[center][h2]A Temple in Celwezc[/h2][/center]
Elsewhere, a priestess stands in a semiarid breeze.

An undyed linen toga her sole attire, the warm wind teases her exposed limbs and ensorcels the spalted pillars of Celwezc’s humble holy site—upon one of which her open palm presses, delighting in an exchange of warmth, a unanimity of flesh and verd. Young, bronze, and without blemish, her soot-ringed gaze reflects the golden millet swaying and racing as a single, vast organism across the steppes and beneath the great day star’s farthest fall. 

Before her, she sees the sweep of scythes, the sway of buckets yoked on strong, sun-touched shoulders. To an eye untrained, the laborers appear content. She knows better. For that cause, no smile lights up her face. Instead she ponders their pains, then retreats from the porch. Into the cool, the shade, the obscurity of her domain her steps compel her. Nailed to the doorless entrance are the five edicts of her faith, on which her eyes momentarily linger:

[list]
[*][i]To provide for one’s family is to honor the gods.[/i]
[*][i]Life in and of itself is meaning.[/i]
[*][i]To die dishonored in the eyes of the gods is to be forgotten.[/i]
[*][i]Take only what is in good faith offered.[/i]
[*][i]Let no impious eydolin disgrace thy home.[/i]
[/list]
Eokadya recites those edicts mantically in her mind, drifting meanwhile with outward placidity through the little sanctum where she sometimes explicates to her congregants the profound nature of those few, simple phrases. It is not for her to sermonize. Group rituals are few and far between—births, deaths, consummations; rites for good times that warrant gratitude and periods of woe that demand sacrifice. Should one of her flock come to the temple with a question, she will answer. Individually, as it should be. As a family, as they are meant to be. To speak on behalf of the gods requires intimacy, knowledge.

Beyond the only door in the temple, she arrives in her chamber. Bed, basin, and the storage of necessities befitting her role. Therein, there is no window. A lantern flickers and reflects against the silverglass of a small vanity, revealing the simplicity of her private space. It is special, for only she may enter; her, and one day in the distant future her postulant. 

Suddenly kneeling, she traces the edges of a large stone floor tile with her fingertips. They locate a lever, which she releases. The tile lifts, and she swings it on its ancient hinge to expose a flight of stairs. It is well-oiled, and moves silently. Immediately she hears the babble ascending. It emerges as a distant, indecipherable drone—the god-speech. Retrieving her lantern, she descends. Nine steps, then she stops. Another lever she pulls, shifting the tile above her back to its prior station. This place she must keep holy, hidden, and silent save for the god-speech. Pausing, she lifts her hand in a sign and fortifies her mind and soul. The stairs descend for a great while, yet she counts the eighty-three steps by rote. At the bottom, the lantern flame shudders in tandem with her resolve. Shelves extend from linear recesses in the hardened clay walls, and on them recline the god-speech dyads of her people’s eydolins, queer little dolls fashioned of lignum, bark, and dry grass. These around her possess only tongues.

[center][h3]The Hideout at Dalawakz[/h3][/center]
Beyond the termination of her words hums a moment swollen with portent, unheard and wraithlike yet striking out at the senses as iron needles that scratch and grate along cold, stimulated flesh. Before her, by no obvious sign, the eru-glass table dims dormant, its copper fibers releasing their heat, their electric charge. For a while she looms quiescent—immaculate, straight spine, and erect skull from which twin pronged, serrated antlers curve, either through or as part of her lavish gown. Three of her four arms hang slack at her sides as her final forelimb crooks under the point of her chin in that emblematic posture of rumination. 

For a moment, all is still—the woman dripping in metallic glamour, the crystal figurines, the shadows lounging apathetically at the chamber’s edge, and even perhaps the interlocutor who within their dark embrace skulks.

Timeless are those whiles of anticipation that stretch instants into aeons. Yet at the end of such a while, her lips part, a nigh-imperceptible dimple in the perfection of her veil denoting that subtle shift in form.

Eager ears perhaps strain to capture her secret murmur, her indulgent, breathy brevity. Yet no coherent words emerge. Instead, a scream. Erupting and otherworldly, it seizes the chamber and suspends the air’s current in stultifying malevolence. At the edges of the space, the shadows raise their hackles, their once smooth edges shifting to echinate barbs that slice the walls with a frigidity of remote horror that lurks distant behind the glare of stars. As abruptly as it emerged, the scream abates. The shadows relax. And, bizarrely, chamber’s features remain intact.