Faith is Earned 1, page 36
The interior was wide and winding, a single hall broken by uneven levels, open platforms and sunken lounges. No single table matched another, no chair sat where it was supposed to. Cushions were dragged into piles, with benches bent under the weight of too many friends. Murals were painted across every visible wall, most of them mid-story, some of them beginning again because someone forgot how they ended. Light filtered through mismatched stained-glass windows, turning the air into colored fragments.
Clef strutted in like a prince returning to a court that only half-remembered him.
No one stared or demanded introductions. A few raised their cups and shouted vague greetings.
“Hey Clef! You bastard! You brought another one!”
Luke half-expected them to ask his name, his Class, his business. Nope. A [Priestess] with feathers in her hair offered him a fried fig and a wink as she passed. A dwarf lying upside-down on a divan muttered something about gravity. Clef grinned, slapping backs and bumping fists, winding through the mess like he had always belonged to it.
They found a low table with crooked legs and a single candle jammed into an empty wine bottle. Clef dropped into one seat and Luke took the other, warily.
“I’ll get food. Don’t leave. Or… do, I mean, if you want to or you feel like it. You’ll come back, eventually.”
Luke sat alone for a few minutes.
Around him, chaos held hands with contentment.
A half-elf in ceremonial silks was being painted by a halfling with glowing ink while drinking from a bowl the size of his head, as a pair of gnomes argued over the correct tempo of a drumbeat while hitting different tables with forks. A woman danced alone on a table in the far corner while illusion-magic spun fractals around her. In a shadowed alcove, a pair of lovers slept under a cloak that moved to its own heartbeat.
In one corner, a quiet space held three old men playing a game of stones and memory, each placing markers and then telling a story to remember where it went. Their laughter came slowly but honestly. Not everyone drank here and not everyone laughed, but everyone seemed to be involved in some kind of ‘fun’ activity.
It was just that most of those activities relied on substances that could be drunk, snorted or eaten.
Clef returned carrying a tray with one hand and balancing a bottle with his knee. Somehow he made it look like art.
Stew… goat, maybe. Luke had a thought about pointing that out, remembered being called a ‘specieist’ and held his tongue. Spiced greens to go with it and flatbread. Two cups.
Luke eyed him with suspicion, as Clef winked.
“Just ale, just ale, I promise. I asked for the weakest thing they had and the guy behind the bar told me he was disappointed in me.”
Luke sipped. It was indeed barely stronger than water, with a hint of clove and something sweet. Acceptable. He could do with something stronger, but he wanted to keep his wits about him for the moment.
They ate in silence for a few moments.
Clef eventually leaned back, arms spread.
“Alright. More formal this time. I am sorry. Really! I was drunk, I was stupid, I… thought it was funny. You didn’t, which makes me the ass, I guess. No, wait, correction, the goat-ass. Ha! …sorry. But you didn’t kill me, which means you’re better than I am. So, you know, thanks for that.”
Luke looked at him, the stew halfway to his mouth.
“Accepted.”
Clef grinned.
“Praise Panitheos! Because that means now we can be friends. You ever want someone to carry your scroll while drunk, I’m your satyr.”
Luke chuckled, despite himself.
“Was that an innuendo? No, never mind. So what exactly is your faith about? I mean, beyond the obvious.”
“Revelry. Joy. Letting go? Not recklessly, though we sometimes get that too, but honestly. Everyone builds pressure, right? Life, duty, pain. Even love. Even prayer. You hold it in and it, like, cooks you from the inside. Panitheos says: don’t. Let it out. Dance it out, drink it out, fuck it out, smoke it out. Laugh until you cry or cry until you laugh. Just, you know, don’t let the world turn you into a barrel of bad wine. ‘Cuz what would be the point?”
Luke chewed, thoughtful.
“And the drugs?”
“You’re not like… anti-drugs… right? No? Good, good, just checking. Uhm, well, it’s like this. Some use magic. Some use alchemy. Some use sound or memories or whatever. We don’t push. We don’t convert, either, not forcefully. But if you want to forget something for a night or remember something in color, there’s probably a [Priest] who knows the recipe. We have our own special Classes for them, mixed in with Alchemy and Herbalism. The stuff they make? My dude, it’s art! But yeah, it’s not about losing control or, like, not mainly that. It’s about giving it a place to rest.”
“I can understand that. You get along with other temples?”
“Oh sure, sure. Uh, I mean, the ones that like us. We’re like best friends with the sex Goddesses, the food cults, a few of the moon-drunk dreamwalkers. The Love Gods love us. Like, physically. What’s an orgy between friends, right? And the Harvest faiths owe us favors usually, almost yearly. As for the serious ones? Pfft. They act like we’re a joke, but that’s fine. They need us, even if they won’t admit it. Every [Inquisitor] needs a night off and every [Ascetic] has a story they’re too embarrassed to tell.”
Luke finished the last of his stew. His shoulders had relaxed without him noticing and he sat back.
“To be fair, it’s a good idea. Necessary, even. Just… not all of life can be about that.”
“Ha! Watch me!”
“No, really. I can respect the need of your Faith, when you express it like this. I knew a woman once who would have probably taken to praying to your God. I just think one’s life should be centered around other things. At least, I think my life should be.”
“I knew I needed stronger drinks. Fine, fine, tell me all about your stoic, important, God and Its view on things. What’s your Faith about?”
“I admit, I would also like to know.”
A shadow fell, light but certain. A woman lowered herself gracefully onto the cushion beside them and the air bent around her from presence alone.
She looked to be in her late twenties, early thirties, though she had a kind of ageless beauty to her, young under one ray of sunlight, mature under the next and her beauty arrived in lieu of trumpets, with laughter instead. Auburn hair fell in a loose braid along her shoulder, streaked with strands of warm orange that caught the colored light like woven stories. Her eyes were green and her cheeks were flushed, though whether from wine or heat or joy was hard to say and her robe was less robe and more suggestion, a draped, flower-threaded garment with an apron of all things tied over it as though she’d come straight from a kitchen that also served as a dancefloor, all barely concealing a shapely body. The flowers in her hair weren’t fresh, but not quite wilted either, petals bending as if they too were a little drunk.
Luke felt his shoulders tense and it wasn’t because she was that seductive, though she certainly looked like she could be, but because her presence was layered. Matronly, yes, but also very kind-eyed and laced with something just sharp enough to make a man wary of saying something foolish. She looked like she was constantly endearingly amused at what happened around her. A mistress and a wife, at once and in turns. His mind held firm and his Will answered. He drew it up quietly as she turned her smile on them like sun through stained glass.
Clef made a noise that Luke could only describe as a hiccup smothered in terror.
“[Abbess] Lessara! I, uhm, didn’t notice you. Can I just point out that those flowers really bring out the—”
“Lessie is fine, Clef. And you only use my full name and title when you are in trouble.”
She turned slightly, adjusting the lay of her robe, hands folded neatly atop her apron.
“Which, I guess, going by what a friend of mine told me, you are.”
Clef’s ears twitched. He sat straighter, then shorter again, like trying to fold himself into invisibility.
“Tell me, why did you feel the need to vomit over others in public after stealing not one, but two Fireflower Draughts?”
“…’cuz they taste good when you mix ’em with plum wine?”
“Oh. And that is a good reason?”
“I mean… yeah?”
“[Instant Sobering].”
Clef nearly leapt from his cushion, pressing both palms to his temples.
“Ugh—oh, come on! Oh my Pan, this is horrible. Lessie, why would—why would you do that? I can feel my teeth. Did you really n-”
“I’m back to Lessie now, am I? And it’s because you deserve it, you little goat.”
Clef curled in on himself, muttering childishly about betrayal and his sacred right of intoxicated worship.
Lessara turned back to Luke.
The shift in her was slight but unmistakable. Her smile remained, but it bent gentler now, a softened fold at the edges of her eyes. Yet Luke got the feeling that was what she wanted to express. Because he also noticed how something in her posture held firm, as if she were bracing against whatever Luke might say next, uncertain whether it would comfort or condemn.
“I take it you are the one our darling Clef now owes a service to.”
Luke inclined his head slightly.
“My apologies, on his behalf. But I spoke the truth earlier, I am curious about your Faith as well. It is not often we get someone with such an esteemed mind into our halls.”
Chapter 40
“I follow Xelreth.”
The name settled into the table like a coin dropped in water, too heavy for the surface tension to hold. Lessara’s breath caught, just slightly, just enough that someone not watching might have missed it. But Luke was watching. Always was, now, after the things he went through. He saw the flicker of stillness, the pause that wasn’t natural, the silence a fraction too intentional before she recovered, her face smoothing with practiced ease.
He noted it, filed it and did not speak of it then.
“Xelreth is the God of Binding Oaths, Sacred Vows and Justice Returned.”
Clef blinked at him with the blank serenity of a man who wasn’t sure if those were three Gods or one, but was too polite or drunk, to ask.
Luke continued, eyes on the candle stub between them.
“He isn’t a judge. That’s important. Not a punisher, not an arbiter of laws made by men. Justice returned doesn’t mean vengeance or courts or scales. It means keeping your word. Holding to what you vowed, even if the world shifts around you. Even if it hurts or… especially then. Broken vows bring injustice and wrongs into this world and my God empowers me to right such wrongs and keep such vows.”
Lessara was quiet, her fingers laced before her.
“My Class was given when I bound myself to an ideal, a… I suppose, desperate wish to change the nature of this world. I was a [Labourer] before that. [Farm-hand], actually. Then I tried taking on adventuring, nothing grand. But when I swore, it stuck. And the System… listened.”
Clef leaned forward, elbows sliding across the table, face full of awe.
“You became divine because you promised hard enough?”
Luke let a small smile touch his mouth.
“Something like that. I swore to protect people and my Vow became my Class. And it’s grown since then. Every time I make a promise that matters, that carries weight, the bond deepens. I’ve learned that Xelreth rewards constancy. But not stubbornness, not blind adherence. He doesn’t want martyrs, he wants people who remember what they said and why they said it.”
“And if the world changes? If a vow once sacred becomes unjust? What then?”
“Then you face it. You weigh it and you either reaffirm it or you choose the harder thing. You break it, with tears, yes and you take the consequences willingly.”
Clef was staring at him now like Luke had just given a speech about funeral rites at a festival.
“So no dancing? No food? No joy? Just, like, straight-backed honor and... eternal squinting at moral puzzles?”
Luke laughed.
“No. I eat, I laugh, I love. Xelreth doesn’t demand rigidity, just integrity. There’s room in my Faith for joy, just not at the expense of what’s right. Or what’s been promised.”
Lessara nodded slowly and Luke could tell her next question was shaped with care.
“And what is the purpose of your journey now? Is it all bound in one vow? Or do you… wander?”
He paused, feeling that familiar thrum at the edge of memory, fires, choices, the ache in his hands when he clenched them too long.
“I’m between things. Between Vows. Between understandings of who I am. But I walk forward because that’s where the next Vow will be and I know I’ll hear it when it comes. And I came to this city because I was made to understand there are a great many things that reek of injustice here.”
That flinch again from Lessie.
Strange.
“Okay but like, what happens if you swear to get married and then find out your spouse sucks? Do you just… stay together forever and slowly die inside?”
And back to normal.
“Depends on how you swore. What you meant when you did. I told you, Xelreth isn’t a tyrant. He respects truth, true, but if your truth changes, you have to face it, not deny it. But you don’t get to walk away without facing what that breaking costs.”
Lessara’s smile returned. Wry now. Thoughtful.
“Thank you, [Votary] Lucian. That is… beautifully said. And deeply anchored. I can feel the marrow in your words. May I ask, do you have any questions about my God?”
Luke glanced at Clef.
“He gave me the rundown. Revelry, joy, catharsis, alchemical mind-breaks, communal dancing, consensual orgies and occasionally getting bitten by [Priests], but in a fun way?”
Lessara gave Clef a cold smile, who was busy shooting death glares at an amused Luke.
“Ah. Yes. The usual, then.”
“But. I do have a question.”
“Please.”
“When I told you who my God is. I hope you don’t mind, but I could see the surprise on your face. Do you know my God?”
“Oh. No, I can’t say I do. And my compliments to your observation Skills.”
“But something surprised you.”
“Yes. I suppose I simply expected you to hold to a different Faith.”
“Such as?”
She smiled, but it was the kind of smile that locked a door rather than opened it.
“I believe I will hold it as a secret for now. A lady must have her secrets, yes?”
Clef perked up, entirely too fast.
“Ha! I saw you with that elf, two weeks ago, Lessie. You sure ‘lady’ is—”
“I will make you allergic to alcohol for two weeks, Clef.”
“Yes, [Abbess]. Apologies.”
Lessara turned back to Luke, as Clef wilted like a slapped flower.
“Nevertheless, Luke. I saw something in you, the first time I saw you. Perhaps I was wrong. Your Faith certainly sounds honorable enough. And… no. Because perhaps I was right. I will only tell you this. Offer no wrong to me or mine and none shall be offered to you. You are, as all are, always welcome in the House of Cheer’s embrace.”
She stood then, the light from the bottle-candle catching in her braid.
“Thank you for your time, [Votary] Lucian. Oh and… happy partying.”
The moment Lessara left, the lightness at the table didn’t return so much as skitter awkwardly around the edges.
“Uh, dude. My dude. Luke. My good dude Luke.”
“You planning on getting to the point, Clef?”
“Yeah. So, I totally don’t judge, remember that. But, did you, like, ever… maybe… sleep with Lessie? And by sleep I mean had an amazing—”
“No! Why— the hell could have given you that impression?”
“‘Cuz she basically threatened you? I ain’t ever seen her that cold. And I’ve known her almost my entire life.”
“That was cold? I don’t know, she seemed very decent to me. She laid out normal terms of non-aggression and invited me to enjoy my time. And no, I didn’t sleep with her.”
“That was normal?! The fuck kind of people did you hang around with? And no, that wasn’t normal. I figured you were maybe an ex-lover and your whole ‘not knowing each other’ thing was an act. Listen, even when other faithful from other religions come here to tell us off for doing stupid, admittedly funny, but stupid shit, she’s always charming. Always warm, always charming, always like… uh…”
“Like making you feel you are owed supper or her bed or both?”
“Yeah. That. So, what gives?”
“How should I know? Maybe my Faith sits wrong with her?”
“…Nah. I mean, it’s boring. Really boring. But there’s nothing really bad about it… Weird.”
Luke’s shrug was mirrored by Clef’s own.
“Oh, look, they’re doing shots!”
It started small, as these things always did. A clink of glasses. A chorus of cheers. Someone smacked a drum, a girl in ribbons started spinning and a firelight spell flickered in time with her rhythm. Clef yanked Luke bodily from his cushion and shoved a shot glass into his hand, laughing. Luke looked at it, sniffed once and sighed like a man climbing into a cold lake.
He drank.
It wasn’t that strong, but the warmth came with memory, with rhythm, with the hum of music brushing his ribs like a second heartbeat.
The song changed, then, faster. Someone began clapping, as a gnome produced a stringed instrument with only three strings and still made it sing. Luke found his foot tapping. Then Clef dragged him again, onto the floor, into the circle and Luke laughed, almost unwillingly, almost against himself and then didn’t resist.
He moved, badly, at first, stiff-limbed, awkward, like a soldier learning to swim. Happiness came harder for him now. But the others flowed around him, bodies loose and unashamed, joy bleeding like heat into the air. A dwarf spun a halfling. A woman tossed her head back and whooped at nothing and Clef twirled twice and then fell down cackling.
