Nyella Lichenstone.
***
"Man, this is hard!"
I looked at the Silverskin Lady, the young vampire cleric of the moon, incredulously- as I have so many times throughout the past few days.
Vampires could be clerics. I never thought that possible. Nor did I think Mani's first chosen would be this… eccentric. But in this particular instance, I couldn't blame her.
"But, Lady Zakira, these animals are Mani," I assured her with a gesture across the Silverstream Forest. In particular, the fabulous creatures of onyx and silver-hued flesh or fur swimming lazily about our floating stone.
"Duh!" She rolled her eyes, playfully or not, I couldn't tell. "It's not the animals."
"Prayer is hard then?" I looked at her again, fearing for the answer. As she'd done every night, from the moon rising to the moon setting on Bithisarea's horizon, the young cleric drafted, revised, and eventually perfected her prayers to Mani. And once twilight appeared on the horizon, she'd go out and practice the bounties our God blessed her with.
The power of Mani was that of light and darkness. Healing and death. But also illusions and nature, and a hold over the open waters. Of space and time itself. Of gravity.
Thus was the power of Mani's clerics. Like any cleric, Lady Zakira's spells, cantrips, and rituals came from her prayer and worship.
Thus was the power of a priestess as well. But there was a long road ahead of us.
And a longer one ahead of me.
"No!" She shook her head with a loud groan. "And being a cleric is, like, super easy."
"Then, dare I ask, what is it that is hard?"
"Being a Legionary."
"Oh." I recoiled by the sudden shift in conversation, though dawn was just around the corner, so I supposed it was appropriate. "I know not much about the Legions," I paused, attempting to recount the tales I regularly allowed to flow through my ears. "You are… militant explorers, if I understand correctly?"
"Well, like, overall. Yeah. But I need, like, a job, you know? Like, Peter wants to build a monastery and free slaves, and do environmental work. And I need to form a party and create a city and…" she took a great sigh and turned her bulbous, pained eyes to me. "It's a lot."
"Well, My Lady, Mani guides you. You will find your way."
Though she didn't roll her eyes or even groan, it was clear that my words weren't what she needed to hear at the moment, devoted though she was.
Or rather, it was something she fully well knew. So I attempted to save the conversation with a belated step forward. "If I may offer some advice, however, I would say that acting as a missionary would make the most sense for your… job. And, mind you, there are many good folk down in Bithisarea who were more than willing to join up with your friends.
"And." I took another step forward, remembering my free days in the Darkworld, days that now seemed like ancient history. "Mani's church was quite popular before we came to the surface." She spun her eyes back to me at once, now full of life and vigor. "Not as popular as the Twilight Sanctuary, mind you. But popular nonetheless."
"Oh, man! That reminds me!" She suddenly slapped both hands against her head. "I need to see Opal too! Let's go!"
Though I could fly just as freely as her in this realm, she led me down the vertical bridge under her absurd vampiric strength to the realm I found myself hardly visiting.
The Duskwoods, it was called. A forest, no different from that of the Silverstream. Other than it being shrouded in twilight. It was here that owls and snakes and rats and weasels and the gracefully ferocious beasts known as cats, both big and small, resided. It was an eerie world, with violet leaves and star-filled skies, brisk breezes carrying hints of spices, and a haunting chorus of calls, hoots, and hisses that rang through the world without pause.
It was here that Amun's darker side was realized. As Mani represented change, and more, so too did Twilight represent duality, and more. Represented no better by the cathedral of onyx and brass- or perhaps gold, floating below the twinkling skies, the Twilight Sanctuary. Residence of the Black Plume.
Thank Mani we didn't have to enter, for Madames Opal and Syele drifted over to us shortly after our arrival.
Eager to show our symbol, Lady Zakira pulled me halfway to them to show off the glorious stitchings spread across my silken-covered back.
The symbol of our Order of Worlds was a semicircle- a half-broken world- with the ruptured half facing down towards an expanding cone of silvery stones and boulders. Contrary to the horned owl spreading its wings around a golden-rimmed orb of darkness, it seemed far more quaint and much less unnerving. But Madames Opal and Syele loved it nonetheless.
She seemed so regal, Madame Opal, that I found myself lost as she turned to compress the vast cathedral into an onyx ring that fit neatly around her finger. The polar opposite of Lady Zakira, she was. Elegant and refined, but no less wise than the eccentric vampire. And yet, far colder than the Lady could ever dream of being."
"Are you to make her into a vampire?"
The casualness of her question and the gesture at my small frame sent a chill down my spine that I haven't felt in decades. And following it, came a sense of relief I felt just one time in all my years of living.
"No!" Lady Zakira rushed to my defense with a sharp turn. "Why do you keep asking me that, Opal?" She fumed, took a deep breath, and turned. "Besides, it'd be going against the tenants of freedom and change if I did."
"That's right!" I proudly added, prompting Madame Opal to inquire about my name.
"Nyella Lichenstone." I bowed. "What Madame Syele is to you, I am to Lady Zakira."
"I never took you to be one of faith." The former chortled dryly, then muttered. "Though I'm not one to talk."
"I… I- I used to be a woman of faith. Long ago. But I... I have since lost it." I meekly chortled. "Gone shortly after I was forced into bondage. But, that is fine! For I have found the gloriousness of the Moon!"
"One side of the being we devote ourselves to." Madame Opal bowed in turn. "As such, we too abide by freedom, thus I am to free Elijah from his… bondage when this next period of change is upon us." She glanced a smile at me before turning to her high priestess, or whatever she called her. "And soon, Syele as well."
"Y- you're to become a vampire?" I incredulously asked. But she eagerly, and proudly nodded.
"I advise you to as well, Nyella, for our God is a sovereign of death. And we need to be the strongest if we are to carry on his will."
"But as our God so often says." Madame Opal promptly added with a hard look to Lady Zakira. "The decision is yours to make."
I couldn't deny that I thought about it intensely during our trip to Bithisarea, the main world, instantaneous thought it was.
We waltzed to the highest floor of our God's home and stared up to the glass ceiling, imagining our destination, only to find ourselves looking across the cities floating in the sea of clouds a moment later.
I thought about it still as we followed motes of light and glowing walkways to the central island, rather than to the inverted docks and industrial yards floating just above it.
Even when we came to the renovated church and sanctuary that existed in the Darkworld and saw the hundreds of faithful swirling around did I think about it. Becoming a vampire. A holy vampire, like Madame Opal and Lady Zakira. Able to carry on God's will for centuries, perhaps millennia, without fear of growing frail and weary.
I thought about it. Up until Lady Zakira leaped onto a table and shouted to the crowd. "Hey! So, if you, like, really love Mani, follow me!"
That was it. That was her speech to rile the crowd into following her down her path. Those were her revolutionary words to declare herself as God's chosen to the many faithful before us. And that, I couldn't take.
I promptly pulled her aside and down to my level, away from the many prying eyes. "This is serious, Lady Zakira!" I whispered as low as I could. "You may be Mani's bride-to-be, but you are his representative still! It is you who explores the realms, performing miracles to those who have yet to see his glory!"
I meant to go on, but Madame Opal stepped closer with a dangerous eye and more, The Lady visibly deflated, making me feel horrible about it all.
"I ask not that you be different," I hurriedly said. "Never would I! For that would be against the tenant of freedom. I ask only that you put yourself in another's shoes whenever you speak of our God and think of how they may perceive him. You are a Cleric, I a High Priestess. One of his first two, mind you." I shifted my eyes between the two Madams. "Our words hold divine power. We must be impeccable with them."
Thankfully, my words served to toss aside whatever grievances they had and Madame Syele, in particular, stepped forward to pull me before the church while she moved to the sanctuary. And together, we declared our mission: To journey across the land and build our house of worship.
Like our God, we left nothing unsaid. We detailed precisely the goals of our denominations and more, made it clear that our clergies would be staffed by not only those deserving of the roles. But those best suited for them. And only then did we tell them of the benefits. Of which, there were many differences. Many similarities.
But only one blessing was truly shared between the faithful of Moonlight and Twilight.
"The afterlife!" Madame Syele shouted, and I nearly along with her, but then she continued. "The Black Plume offers you- no matter how saintly or sinful you may be, a second chance at life! Either as a noble vampire. Or a blessed shadow."
"And-" I hurriedly stepped in, aiming to renege the offering of becoming an undead shadow from the Order, only to stop at the sight of a miracle.
Or rather, a feeling.
Both, in fact, as I first looked upon the golden and silver radiance of Madame Opal and Lady Zakira's bulbous eyes before the light of the divine bloomed inside Syele.
And then me.
Suddenly, I was where I stood before: on the exterior of this grandiose realm, staring up at the never-ending expanse of the Mortal Plane. And falling.
I fell faster than was possible, down into the ring of greens and blues the surface dwellers called Paradise, to find a tiny sliver of land within a bay of colossal proportions.
I fell further and learned the true vastness of the Bodhi Peninsula, however small it was from here, as I fell faster- sideways this time. Wide rivers of rushing white waters and thick expanses of thin-leafed trees reeled by like a scroll, making way for white-powdered grasslands that went on for leagues and leagues until the base of a great mountain loomed before me.
And then I fell upward.
Up the mountain and into the clouds I fell and eventually stopped at a peak that overlooked the sea of clouds and envisioned a great temple. A monastery, more than a church.
An observatory, more than a cathedral. One where we could gaze upon the moon with zero inhibitions.
As I looked down from that monastery or observatory- or home- I saw the path I'd traveled as a line of silver mist stretching to the horizon. And then, I saw Lady Zakira standing before me with tears in her crimson eyes, showing a silver streak in them that may or may not have been a play of the light. Regardless of what it was, I tossed the notion aside and stepped into her embrace, smiling with the least amount of smugness I could muster.
"As I said. Mani guides you."
"Yeah." She drew out the words, dreariness apparent in her breath as she gazed upon the wood crowds. "We're gonna need a lot of carriages."