"They are not gods," said Seraph in her tongue. Though, she remembered, in the old stories of before they Traveled, her people had believed that there were gods as he had described. But as the Old Wizards had grown in knowledge and power they had put those fallacies behind them.
As if she hadn't spoken, Volis pointed to the eagle. "I found him, in books so old they crumbled at my touch, in hints in ancient songs. For generations the Elders of the Path have worshiped only the Five - until I found the lost god."
"The Eagle?" said Seraph, caught between an urge to laugh at the idea of solsenti worshiping the Orders as gods, and distaste. Distaste won.
"The Eagle." He looked pleased. "My discovery led me to be honored by this appointment," he waved a hand to indicate the temple.
"Congratulations," said Seraph, because he seemed to expect her to say something of the sort. She glanced at the ceiling again and wondered what her father would have said if he'd seen it.
"I have gleaned some things," he said. "The Eagle is protected by the others, so that he can rescue them in some future time, when they are all at risk and the world hangs in the balance."
She'd taught Tier that song in translation, a child's tune to teach them about the Orders. Obviously the translation that Volis had happened upon had been less careful. He made it sound as if the Eagle's purpose as Guardian was for some single, predestined event.
Eagerly the young priest turned to Seraph and took her hands. "I see from your face that you know about the Eagle."
"We do not speak of the Eagle to outsiders," said Seraph.
"But I'm not an outsider," he said waving an impassioned hand at the ceiling. "I know about Travelers; I've spent my life studying them. Please, tell me what you know of the Eagle."
Seraph didn't suffer fools gladly - she certainly didn't aid and abet their stupidity. It was time to go home. "I am sorry," she said. "I have work awaiting me. Thank you for showing me around; the artwork is very good."
"You have to tell me more," he caught her arm before she could leave. "You don't understand. I know it is the Elders of the Path of the Five who must free it."
"Free it?" she asked, and that chill that had touched her upon seeing the Birds of the Orders in a solsenti temple strengthened, distracting her from the encroaching grip of his arm.
"In hiding him," said Volis earnestly, "the Five trapped him, for his protection. 'Sleep on, guarded be, until upon waking destroys and saves' - "
Seraph started. That bit of poetry had no business being spoken in the mouth of a solsenti, no matter how well he spoke Traveler. It had nothing to do with the Eagle, but...
"He must be freed," said Volis. "And the Master of the Path has foreseen that it is we of the Path who will free the Stalker."
"The Stalker is not the Eagle," Seraph said involuntarily, then could have bitten off her tongue. This was dangerous, dangerous knowledge. He was mistaken about the Eagle, about the Orders being gods, but the Stalker...
He turned his mad gaze to her. He must have been mad. Only a madman would speak of freeing the Stalker.
"Ah," he said. "What do you know about the Stalker?"
"No more than you," she lied.
She fought to draw in a full breath and reminded herself that this man was a solsenti, a solsenti possessed of more knowledge that he should have - but even if he were so mistaken as to confuse the Eagle with the Stalker, he still should be harmless enough.
She gave him a short bow, Raven to stranger rather than good Rederni wife to priest, and used the motion to break free of his grasp.
"I have work," she said. "Thank you for your time - I'll see myself out."
She turned on her heel and strode rapidly to the curtained entrance, waiting for him to try and stop her, but he did not.
By the time she was on the bridge, she'd lost most of the fear that her visit with the new priest had engendered. The Stalker was well and truly imprisoned, and not even the Shadowed, who had almost destroyed the human race, had been able to free it. A solsenti priest with a handful of half-understood information was not a threat - at least not to the world as a