Apostles of Doom

“Yes, he is personally overseeing the investigation that was started when Hilda detected the mana-stealing event.” Stevos chuckled. “As you can imagine, someone compromising the Holy Ciphers and intercepting the mana stream between a saint and their illuminaries requires the attention of those responsible for the world involved.”

Teragdor nodded. “Of course — an unbelievable story.” He had heard the entire story over wine and food with the others. “So then, Hilda is a regional saint, like yourself?”

“Yes, although a bit less regional; her region was pretty much wiped out and her legend and illuminaries have spread out around Eton. She is also older than me and has more illuminaries,” Stevos told the priest.

“Who then are Beragamos and Sentir Fallon?” Teragdor asked. “I know I have heard of Sentir Fallon before, and I think I might have heard of Beragamos, but I am not sure.”

Stevos nodded and grinned. “They are the big swords. Sentir Fallon is the elder archon for the localverse.”

“Elder archon? I have not heard of that title,” Teragdor said.

“Very few have; it is really only relevant at the multiversal level. He is in charge of Tiernon’s operations in what you and I call the localverse. He had been the Attendant Archon for Etterdam up until about thirty-five hundred years ago, when he moved to Astlan to become the Attendant Archon here. He was here up until about six hundred years ago before being promoted to Elder Archon in charge of the localverse, and Moradel took over in Astlan.”

Teragdor shook his head, trying to grasp these timescales. “So Sentir Fallon is Moradel’s boss?”

Stevos bobbed his head. “Technically, but Attendant Archons are fairly autonomous. An Elder Archon is more like a steward, coordinator and advisor to the Attendant Archons. In particular, they deal with inter-plane coordination and ensuring that the various churches are consistent from world to world.”

“Whoa. This is more complex than I’d imagined. So then where does Beragamos come in?” Teragdor asked.

Stevos gave the priest a rather wicked-looking grin. “Beragamos does not have an official role in the hierarchy of our localverse.”

“But he is involved somehow, obviously.” Teragdor looked at the saint with a puzzled expression.

“Beragamos is a supreme archon,” the saint said with a very straight face.

“A supreme archon!” Teragdor exclaimed, feeling floored to think he had been in the presence of, and consumed wine and food with, and had laughed with, a supreme archon of Tiernon!

“He is,” Stevos affirmed. “Which means he does whatever he wants to do; involves himself however he sees fit.”

“He is a personal friend and advisor to Tiernon?” Teragdor asked.

Stevos squinted and shook his head gently from side to side. “More like trusted vassal, chamberlain, confidant and advisor. I don’t think gods have friends; at least not friends that are not also gods.”

“But he sees and speaks with Tiernon regularly?”

Stevos nodded in reply. “I don’t know the exact frequency, of course, but from what I gather it’s generally at least every day or two.”

“Wow,” Teragdor said. “I can’t believe I have actually spoken with someone who talks directly with our lord on such a regular basis. It’s like a dream.”

“I would have to agree. I didn’t expect to be involved with people this high up for several hundred years, at a minimum,” Stevos said, shaking his head. “We are in interesting times. It’s been a very long time since Astlan has had avatars on the ground.”

Teragdor frowned; that brought up a question he had. “So I was wondering about that. You avatars are here, doing stuff on a daily basis; what happens if someone prays to you, or needs your permission for a ritual? I haven’t noticed any of you doing any reverse praying, or however it is you answer prayers.”

Stevos chuckled. “You may be over estimating how many prayers I get in a day,” he replied, grinning. However, while we do not need to sleep, we — particularly those with a wide number of illuminaries — cannot be on duty twenty hours a day, four hundred days a year.”

“So what happens to prayers when you are off-duty or away, like now?” Teragdor asked.

“We use our HALO,” Stevos said with a broad grin before biting into the piece of bread he was holding.

Teragdor blinked, not understanding. “You mean your saintly aura?”

Stevos raised and lowered his eyebrows while giving him a grin. “No, HALO: Heaven-Avatar Link Optimizer.”

Teragdor frowned. “Heaven avatar link optimizer?”

“Yes, it’s basically a divine daemon that assists us in our saintly duties, or archon duties for archons.” Stevos said.

“A divine daemon?” Teragdor shook his head. “A demon that works for gods?”