The manor of Brar isle, once the destination of extravagant parties hosted by a famous exorcist and his noble wife, died with it's lady. News spread by boat to neighboring islands off the coast of the mainland, but most didn't make it for Madame Juliet's funeral.
Servants of the house had no time to grieve. They said Silas, a generous man and servant of Anthem, had a temper before, but in mourning he was near demonic.
Three days after Juliet's passing the head of staff, Trula, was beginning to worry for her girls. There would be no time for them to send letters out to find work beyond the manor. Silas had made it clear he wanted his business on the island done before the week was over. She knew he meant to leave, and she couldn't blame him. A man had no place to call home without a wife.
But she also knew she had to speak up for the rest of the house. They needed more time.
As apologetic as she could make it, Trula knocked on Silas' study door.
"Leave."
Trula whispered a prayer, and entered.
The study was dark, only a candle by Silas' scribbling hand. He feveredly looked up from behind his glasses, saw her, quickly looked behind himself, and began to write more furiously.
"I said to leave."
The venom in his voice tightened Trula's throat and her thoughts fumbled to find order. Silas had never lashed out at her, but she was scared. He wasn't just a powerful man, he was a man of power, and power often made her shrink. While her throat loosened itself, she took the few steps she needed to stand over his desk.
"I-I have some concerns, Silas." She dropped his title on purpose. For some reason, it had been angering him as of late.
He didn't respond.
Trula's lips tucked in between her teeth and her hands knit themselves together below the edge of the desk. She didn't want to feed his temper with fear.
"We need more time to prepare."
"Juliet's family and Bellow will be here in two days. We're on schedule."
"The servants," she caught her voice before it trembled. "Sir, we need more time to find new positions, Sir."
Silas halted his writing. He held Trula in place with his eyes boiling behind his spectacles. Slowly, he pulled a draw out, retrieved a paper inside, and placed it before her.
Trula was the most well read of the servants as she did the orders for everything they needed on the island. There were a lot of words that were not found in psalms or in the stock of a kitchen, but even in the dark behind the mad curling letters of the paper, Trula could read the word orphanage bright as noon.
"Should you wish to leave," Silas' voice was taut as he returned to writing, "you may. But there will be work to be continued here."
Trula bowed her head and returned to the door of the study, her hand firmly holding the handle, ready.
"I know Madame Juliet is singing for you."
"Leave."
She was down the hall and around the corner before the echo of Silas' anger left her head. Her hands, still clasped together, raised up to her mouth to hold back the whimper she wouldn't let anyone else hear.
When she returned to her room, she fell to the floor, and prayed with tears in her eyes.
"Please, don't let Silas become lost. Anthem, keep him near. Please, Healer, don't let that good man lie beside his wife this Sunday."
X
When the Branvallen family arrived to the manor, everyone hid before the two storms collided.
"Silas."
Sir Julian Branvallen demanded the head of the house the moment he arrived. His wife, sons, and even the Bellow couldn't stop him from thundering through each room until he found his son in law within his study.
"Where is she?"
Silas' teeth clenched his tongue. Julian's presence, bolder and deeper than Juliet's ever reached in her cruelest ire, bombarded him like a mocking laugh.
Conscious of his quill putting more pressure on the paper, he said in his most even tone: "You'll see her after the Bellow performs her rites."
"You'll rot before I'll let that happen. I will see my daughter now. Return her this instant."
The quill snapped. "She's being buried here."
Julian threw his massive knuckles on the desk and leaned across the wood. "She is going to be buried at home, where she always belonged."
I am going to set this man on fire.
Silas pulled himself inward. If he even looked at Julian's face, he knew he'd do it. Because for all the ugly, nasty bastard he was, Juliet had resembled her father. Seeing him made Silas shake in fear that he was too late.
"This is my home. She was my wife, and she will be buried where I say. There is nothing you, or the law, or your Bellow can do about it. And if you don't get out, you'll be seeing Juliet much sooner than Sunday."
"Are you threatening me, Exorcist?"
Julian was twice his size, an oaf. He'd been leaning so far in that it almost took none of Silas' strength to grab the man by the collar, swing him off balance, and slam his back down on the desk. He struggled immediately, but Silas had leverage, and a much, much greater hatred for himself than Juliet's father could ever deliver.
"I can do much worse things than drown you in the ocean and get away with it, Julian. I can scathe your soul and keep you alive. For years. Maybe until you die naturally."
"You're a Demon," Julian screamed.
Silas tossed him off the desk and sank back in his chair. Old scars began to ache, his energy seeping away. There was nothing he had left to say to Julian, or any of the Branvallen's for that matter. Juliet was the only one of the lot that was worth this world, and she was gone.
He didn't let himself finish his next thought.
X
A private boat was ready for Silas as soon as Juliet's rites were finished. He didn't dare approach her, afraid of what he would see. He stood alone, away from the grave, away from the servants and the Branvellen family. The few things he was taking with him were already on his back.
The Bellow was taking his time finishing the ceremony. Traditionally, Bellows told the life story of the deceased before Anthem over the grave, to give them more credence to enter his Choir.
Juliet had only been twenty. Part of Silas watched the setting sun, wanting to be on the boat long before nightfall and for the Bellow to hurry through Juliet's short life. What was left of him, beyond the fear of staying on the island a second longer, was entranced. There were so many stories of Juliet he hadn't heard. Follies of childhood they never had the time to discuss, anecdotes of friends he'd never met who had shared precious moments with her growing up.
It all sliced away at him. Everything he didn't know, every moment that had been robbed from him, every step he was away from that boat. His being was composed of open wounds left by Juliet, as if she had been a knife meant to cut him open from the beginning.
Not even a quarter of the sun was left when the Bellow finished. Like a coward he ran from the crowd. Veering away from them he took the long way around the front of the house. The ground was stubbled with tall grass and wet pebbles, causing him to nearly trip in his long strides.
Once again he was half awake, caught between a horrible dream and reality, wanting neither. His blood was racing, his skin was sweating, the pounding of his head threatened to decapitate him as he bobbed down the jagged path to the pier. He almost hoped that was what happened to him when he skidded to a sudden stop.
He was too late.
She knew him so well. So, so well. Because there she was. Juliet, in her favorite ball gown, the last one she'd worn, waiting for him on the last step of land before the dock.
Silas cried for the first time in a week, her name and an apology the only thing he had left in him. She didn't respond, didn't react, simply watched.
His Juliet had come back to haunt him.
The Archive of Olexco was the largest collection of manuscripts kept by the choirs of the second root. It was also the most available, as the Sovereign's first root archives was only for those of the Council, and anything the third root once held was either burned or displaced. Silas was looking for those things that had been displaced.
It was an odd thing to be in the archive at night. He could feel the art, but was unable to truly see it. Most pieces of creative mastery carried an essence of their creator. Walls these old, written history between them, created their own essence as well. Dazed, humbled, with no direction on how to interpret what he was feeling without looking at the stimulus that was affecting him, Silas felt uneasy.
The sensation amplified as he went deeper below ground. No longer was the art reaching for him, it was the manuscripts themselves.
Ancient, beautiful emotions grazed him, but nothing broke Juliet's grasp. She was always a few steps behind him, filling his bones with her cold spirit, never freeing him from her dispassion.
Three months after her death, he still couldn't bring himself to lift a finger at her.
The curator rooms were two levels down. It was the quietest place in the archive thus far, filled with sleeping brothers of every age. Silas heard their soft breaths as he passed each door, until one captured his attention. He was certain the man behind it had to be the Keeper he lettered weeks ago, Suvaun.
He was lithe, young for the position of Keeper, but his presence spoke well of him. It was dry, tepid parchment, ruffling from page to page, thinking, adding.
Suvaun bowed his head to him. "Welcome, Exorcist. I am Keeper Suvaun, all preserve tradition's order. You've arrived early."
The office was barren except for the mat Suvaun sat on, a low table, candles, and Anthem's root etched into each of the walls.
Silas already hated this place. "What is your answer?" he asked.
"Please, sit. You've just arrived and you look ready to leave."
"I am."
"Sit. I have an offer."
Resisting every muscle needed to scowl, Silas sat across from Suvaun. The church didn't give offers, they gave demands.
"Your letter was rather vague," Suvaun said. "If you could perhaps give more details as to what you're looking for?"
"I can't."
"Is it unsavory?"
"No." The very corner of his lips were starting to strain as Silas forced himself into a smile. "I can't say exactly what I'm looking for, because I am unsure of its nature."
"Many arrive to us this way."
"I'm not interested in an apprenticeship."
"You'd simply take what you need and leave?"
A dark, tired laugh rumbled in Silas' chest. "Trust me, Keeper, you won't want me around for long."
Suvaun didn't react to the growing malice in Silas' voice. He didn't fear anything a man could do, only feared what they could believe.
To be a Keeper, was to know everything was never fully true. This extended to Exorcists. They were servants of Anthem like any Bellow, Curator, or even the Voice's themselves. Their work was crucial against demonic rot, despite their dwindling numbers. Followers of the Unnamed Voice had their reputation corrupted by association with magi. Even with the third root burned and mage practice outlawed, a vital choir to Anthism suffered due to these rumors.
Suvaun knew better than to believe all exorcists were rotten. It saddened him that a fellow worshipper, an exorcist himself, had internalized those horrible lies.
"If you are not interested in apprenticeship, then allow me to make my only offer. You may search for the knowledge you seek, but you must perform your duty when needed."
"I am not going to be sent from village to village handling any 'spirit' that is reported to a bellow."
"You misunderstand," Suvaun smiled softly. "Your work will be entirely here. I will even give you some more rare texts on the art of exorcism."
Silas' eyes narrowed. "Why would books and devoted curators need to be exorcised?"
"We can discuss details after you've settled in. Do we have a deal?"
Suvaun saw every thought that went through Silas' mind. This was a man who was suspicious and critical of the world, even of faithful criers.
He was exactly what this archive needed.
"Deal."
X
After four years, Suvaun lost a battle within himself, and he would forever wonder if he did the right thing.
He prayed every night, looking for a resolute answer. None were ever present. The decision weighed on him every day: destroy a friend to save the archive, or allow the archive to destroy itself from within.
This was his fault, not Silas'. If the Exorcist had told him the truth in the beginning, something he still hadn't fully done, Suvaun wouldn't have believed him.
It wasn't the job of a Keeper to search for confession. He was there to protect tradition, learn, and garner knowledge. This meant even teachings of the dead arts, to which Silas had been instrumental to their progress.
As an exorcist, Silas had improved greatly, performing feats Suvaun didn't think possible in his lifetime. Tomes had been freed of demonic grasp. Tempted curators had been cleansed from previous ill effects of their research. He completely believed in Silas, and thought should he keep studying, together could find a way to save even the rotten.
But his brilliant, generous friend, was cursed.
Silas had warned him the longer he stayed, the worst things would become. It was almost unnoticeable the first year. Simple things, so small they could be dismissed as carelessness by a curator. Candles tipped over, books out of place, all mistakes any man made.
When Silas came to him and said he needed permission to exorcise spirits within the library, Suvaun couldn't believe it. No malicious spirit had ever harbored there, and no one had died in years on the premise. But his friend had insisted it was necessary.
Suddenly, the exorcist was exhausted by his continuous work, desperate for any time to research in peace without an incident happening. And they were happening day after day. Disembodied screams, invisible assaults, traumatizing nightmares. The curators were at the end of their aisle, too afraid to do anything but pray.
Suvaun begged Silas to tell him the truth of what was happening. Instead, the exorcist found a new technique to end the horrors. He never spoke of what it was, only that the more malicious events should be over. For a time, things almost returned to routine.
Then the curators began to be sleeping more, eating less, and growing weaker. During the winter was the hardest. Medicine only stabilized, never healed, making the doctor stop coming since he had been unable to help their conditions.
Suvaun's heart was broken as he sat with every brother who requested he write letters to their family, in case the worst happened. He had done this to them by allowing Silas here so that his own drive for knowledge could be satisfied. Each life under this roof was his responsibility, which was why he had been unable to let Silas leave.
He knew what the exorcist was looking for, even if words had never confirmed his thoughts, and he couldn't let Silas do it. Never again could he call himself a pure man if he let Silas walk away with what he sought.
When the first curator died, he no longer knew what was right.
The abled attended the rites. Promptly following the ceremony, they rallied and demanded Silas leave. They had never been kind to him, bad faith in exorcism prevailing even in a place of Anthism. Now, without knowing for certain he was the cause, despite how reverently he fought against the ailling evils, they wanted Silas gone.
Anguishing over what to do for what felt like an eternity, Suvaun came to his decision when he realized what Silas' curse truly did to him. Forever to harm those around him, never good enough to stop the evil he drew, Silas suffered alone. His friend was only a numb facade above anger and resentment.
He wished Silas would tell his own story, because all Suvaun could do was see a man who was hated his whole life. Who believed in Anthem, who worked day and night to fight evil, but never understood why he had been given the curse he bore.
On the night Silas left, Suvaun found him in a dark corner, four levels below ground. He'd secluded himself entirely now, taking his meals while he read. He didn't even return to his quarters anymore, presumably because they were too close to the other curators.
With a heart of stone, Suvaun set the artifact he held gently on the page.
Silas blinked at what appeared to be a necklace. It's string had six worn beads, and a jagged, brown tooth in the middle.
"What's this?"
Suvaun tucked his hands behind his back and swallowed the wad in his throat. "It's a crevice stone. It... Will take you where you want to go."
Never in his life did the Keeper think he'd feel so much agony by seeing hope return to someone's eyes.
"Why?" he asked Silas. "Why do you want to chase something so...?"
"I've done it before, a long time ago."
Suvaun felt his beliefs, everything he knew about his friend, shatter. "What?"
Silas put the crevice stone in the pocket of his robes then stood to leave, expression cast down.
"Thank you."
As he walked away, Suvaun, the Keeper of Olexco's Archive, thought back on the last four years as he fell to his knees. Answers to questions snapped into place like a bone resetting itself. Now he understood why his prayers had gone unanswered.
For the last time, Suvaun prayed for Silas.
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