God of Eyes

I was half expecting my tour of the Temple to be short and brusque, but Miana, while she clearly had introvert tendencies, seemed to love the place, and enjoyed showing off what she knew of it. For my part, I enjoyed the tour on many levels, from enjoying Miana's company to mentally cataloging what I would need, and of course want, for my own.

The overlook where I had met with Pal'lud was probably about three quarters of the way up on a side not directly facing the bridge. That level was actually rather large, with an expansive section that was outdoors, built on top of a lower level's roof, with a few small plots with shrubs in them, but far more marked-out areas for sparring. It did not escape my attention that there were holes in the stone around the sparring rings, ones I suspected were meant for poles, either to string up fences or to support an awning in bad weather.

Miana seemed less concerned with the actual sparring area, though, and was walking us to another area on the other side, so I cleared my throat. "These are sparring rings, right?"

She turned to me, looking a bit surprised, but gave me a small smile. "There are many sparring rings in the temple, Ryan of Eyes. These are not any different than the others, although they tend to be used most often when it's raining."

"When it is raining?" I raised my eyebrows.

"Yes." She gave me a side-eye, as though what I was saying was borderline insulting, though I didn't sense she felt any real offense. "The warriors of the Temple will not be stopped by bad weather, just as the blood clans won't. The drains," she gestured to the holes, "keep the water from pulling people off the edge. We do take some caution with high winds, as falling weapons are a serious danger to those below."

That made sense to me, and I nodded, looking over the grounds. Now that I looked at it, the small shrub beds were positioned to break the winds over the arenas, too. It probably didn't help too much, but anything that saved a life would help.

At the end of the overlook was a small shrine with a hanging bell and a sword embedded deep into the stone beneath it. "The Lady of Blades does not often ask us to pray," she said as she ran one hand over the bell, as though sentimentally. "But if the high priestess rings the bell, all those who hear its tone shall know her words." She paused. "You could try, if you wanted. It won't ring for you."

I smiled, but I had already sensed that. The magic cast over both the bell and sword were powerful, though I suspected it was more locked to those with divine powers rather than just Ciel'ostra. Then again... if the high priestess could do it, maybe it was both? I assumed Murn was not the High Priestess, and neither was the Avatar. Perhaps the fourth woman from the book?

"Who is the high priestess?" I asked after a moment. "I haven't met anyone but you, Pal'lud, and a few guards."

"She keeps to herself. I doubt she wants to meet you; she doesn't like men. Her name is Bia'nella, and she keeps the Record of the Fallen, among other duties." Miana tapped the side of the bell idly, and it didn't ring even a little bit. In fact, it seemed to muffle the sound of her tapping completely. "Her room is the highest in the temple. If you even try to get close, someone will stop you, probably kill you. She is closest to the Lady, and the Lady guards her."

I considered that silently, nodding to myself. "What's next?"

Next was a tour around the outside edge of the temple, two levels down, where it faced the back of the mountain. There was a narrow stone ledge overlooking a sharp dropoff on all faces of the mountain except those pointed at the city, and although I could not sense any enchantment, godly or otherwise, to repel those who tried to climb up, anyone who tried wouldn't have it easy. It was very tall, and very steep, and higher than the adjacent mountaintops by at least a hundred feet. The only mountain nearby that came close was attached by bridge, and that was probably the reason it was chosen.

Miana didn't so much seem afraid of the sheer drop as she had a healthy dose of caution. I could tell she was paying attention to her balance and footing, and especially to the wind gusts. Although she didn't mention it, I noticed as we went along that there were a series of iron rings built into the wall we walked along. Whenever the wind would gust, her hand went up to the nearest ring, a habit that I copied as soon as I noticed it.

Exactly opposite the bridge was a notable addition, and that was a narrow walkway that extended about ten feet out from the ledge. That walkway had no handrails, and there was nothing beneath it for a very, very long time.

"Executions?" I asked, peering over the edge timidly.

Miana nodded, but didn't elaborate.

After that was a tour of the Great Hall. If the view over the edge was meant to imply the fortress was unassailable, I decided, this room was there to show that the inhabitants meant business. I would have assumed that the Great Hall was primarily for talking, maybe meals, and certainly there was a high podium and a number of tables... but the single greatest use of the Great Hall seemed to be as an armory. The room was circular, with an enclave on the side opposite the entrance that held the raised podium, and to get to the central area with the tables, you had to walk down five flights of steps, and each flight of steps ended with a landing. Each landing was a ring all the way around the central hall, and the wall of each ring was a weapons rack, each two stories tall--if you stood behind one of the racks on the next level up, you wouldn't be able to see the center. There were gaps, about every five feet or so, so you could still, in theory, watch what was going on below, but...

I couldn't help feeling my breath catch as I realized the enormity of what I was seeing. If all of the racks were full, there would be a hundred thousand weapons in that room, enough to arm the entire nation several times over. It wasn't full, though; there were plenty of places where things were missing or obviously had never been placed. Even saying that... I glanced around, but could find not one speck of dirt, not one dulled edge, not one cracked haft or sign of rust.

"The Lady's armory is... impressive," I said after a moment.

"Armory? No." Miana grinned. "That is closer to the entrance. These are the Records of the Fallen."

That... gave me a sudden stab in the heart to hear. I immediately turned and walked along the top ring, examining the first weapon I came across. It was a relatively simple glaive; a long wooden haft topped with a relatively wide saber blade on the top of it, made for stabbing and slashing, but the tip was wide like a blade, not pointy enough to be a real piercing weapon. This close, I could see a name engraved on the haft, and a date. I wasn't actually all that familiar with the calendar here, but from what I'd seen working with Manne, this was many centuries old.

I reached out and touched the haft, and I felt a surge of alarm from Miana, although nothing from either the weapon or anything else in the room. I didn't do anything, but... touching the wood, I could feel the faint echo of the weapon's owner, a black haired cat-woman with an infectious smile. There were nuances to the image that remained there, echoes of her history--youth, love, pregnancy, injury, wrath, despair, age, death. Whatever power Ciel'ostra had used to store the woman's history in this weapon, it was subtle, but lovingly done.

Beside the glaive was a saber, and when I touched the hilt, I saw a man, felt that he was the woman's husband. Their stories wove together; youth, love, parenthood, protection, rage, death. He had stayed to guard their child while the mother went to war, but when she came back injured, he enlisted to get revenge--and died. I shook my head.

"You--" Miana seemed honestly startled that I was daring to touch the weapons, but she was quickly distracted. "What-- are you crying?"

I wiped my one good eye, feeling the sting of the tear ducts in my other, destroyed eye, but ignoring it. "I can See," I said, looking around, "...a great deal of history here. A great deal of love."

I didn't really pay much attention to Miana's reaction to that, instead wandering down the path and touching a few more items. Wherever I touched two items from a similar age, I could feel the subtle threads connecting them, even across generations. Not just parents, but students and teachers, uncles and aunts, neighbors and friends, popular people and the shy ones that stayed along the edges. Admiration, love, lust, hatred, jealousy... not every last emotion was written in a person's story, but if the storyteller could see it in them, then it was recorded. Sometimes she did not know reasons, but often enough she did, or suspected them well enough to tell the story in a compelling, if brief, way.

I probably spent a good hour or two browsing, enough to notice immediately when the one doing the inscriptions changed. The previous Keeper of Records--High Priestess, I suppose--had a consistent feel to her magic, but when she was replaced, there was a new feel, a new consistency. I had not been paying attention to the dates, but the impeccable evenness to the records suggested again that the High Priestess was the fourth body of Ciel'ostra. Most likely, that fourth body would keep these records without tying up her attention span, although from the emotions involved, no doubt she put her heart into it.

It was difficult to keep my eyes dry as I wandered through the racks. Not one of these ancient artifacts felt like a grave, like a centuries-old record of the deceased. Each of them might as well have died last week, might as well have been visited by friends just yesterday. Not one of them felt forgotten, or lost. The love and hatred and sorrow of each monument was too real, too freshly captured.

Finally, though, I returned to the stairs, and looked out over the great hall. The tables there were likely used by the women of the temple often enough, maybe every month or every year, maybe every week or day for all I knew. But these racks, these monuments, these were not for the living, except as a promise--a very important promise, to each and every last one of them, that not one of them would be forgotten, not one of them would fade from memory.

I snuffled a little pathetically as I turned to find Miana watching me from by the door, as she'd been for a while. "I think," I said, "I'd like to go back to my room, now."

She studied me for a minute, but got up and silently turned.

Before she shut me in to the small space, she stopped and stood there for a minute, watching me as I settled down on the small meditation circle. "You showed more respect for the dead than anyone except Bia'nella. Why?"

"Loss. Love." I closed my eye, but didn't quite start trying to meditate. "The first time you bury someone that you truly wish would have remained by your side, you will understand."

Miana eyed me for a long time, then closed the door. It wasn't until I heard her throw the latch, though, that I let the tears flow freely again.