“Ah... Lord Alaric, what a delight to run into you here!” Maria exclaimed as they entered the chapel. She didn't bother to look back or wait for Francesca, who was struggling to navigate the steep, uneven stone stairs leading into the building without help.
By the time Francesca crossed the threshold, she was panting, her chest heaving as she caught her breath. She leaned heavily on her cane, her eyes scanning the humble, weathered interior.
“Ah, you finally arrived, Your Ladyship,” Maria scoffed. Beside her, Lord Alaric clicked his tongue in a momentary lapse of patience before fixing a practiced, oily smile on his face. “I see you are here with Her Ladyship today, Lady Maria,” Alaric said, his voice smooth and forced.
“The younger generation has been neglecting their faith in the Goddess lately,” Maria said, casting a sharp jab at Francesca. “Now that she has married into our family, I decided it was time to teach her properly. I’ve brought her along to show her the way.”
The comment was a blatant insult, but Francesca simply maintained her serene, practiced smile. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Lord Alaric. You have been a vassal of the Ironwood mountains since long before Miller was bestowed the surname, correct?”
“It is a great honor that you know my family history, Your Ladyship,” Alaric replied with a hollow chuckle. He gestured toward the center of the chapel, where a priest stood waiting by a large statue.
The building had clearly seen better days. The wooden pews before the statue were cracked and graying, creating a scene of desolate abandonment. During hard times, people usually turn to religion, Francesca thought, but this chapel is completely empty. It’s clear seeing this isolation that Maria is using this exactly the way I remember.
Francesca turned her attention to the statue of the Siren Goddess. The figure was draped in a diaphanous, half-naked dress, her finger pointing toward the heavens. Francesca leaned on her cane for support and lowered her head, beginning her silent prayer alongside Maria.
In this world, the central faith is Hakionisum, based on the belief that humans are the direct descendants of the ancient Sirens. As Francesca went through the motions of prayer, her mind sifted through the religious history she had studied in her past life, knowledge that felt far more practical now than it ever had before.
Just as she finished her reflections, the sound of voices erupted at the entrance.
“Ah... it seems Lord Keith and Lord Madson are here as well!” Alaric noted, watching as two men walked in, deep in conversation. “I shall go and greet them. Will you be alright here, Your Ladyship?” Maria asked, her smile appearing more genuine now that her co-conspirators had arrived.
“Of course,” Francesca replied, returning the smile with a sweetness that didn't reach her eyes.
Once Maria and Alaric had hurried off to join the others, Francesca sat down in one of the worn chairs. She stared up at the Goddess’s statue, her fingers tapping rhythmically against the head of her cane.
After a few minutes of hushed chatter, the three conspirators slipped out of the main hall and toward a smaller building in the courtyard, not offering Francesca so much as a backward glance. She didn't mind. A smirk played on her lips as she looked up at the priest standing by the statue.
“Tell me, Your Holiness,” she began, her voice echoing in the empty chapel. “Do you know the story of Jinala and the Goddess Hakio?”
The priest smiled with the calm, spiritually enlightened expression of a man who had spent a lifetime in prayer. “Of course, Your Ladyship. Even children who are not blessed with wealth are taught such stories.”
Francesca tilted her head, silently inviting him to recount it.
Though the priest didn't understand her intent, he began the tale with a practiced cadence. “Goddess Hakio, as the ruler of all Sirens, trusted Jinala, one of her many lovers with the key to her treasury during the Great War between the Sirens and the Mermaids.”
“Jinala would mask her nightly duties in the Goddess’s bed as simple devotion, using that excuse to return to the palace and steal from the vast wealth of the treasury, one trinket at a time.” The priest cleared his throat and continued. “It wasn’t until the Great King Artutas of the Southern Seas pleaded for help after an onslaught of Mermaids, funding his war by sacrificing his own heart did the Goddess finally understand. Her inaction was making the people suffer.”
“She exiled Jinala and punished every person who knew of the sin but failed to act. That included herself,” he finished, clenching his fists behind his back. His eyes met Francesca's, and the enlightenment in his smile began to fade into a look of realization.
“It teaches us that even if you are not associated with a crime, you should not turn a blind eye to it,” Francesca said, her smile sharpening. “So, Your Holiness, if even the Goddess was not free of sin for turning a blind eye, can her messengers afford to do so?”
“Certainly not, Your Ladyship. Rather, they are more accountable, for upholding the Goddess’s will is their life’s goal.” The priest’s smile turned sober. He walked toward her and suddenly fell to his knees, his head bowed. “I shall answer for my crimes, but the children are innocent, Your Ladyship. Surely the Goddess’s will would be to forgive them.”
“It certainly would be,” Francesca replied. “I just wish to know where the children are. That is all.”
Meanwhile, at Lord Alaric’s mansion, the quiet of the morning had been shattered. Knights were raiding every room and storage locker, turning the estate upside down in search of ledgers. Alaric’s family sat huddled and tied in a corner room, watched over by armed guards.
Miller led the search personally. He moved toward a specific structure near the servants' quarters in the courtyard, his brow furrowed.
“She was weirdly specific about searching behind the servant quarter walls,” he muttered to the two trusted mercenary captains at his side. Just as they reached the wall, he spotted movement. A small hole had been carved into the stone, and a young child was currently wriggling out of it, clutching several leather-bound ledgers to his chest.
“You! Stop right there!” Miller ordered.
Startled, the child scrambled away. The mercenaries didn't hesitate; they vaulted over the wall in pursuit. They quickly discovered that it wasn't just one child, nearly a dozen children were darting through the narrow alleys, each carrying stacks of papers, running toward an abandoned street at the edge of the city.
The knights followed them into a hidden, dilapidated building. Inside, the air was cold and stale. Bunk beds were crammed together in a single room where nearly fifty children were living in squalor.
“What in the world is this?” Miller demanded, retrieving the papers from the trembling hands of the children. They huddled together in the center of the room, their eyes wide with terror at the sight of the armored troops.
Miller looked at the ledgers in his hand, forged accounts, hidden contracts, and the true records of the territory’s wealth being embezzed. Then he looked at the shivering orphans who had been used as mules for Maria's greed.
“They were having children do their bidding?” A pure, cold rage flooded Miller’s eyes, more intense than any fury he had felt on the battlefield.