“She refuses to talk to me, Enoch,” Cayd said shrugging as he sat across from the High Sergeant in the office of the Cathedral’s operations manager. “I thought being an outsider would have given me an edge on the conversation.”

  “Still? Even after we gave her two days to calm down?” Boldbounty asked. He shook his head slowly. “This is the perfect storm of Church stupidity and she decides to go mum on us.”

  “Can you blame her?”

  “Well, considering the circumstances and my legal authority, she is kind of the only one I can blame.”

  “Well, when is the Justicar arriving?”

  “This afternoon.”

  “And we can not just ask him to postpone the trip?”

  “Ah yes,” Boldbounty mocked, rising from his chair. “Mr. Justicar, despite the fact that you have been personally seeking the death of this particular criminal and wish to immediately execute her despite generations of tradition and regulation, I want you to just not do that.”

  “He has to understand the information we get from her is more valuable than the message of her death, though, right? Not to mention the fact that a god may rush to rescue her at any moment.”

  “The Church has promoted this particular Justicar far beyond the need to be understanding,” Boldbounty sighed as he moved toward one of the office’s large windows overlooking Dawnbreak. “Most executions take six months, Cayd. We’re knocking this one out in three days. Ah well, hopefully that little priestess can get something out of her before too long.”

  “She is something,” Cayd said, nodding. “She just fit right in, didn’t she?”

  “One of the benefits of Church life,” the High Sergeant said. “One learns to be flexible. Well, more malleable.”

  “I am sorry I could not be as easy to mould as her,” Cayd said glumly. “And on that note, with the Captain caught, I’m planning on my next move.”

  “Already?” Boldbounty turned back to Cayd.

  “What do you mean? I’ve been here all winter,” Cayd laughed. “At risk of being rude, I was wondering if any of my payment is ready?”

  “Do you not think I’ve shared with you all I have learned?”

  “Frankly?” Cayd asked, smiling slyly.

  Boldbounty allowed the tension to rise for effect before guffawing. “Always the clever tactician, Mr. Cayd. You have called my bluff. And I suppose you have met your end of the bargain. We would have lost the Washway were it not for your use of that lantern.”

  “I was just as lucky to have bumped into it on the street.”

  “Well, I will recall the nets I tossed the day we met and share with you anything we found about that former student of yours.”

  “I truly appreciate that, Enoch.”

  “Gentlemen!” The Mother Superior’s cry came suddenly from the other side of Boldbounty’s office door.

  “Mother Superior?”

  “Boldbounty, open this door. We need to talk.”

  The fanged folk priestess rushed into the room as a gust of wind as soon as the door was even cracked open. “No sense of decorum! None at all!”

  “What is wrong?”

  “Justicar Helmshead is here already, demanding an asinine Clergy Call in the courtyard right now.”

  “Well, were we expecting anything less?” Boldbounty asked.

  “No! But dammit, he is hours early! I had the Clergy Call already in the day’s minutes. Can you please put some weight behind that shield of yours and get him to reconsider?”

  “I mean, I could try, but I do not think a Justicar will care what I want.”

  “I am particularly uncomfortable taking that temporary-duty girl out of Zora’s cell. She is the only interrogator we have on staff that has gotten that wench to speak!”

  “Well, why not just let her off the hook for the Clergy Call? She has more important places to be, no?”

  The Mother Superior stopped for a moment, and began to seethe. “Well why is this even being called into question? Why did the Justicar not send a messenger ahead?”

  “I will talk to him. Mr. Cayd, would you like to meet the Crossroads Justicar?”

  “Why not?”

  “Just do not go bragging about how important a Gavundari was in this,” the Mother Superior snarled. “I won’t have Cayd messing up my chances for promotion back to The Throne.” Cayd responded with a sly wink and the three left the office.

  As the trio got closer to the welcoming hall of the Cathedral, the activity was becoming more and more frantic. It was evident that something was happening, and when they came across a gaggle of priests and paladins standing near the door to the lobby, the Mother Superior erupted.

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  “What do you think you are doing!? He is a Justicar, not a celebrity. Stop blocking the door, you fools!” she barked, startling the group. They immediately shuffled aside. “Do you not have enough to do today? Because the baseboards of my office are looking a little dusty.”

  Muted apologies came from all sides as they pressed through the door. The Mother Superior shot off a final, hushed warning before moving to the lobby. “Do not be out here when I come back or we may have to schedule several more executions.”

  She immediately switched to her happy face, however, when she lead Boldbounty and Cayd into the welcoming hall. In the center, a small man stood, flanked by a diminutive priestess carrying a thick, leather bound book, and a mountainous paladin with a tower shield.

  The small man was impressive, though, by any other measure. His face seemed worked from stone, the angles jagged and deep. His armor was extremely stylized, the pauldrons of which were decorated with metalwork catoblepas heads that went up nearly as high as his own. A thick, royal blue cloak ran between the bovine shoulderplates and clasped in the front with a jeweled miniature cow skull. At his hip hung his signature weapon. His personal gavel, a warhammer enchanted so that only he may wield it.

  It kept the bovine theme. While the striking head was a smooth, flat, but sparkling silver, the opposite side was mounted with horns that curled like a catoblepas and looked like they were made from pearl.

  “Well if it isn’t the Mother Superior!” he called, his voice filling the room.

  “Mother Superior of the Dawnbreak Cathedral, please allow me to welc-” the small priestess began to recite the official greeting but she was cut off.

  “Oh, stop it. We’ve all heard the lines before,” the old priestess said as she made her way to welcome the Justicar. Boldbounty and Cayd shared a small laugh as they followed her over.

  Almost immediately, political smalltalk broke out between Boldbounty, the Mother, and the Justicar. Cayd tried to listen, but he could feel the small priestess looking on him.

  “What brings a Gavundari to a greeting of a Justicar?” she finally asked softly.

  “I’m not sure myself. What wraps one in a habit?” he asked with a grin.

  “Second generation,” she said with a nod. “My parents came to present on behalf of their workshop at the Duskfall Expo. Decided to stay. Called me their souvenir.”

  Cayd laughed at the joke, but tried his best to end the conversation there. He was frankly more interested in the fate of that pirate.

  “Do you work here?” the priestess asked.

  “Sort of,” Cayd said dismissively.

  “Hmm,” the priestess mused. “I can tell from your tattoos that you’re a sorcerer. I wish I had kept up with my family’s culture. The most my hands can do is take notes.”

  “Well shouldn’t you be taking notes of this conversation?” Cayd asked, more impolitely than he had intended, but it got the message across. The priestess smoldered, frustrated.

  “Excuse me. It’s just rare to see someone like yourself. Funny coincidence what with the magic user in Crossroads that’s been showing up.”

  “What?” Cayd asked, loud enough to interrupt the conversation the Mother Superior and Justicar were having.

  “Excuse me, Sister Elizabeth?” the Justicar almost sang. It communicated his authority well. Too practiced for Cayd’s tastes. “Were you writing down what we were discussing? It has to do with tomorrow’s schedule, after all.”

  “I apologize Justicar,” the priestess said with a small bow. “Please repeat the plans.”

  The Justicar mockingly rolled his eyes toward Boldbounty and the Mother Superior and began to recite the plans. “The Clergy Call will be in one hour, then-”

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, Justicar,” Boldbounty said. “But I mentioned that one hour was too soon. I would like to keep the Clergy Call for its previously scheduled time this afternoon.”

  The Justicar looked unimpressed. “Where do we find these assistants?” he asked the Mother Superior who cackled a laugh.

  “Please, be political, High Sergeant,” she reprimanded. “The Justicar does not get to visit our fair city often. He needs time to see the sights.”

  “If the sights include horse turds all over the courtyard during his Clergy Call, he’ll see plenty.”

  “High Sergeant, please.” The Justicar looked, and sounded offended.

  “I just need a few hours to get the place cleaned up,” Boldbounty groaned.

  “Well, I apologize that the cathedral’s residents were unable to plan ahead for my visit.” The Justicar’s nose crinkled in annoyance. “Fine, we will have the Clergy Call at the original time, but High Sergeant, I would suggest you immediately get to work on those ‘horse turds.’”

  “Yes, Justicar,” Boldbounty said bowing.

  “You are dismissed, High Sergeant,” the Mother Superior said with a wave.

  Boldbounty gestured for Cayd to follow him as the Justicar moved to check over the priestess’s recording of his schedule so far. As they turned to leave, Cayd watched the Mother Superior smile widely at Boldbounty before mouthing the words “thank you.”

  “We will talk soon, Sister Elizabeth,” Cayd called to her as they stepped out.

  “Damn, I hate high profile visits,” Boldbounty groaned. “Nothing stings like a grown man being made to feel like a child.”

  “Is it always like this?” Cayd asked. “The second takes all the heat for the leader’s poor performance?”

  “More or less,” Boldbounty said with a playful shrug. “You either scar up from it or you have a breakdown. How do you all do it overseas?”

  “Well, my experience has been that the only common language across many of the communities of the empire is a fistfight. That Justicar would have been on the floor had he made that assistant's comment in Gavundar.”

  The two laughed as they made their way back through the halls, but were suddenly interrupted by Sister Maribel.

  “High Sergeant, Cayd,” she said bowing. “I believe I am finished with the Captain for now.”

  “Does she know she is being executed tomorrow?”

  “I was going to tell her this evening,” Maribel said. “Wait until the Justicar was already here and the schedule was certain. Figure changes to the timing of one’s death do little but make the anxiety matter worse.”

  “Good news, then,” Cayd replied. “He’s early. Did she say anything about a rescue plan?”

  “Nothing at all,” Maribel said, shaking her head. “But something is bothering me. She still seems hopeful. Happy, even. She asked about tomorrow’s weather report.”