacing, but permissive look to follow her.

Stepping out into the hallway, I didn’t know what I expected, but it was not to be in the middle of what looked to be a very ornate hallway with glittering cream stone walls and multitudes of tapestries hanging on the walls in regular intervals. As she led me towards the stairs I only had a brief second to view each as we passed, but it was long enough to identify them as important scenes from the various stories used to teach their morals and rules. One of the most impressive was a detailed image of a man wrapped up in a huge snake, his face fierce as he struggled to wrestle the beast. I vaguely remembered the stories as being the background for one of their more prominent saints, something about him single handedly taking down a group of divinely empowered snakes sent by a dark god.

At the bottom of the stairs, it was apparently by the increasing amount of tapestries, religious icons, and copious use of stained glass that I had been in a temple this whole time. I had assumed that I was in some sort of Church owned building, but I felt infinitely more uneasy to know that I was in the heart of a place they held sacred. This had to feel to Aela much like the story in the tapestry, having a dangerous, evil snake directly in her home, so there had to be a very compelling reason to have convinced her to bring me here. Several girls all dressed in the same basic attire that Gloria wore daily skirted past us, taking a moment to give Aela a wide-eyed curtsey before continuing on their way. Their hair was all done up in braids and their faces freshly washed, perhaps they were all getting ready to go to whatever event I was being led to, the servant girl had blathered on about how they all looked forward to the festivities.

“Where am I?”

Now that I knew she was not likely to get away with snapping on me just yet I felt emboldened to get some kind of answer.

“What is it to you?” she asked with a sharp edge to her voice.

She did not even look back to me, instead nearly knocked over a poor girl who did not step out of the way in time. The girl tumbled to the side, almost dropping the armful of clean linens she had been carrying. She opened her mouth like she was about to let out a startled sound, but quickly snapped her mouth shut as realization dawned over her features about who had pushed her. Instead, she righted herself, muttering a profuse apology for getting in the way and scurrying off in hopes Aela would not take out any frustration on her.

“Is it not normal for anyone not familiar with where they are to ask?” I said.

There was a long silence and we arrived at a door, this one incredibly ornate and a bright blue that stood out all the more against the cream stone. The door had glittering gold hardware with beautiful scroll work depicting flowers and vines. By the size and shape, I assumed the door would lead to some sort of large room, perhaps a grand hall. It reminded me of the door to the throne room at the Castle Yser. A pang of longing and sadness gripped my heart as I thought of the castle, the only place I ever felt like was my home. I doubted I would ever see it again and I felt like I had been cast from it like a pariah, exiled to suffer away from all that held comfort for the rest of my days.

“I will tell you only so that you might behave a bit better at this event,” she snarled. “Do not confuse my intentions, I do not believe you deserve to know, you are my prisoner and you are not the type of person who deserves to be anywhere near this holy place. If I had my way I would be keeping you in some wretched shack in the cold and rain, count yourself lucky.”

I nodded and smiled pleasantly, I knew that was the response that would annoy her the most.

Her face reddened and her fists clenched at her sides. “You have been brought to the Temple of Amara. This is one of the most holy places the Church possesses and no one of any rank in the Church will hesitate at this ceremony today to purge you from this plane of existence if you try in any way to taint the sanctity of this temple.”

Amara. The name rang a bell, I felt fairly certain that it was one of their more important goddesses. If pressed I wanted to say that it was the goddess of love and passion, but to be honest their pantheon bored me and I often mixed up which were which. Nothing I had seen so far in the imagery really spoke to love or passion so perhaps I was mistaken, not that it mattered, if their gods were real or were all powerful as they proclaimed they would have scorched me to dust the moment I had stepped foot in the temple. They would have to know that deep down nothing was going to convince me to join their side.

“I will be on my best manners,” I replied, trying very hard to sound sincere despite the deep, burning urge to say something snarky. I didn’t know how far I could push right now, but I didn’t really want to test the limits just yet.

“You better be,” she scoffed, then pulled on the doors, opening it into a grand place of worship, the walls mostly made up of brilliantly colored stained glass with sunlight streaming in from all angles.

Even a cynic like myself was a bit breathaken by the beauty of the room. The dancing sunlight lit up the white stone on the floor with all sorts of twinkling colors from the glass and suddenly it made sense why everyone seemed to wear white all the time. All the people who had already gathered and settled into pews were awash with color, like their goddess had reached out with her divine hand and painted them in brilliant hues.

“Come and stay silent,” Aela commanded, marching towards the middle of the pews where there was an aisle all the way up to a white marble pulpit.

It looked like there were already well over a hundred people here, maybe even past two hundred, all smiling in their white frocks until they caught sight of Aela. Strangely, they all seemed to be female and ranged in age from just young enough to be of help with chores to the very old. I had heard that some of their gods supposedly demanded only followers of a certain gender, but I did not expect Aela to be a part of one of those, she had renounced Evonia’s idea of only female descendants long before. Usually if her mother or I had thought something was a good idea she had gone out of her way to do the exact opposite to spite us.

“Cleric Aela,” a woman probably around my same age said, stepping away from her place at the pulpit to greet her with open arms.

They embraced, then the woman pulled away and looked at me with curious eyes. Her robe was very ornate, made out of fine silk and depicting a very large sun on the front that depicted a sprawling field of wildflowers. The flowers sparked a sense of understanding in me, there was a shared link between her robe, the stained glass, and the other decorations on the way to this place of worship. This goddess obviously was depicted by flowers which made me think that she must have been one of the pantheons that represented seasons. Of course, it made sense now, they had brought the child tainted by the hands of the Spring fae to the hands of the goddess of spring.

“Is this her?” the woman asked.

“Yes archbishop,” Aela replied, “I told you I would get her here in one piece.”

She nodded, not taking her eyes off me like she was fascinated by the fact I stood before her and had not yet burst into flames. “She is nothing like I imagined, I did not expect her to look so much like you. The family resemblance is strong.”

Either the woman did not know how infuriating Aela would find that statement or she enjoyed upsetting her, but either way it brought a genuine smile to the corner of my lips. I could feel Aela’s internal fuming though her face remained even except for a small twitch now present in her left eye.

“Well, I hope that our goddess opens your eyes to the light and what is possible through the cleansing rays of sunlight,” the archbishop said, dipping her head to the two of us before returning to her place behind the marble.

Aela made a grumbling sound in her throat then pointed towards an empty place at one of the pews near the front. She waited for me to sit, then took a deep breath in, let it out slowly, then walked the rest of the way up to take a stately position next to the archbishop. The area behind her was one huge mural that stretched from the very bottom of the floor to the top of the vaulted ceilings. The mural was of a sprawling field of flowers all in various stages of bloom, the sunlight streaming through hazy clouds to illuminate the field. I found myself in awe of their sense of decoration, it was not at all the kind of style I would have chosen, but I appreciated their commitment to over the top and extravagant displays of wealth. We at least had one thing in common. After a few more minutes the archbishop loudly cleared her throat, which quieted the soft murmurings of conversations until all was silent.

“It is a very special day, my sisters,” she said in a strong, clear voice that sounded like it was just on the cusp of singing the words instead of speaking them. “Today we all have the blessing to experience a once in a lifetime event. We are gathered to witness the birth of a new saint. We will witness the proof of her blessing of divinity and celebrate the gift that the goddess Amara has bestowed upon us. This girl blessed by the purity and renewal of spring is our proof that our goddess smiles upon our efforts and rewards our piety.”

A wave of soft sighs and murmured prayers wafted through the room and I clenched my fist at my side to keep myself from rolling my eyes. It was all lies, the girl was certainly not sent by any divine. The fae would certainly not consider any of the people in this room worthy of anything but to be a skull crushed beneath their boots.

“Please, everyone rise as our new saint prospect enters the room.”

Everyone in the room stood, including myself, and Alice entered from a side door behind the pulpit, her eyes were wide with wonder and a little bit of fear. She had been dressed in a plain, bright white dress and her long blonde hair had been adorned with as many flowers as they could possibly get pinned in without falling out. Her eyes looked over the room, growing wider at seeing just how many people were there to see her and sweat broke out over her brow. It looked like she sorely wanted to run away like a frightened prey animal. To her credit, or maybe to the credit of what she might have been threatened if she backed out, she stood her ground and eventually crept forward again, stepping lightly and slowly towards the two women waiting for her at the pulpit.

“Alice,” the archbishop said, holding out her hands to welcome her, “the sunlight blesses your steps. Divinity follows in your wake.”

The girl looked up to her with wide eyes, a look in them that belied the fact that she had only the faintest idea of what was happening to her. It was not a surprise, the girl had been aware of the fae influence on her and how it had potentially come about. This had been presented to her as fact and now they were trying to completely change the narrative and presenting their own version of events that matched nothing she knew. I didn’t have to wonder long about which she truly believed when her eyes darted out over the assembled crowd and fell on me, her features spelling out relief and her eyes silently asking me to help her. Unfortunately for her there was nothing I could do, I didn’t dare try to make any bold moves in my weakened state. Even if I had not spent the whole night exhausting the extent of my magic, I knew what Aela was capable of and while I liked the girl, I would not throw what little of my life I still had left on trying to rescue her.

“Now the girl will display her divine blessing for us all to witness, then she may ascend to the status of saint and use her gifts for the betterment of us all.”

The girl broke her gaze with me to look in alarm to the archbishop. I felt myself doing the same, surely they could not be asking her to unleash her power here and now. Aela at the very least understood that the fae were looking for the girl and this would create a giant beacon over the temple to draw them here. Were they really so arrogant to think they could handle their arrival? Aela had felt powerful, yes, but she was still nowhere near powerful enough to confront the fae and come out whole on the other side. Even an army of people as powerful as Aela would not hold up against even just a few fae and they were going to create a homing signal for a whole army of the fiends.

“Come now, show us your blessing,” the archbishop encouraged.

There was a long pause where nothing happened and I thought that maybe the girl would use her sense and refuse, but her expression turned from uncertainty to fear and her magical aura expanded, buffeting those in the room with her wild energy. The women in the room gasped loudly and there were many exclamations of “I can feel it!” I couldn’t help but shake my head a little, they did not understand that they had all just been doomed.

“Revel in it sisters, feel the blessing of our goddess!” the archbishop exclaimed.

Alice let her powers roam for a few moments more before Aela placed a hand on the little girl’s shoulder and the aura snapped back into her with a shiver. So it was Aela who was ensuring it got sealed back into her to keep her hidden, but it seemed useless to bother hiding it all now that they had unleashed it.

“Is there anyone here that doubts this girl’s sainthood?”

I briefly considered just how much fun it would have been to stand up and testify against it, but ultimately kept my mouth shut and no one else came forward.

“Then I welcome you to gaze upon Saint Alice, child of the spring!”