The small, stone monastery in the foothills of the Nether Mountains was very definition of humble. Swirling winds buffeted the temple from all sides and snow was piled high against all sides of the structure. Built of stones from a nearby quarry, it contained two rooms. A small temple with a shrine to Ilmater in the front and an even smaller room serving as the personal quarters of the Abbot of the monastery in the back. A narrow path had been dug through the knee-high snow to a narrow door at the front of the monastery but the snow piled in front of the door suggested that the door was rarely opened.
Acolytes were few. And visitors even fewer. Many went days or months without entering the temple of glimpsing the Abbot that lived within.
At a respectful distance from the monastery were a few huts constructed from unfinished trees and seemingly chinked with frozen mud. They surrounded a blazing bonfire. Three acolytes sat around the fire. T he young acolytes of Ilmater that lived on the grounds had often arrived cold, hungry, and without possessions and stayed. The youngest of them was the first to notice the messenger stagger into the clearing, on foot, saddlebags slung over his shoulder.
The young acolyte rushed to the side of the messenger and guided him to the fire. The messenger shrugged off his load, stood with his feet nearly in the fire as if he could not yet feel the heat, rubbed his hands over the flames and waited for his jaw to loosen. It had taken him almost two weeks to get here, following the River Rauvin, tracking through the marches, and then climbing up into the hills searching for the monastery.
The acolytes, here for so long with so little to talk about waited patiently, stretching the limbs occasionally and staring into the fire. One acolyte handed the messenger a small tin cup with weak tea. The messenger held in gently for a few minutes, warning his fingers, and then drank it.
He reached down and pulled a crumpled, rolled parchment from his saddlebags and handed it to he youngest acolyte.
One of the young acolyte took the message from the courier and approached the monastery gingerly. Excited by the opportunity to have a valid reason to knock on the door and enter the temple, he knocked quickly on the door and pushed it open.
There, prostrate on the floor in front of a small shrine to Ilmater, lay one of the most blessed priests. Before he could rise from his knees before the small shrine of Ilmater, the young priest bursts in.
“Your eminence, a letter has arrived by courier from Everlund.” He holds the scroll up to you with bent head.
The abbot held up a finger and bide him to wait.
“A letter from Everlund, you say?”
“In the War of the Silver Marches, Ilmater sent me out to minister to the soldiers of Everlund. Conscripted, poorly fed, disease running through the camps.”
“When the lines were collapsing at the Battle of ___, men retreated and were cut down from behind. Couldn’t bare it. Set myself on a hilltop, rallied the remaining troops, outnumbered 3 to 1, held the field for four hours until troops from __ arrived and swept the enemy from the field.”
“The siege at Fort ___. 24 men held the mountain pass leading down into the valley of ___ for three days so that he entire valley could be evacuated.”
“And at the end of the War of the Silver Marches when the adventurers descended into the underdark, I held the base camp. And when the adventurers returned after ____, injured and exhausted, I held the camp against hundreds of drow until dawn. What did i learn: even mightly adventurers are indistinguishable from those wounded conscripts at ___ if they are in desperate need of succor.”
“So, the note? I don’t find myself more interesetd just because if comes from the High Priest in Sundabar. But you are disturbing my morning, so open it up and read it to me.”
The young acolyte cracked the seal open and read in a quavering voice:
The Lord Chamberlain is commanded by the Grand Duke Sagus Macerock to invite Veit Torunn to the marriage of Prince Wyan Silverleaf with Lady Rosa Macerock at Moonshadow Keep on the first day of the first tenday of Mirtul. We ask of you to perform the ceremony on the day of the wedding, friend. May Ilmater find you well.
Add Comment