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"What are they thinking?" a woman asked.
Jola huffed at that. "It's Oryll. He's checking off the list to become a part of Kinen's council. Education, administration, and doing favors for the temple. With Ghale teaching the Protection classes, he has sway there as well. I sat in on a class the other day, and Oryll skipped over why we have abusive sessions. He didn't mention any of the protections. Not once did he discuss the rage or euphoria that could come over someone. He just told them to read the fucking chapter!"
"Sounds like the rest of us need to stop talking about doing something, and actually step up," a man said. "We all agreed to help, but I can't be the only one who keeps saying 'tomorrow,’ right? I'm busy this week. I don't want to cause problems for my desire, and things like that?"
"No, you're not," Harlin agreed. "Jola's actually the one who got me to go. She wanted to see the girl with all the lace."
"Zeal's Chosen," someone else said. "That's what he called her."
"Are we sure that was really Zeal?" someone else asked. "I heard the young man talk, not the god."
"They both were," another confirmed.
"Does that happen?"
"It can," I said, stopping the chatter and making them all look at me. "When Zeal slides into our bodies, we don't go away. The more we work with him - instead of fighting him - the more control we seem to have. We can think. We can still see and hear and smell. It's just that Zeal is operating where we look and how we move. None of that is a problem. It's strange and confusing at first, but the reason Anver is sleeping is because the power of gods wasn't meant to be poured through the body of a human."
"What do you mean?" Amerlee asked.
"When I was a girl, Zeal used my arm to lift up that girl. His strength, but my arm. It was the power of a god. I was also a child, and carrying him was too hard. That's why I slept all night. The next time he rode me, he let me see. I watched as he performed a miracle. I could almost see what he did, but I couldn't understand how it worked. Anver? Zeal was riding him when he healed Talin. Those marks on my guardian's neck? They're still healing him, I think."
"They are," Ela confirmed. "It was barely closed, and now the line is almost gone, but the lace is fading fast now."
"Same thing happened when he did your shoulder," Talin said. "The lace is pulled to the surface."
"No."
The word was soft, and it came from the door to my room. Everyone stopped and looked toward the sound. Anver stood there, using the wall to hold himself up, but his eyes were on me. Wraythe jumped up and hurried over, but Anver just waved him off.
"I'm fine, Wraythe. Tired, but fine. I just had to know that Nari was ok, and I heard her." He glanced at me again. "But it's not your lace. That? It's Zeal's. It's his divinity being pushed into your body. It's him beneath your skin, just like our lace is mostly our souls pulled to the surface, but the match marks are a piece of our desire - or ward."
"Why is it fading?" I asked.
"Because Zeal didn't set it in the skin, he pushed it into the man. That's how he healed Talin. Zeal used his own godliness to repair his body. He left a piece behind because there wasn't enough faith around us. He was losing power, so did what he could while he could." Anver pulled in a breath. "But he usedallhe could. It felt like he slipped out of me, not like he wanted to go. I think he was grieving too hard to do anything else. The loss of his priest? It..." He paused. "Our god loves all of us. I got that much. Zeal tries to take care of us, and he's so angry that this was allowed to happen." Then he looked at Wraythe. "Is there any way I can get a drink? I feel like a god used my throat."
"Sit," Wraythe told him. "Ela, give him a spot."
"He can have mine," someone else said. "Come, Chosen."
"I'm not the Chosen," Anver told him. "Nari is. She's the one who speaks for him. I was just the closest priest he could ride at the moment. He knew Wraythe wouldn't leave Ela. He called everyone he could. I was just there and convenient, and Zeal wanted to save the priestess he's picked as his Voice."
"That's a heavy title," Saval said.
Anver nodded. "You have no idea. Nari hoped to be a good priestess. All Zeal did was take the chance. She's wearing all of the Paths because he believes in her. Let me say that again. Our god believes in that priestess. Zeal chose Nari because he thinks she's what he needs, and she was almost killed. So how about we stop worrying about if we look crazy being priests who actually believe in our god, and maybe we start acting like it's insane to not believe in him?"
"He has a point," Jamik said. "Hearing Zeal's voice used to happen once in a generation. Now? This is the third time."
"Fourth," Talin said. "Zeal rode Nari over the winter holidays when we were at Sandrest. He's walking the halls again. He's here. He wants to change things, and we're the tools he's trying to use."
"And that means we need to make sure these students are trained properly, to start," Saval said. "I'd file a complaint, but I'm her mentor."
"I'm not," Roek said. "I was just there to check students in. I have friends in the High Priest's circle. I have no problem with filing a complaint, but that's going to raise a lot of questions."
"Raise them," I said. "A priest died today because the temple let him down. The system is broken. That's what Zeal wants us to fix first. This is not what he intended!Weare the thing our god values most." I paused, looking around the room. "And Priest Kinen doesn't believe in our god."
"How do you know?" someone asked.
"Because he can't see Zeal."
