New National Parish Temple
Nuvrenon, Tavaris
18 January 2022
7:27 PM East Tavaris Time
The first thing the King said to Žarís when she greeted him in the tucked-away side room the temple had set aside for them and their security agents was “You’ve got a bit of a bruise on your forehead.”
“Got in a bar fight,” the Prime Minister quipped. “You should see the other guy.”
King Zaram laughed, and it seemed to be a true, warm belly laugh. “What’s left of him, I’m sure.” The pair were silent and the King bounced on his heels for a moment, looking around. “So, this is it, huh? Ever been here before?”
“No, sir. My first time here as well.” The New National Parish Temple looked very little like the significantly smaller temple that was down the street from the residence. Sacred Mandate had been built at least two hundred years ago and was the community parish for the neighborhood they had happened to build the Prime Minister’s Residence in much later. New National had been built in the 1960s to serve as the Church of Akrona’s southern Tavaris administrative headquarters as well as the home of the Synod, a legislative body under the Elders. It was also the seat of the High Priestess of Nuvo Province, a position often known as Matron-in-Waiting. The previous High Priestess had been a popular, charismatic firebrand named Vana Dandreal.
It was massively tall, with several towers—roofs clad in gold—in a distinctly cosmopolitan style much unlike the neoclassical western Tavari style that most temples tended to stick to. It was much more indicative of a castle than a callback to the stepped, almost pyramid-like structures they had built in the time of the First Elders. In the front was an absolutely massive, almost imposing stone slab facade with the First Elders etched in bas-relief; the Elders looked out over a large, verdant, well-manicured garden that featured palm trees imported from the island of Mt. Akrona. Akronists would tell you it was a testament to the beauty of the world, but Žarís was pretty sure it was meant to be a reminder of just how wealthy the Church of Akrona was and just how grand its ambitions were.
So far, Žarís had seen little of the interior, just a back door, a few hallways, and what might have been a kitchen. There was a distinctly sweet smell in the air which might have been a banquet of fresh-cut fruit or might have been a truly stupendous amount of flowers. It was quite possibly both. The stone brick walls were brightened with brightly colored silks and other tapestries, and the floor was a very light kind of wood, perhaps bamboo, which Akronists favored because unlike trees, you could leave part of a shoot of bamboo uncut and it would grow back—no life technically taken. All in all, it was quite the opposite of the stone castle she had been in yesterday, and truth be told, she liked it much better.
“A friend of mine got married here once,” said Endra Tivriš Žovradai, the Minister of External Affairs who had appeared at the Prime Minister’s shoulder without her noticing. She jumped just slightly and turned to face him, but he was looking up at the walls and ceiling. “I only saw the main hall and a luncheon room, of course. The building is huge. It’s said they considered moving the whole Church administration apparatus down here in the 60s as a ‘fuck you’ to all the anti-cremation people, Elders and all, but they decided against it and just put the Synod here.” He chuckled. “Far away, where they don’t have to be listened to.”
An amused laugh from the other end of the room caught all three Tavari government officials by surprise and they turned to see Vana Dandreal leaning casually on the doorframe, as if she had been waiting and watching for a while. “We couldn’t fit the Synod in Crystal Coast, the Church had just gotten so big,” she said lightly. “But Antero Anadra was Matron then, you couldn’t have dragged her out of the Temple of the Emergence.” Pausing just a moment to truly stare into the eyes of each of the three, she straightened and then politely bowed. “Your Majesty, it is quite an honor to have you. Really, we’re all quite, quite pleased. And, of course, lovely to see the Prime Ministers as well.” She nodded at Žarís and Endra, a former Prime Minister twice-over.
The King might have, perhaps, just slightly leaned forward as he nodded to the Matron in return. “Your Beneficence, I’m pleased to be here.”
The Matron’s eyebrow arched almost imperceptibly; her title was “Most Esteemed Beneficence,” and she might have been wondering if it was an intentional slight or not. Apparently she decided to let it pass. “If you would be so kind as to follow me, I’ve saved you some front row seats. All seven Elders are here, and the High Priestess is presiding this evening, so it is truly an auspicious occasion.”
Beside her, Žarís could see the King hesitating. He did not typically follow, as a general rule, and she knew that the idea of being second behind the Matron was torturous to him, but without a truly noticeable pause he dutifully took his place a few paces behind the leader of the Church of Akrona. Žarís followed, and then Endra, an order of protocol that was well-ingrained in all of them by now. There were a few aides that had come with them and they, along with security agents and two violet-suited royal guards, made up the government entourage that was led single file down a long, elegant hallway and then right out to the front of the truly enormous main worship hall, with a crowd of thousands all staring right at them.
The crowd immediately rose to their feet in unison and Žarís noticed the King seem to straighten his back and put a little more feeling into his step. The crowd was standing for the Matron, of course; that the King was there was likely incidental to most of them. It was, however, an admittedly nice touch that the temple organist began playing the Tavari national anthem as they were ushered to their seats—front row center. The entire row beside them, and the entire row behind them, had been kept empty for security purposes, and the various agents took seats spread out across the expanse. The aides took seats far to the side and the back, allowing the three state officials to be the center of attention.
The hall was much more like an auditorium than anything else. There wasn’t a single Tavat Avati shrine anywhere in the country that was anything like this. You could probably fit three or four of even the largest shrines in the room, which had two tiers of seats and literal stage spotlights to illuminate the altar and the raised pediment behind them at which the High Priestess stood. Seven rather ornate chairs that could easily have been called thrones were arranged behind a simple podium, with six of them already filled. The Elders, unlike the rest of the room, remained seated—Žarís didn’t blame them, since all but Anda, the newly elected dwarven Elder, were incredibly advanced in age. Vreila was, if Žarís recalled correctly, the oldest living orc in Tavaris, and quite possibly the world. All of them wore matching orange silk robes and what Žarís would call silver tiaras—simple headbands, really, but quite dazzling—while the Matron wore the traditional purple-feathered diadem that was her badge of office. Perhaps by design, perhaps by coincidence, the Matron reached her seat at precisely the moment the organ reached the end of the anthem.
“Please be seated,” said the High Priestess, and the crowd complied. Kalvra Σentorek was much unlike the Matron—she was stout, even for an orc, with a wide, round face. Unusually for Akronists, she had designs etched into her tusks; she was likely a convert to Akronism, as such body modifications were usually disdained by Akronists who hailed bodies as testaments to Akrona. It was an old, old Tavari tradition that probably meant she, or at least her family, was at one point a staunchly observant follower of the Tavat Avati. Also unlike the Elders, she wore a gown of off-white, trimmed at the fringes in a sapphire blue.
Adorning the top of her podium as well as the large altar—it was at least a square nai—were bright flowers in pinks and yellows and reds. Both podium and altar were simple blocks of the same gray stone of which the temple had been built; the podium relatively tall and the altar much broader and lower, but both unadorned except for the bright examples of local life that Akronist temples used to stand in for Akrona at their ceremonies.
There was food on the altar as well, and Žarís noted the cut fruit she had been smelling. Passion fruit, guava, coconut, star fruit, and dragonfruit were among the ones she could recognize, all of which must have been grown within twelve avnai of the altar if Žarís remembered correctly. There were bounties of the sea on the altar as well; seaweed and crab primarily, but with a notably large roast fish of some kind in almost the middle of the altar. It had always seemed counterintuitive to her that despite holding the sea as sacred, it was seafood Akronists were allowed to eat and land animals they were not, but then, on the new year, every follower of the Tavat Avati was supposed to go to the nearest shrine and hop on one foot twelve times. Every religion had its quirks.
The lights began to dim, with only the altar remaining so brightly illuminated—there was a skylight above it, it turned out, almost certainly directly aligned with the altar. Night had not yet fallen, but it did certainly look like the light of the moon was washing over the altar. Žarís understood why Akronists would look at such a sight and call it holy.
“You are, all of you, a gift,” High Priestess Kalvra intoned.
“As are you,” the crowd responded. Žarís and Endra responded as well; they at the very least knew the answer to this particular call-and-response. The King had remained silent, though Žarís was certain he knew what to say.
“We are particularly gifted today, my brothers, sisters, and siblings,” continued the High Priestess in the same ethereal tone. “Normally, at the end of the service, I like to ask if there are any people here who are at a temple for the first time, but today, I would like to start there. So, those of you who are joining us for the first time, if you feel comfortable I ask that you rise, and I would be deeply honored to welcome you here today.”
The three guests of note rose—Žarís had been afraid the King would not—and out of the corner of her eye, Žarís was fairly sure there were others standing up as well. She wondered what it might mean that there were people whose first visit to a temple was when the King and the Prime Minister were in attendance. Were they media, perhaps? Curious Avatidari? She hoped, whoever they were, that they meant well, and she decided—being in a place of worship—to trust that they did.
High Priestess Kalvra looked across the room and, much like the Matron, lock eyes with every person standing. “Thank you. Welcome. Welcome. I’m glad you’re here,” she said, presumably to each one individually. She said the same simple greetings to Žarís, Endra, and the King as she swept across the room. Akronists were an egalitarian bunch—everyone was meant to be on the same footing. The gossip was that even the Matron herself disdained the special treatments she tended to be afforded, although sometimes Žarís wondered if that was just something that was… well… perhaps somewhat engineered as a rumor to ameliorate the alternating rumors of her stone cold ambition and, as some said, callousness.
After greeting each person, the High Priestess began clapping, and the entire room joined her, including all the Elders. They seemed to be in a pleasant enough mood as they smiled and looked out across the room. The applause lasted for several moments before the High Priestess leaned back into the mic and bade the room to once more be seated.
“As I said, my siblings, we are particularly gifted today. It is always, always a pleasure when people from different faith backgrounds come to pay us a visit, but we are all very honored today to have in attendance, for the first time in the history of our Church, the King of All Tavaris and the Spiritual Governor of the Tavat Avati Shrine Association. Your Majesty, King Zaram V, from the bottom of my heart, once again, I want to say thank you for coming today. It is truly, truly, a wonderful sight to behold.”
The King nodded—much more deeply than he usually did in recognition—and another, shorter round of applause broke out across the room.
“We also have here with us today Prime Minister Žarís Nevran Alandar, and former Prime Minister Endra Tivriš Žovradai. Never before has any Tavari Prime Minister come to see a worship service, and it is simply quite an honor to have you here with us. We know that all of you have busy, busy schedules and it is very, very touching that you would set aside time to be with us. Thank you again.”
Žarís took the time while the crowd was once again applauding to wonder if the High Priestess was being genuine. She certainly sounded like it, but Žarís couldn’t help but worry if she was simply being passive-aggressive. She couldn’t help but notice how many times the High Priestess repeated herself, which she had to admit was kind of grating in addition to the strange tone of voice she was using. Shrinemasters certainly never talked this much—in fact, the Tavat Avati had essentially no established liturgy, or really that much hierarchy, involved at all. Shrinemasters were more like custodians who did more maintenance than preaching. The Tavat Avati had always focused more on performing rituals than speaking about teachings.
“And, of course, as you can see, we have our holy Elders here with us today, though if I ask you to applaud them, the Matron will fire me, so let’s not do that.” The entire room laughed—even the King. “And on one final note, I would be remiss if I did not take a moment to acknowledge the passing of another very important life, former Prime Minister Shano Tuvria, who moved on from this life yesterday. Shano was raised in a mixed-faith household, uncommon in his time and still today, and he had an important perspective as leader of our country that, so far in our history, was unique. Shano was a gift, and we should remember him well and keep our thoughts with those he leaves behind, including his wife Linda and his mother Našana, who is a parishioner at the Temple of the Poetic Edicts in Ratani, Nandrat. Shano worked throughout his life in the name of peace, and we know that his spirit now has found peace with the Goddess.”
The King audibly scoffed. “No it isn’t! He wasn’t an Akronist!” he said at full volume in a tone that clearly indicated he had taken offense. For a beat, the entire room was silent as a tomb. It was at that moment that Žarís knew that Tavaris was lost, and so great was her sorrow that she could not stop herself as her hand came up to her face and cradled it in embarrassment. Very quickly afterward, Endra tugged at the sleeve of her jacket as a helpful reminder and she forced her hand down, but she knew she still had to be grimacing. She eked her eyes to the side as much as she could and Endra was grimacing too. Whether at the King or at her, she didn’t know, but at this point, did it even matter?
“They can’t say that, they can’t claim him like that!” The King had lowered his tone to an indignant stage whisper but gestured wildly in a way that clearly indicated he wasn’t done with his outburst.
Whoever might be listening… Spirits, Akrona, Ademar… please kill me, the Prime Minister thought to herself. With a deep breath, she forced herself to turn to her left, clasp both her hands to her chest—mainly to prevent herself from grabbing the King—and whispered with tears forming in her eyes “Your Majesty. Please.”
The King forced himself into a rigid position with his hands gripping both armrests next to him and his back practically pushing into the seat. Žarís turned back to face forward and prayed as hard as she could that she could somehow pretend like what had just happened never happened. All seven Elders had stone cold faces, staring straight forward and unmoving. As they were elevated from Žarís’ perspective, they were not meeting her gaze, and it was a relief, but it could not be clearer that the Elders were not amused. The Matron untucked a foot from behind her ankle and tapped it on the stone floor beneath her just once, letting out a single clack.
“Today, on our first full moon of the year, we think first and foremost about renewal, about making changes in our lives, and thinking about what those changes might be and how we might dedicate ourselves to them,” intoned the High Priestess, continuing without even a flicker of a change in facial expression. She, too, was looking out across the whole crowd rather than at the front row, and as she continued speaking, it was thankfully clear that she would not, at least not now, address the awkward outburst. Žarís had to zone out for a few moments to collect herself and regulate her breathing. Her heart had begun to pound again, and if she passed out here there would be no sweeping that under the rug. It had been hard enough to convince her physician not to take her out of commission yesterday.
It was absolutely stunning to see the King—Zaram V, the pinnacle of protocol and procedure—act so unprofessionally at what was perhaps one of the most important things he had ever done in his reign. It was inconceivable now that the King was anything other than a decided anti-Akronist—which was to say, a bigot. So great was his anger toward the Akronists that he would throw out everything he had ever learned about composure and poise, which was a considerable amount, since that was essentially his entire job. A gaffe like this by a Prime Minister would at least mean a vote of no confidence, likely a successful ouster. In fact, even being next to the King when he did that put her government in danger, not to mention quite literally the entire country itself. Any good faith that might have been generated by the King coming to a temple was now completely and utterly erased, Žarís was sure of it, and she had half a mind to begin packing up her things when she got home that evening. She felt defeated and entirely hopeless.
The Kingdom was lost. Seven centuries undone by a bitter and resentful old man who couldn’t keep his mouth shut for one spirits-damned hour. It was hopeless. It was useless. She felt herself sinking and it took far too long for her to realize that she was literally sliding down in her chair and not just thinking of that void that had been following her. As she always did, she forced herself back up and put on a politically presentable face, desperately trying to think of something, anything, that could dispel what had to be something not even a whole ímonai short of a mental breakdown.
“No funeral for the former SecGen, eh?” The King muttered in a low voice that he apparently remembered he was capable of using. Žarís wanted to strangle him. He was even following a high holy tradition of not saying the name of the recently deceased aloud, a Tavat Avati tradition so conservative that really, the monarch was the only one who still followed it. Awkward and out of touch. Just like him, apparently.
“Funerals are fraught for some people,” Žarís whispered as quietly as possible. “I rather think he didn’t want to trouble anyone.”
“Shame. I imagine many want to say goodbye. He could go out on his own terms,” replied the King. Žarís did not answer and instead focused her gaze on the High Priestess, hoping the King got the message.
“We make changes all the time, of course, not just on the new year,” said Kelvra, who had been speaking for quite some time without the Prime Minister picking up a word. Hopefully she hadn’t missed anything important. “It’s wise to be mindful of change every day of the year. Sometimes it’s unavoidable—it’s very often unavoidable, in fact. But Akrona teaches us that we have more control than we might think. By being respectful to all the life around us, we put into the world a wellness, an energy of good will, that will get reflected back to us. It’s part of why we say that people are a gift, and we should remember that changes are gifts, too. There will always be changes that we would rather not see, but we have the power to be mindful about how we respond to them, and the power to prepare for them before they occur.”
This was the sort of vague pontificating that, if you asked Žarís, didn’t actually mean much. She was not a spiritual person. She didn’t go to shrines, either, and she hadn’t hopped on one foot at the new year since she was 12. Maybe that’s your problem, she thought to herself. The Tavat Avati was mainly just common sense peppered with superstition. Don’t over-indulge, respect your elders, be community-minded, and don’t wear blue the day after a rainstorm was really all she had taken from the tradition. Akronism was about not over-indulging, respecting your elders, being community minded, and not eating beef. She didn’t see the need to have big, long speeches and ceremonies about it, but at least she could be respectful of them. The fact that the King couldn’t even pretend was horrifying.
It occurred to Žarís then that perhaps the High Priestess had a point in talking about making changes. She remembered the threat she had made to the King yesterday—as she would every day for the rest of her life—and wondered if now was the moment she would have to make good on it.
It had been barely more than 24 hours.
“This year, we have a lot of new changes to think about, some of them unexpected and some of them long foreseen,” said the High Priestess, and suddenly Žarís snapped to attention. It was obvious then what she was really talking about, and the Prime Minister regretted having zoned out in the beginning of the homily. Who knew what she could have missed. “Like never before, it is incumbent upon every Akronist—upon every person—to use our judgment, our reasoning, and our wisdom in our consideration of what these changes will mean and how we should respond. Akrona, as we know, is not rash. She waited beneath the sea for countless eons before appearing before us at exactly the right time. Think of the tree that takes centuries to grow. Think of the flower that blooms only once in a hundred years. Think of the hundreds of thousands of years it took for nature to produce the species that walk the Urth today. We speak so often of life moving quickly, but the truth is that life is slow, and we should heed that wisdom.”
The Prime Minister could see that Endra and the King had joined her in paying rapt attention to the speech. She dared not move her head, but Žarís prayed that, at the very least, the King wasn’t making a face.
“From time to time, a people will face a moment that will either make or break their future. Countless have fallen at these moments because they were unable to make the hard choices. And it is hard, when these times fall upon us. Immeasurably difficult. We feel the weight of the entire future weighing down upon our shoulders, and we are but mortals. We can’t shoulder these burdens alone, we have to face them together. When you have to rally an entire community, an entire people, together… well, that can seem impossible. I mean, my goodness, we held a meeting of all the High Priestesses yesterday and we couldn’t even decide on what we wanted for lunch!”
The crowd laughed, but the joke only reminded Žarís of something the King had said yesterday, and it just made her stomach sink.
“So in these times, where our unity and clarity of thought is most critical, but also hardest to achieve, what do we do? We turn to Akrona. Akrona is the way, Akrona is the beacon to follow through the seas of chaos to the stable shore. As those Akronist sailors of old sang, ‘Akrona is our anchor.’ And that is precisely the hymn I have selected for us to sing today.” The High Priestess was beaming; clearly the music was her favorite part of the ceremony. Žarís hated singing with a passion, but far be it from her to put more egg on her face.
“For our first-time visitors, you will find a yellow book, the Golden Hymnal, under your seats. Please turn to page 506 and find ‘Akrona is Our Anchor.’ And if you aren’t a singer, don’t worry. We don’t judge.”
There was a somehow thunderous sound of thousands of people pulling books out and rising to their feet. It was somewhat impressive to hear such a loud crowd move so closely in unison, and despite her dislike of singing, Žarís felt secure that at least everyone else was doing it, too. She turned the book to the given page and hoped that the tune was easy to get a grasp of.
No miracle of sonorousness graced the Prime Minister as she awkwardly, and inaccurately, sang along with the tune, which was a boisterous, quick-paced shanty that would indeed have been at home on a ship bound for Elatana or the Pacific Isles. The surprise, though, turned out to be Endra, whose unexpectedly loud and surprisingly pitch-perfect voice made both Žarís and the King turn in surprise. Žarís could see people in rows behind them notice as well, with eyebrows rising and mouths turning down in that unmistakable expression of “well, how about that!” It had apparently fallen upon the vocal cords of the Minister of External Affairs to save the Kingdom. Žarís prayed they did, because at the moment it felt like that was all they had left.
After the song, it was the Matron, not the High Priestess, who took to the podium. The High Priestess stood just to the Matron’s right, her hands clasped politely in front of her. Vana Dandreal really was incredibly tall, probably the tallest person she had ever met personally (excepting Adolph Beartov, the ursine Durakan ambassador.) Žarís would have killed to have her on her volleyball team, but it would almost be unfair to everyone else. She was a regal and stately woman, but sharp. Infinitely sharp.
“You know, it’s a bit out of protocol for me to call someone out in the middle of a sermon,” said the Matron, whose eyes were very plainly locked on the King, “but I simply have to say, Prime Minister Tivriš Žovradai, you have a truly beautiful voice. Really, that was quite a treat.” Turning her eyes to Endra, her face immediately brightened, as if Vana Dandreal had never been angry a moment in her life. She, too, made the “how about that” expression and raised her hands for a brief moment of applause that the crowd echoed. “Of course, everyone’s voices are beautiful, there is no sound greater than a temple united in song, but my goodness, what a surprise. You should be on one of those… talent TV shows. Tavaris Has Talent, or whichever one.”
Endra was red in the face and shifting from foot to foot—Žarís had never caught him in such a state except for the meeting she had had the other day about his comments about the King of Casillo and Real—but he bowed and said “Thank you, thank you,” to the Matron.
The Matron smiled at Endra again and then turned back out to the crowd. “Good evening, my siblings. You are a gift,” she said, still in the same bright voice. The Matron seemed to have several different voices, and she was quite skilled at picking which ones ought to be used at which times. In fewer words, she was a skilled politician.
“As are you, Blessed Matron,” the crowd answered.
“Please be seated,” she said, making a gesture with her hands. “We are gathered here today to give thanks to the Goddess Akrona for the countless gifts she has bestowed upon us and continues to bestow each and every day, each and every moment. In a few moments, our High Priestess will give the benediction at the altar and you will all be dismissed to the best part of temple day, the food.” The Matron smiled and even allowed herself a chuckle. “But before that, I wanted to speak with you all for a moment. It was a beautiful homily that our High Priestess gave tonight that had many, many good lessons for everyone here to keep in mind, and I want to expand on it a little bit because I do believe the High Priestess was very right to speak about what she did. But, as I do, I watched over the crowd, at all of your faces—” At that moment, the Matron’s eyes settled on the Prime Minister, but Žarís couldn’t tell what exactly she meant by it. “—and I did see some faces that were unsure, perhaps concerned.”
The room was dead silent again, and the silence was pregnant with an unmistakable tension. Žarís almost began sinking again in her chair and willed her body to remain steady. There was no way for the Prime Minister to know for sure, but this moment of the Matron giving her own additional homily didn’t seem to feel normal. It felt as if the entire crowd was unsettled by a break in the usual order of things.
“From time to time, a people will face a moment that will either make or break their future. My siblings, we truly are at such a moment, and today I intend to name it and make clear what this Church believes should be the way to rise to meet it. Last month, the Province of Crystal, in which our Church is administratively based and has been since its inception, declared its intention to secede from the Kingdom of Tavaris. The Church of Akrona is the largest employer in Crystal, and I do not need to tell you of the immense spiritual importance the crystal coast has to us. For centuries, it has been the strict policy of this Church to leave to Akrona what is Akrona’s, but leave to the civil authorities those matters with which they govern. The Church of Akrona is a religious organization, not a political one. But there has come a time where a moment will make or break our future, and this Church can simply no longer remain silent on this issue which directly affects us. The continuance of this Church and this community of people depends on it.”
The Matron once again cast her eyes across the room. Her voice had morphed as she spoke, shifting from bright and cheery to stern and serious. There was no longer any laughter on her face or in her eyes. The room was still silent, somehow even quieter. They were all in the void now.
“I give to you and to all the people of your nation all the blessings of life in creation, and charge you with the protection and continuation of life everywhere,” the Matron called out. Her voice boomed and echoed throughout the room; it filled the room and made Žarís feel like the Matron was somehow around her on all sides. “These words are the words that were spoken to us from the mouth of God. These words are our Sacred Mandate, our charge, our task, our ideal, given to us by Akrona. For more than five centuries, from these words, we have hailed the nation of Tavaris above all others, in the highest and most holy esteem, as the chosen nation of Akrona. For more than five centuries, we have lived in Tavaris, prayed in Tavaris, loved in Tavaris, worked in Tavaris, shed blood for Tavaris, and died in Tavaris. Tavaris, our holy nation, our chosen nation, has been everything for us, because the Goddess Akrona spoke not just to seven women bathing in the sea but, as she said, to an entire nation. But what I am here to tell you today, in Edict One of the year Two Thousand and Twenty Two, is that when our First Elders heard the words of Akrona and declared Tavaris the chosen nation of Akrona… they were mistaken.”
A collective gasp rose up from the crowd and swept over them all like a crashing tidal wave, but the Matron remained firm and resolute as she continued speaking. “The Goddess Akrona was not speaking of the nation of Tavaris. She was speaking of the nation of her people, the nation of Akronists. For Akronists are a nation, a distinct people with our own culture, our own sacred traditions, and our own values. Our nation is the nation of those people who choose to follow the way set out by those First Elders. And the Church of Akrona, as an organization of people, as the custodian of the legacy of the First Elders, as the keeper and true defender of the faith, today declares that it believes that the nation of Akronists should become a sovereign nation-state. The Church of Akrona supports the Province of Crystal in its efforts to secede from the Kingdom of Tavaris, and will support any further province, community, or person who seeks to do the same in the name of Akronism. The time has come for the nation, and state, of Acronis.”
There was, at first, a roar of applause, but the Matron raised both her hands and shook her head. It immediately ceased. “We have given Tavaris five hundred years of blood, sweat, and tears, and at every turn, at every moment, we were rebuffed, repelled, and cast out. We built Queen Melora’s Empire. We fought and died in all her wars. We have spent all of our existence giving Tavaris everything we have, but Tavaris does not want us. Tavaris tells us our ways are unwelcome. Tavaris tells us our traditions are desecration, that we belong only at the fringes of their communities, that we should have no voice in their government, that the things we do and the values we hold dear are not important to them. The King of Tavaris comes here and disrespects us in our own house, on our holy day. He has never even invited us to his. It is only today, only after five hundred years, that Tavaris does something as simple as hang a pendant in a window on the full moon. Only now, after five hundred years, does Tavaris think it prudent to ‘invest in the West’ when we have been investing in Tavaris all this time. No more. We will not be sated with meager breadcrumbs after having been starved for five centuries.”
The Matron was far beyond “intense.” She was furious. Her blue eyes were alight in pure rage, a rage more powerful even than that of the King’s yesterday. She gesticulated severely with her hands, at several points pounding them on the podium in front of her. Behind her and beside her, the Elders and the High Priestess were all nodding. They, too, had masks of anger on their faces. They, too, had had enough.
“King Zaram, Prime Ministers, thank you for coming. Really. At the very least you had the courage to come here and face us. If you look to your right, you will see a docent in a yellow cassock standing by a door. Please follow him and he will lead you out of this temple, because you are no longer welcome here. We will not be disrespected in our own house. You have failed us, and we are done with you and your country. I hope you know, King Zaram, that it was your mouth that broke your Kingdom. I hope you know that I desperately wanted not to make this speech today. And I hope and I pray that tomorrow morning, the picture on the front page of the Nuvrenon News is the Prime Minister’s hand clapped on her face in shame. Now please leave.”
The eyes of Vana Dandreal burned into Žarís Nevran Alandar as she rose, picked up her bag, and walked out of the room in front of thousands of silent, staring, angry people. She dutifully waited for the King to walk in front of her and walked behind him in lockstep, filled with more spite and more anger with each step. No one made a sound as they made their walk of shame across the auditorium and down the brightly decorated hall. The scent of flowers, perfume, and sugary fruit was suddenly overwhelming, cloying, and revolting. The stone walls were imposing, unwelcoming, and closing in on her. By the time they were ushered out of the building to the place their cars were parked, the sudden blast of fresh air felt too sharp in Žarís’ lungs and she staggered.
There were two cars; one for the King and one for the Prime Minister. Wordlessly and in violation of convention, the Prime Minister of Tavaris quickened her step, faced her back to the King, and got to her car so fast they couldn’t even open her door for her. She threw it open and slammed it shut, pulling her cellphone out before Endra could even reach the other door.
Her thumb flew to her recent contacts and the Chief of Staff answered her call almost instantly. “Do exactly as I tell you. Clear the King’s public schedule for the next year. Yes, year. Get the Constitutional Reform Working Group in session as fast as physically possible. And get me Crown Prince Otan on the phone, because he and I need to have a very serious conversation.”
