“I swear!” the woman blubbered. “I’m not a Wrath Lich! I swear on Gessel’s Throne!”

  “Look, I know,” Maribel said gently to her. The softness in her voice belied the nurturing persona she had adopted for this interrogation. In reality, the thirty hours after the riot and explosion outside of the mission had been a stressful marathon. Everyone the church had managed to capture still alive had been too shocked or ignorant to the riot’s roots to be of any use, and one by one they were turned over to the law enforcement mechanisms within the Throne proper.

  This portly vegetable peddler from the Back City markets was all that remained. Her smock had been crudely stained red with what smelled like beet juice. A pink bandana hung loosely around her neck, turned dark by sweat and tears.

  “I understand you are not a proper Wrath Lich, but they taught you all how to use that magic, did they not?” Maribel eyed her scepter, which was lying at the end of the table. She had had to use it too much in the past hours. She prayed silently for this woman to be more welcoming.

  “Not me,” she admitted. “I wasn’t good enough at it. I couldn’t make the fire like the rest could. Not mana sensitive at all, just like my parents.”

  “So what happened to you then?”

  “They told me to stay home. They didn’t want me if I couldn’t do their magic,” she held back tears, but just barely.

  Finally, Maribel thought she was making progress. Some insight into the actual Wrath Liches behind what had happened. So far, all she had learned was that they were not from The Throne.

  “Why did you ignore their advice? It would have saved you a lot of trouble and heartache.”

  “Save me heartache? I don’t have a heart to ache anymore! This damned city has broken it to pieces.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your brothers and sisters,” the woman used the title as if it were a curse. “In the city. When my husband came ill, you conveniently could not heal him.”

  “Did the Wrath Liches know you were in such pain?”

  “Of course not. I don’t brag about what you all dragged me through,” the woman wailed.

  Liar. Maribel had heard this woman’s story, though she could not recognize her as the subject. The gossip-ridden streets of the Back City all knew about “Crying Patsy.” Her emotions, not a lack of mana sensitivity, were obviously what held her back from casting the blended Wrath magic. She was sad more than angry. And that was Maribel’s foothold.

  “Have you come to our mission for help before?”

  “After your priests told me my husband was Chael’s, I stayed as far away as I could,” she spat. There was a pause, then her emotions took to filling the silence again. “Of course, not that I could get away from my stand. Rent is so high back here now. And without my husband’s pay, I work all day and all night just to keep off the streets.”

  Everyone suffers, Maribel thought dryly. “You do not need to suffer like that. You have to understand that our power is carried out through the Will of Gessel.”

  “Piss off,” the woman muttered. “You can’t honestly say it was a god’s Will that my husband died.”

  “I can, and I must. Because I have devoted my life to ensuring that the civilization as designed by Gessel is perfected. Just as you losing your family has caused you to lose your way, loss of faith would do the same to me.

  “I am genuinely sorry about what happened to your family, and I, for one, am truly interested in helping you relieve some of what pains you. Do you know the real reason why you were unable to cast the magics the Wrath Liches taught?”

  The woman looked up from her sorrow curiously.

  “Because you are not motivated by hatred of the church. You are motivated by love of family.”

  A small smile cracked the woman’s cry face. Maribel was relieved to see it. Her twisted sorrow was honestly quite ugly.

  “Think, ma’am, about the other mothers, fathers, husbands, and wives who loved ones are being shoveled from the streets outside right now. And while you think about that, let me ask you a question. Did healers try to heal your husband?”

  The woman silently nodded.

  “What about the Wrath Liches, did they stay to heal the wounded of their own riot?”

  A pause. Then a slow shake of the head.

  “I am so sorry that we failed you. But I trust that we tried. And right now we are trying something else. We are trying to find justice for the families that were shredded by the Wrath Liches.”

  Patsy looked at Maribel with sad eyes. “They all already left,” she said with a slow sigh. “There were five of them. Two left before the riot even started.”

  Maribel tried to hide her excitement as best as she could. This was more than she had gotten from anyone else.

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  “Do you know any of their names?”

  “I don’t, sister. They did not even let anyone see their faces. We would meet twice a week for training with them just outside the city. You never knew which of the five would show up. Didn’t even know how many there actually were until the day of the riot.”

  “How long had you all been preparing?”

  “Since summer.”

  Maribel nodded with understanding. There had been an incident where a handful of violent arrests in the Back City that definitely stoked the fires of this riot during those months, not to mention all the news of the Church losing ships to the Sea Witch in the south validating some anti-Church opinions.

  “Why did you continue to go to training even though you were unable to cast their magic?”

  “I told them I truly wanted to help. So they let me carry messages.”

  The priestess twitched with excitement, but quickly squashed a visible reaction. “Do you know what the contents of these messages were?”

  “I never knew, no. I would just give them to whoever was leading that training session, then pick up another for the coming week. Sometimes I would be handed them at my stand, but not often.”

  Oh, you gossiping woman. Please, keep talking.

  “They would never read them in front of us. I found it strange that they were responding without even reading, but I suppose there were conversations moving between all of them the whole time.”

  “Do you have any of these letters left?”

  The woman said nothing. She simply reached into her smock and removed a thick, cream colored envelope and passed it to Maribel. The priestess refused it.

  “Would you mind opening it for me? And just unfold it in front of us.”

  Patsy nodded and broke the thin wax seal. She began screaming in shock as the envelope tried to ignite. Quickly, Maribel reached out, one hand on Patsy’s wrist and the other on the envelope. A flash of white light dispelled the trapfire and protected the paper and the woman from burns.

  After a few calming whimpers, Patsy quieted again, relaxed by Maribel’s touch and gentle smile. She continued to open the envelope and unfolded the letter in between them.

  Largo,

  Your rumors smell worse than Kraag’s shit. The Halcyon Band is nowhere in this city. The relic registry had no mention of it. The mission listings had no mention of it. That paladin we tortured had no idea what it even was. Elmsmith is a waste of time.

  Alicia

  Sam’s armor was far from suitable for a meeting with Lieutenant Braver. He had been in front of the mission helping with the grotesque cleanup job. Luckily for Corporal Bleedingheart, he had been sought out by a teary Madge and personally asked to help clean up her restaurant. So the job of moving corpses had fallen to others.

  Sam was standing beside a very exhausted Sister Maribel outside Braver’s closed office door. He tried to make conversation, but Maribel seemed unwilling, or unable, to put up the effort for talking.

  He did not mind terribly, though. The past two days had been a whirlwind of stressors and activity. On one hand, he had never felt more like a paladin, but on the other, the gritty reality of his occupation took hold and was quite a shock.

  “Corporal, Sister, I’m ready for you.” The voice of Brother Nathan was a surprise. Sam and Maribel looked at each other with a moment of confusion before shrugging their way through the door into the Lieutenant’s office.

  Inside, Lieutenant Braver was sitting behind his oak desk, unsurprisingly clear of any knick knacks or papers. Brother Nathan hovered behind him like a shadow. The smug grin on his face clashed harshly with Braver’s bright grin.

  “Good morning, you two.”

  “Good morning sir,” Sam said respectfully while Maribel bowed lightly. “And hello to you, Brother Nathan.” The priest simply tilted his head in Sam’s direction.

  “I want to commend the work both of you have done lately. The cyclone plan, Bleedingheart, was brilliant, and the information you retrieved from Patsy, Sister, has informed our next moves.”

  “I appreciate your compliments, sir,” Maribel said sleepily.

  “So, now we will discuss your next assignments,” Braver said, pulling two thick bundles of papers from a drawer in his desk. The smug grin on Brother Nathan’s face seemed to flash with renewed life.

  “First for you, Maribel. This is highly sensitive information that will not leave this room. You will be dispatched to Dawnbreak on a temporary duty assignment. Right now, our ally, High Sergeant Enoch Boldbounty is preparing for a siege by the pirate known as the Sea Witch and her fleet. The issue is that she is believed to be allied with the ocean god, Tidus.”

  Maribel did not react readily, so Sam spoke up. “Excuse me sir. I was actually trained at the Abbey by the High Sergeant.” He hoped that he may be able to see Boldbounty again.

  “Then you know how good of a paladin he is. Though he needs all the help he can get. For you, Sam, though. You are needed elsewhere. I will be sending you to the chapel at Happfield until further notice.”

  “What is in Happfield, sir?”

  “A chapel, Corporal. That you will be working in until further notice.” Brother Nathan said it suddenly, and harshly. It was almost biting.

  Maribel looked up at Sam. She was stoic, but her glance said plenty.

  “When do we leave?” Maribel asked.

  “Maribel, your caravan will be provided by the Church, and you will be informed of its departure,” Braver said, handing the Sister her stack of travel orders. “You, Sam, will be leaving in just a few hours.”

  “You will not need civilian clothing while you are working at the chapel, Corporal, so please ready your practical and ceremonial armors.” Brother Nathan moved around the Lieutenant and pushed the stack of papers in his direction. “So, since you have to get ready to go, Corporal, you are dismissed.”

  “Good luck, Corporal Bleedingheart,” Braver said, holding out his hand for a shake. “We will contact you when we need you back here.”

  Sam looked down at Braver’s hand, then over at Maribel, who was reading her paperwork. Suddenly, the confusion seized him. “I’m sorry, sir, but what is happening?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why am I being sent to Happfield? I only got here one month ago and I was specifically pulled from the Abbey for my ‘cultural expertise.’” Sam offered air quotes to the last words. “Why am I being dispatched there? Is something happening?”

  “You, Corporal,” Brother Nathan stabbed at Sam with the words. “Are not at liberty to know why you are being sent to Happfield. You are a paladin, Corporal. It is your duty to take orders and carry them out in the honor of Gessel. So prepare yourself to depart.”

  Sam began to open his mouth, but Maribel put her hand on his shoulder. He looked to Lieutenant Braver, who was avoiding eye contact.

  The paladin reached for his paperwork and moved to the office door. “Well, thank you for your time, Brother Nathan. I will carry out Gessel’s Will to the best of my ability at Happfield.” With those final words, Sam left the room with the door open to find Shiner to get help preparing his suits of armor to move across the northern stretch of the March.