Confessions of a Doubting Arbiter - V

JP with Omni and Winteroak

Was she actually blessed? Was her ability a boon from the Gods? She wondered then if she hadn’t just been used… kept alive by the Pillars as merely the vehicle of investigation to gather and deliver information to the Inquisition … before her usefulness was done and she was to be disposed of...

"These Odonine that the Duke has allied himself with. What can you tell me about them?" He asked while he digested some of the information he had been presented with. The Arbiter had presented the facts as she witnessed them. Nothing more. She very cleverly had kept it simple, devoid of as much emotion as possible, a simple account of what had come to pass. There were other ways to test one's faith in the cause.

She paused to think. She really didn’t know that much, but she had little if no love for them.

“I can tell you only what I have seen from the Odonine in Aquilo, which isn’t much. If I didn’t know better, I would say they were a society of men. I would guess that they do not have respect for women, for I was treated as little more than an object for their idle eyes and hands to play with…

They are rude. Dark of hair and eyes with scarifying tattoos. They live in tents of wicker and hide and carry crude weapons. The ones who attacked rode on horseback but did not seem to ride as well as the Odsier or our own cavalry.

When the settlement was attacked by other mounted clansmen, I tried to persuade them to retreat to the mine, but they are fierce, ruthless warriors, and stubborn to a fault. They fear the underground society and the madness they consider a curse and a disease. Their love for war would make Vastad proud but their understanding of the value of retreat coupled with the fear of the deep cost almost everyone in Aquilo their lives.”

So many happenings in one year. Some many threads of fate unravelling since she arrived, others seemingly put in place hundred of years ago. A Convergence.

Now he needed to place himself at the centre of it all and control the possible outcomes.

"You are no longer alone, sister. The Silent Flock now stands with you. We have come to bring the Light of the Pillars to these lands. This war orchestrated by Stoneshade, against these Odsier, is only the first battle in our new Crusade." He said again as his voice regained the passion for his beliefs.
"This war belongs to us." He told her running the tip of his nail over the rim of his cup.

"A new Holy Crusade sister. A world waiting for our faith, fire and swords."