The caravan rolled into Brighton a little past noon. It was lunchtime, but Gerhold had eaten a large breakfast and was too eager to complete his journey to stop at one of the many cafes or bars lining the central street that led into the capital city. He felt good as he stretched his legs, the tightness in his side almost gone. The Elemental Order’s keep was in the center of the city amid many other prominent government buildings and temples. That wasn’t where Gerhold was headed.

On the southern edge of the Brighton, a hundred paces from the road that led to the port on the river sat a small little-used building. The Temple of the Divine Creator wasn’t a popular religion. Most people thought it was akin to worshiping gravity or light. Everyone knew that something or someone had created their world, and there was evidence that it had happened within the last 1000 years, but no one knew how or by whom, other than it must have been a divine being. The temple didn’t offer any explanation either, just that it had happened, and whoever or whatever did it should be worshiped.

The faith had no view of the future; no moral standard by which you should live; and no theology about dealing with the world’s problems. It only focused on worshiping and singing praises to the Divine Creator. It was an early religion; some believed its origins came from before the fall when presumably humankind had a more intimate relationship with the divine beings. But the wars that had followed the fall had wiped out most of that history, and only the central idea of a Divine Creator remained.

Most people wanted their faith to give them a meaning or purpose, so they moved on to worship the Divine Savior or the Supplanter. Some denied the fall and became perfectors. There were different sects of those beliefs, with many interfaith debates. Only in a city as big as Brighton could you find enough people who were just happy to be alive, living in a world that could provide for them, and wanting to thank someone for it to support a Temple of the Divine Creator.

Gerhold approached the dilapidated building with a smile on his face. No one would look here. The road from the river port was primarily lined with warehouses to store goods that had just arrived or queued for delivery on a future shipment. The river was also the border to Talla, so a few precautionary garrisons were kept. Several merchants set up shop to meet any Talla traders who wanted to spend as little time in the northland as possible.

The temple building was small and conservatively adorned. It lacked the towering spires of the temples in the city’s center and could have been mistaken for a home. It was tucked behind a large warehouse, only visible if you looked for it. Behind it lay several shacks and dilapidated houses.

Gerhold approached swiftly, not wanting to draw attention to himself. He guessed he looked like a typical worshiper for this temple, assuming it got any. He was an older man in good health who looked like he had lived a prosperous life. People in need were not usually the ones first in line for a faith that thanked the creator but didn’t offer a means for salvation.

A bell on the door chimed loudly when the knight entered, presumably alerting the priest that a guest had arrived. Gerhold waited and examined the small chapel inside, not wanting to intrude. Four wooden pews sat in a small chamber before an altar, song pamphlets lying on the benches. Gerhold guessed no more than 12 people could sit in the room, and he doubted the small chapel had hosted that many people in a long time, even around holidays. A door opened to his left, and an elderly man, maybe a few years older than himself but not nearly as fit, entered the small narthex. He wore a long white robe with golden tassels.

“Welcome, sir,” the man said, a broad smile on his face. His voice was surprisingly strong, probably a byproduct of a lifetime of singing and often being the leader. “Are you here for our praise service? It isn’t for another two hours. Or do you just wish for a quiet place to pray?”

“I was actually here to offer my services. I have worshiped the Divine Creator for many years, but now I have the time to give back to the faith in any way I can.”

The old priest looked Gerhold up and down for a moment. The knight wasn’t wearing his armor, he never wore it anymore, but he did have his sword. Wearing a weapon openly was not outlawed in Brighton, with Talla so close, and it often deterred crime, but bringing one to a temple was a little unorthodox. Gerhold looked like a laborer built for action, not a holy man.

“I . . .uh . . . don’t know what to say, sir. Upkeep in the temple is not hard. If you wish to support us, coin is always welcome, but we don’t need laborers much these days. Especially since I just took in another volunteer last week. She has taken on most of the duties, what few there were, and I feel I have nothing left to do.”

“She?” Gerhold asked.

“Yes,” the priest answered. “A woman about your age, though she has the energy of someone half that. She is a gifted musician too. She plays beautiful music on the harp. I also don’t have any quarters left. You are welcome to stay for our praise service, though.”

Gerhold smiled. Celaina had played the harp. “I think I will stay, thank you. It has been a while since I have sung within a temple. Do you get many of the faithful to join?”

The priest’s constant smile dropped a little. “Sometimes it is only me,” he said, “But we will have at least three this afternoon.”

“Could I meet the woman who came to you last week? I would love to fellowship with others of the faith, especially one as devoted as she appears to be.”

The full smile returned to the priest’s face. “It would be my pleasure.”

It was a short walk through the side door and down a narrow hallway. They passed the priest’s own spartan quarters to a second door. The older man knocked and waited as a woman’s voice called back. Celaina opened the door and froze. The priest stood directly before her, but Gerhold’s height made him visible over the stooped man’s shoulder.

“Gerhold,” she gasped.

“Celaina,” he replied. “It is good to see you.”

The knight enjoyed the shocked look on the woman’s face for a few moments, but she recovered quickly. “Priest Kreig,” she turned her eyes to the older man, “If you would give us a few moments.”

The man nodded, quickly understanding they knew each other. He turned and retreated to his room next door, leaving Gerhold alone in the hallway, Celaina still guarding her entrance. “Well,” she finally said, “I suppose you should come in. Though it is a bit inappropriate for a man and woman to be alone in temple quarters.”

“Even if they are married?” Gerhold asked.

“Is that what we are?” she questioned but did step aside to let him in. “Be careful what you say; these walls are paper thin.”

“In that case,” he quipped as he walked past her, “the sanctity of this room should remain intact. You always were a screamer.”

“Gerhold!” she cried in response, turning to punch him in the arm. Gerhold winced at the strike, noting with interest that his wife had lost none of her fiery nature.

Once inside the room, Gerhold noticed there was barely enough room to turn around with both of them in it. A bed sat along the opposite wall that ran the entire width of the room. A desk and a dresser stood along another wall, and that was it. After Celaina closed the door and the two were standing in the room, their closeness became instantly awkward, and Gerhold found his way to the desk chair while Celaina sat on her single bed.

The two stared at each other for a few moments before talking. Gerhold was not surprised to find that she was just as beautiful as he remembered her. Her long brown hair had a few streaks of silver but retained a vivid sheen of youth and was pulled into a tight braid behind her relatively wrinkle-free face. She wore a modest dress of primarily white with golden embroidery over the bodice and skirt and a golden cord tied around the waist. Only her eyes hinted at the many decades they had seen, and the knight felt drawn into them.

“You know why I am here?” he asked finally.

Celaina had actually forgotten about the Elementals for a moment and had to bring her mind back from ancient memories to the present. She nodded. “It is good to see you are well. Is that it?” she motioned to the sword at his hip, the tip propped on the floor with him sitting.

“Is this . . .” his words drifted as he looked down and realized what she was asking. She knew that he had been guarding one of the weapons and assumed that the assassin had come after him and failed. “No,” he responded. “I lost the sword.”

“But he didn’t kill you?”

Gerhold didn’t want to waste too much time going over what had happened but saw no way around it. “The assassin left me for dead, but a young man reclaimed the sword. In the process, he took on the Elemental. Now he is on the run. I see you were more successful at your duty.”

Celaina had many questions about the loss of the sword but held them in check for now. “I had several throzens who lived on my property. The assassin wasn’t prepared for their watchful eyes, and he was ambushed. He killed two of them, but I was alerted to his presence and killed him.”

“You have it with you,” Gerhold asked.

“It is safe,” she replied.

The knight’s eyes went around the room, looking for a hiding place, but there weren’t any and finally decided the dagger must be under her bed. When his eyes went to the gap behind her feet, she cleared her throat in annoyance. His eyes went back to hers. “It is safe,” she repeated. “And I don’t need help guarding it.”

“Self-reliant as always,” her husband was too quick to say.

“Did you come all this way to fight?”

“Not against you,” he said, trying to steer the conversation back. “Do you think the enemy will not find you?”

“It appears they already have.”

It took Gerhold a moment to realize she meant him. “I am not your enemy.”

“You lost your Elemental, and when this young man returned to you with the Divine’s property inside him, you didn’t see fit to reclaim it.”

“Perhaps you missed the point where I said I was left for dead,” he bit back a little too harshly.

“A wound would have never stopped the man I married from carrying out his Savior’s will.”

Gerhold sighed, determined not to dig up old memories. “I am not convinced it wasn’t the Savior’s will for Ethan to have the Elemental. He left my protection in the company of a young woman with a powerful connection to the Savior. I believe they will disrupt the enemy’s plans. I am not the enemy.”

Celaina looked him over slowly. Based on when she had been attacked, her husband must have fought his assassin 6-7 days ago. He looked healthy now for someone claiming to have been left for dead. Gerhold never had the same healing connection to the divine that she had. She was sure he was hiding something from her but decided not to press her questioning any further.

“Either way, I do not need help guarding the Elemental. I am safe here. No one knows where I am.”

Gerhold looked himself up and down slowly as if his presence in her room said, I found you.

“Yes, you did,” she replied. “Sir Jenkins knows, and he told you. But who else have you told?”

In response to her question, they both heard the bell on the door chime again. Gerhold was surprised by how clear the sound was, passing through two closed doors and a hallway. The walls were as thin as reported. They listened as Priest Kreig left his room and greeted at least two people entering the temple. Their conversation was muffled through the walls, but eventually, footsteps made their way down the hallway, and a knock sounded on Celaina’s door again.

The female paladin looked at her husband curiously, but when he didn’t offer an answer, she got off her bed and opened the door. Gerhold shifted in his chair to get an angle to look into the hall and was shocked to see Emoyen and Terrance. They were both dressed in armor that clearly labeled them as knights in the Elemental Order.

“Sir Jenkins is great at keeping secrets,” Gerhold observed.

Celaina frowned, seeing a more likely answer. “Or they followed you here.”

Terrance wasn’t interested in banter. “We are here to help protect-”

But the older woman cut him off with a gesture. “Not here.” Her room was too small to host four people, and she led them to the chapel instead, giving Priest Kreig a look that told him to stay in his room. After closing the glass doors to the small worship room, the four paladins each took a seat on a pew and waited for the keeper of the Elemental to speak.

“I don’t need help,” she said fiercely. “And you are just drawing attention to us out here.”

“We were not followed, Emoyen said. “No one knows we are here.”

“Which is what I would have said if asked,” Gerhold was willing to admit, seeing, as always, that his wife was probably right. “This temple hasn’t had this many visitors in weeks, I’m guessing. Anyone in the neighborhood will remember today, and you two aren’t exactly anonymous.”

Emoyen and Terrance frowned. “We are here to protect the Elemental,” she said. “The enemy will come for it, and they will start their search in Brighton. When they come, you two will be unable to defend against them without help.”

Gerhold winced as someone else claimed his wife needed help, but at least it was another woman. “Then,” Celaina replied through thin lips, “you can help by watching for the enemy. This is not the first place they will come. They will visit other temples, probably even our keep. Go there, wait for them to arrive. Feed them misinformation that we have sent the Elemental to River’s Point or beyond. But don’t stay here, and don’t return.”

Emoyen and Terrance looked at Gerhold to see if he agreed with this assignment, but he looked at Celaina to see if this order also applied to him. The older woman returned all their looks with a determined face, and they nodded in return.

“The priest was looking forward to a larger crowd for evening praise,” Gerhold dared offer.

“It has been the two of us each day the past week,” she replied. “Besides, I wouldn’t want you to soil your memory of my harp playing with what I have become.”

Gerhold rose to signal the end of the short meeting. “Very well. It was nice seeing you again. We should do this again in ten years.”

“Hopefully not sooner,” she replied, standing as well, no hint if she was being ironic.

As the three newcomers filed out of the small temple, Celaina returned to her room. Kreig chanced a look out his doorway and caught the woman’s eyes. “They won’t be staying for singing?”

Celaina managed a smile back at the clueless priest. “I’m afraid it will just be us this evening.”