The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) by Melissa McPhail Page A

around, those who’d been spared his Fire—like Kjieran—were considered in the lowest regard and were always looked upon with suspicion by the Prophet’s Ascendants. The Ascendants acted both as administrators and as the priests proselytizing Bethamin’s faith, but since they were not themselves Adepts, they were quick to distrust all who were. Many times, Kjieran had endured several hours of interrogation just because he’d looked an Ascendant in the eye, and their probing was never pleasant, even when the Marquiin weren’t involved.
    So Kjieran was exceptionally careful when he prepared his reports to the Fourth Vestal. He did not like to envision what would happen to him if a Marquiin or one of the Ascendants discovered him spying, but he did know that under such a circumstance, death would be a mercy most certainly denied him.
    There were many patterns that enabled communication across distances if one had the right medium, but any working of elae within the temple would bring the Prophet’s Marquiin swarming down on Kjieran. Having anticipated such a problem, the Fourth Vestal had set up an elaborate network of contacts to forward Kjieran’s communications out of the temple. They were all of them spies in the Brotherhood of the Seven Stones, professionals ready to die for their cause. Kjieran never came into contact with any of them, so he couldn’t be questioned about their identities, nor they about his. He could only trust that his reports were being found and forwarded on, that the information he was risking his life to smuggle out of the temple was reaching those who needed it.
    Sitting down at his desk, Kjieran wrote everything he’d overheard that morning in a complicated double-strand helix code the Vestal had made him learn before leaving Dannym. Then he rolled the letter tightly and placed it inside the hollowed-out center of a pillar candle—one of the thousands in use around the temple. Kjieran spent his free evenings digging out the candles’ centers for this use, so he always had one ready. With the report safely coiled inside, Kjieran settled the bottom plug of wax back inside the candle and then warmed the wax all the way around the circular base, covering any evidence of his tampering. Then he dropped the candle to dent the bottom edge.
    Now it would have to be replaced, for the Prophet unfailingly remarked upon the least imperfection in his temple.
    Kjieran took his candle and some other items he’d brought from the vestry to be swapped, cleaned or repaired and made his way out of his dormitory.
    Epiphany’s grace had landed him the position of acolyte. He’d come in fully prepared—inasmuch as anyone could be prepared—to face Bethamin’s Fire. Raine had even crafted a talisman to aid him in overcoming the deleterious effects of the Fire—provided he survived the working to begin with—but Kjieran hadn’t needed to use it. The talisman remained sheltered in the false bottom of his trunk, protected by trace seals too minute to be noticed on the currents.
    Kjieran believed it was divine intervention alone that had spared him the Prophet’s ‘purifying’ fire, but he also knew—as did anyone who’d survived more than a week in Bethamin’s temple—that no one was wholly safe from it. Kjieran had watched the Prophet enough to know that he was erratic in choosing his Marquiin. There were whispers, of course—from the other acolytes and the less discerning brothers—who believed that the Marquiin were chosen only after they’d displeased the Prophet during one of his midnight dalliances. Those ‘chosen few’ who were invited to the Prophet’s bedchambers in the dead of night were just as likely to be mortals as Adepts, however, so Kjieran suspected there was slightly more to the decision of who was ‘elevated’ to the rank of Marquiin.
    He only prayed it would never be him.
    This fear more than anything kept him awake at night and inundated his thoughts during every moment