Gaining Back Trust Part 14
The 14th part...
Michael stood silently, studying the large cathedral about a half mile distant, Father Erlin’s words replaying in his head.
Michael had carefully investigated and considered all that the monks had experienced: attacks from armed brigands and ruffians, missing supply envoys that had been paid to deliver to the Monastery, false complaints and accusations that made a local abbot send grouchy letters of reproval and issues with other officials.
All these things had led them here to the cathedral of Bishop Peroa, situated on the edge of the city called Chakrin, which lay 15 miles to the southwest of Ashvale, and three miles away from the edge of the territory of Azney.
A lord by the name of Ferdinand governed the territory that Chakrin lay within, he was another vassel of Baron Matthew, but Michael took a very Ashwalker approach to the situation, and ignored the fact that he could ask the lord to investigate for him.
He would get to the bottom of this himself.
After going from end to end to end of any and exhausting every source he could track, Michael was tired, dirty, and fed up.
Unlike this Bishop, who was by all appearances, clean, rested, and well-fed.
Although appearances were not everything.
Bishop Peroa had a few secrets, and a few skeletons in his closet.
If all went well, Michael would play his cards right and have all he needed come sundown.
~~~~~
As the sun disappeared beyond the horizon, a dark, clear-skied night, with a quarter moon emerged. The sky shimmered with stars, and the angle of the moon caused uneven shadows to play about the ground. Each tree, plant, rock, and building was dwarfed in length by the substantial size of the long shadow it cast.
It was a night best spent with one's eyes gazing upward, taking in the splendor of the heavens. And it was a night near perfect for the stealth of an Ashwalker to be able to do nigh on anything.
Michael moved with fluid ease across the grassy fields surrounding the Cathedral. Every lone tree, every rock, every small bush, gave him all the cover he needed.
Every patch of unevenly scythed grass, along with the shadows clinging to the ground, allowed Michael to move almost invisibly nearer and nearer to the colossal building.
He had gone inside earlier disguised as a beggar and had wandered about the place before being rudely turned out on account of his filthy condition.
That in itself gave Michael more than enough reason to want to poke around and find everything he could about this Bishop.
Well, the rude treatment, and the fact that this place was swarmed with guards.
Now, there was nothing wrong with having guards to keep a place safe, but when a Cathedral looked more like a garrisoned fortress than a place of refuge filled with monks, there was surely something wrong.
Michael only saw about a dozen monks, in a place that could’ve easily housed three hundred comfortably. All the guards were also not the most… pious-looking of men. Some had the very distinct smell of strong drink saturated into their clothing, and Michael overheard others making jokes and the like that would be inappropriate in any setting. Let alone inside of a magnificent church.
Once at the wall of the Cathedral, Michael moved along under the high windows, and around doorways until he found what he was looking for.
A decorative column led up to a balcony disguised as a rooftop above the monk's bedchambers. From there, Michael could go top down into the hallways that led to the Bishop's chambers and office.
But first things first, the climb.
Michael looked up and pulled a climbing hook and rope. Casting the hook upward, he got it caught on the edge of a stone window. Then placing a foot on a pillar, he pulled himself up the rope hand over hand, walking vertically on the pillar.
When almost to the windowsill, Michael jumped to the sil and gripped it, clinging to his handholds with a strength born of long years spent using free time for rock climbing, climbing trees, and practicing archery. He pulled himself to a position where he could free and re-toss his hook and then repeated the process. Using available purchase to move slowly up the side of the towering building.
After what felt like an eternity climbing, forcing himself to move in near total silence, Michael reached the hidden rooftop and flitted like a shadow over to the door that led down into the monk's cells.
Using just the tip of his hunting knife, he picked the simple lock, which seemed unnecessary on a door so high up, and slowly eased it open. Wincing as it squealed on its hinges, and cursing the fact that he didn’t have oil. Something that he should not have forgotten.
The hall leading past the monk’s cells was richly decorated between doorways by ornately carved shelves covered in books and cases displaying relics, costly trinkets, and ornaments. Bejeweled golden and silver crosses and incense censers hung on the walls. Richly colored tapestries displayed vivid imagery of scriptural scenes, and oil paint on canvas allowed the faces of saints to gaze out watchfully over the hallway before them.
Another person may have been offset by the wealth within this hallway, one of many like it. Or they might have felt guilty as the unseen eyes of long-dead saints and martyrs raked over them.
But Ashwalkers walked to a different code, with a different view on life, and religion.
They studied the same scriptural texts as in cathedrals but went about it much differently.
And Michael Jamesson of Ashburrough was an Ashwalker through and through.
Hope you enjoyed this installment of Gaining Back Trust!