"Tomorrow's the blessing, Orah, nothing more. Let's watch our words till the vicar's gone, then meet at the Not Tree where we can do as we please."
The "Not Tree" was their name for a shelter deep in the woods, built by his father as a place to play their games. They'd named it the Not Tree, using their initials-Nathaniel, Orah and Thomas. Nathaniel doubted his father remembered it, but it remained their special place.
Mention of the Not Tree seemed to calm Orah. She flicked a strand of hair from her face and brushed it back.
"Fine," she said. "We'll meet there tomorrow after dark."
Thomas reached into his tunic and pulled out the wooden flute he'd carved years before and always had with him.
"And with no vicar, I'll be able to serenade my friends."
Orah nodded, then lifted her face to the sky and closed her eyes. Her arms extended, palms outward as they'd been taught.
"Praise the light, giver of life. Let us end tomorrow safely, and then meet at our special place."
Nathaniel watched as she prayed, marveling at the firelight reflecting off her features. Every arc on her face-cheeks, chin and brows-aspired to the light.
But just as she finished, the bell atop of the common began to toll. It rang sixteen times, each clang echoing in the night air. The music stopped. Parents took children by the hand. Cups of wassail were set down, and faces turned toward the entrance of the square. Thomas slipped the flute back into his pocket.
The vicar entered through the east gate of the village, marching with the pomp of temple clergy. He stopped near the fire and confronted the villagers.
"Greetings," he intoned, enunciating every letter. "Don't let me interrupt your festivities. The blessing is for tomorrow, not tonight. Please, dear friends, continue your celebration."
No one stirred.
The vicar approached a table and lifted one of the abandoned cups to his nose. He closed his eyes and inhaled, then shook his head.
"Honey in your drink. We'll speak more about this tomorrow." He twirled one hand in a circle. "But for now, my friends, don't stop for me. Enjoy your evening. Blessed be the light."
The surrounding people muttered "Blessed be the light." Nathaniel touched hands with Orah and backed away. Although no one appeared to move, within seconds the villagers had faded from the square.
***
Orah lingered behind the trunk of an oak tree, invisible in its shadow. She needed to know more, to understand the threat to her friends.
Nathaniel had always been a dreamer.
When they were little, he'd pretend the darkness had been lifted by a knight slashing about with a sword and riding an armored horse, though weapons and the riding of animals had long ago been banned. He invented stories about how the knight had built Temple City, then scaled the mountains outside Little Pond and discovered a great ocean on the other side. As he grew older, his father had warned him to keep such notions to himself.
Nathaniel and his notions. She prayed he wouldn't pay the price.
She sniffed the air, trying to read the breeze, then looked back to the clearing where the unattended fire had begun to die.
The vicar stood alone in the middle of the square. With a sigh, he set down his pack, carried all the way from Temple City. Inside would be two of the Temple's most essential mysteries: the season's medicine and the sun icon, greatest miracle of the light.
After stretching his shoulders, the vicar squared them to the bonfire, picked up an abandoned cup of wassail and poured it onto the embers, which hissed and spit out a sweet-smelling steam. His lips curled upward into his hollow cheeks, until his teeth showed and his face displayed a rarely-used, but perfectly genuine smile.
A Teaching
Following his meeting with the elders, the vicar had time to roam the village prior to the noontime blessing. He assumed the posture he'd been taught-back arched, head up, eyes focused on the path ahead. His beard was freshly groomed, a pencil-thin mark that traced the contour of his jaw. His hair had been razor cut to an exact line that intersected the middle of each ear. On his head was the not-quite-square hat of a junior vicar, narrower in front than in back, all black, with no red stripes as yet. Even so, the villagers would treat him as a proper envoy of the Temple. He'd followed the rules and so would they. Little Pond would yield one of its young for a teaching.
He measured his stride-three foot lengths to each step. As his heels struck, they left a mark that mimicked the hat, forming a sequence of almost-squares in the dirt road. The squares detoured only to avoid the occasional puddle left from an early morning drizzle.
Whenever he came upon villagers, he tried to engage in conversation.
"It's been a warm autumn. Has that been good for the harvest?"
This brought the trite responses he'd come to expect and was able to ignore. Next, he eased into more personal topics.
"Is everyone in good health? Has the medicine been sufficient for your needs?"
Then, intermingled, the more contentious questions.
"How goes the struggle against the darkness? Are there changes that need my attention? Anyone whose behavior has altered, who shows signs of being tainted?"
Most of the villagers, like villagers everywhere, chose their words with care, answering at length, saying little.
"Oh yes, Anne has borne Matthew a son. Elder Robert's daughter's been married to a young man from Great Pond. The light's strong in the people of the Ponds. We're true to the faith."
They'd been conditioned all their lives to parrot back the litanies of the Temple and saw this conversation as one more ritual. By midmorning, he was growing frustrated and began pressing harder.
"Do the young congregate in unruly ways? Are there some who've become rebellious?" And more bluntly, "Have you heard anyone speak ill of the Temple? We must be vigilant, my friends, or the darkness will return."
Back in Temple City, a red stripe awaited his hat. Others had achieved monsignor by his age. But he sought more than status. A promotion would allow him to pass off the Ponds to a younger vicar.
What a nasty little outpost this village was, at the edge of the world, bounded to the west by a barrier of white granite mountains ending high up in a sawtooth. Locals claimed ancients had scaled these peaks and found beyond them a sea so great its far side could not be seen. But no one in the age of light would have attempted such a quest. And since it was forbidden to speak of the time before the light, at least in civilized places, it had never happened. But here at the edge of the world, they still told stories.
Not much changed in Little Pond, and it was his responsibility to keep it so. There were no big problems, only minor distractions. If someone strayed, he had a duty as visiting vicar to correct the transgression before it grew. Even a small change could undermine the light. The line must be drawn, he'd been taught, before the darkness had a chance to return. Be vigilant always.
It was usually the young who deviated. They were adventuresome and curious, and had not yet learned the full horror of the darkness. Schooling was less strict here, teachings less common than in larger towns. So once each season he made the trek and listened in the prescribed way, searching for a candidate for a teaching. But for the past three seasons they'd resisted the will of the Temple, tarnishing his record.
He'd nearly completed a loop and could see the square ahead. Small villages often lacked a candidate for a teaching, but if he failed this time, it would be a full year. Only an hour remained until the blessing-barely time to communicate to his superiors.
He paused to consider his options. Ahead, in the middle of the path, a white-throated sparrow had landed in a puddle to begin its morning bath. With a blur of wings, it splashed about, then lifted its neck and sang with a whistle too passionate for its size. Its song was five notes, two long and three short, with the last ending in a trill. It seemed unaware of him.
He knelt down and picked up a stone the size of an acorn. He straightened, took aim at the bird's head and threw, just a flick of the wrist so as not to startle the bird.
The rock missed by a feather and the bird flew off.
He'd redouble his efforts. This time, he'd find one for a teaching, an example so the light would shine forever.
When he reached the commons, he found the two elders, John and Robert, who had resumed their game from the night before. He strode toward them.
"Greetings, my friends."
The two barely looked up, but stopped what they were doing.
"Elder Robert and Elder John, I believe?"
They nodded.
The vicar reached into the pocket of his robe and pulled out a waterproof pouch. From inside, he took a piece of paper, making no effort to hide the printing that the superstitious villagers took to be nothing less than temple magic.
"Little Pond has had no teaching in almost a year," he said. "As elders, you know the importance of discipline. I need your help in finding a candidate."
The elders looked past him as if wishing he would disappear. The vicar stayed quiet, letting the silence become a physical presence. The two men fidgeted in their chairs.
Finally, elder Robert spoke. "We're a small village but loyal to the Temple. Enough have been taught that we can keep the faith."
"But children come of age all the time. Surely some need ... correction."
Robert's voice became resolute. "We take care of our own and are true to the light. You have no reason to believe otherwise."
The vicar noted the white mourning sash draped across elder John's chest. Perhaps he'd be more pliable.
"I see you've had a passing to the light, elder John."
John looked away, as if the ache inside was none of the vicar's concern. "I lost my wife of forty-four years."
"I'm sorry. May she dwell in the light everlasting."
John nodded in gratitude, but the vicar gave no reprieve. He pulled the paper closer and read deliberately.
"Temple records show two have come of age within the past half year and, as you know, the records are never wrong."
John's voice cracked. "I don't recall."
"Why surely you must have attended the ceremonies."
"I'm getting old. I can't remember."
"Perhaps, if I read the names... " He held the paper up so they could see the bold writing done by no man's hand. "The records tell of Thomas Bradford and Nathaniel Rush."
"Two fine young men," John said after a moment. "From strong families, faithful to the light. The Bradfords work hard on a farm at the south of town. They're good folks and kind to their neighbors. Nathaniel's mother died in bearing him. He was raised by his father, William, one of the elders. You met him this morning. You have no cause to bother either."
The vicar rocked on his toes. "It's not for you to say... what's a bother to the Temple of Light."
John slid toward the edge of his seat and matched the vicar's stare. "William was sent for a teaching when he was young, just a week after coming of age. It was the longest teaching this village has ever known. Is that not enough for the Temple?"
The vicar pressed his face closer to John's. "I will have a teaching today. If not these young men, then another." He glanced at the paper. "The records show you have grandchildren. A little old, perhaps, but maybe the Temple should choose one of them."
John's fingers tightened on the arms of his chair and he began to rise. But before he could get to his feet, elder Robert intervened.
"There's one I've heard making light of the Temple. It's possible a teaching can help him lead a more responsible life."
John turned to him and licked his dry lips, but said nothing.
The vicar's pupils became black beads in white slits. His mouth twitched at the corners. "Elder Robert and elder John, you are true children of light. And once you've given me a name, I'll never need to speak of your families again."
The elders' every muscle seemed to sag, and they avoided each other's gaze.
***
The villagers assembled in the square, old and young, men, women and children. Nathaniel's father went to the front with the elders, while Nathaniel settled at the rear with his friends. While waiting for the ceremony to start, he took stock of them. Orah sat straight-backed, eyes on the altar, hands folded in her lap. But Thomas only grinned.
Like Nathaniel, Thomas bore the obligations of a child of light: a ceremonial robe over the temple-prescribed black tunic, the hair cut to the temple-ordained length and the thin beard marking their jaw line. But that was where the similarity ended.
Though Thomas was several months older, he looked younger. Where Nathaniel's whiskers could use filler, only charcoal could make Thomas's sand-colored fuzz look like a beard. And he was always grinning, his boyish features seeming like they might last into middle age. He behaved younger too. While he made fun of Orah for studying too much, it was she who'd got him through school by keeping him from getting into trouble and covering up when he did.
A hush settled over the villagers and everyone turned to the stone altar. Little Pond was too small to have a building dedicated to the blessing. The closest was the altar, built at the request of the Temple generations before. With no resident vicar, it was often used for other purposes such as holding festival pies. Such use would have angered the vicar had he known, but the people of the Ponds were practical and made use of what they had.
Now the altar was covered by a satin cloth, pure white but for the emblem of the Temple, a yellow orb whose rays beamed down on an adoring family: father, mother, and child. A gold icon, three hands high, stood at its center-an image of the sun.
While the villagers spent little time dwelling on the light or worrying about the darkness-they had enough to do to get by in their daily lives-they were respectful of the ceremony. And they were grateful for the medicine provided for their sick. But the sun icon was different. Through it, they heard the grand vicar speaking to them four times a year from far-off Temple City. And each time, he would astound them with his knowledge-babies who were born, couples wed, young people who'd come of age. It was a true miracle.