Olan Thorensen - Cast Under an Alien Sun

“Speaking of Father sitting, what about you, Mother? I can’t remember seeing you not standing.”

Breda wrung her hands. “Oh, Maera. I still have trouble even conceiving of this. St. Sidryn’s! I can’t help but imagine Culich and Diera killed and the abbey burned! That’s what happened to other abbeys attacked the last few months. Somehow I didn’t believe it could happen in Keelan.”

“I know how you feel. I knew it was possible, but knowing something is possible is nowhere near the reality when it happens. There’s still hope. The abbey is some distance from the shore, and people might have had time to flee inland.”

Breda shook her head at the attempt to assuage her fears. “Do you really think Culich would abandon the abbey or Diera, if there was even one patient in the hospital?”

Maera was quiet for several seconds, then morosely shook her head. “No. They’d both stay at the abbey. All we can do now is await word and pray they fought the raiders off.”

“Which is what I have been doing all day. I only hope God is listening.”

Both women jerked their heads toward the front of the house when they heard a horse gallop up, then neigh as if being brought up short by its rider. Then voices—many voices from the others waiting on the front veranda. Culich and the other men poured out from the main hall and through the front door, Maera and Breda merging with the men.

A messenger from the semaphore station leaped off his horse and bounded up the front stairs, as Culich rushed out the door. The hetman grabbed the message without saying a word or looking at the messenger. He glanced over the message, visibly relaxed, and then read it again slower. People held their breath. Culich let the hand holding the message fall to his side. Pedr Kennrick snatched it without asking and started reading, as the hetman spoke.

“The raiders were beaten off and have left. St. Sidryn’s and Abersford suffered minimal damage and casualties. No further assistance is required, according to Boyerman Vorwich.”

The sounds of multiple lungs letting out air was audible, followed by a cacophony of exclamations and questions.

“How—? Other information—? Thank the Merciful God! How many casualties—?” On and on it went.

Culich raised both arms to quiet the gathering. “There’s no other information in the message. Boyerman Vorwich says he’ll pass on more as it comes to him. There’s no way to know when more will come, so it’s best we return to whatever we were doing until we hear more later today or tomorrow.”

The request to disperse was fulfilled, although it took a half hour of small groups talking and Culich meeting with Kennrick and Luwis before he could finally sit.

The day after the raid, word spread that in four days, Godsday, a special service for those slain in the raid and for deliverance of the rest of the people would be held in the cathedral. The time was later than normal for a Godsday service to allow those more distant to travel. And they came: every soul in Abersford and the abbey who could move, people from farms, mines, and settlements as far away as Clengoth, including Boyerman Vorwich and his entire family. Visitors traveling through the empty countryside and nearby hamlets would wonder what had happened to the people. They’d have learned the answer if they reached St. Sidryn’s Abbey and viewed horses, carts, wagons, and carriages staked for hundreds of yards around the main wall, and they may or may not have been able to pack themselves into the cathedral. The normal seating capacity of 800 was extended to 1,300 with temporary benches, chairs, cushions, boxes, and anything else that could support a person, with more people crammed into the pews than usual. Another almost 300 souls stood at the back and sides, on walkways two, three, and four stories around the chamber and a final hundred or more sat on the floor of the altar area normally reserved for the brothers and the sisters.

Yozef found the cathedral packed. He squeezed into the main hall, content to find a place among the throng standing to one side, when Brother Fitham appeared, grasped his right elbow, and dragged him to a front pew, where Denes held a space for him.

He had attended many services since his arrival, and this one started out with the standard call to worship and a series of traditional calls and responses between Abbot Sistian and the people. The difference came when Sistian, instead of launching into a sermon, recounted their deliverance from the Buldorians. Naturally, primary thanks were given to God, then the abbot named names: the fallen, the dead, and the seriously wounded; those who had lured the Buldorians to the open gate; Denes Vegga, for organizing the defense; and Yozef, for his insights into defending the abbey. Yozef dreaded the attention. He had been so afraid. Four days since the raid and he still shook and his throat constricted whenever he let his mind linger over that morning.

“And thank you, Merciful God, for Yozef Kolsko,” the abbot intoned, “the stranger who came to us in need, who became part of our community, who brought so many betterments, and who has been the implement of God’s grace on our day of danger.”

Yozef cringed. He’d only made a suggestion that had popped into his head! He’d wet himself! He didn’t want everyone looking at him as a hero.

No one knew it, but the abbot’s reference to Yozef being “an implement of God’s grace” would linger in people’s minds.

Okan Akuyun dismounted, gave the reins to a guard, and was halfway to the headquarters entrance when stopped by Admiral Kalcan’s voice.

“General, a moment of your time, please.” Akuyun turned to the naval commander walking briskly toward him.

“Yes, Admiral. Come on up to my office.” The two men entered the outer foyer. Guards came to attention, as did other staff, as they climbed the staircase into Akuyun’s office.

“So, Morfred, what has you excited this morning?” Once alone, Akuyun often used first names with his immediate subordinates and allowed them the same privilege. While such familiarity was not universal among the Narthani, Akuyun believed it helped them believe in his trust and confidence.

“The Buldorians, Okan. They were due back from the raid on the Keelan abbey by yesterday at the latest, possibly sooner since the distance is so short. There’s been no sign of them. This morning I sent a sloop to the Buldorians’ base at Rocklyn. They should be back late today or tomorrow. In addition, another sloop reported back today after finishing a routine sweep along that part of the Caedellium coast. They were some distance offshore, but the captain reported that the abbey and the nearby village appeared intact. The Buldorians had orders to burn anything they couldn’t carry off, but the captain saw no indication of fires. The last time we had contact with Captain Adalan and his ships was when they left four days ago for the raid.”

“I assume there continues to be no sign of any other warships around the island, except ours? No one else the Buldorians could have run afoul of?”

“No. So the question is, where are the Buldorians?”

“Your conclusion?”

Kalcan shrugged. “I expect they decided their association with us had reached an end, and they sailed for home.”

“Well, I suppose that simplifies how to end our relationship,” Akuyun grimaced. “We are about to move into the next phase anyway, so this won’t change our plans.”

“I agree. We suspected the Buldorians would do this eventually. What about Major Nertof and his two aides?”