Paladins of the Pickle Goddess

The lace fluttered, bobbins clicking. Prisca folded her arms, looking between the priestesses. “You have to understand my position,” she said. “Is it too much to ask that-”

“I don’t have to understand your anything,” said the older priestess. She was militant in the way that women who had lived through the dissolution of the empire sometimes were, hair cut short and eyes sharp enough to notice every motion Prisca made. “What are you? Some half-rate Voice that only came to town in time to try and get a piece of the action? Go back to whatever village spawned you, and stay there. Some of us are trying to do real work. Build temples that last, not foment unrest and then take our business elsewhere.”

The bobbin clicked, the lace rotated. The long-haired priestess next to her sighed, handed her a bobbin. She had avoided Prisca’s eyes entirely, beyond welcoming her to the tent and offering her a jar of honey for an outrageous price.

“I am not,” said Prisca, drawing herself up and being insulted even though she knew it wasn’t worth it, “Some half-rate- I am the Voice of Carmen, Goddess of Music and words that matter, and I have been fighting for the defense of your Voice! Marcia understood our struggle!”

Well, she hadn’t. Not really. She could still remember the way Voice Marcia had looked at her. Like she was some child, trying to sit with the adults before she was tall enough to reach the plate. Adorable. A dog performing tricks.

But they had to understand. If the Small Gods were crushed, if Carmen’s grace was successfully ignored this year- next decade, it would be just as easy for Andrena to be locked out of the Spire. Before long, it would just be that horrible insect, determining the path of the country as it pleased.

Prisca shuddered. It wasn’t right, leaving a country to something with more than two legs.

The older woman scoffed, rotated the bobbin. Prisca looked away and tried to calm herself. Candida understood. She knew that the future was a more equal Temple. One that let all gods speak.

Of course, with Voice Marcia gone, and Candida… “You really haven’t seen her?” She said. “Not even-”

“She’s busy. We’ve been working here all festival,” said the priestess with the braid. “Truly. But she can handle herself.”

“It’s not about handling herself.”

“Perhaps she didn’t want to speak to you,” said the short-haired one. “Stopped understanding your struggle, and all that.”

It just didn’t add up. Prisca crumbled up the pamphlet she’d brought, pacing in the darkness of the awning. “She really didn’t come to join you at the festival?”

“Of course not. She knows she has to help maintain the second temple. Unlike you, we actually have worshippers to care for.”

Prisca stopped pacing and blew a piece of hair out of her face. It was so hot here, the crush of people just outside full of chatter and seeming to press in at all times.

Mostly they were chattering about normal concerns, what the beetle might bring in the year to come, about the incense they could buy, about hunger and where they worked. Yet her pamphlets had been working. She could hear the chanting at the base of the spire, how people were begging for justice. She could hear the murmuring just outside. Yes. Someone cared. Someone wanted honesty in this city.

“She wasn’t at the other temple. I already checked.” A truth for a truth. She didn’t want to betray Candida, not to these old bats that wanted to stick their noses into everyone’s business and thought they were better than her. Than everyone.

Still, Prisca had already betrayed her cause by coming here. Would it be so much, to betray her hand a little further?

“We’ve been speaking. Daily. She didn’t come to our meeting-place. When I spoke at the temple, none of the neighbors had seen her.”

Prisca had spent all day yesterday, wondering, worrying. She’d convinced herself that Candida had been needed here, with only three days left until the colonies of beetles took flight for the end of the festival. She’d rushed here as early as she could this morning, wanting answers.

Now she watched as the two priestesses stiffened. “She didn’t report for work? You’re sure?”

“I suspect your charming personality scared her off,” said the short-haired one, not looking up. She clicked another bobbin over. “I’d suggest less pamphlets next time.”

“I didn’t-” Candida had been an ally. Yes, one with not much power. But Prisca needed every ally she could get, and Candida had been a witness. It would have been brilliant. The light breaking over the spire, as Candida teared up- she could do that on command- her hands trembling, admitting how she’d seen it.

The young-faced woman, burning down the temple. Obvious, as she testified. An attempt by Cabellus to frame Teuthida. Prisca had presented her evidence at the daily meeting she held at the base of the Spire. The people were ready to hear the testimony. Already, the guard had stopped trying to arrest them. There were too many protesters. Too many pitch-forks and not enough cells to hold them.

No one could agree on who they wanted to tear apart, but she could feel it. It was almost like music. The feeling of revolution.

“She’s very important to the movement,” she said, instead. “We have to find Candida.”

“Well, if she isn’t at work, she’ll be at the boarding house-”

“I checked the boarding house,” snapped Prisca. “Don’t you manage your priestesses?”

“Bold of you to say,” said the short-haired Priestess. “Given you don’t have any at all.”

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

They both stopped speaking. There, barely peeking over the drum of lace. It was a boy. He had an awful haircut, blond and dome-shaped. Behind him, another boy, twiggy and dark-haired. They both stared at the priestesses. “I knew it!” declared the boy.

Prisca was sure she recognized him from somewhere. She squinted. Why did he look so… familiar?

“You owe me two copper,” said the blond one, turning to the taller boy. He held out a hand. The other boy, who was dressed in much nicer clothing and looked a little like he should be holding his nose, sniffed in disdain.

“It’s not worth much to know where a stall in a festival is.”

“But they’re still making the lace! I said they would be!”

“You’re the one that was with the false Voice,” said Prisca, finally putting her finger on it.

Prisca prided herself on maintaining a good network of information. She’d known the false Voice almost as soon as she’d been in the city- a bard had been performing in the Pig’s Tail, the pub she’d announced herself in, and Prisca had made discreet enquiries afterwards, making sure she knew where the woman was going.

The boy had confused Prisca from the very beginning. Candida had told her he was, indeed, part of the woman’s retinue. Prisca had watched it herself; the way he’d been given tea, fed.

She still had no idea what his purpose was. Especially now that he was without his mistress entirely, and had apparently multiplied.

In all honesty, the entire scam had confused Prisca. Why pretend to be a Voice, if you didn’t want to enter the Spire?

“Where has your lady gone?” she tried.

She had to try twice before she finally made it through the argument. Both boys looked over.

“She was stolen,” said the blond boy, screwing up his face in anger. “By the Lady Sylvia! They locked her in a boat!”

The Priestesses of Andrena looked at him, hesitant. “A boat?” tried one.

The other one leaned in, whispering in her friend’s ear.

Prisca had no such hesitation. She stepped forward, put on her best smile. “That sounds horrible,” she said. “Absolutely terrifying. I’m so glad you survived. Why don’t I buy you a honey-snack, and you can tell me everything about it?”

It took two honey-glazed snacks and one fried piece of meat to get through the story, ducked into an alleyway where they wouldn’t be overheard. It included too many diversions- including a very long story about sleeping next to the harbor, and an extended argument about building boats, none of which Prisca cared about- but finally she thought she figured it out.

The two boys had escaped from a rich house in the Southern District. They had wandered around, lost, in the Hammer, and ended up sleeping in an old warehouse next the harbor. Only this morning, when the crowds had begun to head towards the festival again, had they managed to get here and- serendipitously- meet her. All that time, the false Voice and the man Apis had been in the hull of the quarantine boat.

Prisca leaned against the cobble and tapped her foot in her favorite drum rhythm, trying to think it out.

In front of her, the boys were practicing with the swords again- stupid, but she would allow it. She could hear the chanting of the crowd just out of sight. She should make more pamphlets.

There was only so far pamphlets could take her. She needed someone to testify about the crimes committed upon the temple. The horrors of the law, the injustice in the church. This woman, this ‘Voice’…well, she didn’t know if she could trust Elysia. Certainly, she was a liar. Prisca hadn’t seen her do any of the acts of magic a real Voice could do. Voice Marcia had grown small plants, made flowers bloom.

Prisca had watched Elysia drink chamomile tea and look disgusted. Clearly not the real voice.

Did the crowd need to know that, though? “You’re sure it was the temple of Teuthida?” she asked the boys.

Duran, the blond one, looked up from where he was trying to bandage a cut on his forearm. Prisca realized vaguely that she probably should have told them not to fight with the swords. Ah, well. No one had lost a limb yet.

“Of course I’m sure.”

“Hmmm.” She folded her arms again. The woman had seemed quick to anger. Perhaps, with the right motivation… and there was the man, Apis. Based on everything Candida said, he was very reliable. If she could convince him…

It was worth a try, if she couldn’t find Candida. She nodded sharply, pushing away from the wall.

First, they had to create a trail. A source of evidence, showing that they were in the right, and that Teuthida, working with the Law (oh, this was delicious) was in the wrong. Then, hopefully, Prisca would find some evidence that it had been Cabellus all along. Or, even better, the Beetle.

“To the guard station. Put away those swords, you’re going to hurt someone.”

“I thought that was the point!” said the ratty one, Servius, but he followed quickly enough.

The guard station for the temple district had, at one point, been beautifully-built out of well-carved wood and painted in bright colors to help people find it. Then it had been half-burned, re-painted, re-built partially in stone, and then painted again in dark colors, presumably in the hopes that it would avoid any further burning. There was a broken window where someone must have thrown a brick. It was boarded up, with dents in the wood where someone had clearly tried to throw another brick at it.

Prisca gazed at the front of the guard station with great satisfaction before she stepped inside. The other Voices had said her little pamphlets would do nothing. Oh, how times had changed.

When she pushed open the door, the man behind the counter ducked. “I told you,” he said, from below the counter. “We aren’t releasing-”

“This isn’t about that,” said Prisca. “I’m here to report a missing person.”

“And you brought armed guards?”

He still hadn’t emerged from beneath the counter. This wouldn’t do. Prisca leaned over, frowning down at him. “Marcus, this isn’t professional. Are you going to let me report the missing person, or not? Last I checked, it wasn’t illegal to carry a sword.”

“I swear,” he muttered, pushing himself up and avoiding her eyes, “They said the temple district was a good position, peaceful…”

There was a strange buzzing noise in the station. Prisca met his eyes and smiled. She made sure to show all of her teeth. “I’m here to report Apis, foundling of Andrena, missing. Likewise, Elysia, Voice of Andrena, missing. Last known location-”

Marcus, shuffling through his papers, frowned. “Ah-“

“What?” Prisca frowned. “If this is about the inciting violence charge, I’ll have you know that I am still well within my rights to report someone missing.” She was counting on it, in fact. The city had to know there was a problem in order to fail to solve it. That way, it would be even more heart-warming when Prisca herself solved it.

Or, well, when she had someone else solve it. She wasn’t typically the hands-on type.

“No,” said Marcus. “We, uh, it’s not that.” He pointed a single finger at an entry. “It’s just… I can’t report Apis missing. He’s already classified as a fugitive.” He jerked a single thumb towards the back, where the buzzing was getting louder. “We even have all of his belongings confiscated, on rights of the city.”