“I’m still Taika!” The high pitched comment from Dav’s backpack made Sophia laugh for some reason. It was probably the weird situation. “And would you let me out of here? The backpack’s resting on my flap and I don’t want to try to wiggle out.”

  Sophia knew Taika could get out if he wanted to, but she also knew he preferred to have other people help him. He said it was because helping him made them feel better and he was a Comfort Animal, but Sophia suspected he was just lazy. She reached over and tipped the backpack upright and opened the flap anyway.

  Taika’s head popped out of the backpack and he hopped lightly to the ground. It didn’t look like something shaped like that should be able to move so lightly, but then a crouched rabbit didn’t look like it should be able to run the way it could, either. “So, what’re you three doing out here acting all serious for? I woke up in the middle of Amy telling us that wasn’t her name, so I missed whatever came before that.”

  “We’re trying to figure out what to do next. There’s some conflict brewing in the city and Amy’s brother Lan’ti thinks we should leave town as soon as we can. We came here because Amy needs to visit some Challenges before she can upgrade her Sphere, though, and leaving now would defeat the purpose,” Dav summarized.

  Dav had clearly decided to call her Amy instead of Ci’an. Sophia guessed she’d better follow his lead as long as they were in the Registry. That was what Amy asked for, after all. It would be a difficult transition whenever Amy wanted to be called Ci’an.

  “Lan’ti gave us a plan,” Amy added. “I just hope we can be fast enough. I didn’t know the Registry had that pattern in the tiles of the entrance; it’s always been covered in rugs. Lan’ti thought they’d be neutral, which means he didn’t know either. His plan depends on the Registry keeping us safe by staying out of it, but if a fight starts, it could be deadly; there are quite a few people past the second upgrade in Izel. They could kill us without even realizing we’re there.”

  Sophia frowned as she remembered what they were told about Casterville. “Didn’t you say that higher level Called were suppressed in Casterville?”

  “Casterville has a City Defense Nexus,” Amy answered easily. “Izel doesn’t. Izel is centered on the crystal in the middle of the cave. It makes mana, and you need mana for stable Challenges. If there isn’t enough mana, the Challenge seed will crack instead of growing. That has never happened in Izel.”

  “And that’s why Izel is important to the Skylands,” Sophia followed the logic immediately. She’d already noticed that Izel had more mana in the air than anywhere else she’d been in the Broken Lands. “You need stable Challenges to get the Path, er, Sphere you want and Izel has the most stable Challenges. At the same time, that means you need people who are strong enough to deal with the monsters that live in or are attracted to the higher mana level, along with anything that becomes a monster because that’s easier here.”

  Izel already sounded more like home than Casterville did, but there were also problems that had to be dealt with. Having to defend against monsters was the same as back home, but some of the problems weren’t the same. “And that’s why it’s hard for lower level people to get Wisps; the monsters here are suitable for people past their second Upgrade, not people who haven’t even had their first, so we can’t fight them for Wisps and there are way too many people who can fight them for us to contribute meaningfully and get Wisps.”

  “Then that’s why there’s a Vocational Registry here, too,” Dav added. “And probably why there’s a strong presence of the Broken Temple; there’s power here. No one who wants power is going to ignore that.”

  “It’s not just the power.” Amy blurted, then stopped. Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “You aren’t from around here, you don’t know the Broken Temple or the Broken Lord’s followers. They are … the Broken Temple is very strict in following the Broken Lord’s commands, even the ones he never said. They think everyone else should follow those rules, too.”

  “That’s power,” Dav said with a nod. “If you can set the rules, you can do what you want to.”

  Amy shook her head. “No, well, yes, but that’s not all. They really believe that the Broken Lord is …” She trailed off and waved a hand in the air as if that was supposed to give her the words she needed. “That if you don’t follow the Broken Lord, you’re evil. That forcing people to obey the Broken Lord’s rules is the only right way to act. Even the ones that he didn’t say, that someone in the Broken Temple came up with later.”

  Sophia frowned. She knew of fanatics from history, but worse than that she’d actually met some. It was unavoidable in a world where not only were the gods real, they could actually provide you with power. Most were nice enough people as long as you kept them off the topic of their religion; some were very nice even then. It depended a lot on what they thought their deity had commanded them to do.

  Amy clenched her fist unconsciously. “The Skylands have always had followers of the Broken Lord, but we haven’t always had Templars. The Temple … I don’t know when they arrived, but I know they were just another sect of the Broken Lord’s followers until my grandmother’s time. She told stories of First Snow celebrations from her childhood where all of Izel celebrated, a grand Procession of Patrons, hours of lights and merriment. That’s something I never knew, something I’ll never know. First Snow is celebrated indoors now, within your own family or Clan. The Temple doesn’t approve.”

  Stolen story; please report.

  Sophia doubted that sort of change was simple or quick, but she could see how it could happen and two generations was certainly enough time. How it happened wasn’t the important thing. Actually, she wasn’t entirely sure why that was important at all. “There’s snow on the ground, so that’s already past, right? How does it affect us?”

  Amy flushed slightly and shook her head. “First Snow doesn’t, the Templars do. At least, they affect me and my brother. If you stand by us, it could affect you too, so it’s only right that I warn you. It’s why Modir wanted Lan’ti out of Izel badly enough to not wait for me even though they knew I was coming.”

  The silence stretched as Sophia waited for Amy to say what “it” was, but she didn’t. She seemed to think she’d already said what she needed to. Sophia guessed the only option she could think of. “Your mother wanted your brother gone because of your uncle? She’s afraid they might use you to get leverage on your family?”

  “What?” Amy looked startled. “Well, that too, but only because it gives them a reason to look at us. We’re weak compared to the leaders of the Broken Temple; Lan’ti might be as strong as many of the members, but I’m not, and he could be overwhelmed. It probably wouldn’t matter anyway; the Temple Inquisitors are all second upgrade.”

  “Temple Inquisitors?” That word had a bad history on Earth and Sophia somehow doubted it was any better here.

  Amy nodded. “It’s one of the common second upgrades for Templars. They stop protecting against monsters and start protecting against people. Some of them are even in the Guards. Modir says that’s how they got power in Izel in the first place, they enforced their rules instead of Izel’s until their rules became Izel’s.”

  She took a deep breath, then let it out. “No, the problem is that about five years ago, the Hilt declared that all followers of the Broken Lord had to come into the Broken Temple and receive the blessing of the Broken Lord. About a year later, the Temple Inquisitors started taking people they caught into the Broken Temple instead of to the Izel Constabulary and had them examined. That’s what set Uncle Los’en off; he runs the Constabulary and hates the fact that he can’t do anything about them taking over part of his city. I think he hates it almost as much as the fact that the Hilt declared his actions to be the direct orders of the Broken Lord.”

  Sophia blinked at that. It was emphatically not the reason she’d expected from Lan’ti’s letter. In some ways, it made the demands Lan’ti mentioned make even more sense; they wanted full control of the city streets and thought that removing Los’en from his position or at least tarnishing his image might do it.

  It also explained some of why everyone was so on edge. This wasn’t just an argument about religion; it was a fight for control of the city. Everyone clearly expected violence. That wasn’t all that different from what she’d already gathered, but it was something.

  It didn’t explain why the Registry was blatantly supporting the coalition that followed the Tower of Kestii, but it might well explain the mosaic on the entry hall floor and also why it had been covered. It predated the Broken Temple’s influence in the Skylands.

  “Is it possible they are the direct orders of the Broken Lord?” Dav asked quietly. “Does the Hilt have a Hallow?”

  “He claims to,” Amy admitted. “Modir says he probably does have a Hallow, but she says it’s awfully convenient that everything the Broken Lord tells him to do directly increases his own power, both within the Broken Temple and outside.”

  Dav snorted. “Figures. Power again.”

  “You have a Hallow, don’t you?” Amy’s question seemed to come out of nowhere. “Both of you do. That would explain so much. Why I’ve never heard of Vocations that work like yours and why you know a Patron can talk to you. And you’re not Hallowed of the Broken Lord.”

  There was absolutely no point in denying it now that Amy had put the pieces together. It was a good thing that she seemed to be pretty firmly on the side the Wanderer hadn’t warned them against.

  “The Wanderer,” Sophia admitted. “As far as I can tell, all he wants is to give us a helping hand because we’re lost and clueless. He hasn’t asked us to do anything for him.”

  Amy stared at Sophia with wide eyes. “I haven’t met anyone with a Hallow outside my family before. We don’t talk about it with outsiders. But you aren’t outsiders; you’re my team.”

  There was an implication in that statement. “You have a Hallow, too?”

  “Yeah.” Amy sounded a little hoarse. “Mine is fairly common, almost identical to a Vocation. Aeric Openhand doesn’t do much early on; he wants you to choose your direction first. The only real differences come after the first upgrade.”

  They talked for a while longer, but it didn’t feel like they really decided anything. Their only real option Amy wanted to get the Sphere upgrade she was going for was to work with the Registry Master. Until they knew what was going on between the Vocational Registry and the Broken Temple, they could only follow the path laid out in front of them by Amy’s brother.

  The only real addition to the plan came an hour later when Dav asked if any of Amy’s family knew she was in Izel. His suggestion was that they could go and ask what they knew, but Amy decided it would be better to send a message. She was certain her family’s compound was being watched by the Templars the same way the Vocational Registry was, but she was also certain she could get a letter to her mother discreetly. There were enough Called in her family that someone should be able to visit the Registry to talk without attracting attention, while visitors to the Aurora compound would not be discreet.

  Sophia and Dav were happy to defer to Amy’s local knowledge.

  Eventually, after talking in circles for what felt like hours, Sophia yawned. Taika, the lazy little bundle of fluff, had already checked out and was snoring in his nest on the table. Sophia covered her mouth and shook her head. “I’m headed to bed. You coming, Dav?”

  Dav followed quickly. Sophia was pretty sure he wasn’t as tired as she was. That was fine; she had to admit that she was distinctly looking forward to using the bed for more than one purpose.

  Amy knows an awful lot about Izel’s politics, doesn’t she?