Page 65 of Alchemised
There was the sound of a heavy chain being dragged, another snarl, more furious than the first, and Helena saw what was in the shadows. An enormous creature, black as night, lunged towards them.
It was a wolf.
No. Bigger than a wolf. It was larger than a destrier. So immense it seemed to fill the stable.
Grace had said the High Reeve had a monster, but Helena had not taken that literally.
The creature was monstrous. Fangs longer than her fingers flashed in the light. Wind rushed across the room. The smell of blood struck her face as a foaming mouth burst from the shadows, jaws snapping.
There was the sharp sound of a chain reaching its end. Taloned claws scrabbled across the wood floor as the monster lunged again.
The necrothralls grabbed Helena by the hair and dragged her back out into the courtyard, dumping her on the gravel.
Helena scrambled to her feet, heart trying to beat with fear but unable to. She was stunned by what had happened. Her captivity was so rigidly controlled, it was startling to brush with danger.
She couldn’t help but wonder if the stable door being unlocked was also Aurelia’s doing.
The creature was still snarling, and then a low gusting howl emerged, a sound like moaning wind.
She caught her breath and looked back at the necrothralls, who’d both stationed themselves in front of the stable, watching her as the creature inside quieted.
She moved away. The next building was a small, geometric one. Helena tried the door, and it clicked, swinging inwards. As soon as she saw the interior’s five walls, she knew what it was. A chantry.
She stepped inside, letting the door close behind her. Helena had always struggled with the rigidity of Northern religion, but now, at the end of everything, there was a bittersweetness to a place like this.
Paladia had been a culture shock for Helena in many regards. In Etras, gods didn’t require being believed in any more than the mountains did. They existed. A person accommodated them respectfully, and sometimes made little offerings and prayers requesting favour, but the gods represented facets of life on Etras, not purpose itself.
Things were different in Paladia. While the ancient gods were said to have required blood for their sacrifices, Sol required life itself, lived out in service to him. Northerners were expected to devote their every moment in ritual sacrifice so that in death their souls might ascend to the heavens. Everything revolved around what Sol did or did not allow.
Luc had tried everything to earn the favour Sol had extended to his forefathers. He’d possessed the alchemical gifts, sun-blessed like all the rest, but he never received the miracles his ancestors had enjoyed, which had ensured their triumphs in battle and the riches of their rule.
Luc would have given up all his gifts for one miracle, anything to bring the war to an end, but his prayers were never answered, his devotion never acknowledged.
He’d always blamed himself for that.
If he were still alive, he’d pray even now, but the ritual words stuck in Helena’s throat.
Each wall was for one of the five gods of the Quintessence. The radiant, unconquerable Sol, giver of life, was at the centre, flanked by the rest. The altar brazier that should have been burning ceaselessly with a flame from the eternal fire was cold, its amiantos wick dusty and dry.
The Ferrons had probably had a chantry built for their private worship and interments because that was something the upper classes did—although given the number of spires decorating the house, it did seem that the family had been religious at some point. Paladians loved decorating in sets of five even though their venerations and celebrations were primarily for Sol and Lumithia.
Along the walls there were dozens of stones with plaques bearing names and dates. With limited land, Paladians kept the ashes of their dead for generations rather than burying them in cemeteries as some countries did.
Despite the visible neglect, the chantry was not entirely abandoned. One plaque was brighter than the rest, carefully polished. It sat beneath the altar of Luna, the lesser moon goddess.
ENID FERRON. ALWAYS BELOVED. A WIFE AND MOTHER.
Based on the celestial dates, she’d died during the war, 1785, three years into Luc’s reign. She must have been Ferron’s mother.
Helena studied the inscription, finding it ironic. However “beloved” Enid Ferron had been by her husband and son, it had not been enough to be granted the immortality they enjoyed.
Then again, the guilds had always been intensely patriarchal.
Ironically, the one thing the guilds thought the Holdfasts weren’t traditional enough about was women. Girls had been welcomed to study at the Institute for decades. There were female lecturers, instructors, and board members in the school. It had been with Principate Apollo’s blessing that Lila Bayard had trained from childhood to become paladin primary.
The guilds, for all their talk of progress and equality, and freedom from rigid traditionalism, had very specific ideas about precisely who deserved that equality and freedom.
A low view of women was common in the North, especially among those of faith. Prior to the pressure exerted by the Principate, the Faith regarded women as categorically lesser, and even after the official distancing occurred, the belief remained pervasive.
