Hadya (prime)/Homecoming

Homecoming

Pushing back the hood of her burnoose, Hadya looked around the great halls of the temple. A feeling just then had overtaken her, a sense of being home. These walls had sheltered her and protected her, giving her the space to be free to worship her Master without the disapproving eyes and ears of others. She slowly made her way down the main hall, her morduska hide boots clanging softly with their heavy copper buckles. As she came upon the central dais, she found the old pale priest lecturing an initiate quietly, but severely. She could barely make out the conversation, but the priest’s face made it plain he was not to be interrupted. Hadya whirled on her heel to stride back down the hall when the priest’s voice stopped her.

“Priestess Kha’Taymullah, we’ve been expecting you for some days now. What was the manner of your delay?” his icy tone brooked no argument.

She turned around again, bowing respectfully to the priest as her eye caught the movement of the initiate that scurried off, no doubt, thankful to no longer be the target of the priest’s ire.

“Pardon my delay, there was a matter to attend to in Phannus and I did not wish to trouble the local sect, of course.” She said quietly.

“Yes…well, better you had done so.” He responded in return.

She inclined her head towards the priest, her eyes lowered. “As you say, I should have let them handle it.”

“I heard they wanted to place you in Selanthia, but you declined. That’s quite the honor, isn’t it?” The priest smirked afterward, a disdainful look in his eye.

Hadya kept her tone quiet and measured. “Yes, it is. However, my place is on the edge of the empire where life is not easy, and masks are harder won. You know what I speak of, being assigned here by the Order for so many years.”

The priest’s expression faltered for a mere moment. Hadya could tell she struck a blow, and deep down she was happy to see it. For many years she had fought hard for her place in the Order. Doing as they bid to be recognized as more than a mere curiosity who left her previous order, an order that had gone heretic.

She had gone where the Order told her to go, rebuilding sects after the devastation of Chaston Griffin’s zealotry. She helped to build them back stronger, and with more discretion. The next time The Church of Koar put a madman in charge, she hoped their nests would be undisturbed or at the very least, able to recuperate with ease. Making this priest a little uneasy or insulted was no great loss in her mind. She was no longer a heathen from the desert, she had seen things, done things, and learned more in the empire than she ever would have in Solhaven. That was one thing she was grateful for, the Order had expanded her horizons.

The priest gave her a cursory glance up and down, frowning at the desert attire she was wearing. “I trust you brought robes with you?”

Hadya gave the barest of smiles, nodded once, and said in her friendliest of tones, “Yes, I’ll change for the prayers and offerings.”

“You have an hour to make yourself…presentable.” He offered in return.

She made another respectful bow, hanging there for a second longer which she had hoped would annoy him.

Rising again she folded her hands and offered in departing, “May you walk forever in His Emerald Light.”

The priest merely nodded and turned to leave, Hadya’s eyes ever on him as he walked off into the shadowy depths of the hall. Once he was out of sight her smile turned to a smirk.

“Ah, it will be a hard fight to win my place, here again, I see.” she softly murmured, before retreating to the dormitories, her sepia burnoose getting lost within the shadowy depths of the temple.