The Secret Saintess

For thousands of years, peace reigned over the northern continent. The two largest powers there – the Rocheze Empire and the Holy Land, Astana – kept the balance due to their mutual worship of the Goddess Yvara. Legend said that the imperial family ruling the Empire, the Rocheze line, had been blessed by the Goddess since the beginning of the world. The Holy Land itself was devoted in whole to the Goddess and boasted the whole hearted protection of the Goddess's direct descendent in each generation, known as the Saintess. … what a load of bullshit. Protecting the Saintess? Gimme a break. At first, maybe. The First Priest was a really nice guy. He was the one who discovered the first Saintess, just a poor, starving street urchin picking pockets to buy bread. He took her in, cleaned her up, taught her how to use her holy powers, and even taught her how to use the sword to defend herself. He filled in the role of father she'd been missing for her entire life. And when she died in battle and reincarnated as a farmer's daughter on the outskirts of Azria, Astana's capital city and home of their Vatican, he searched hard and found her once again. Not for fame or to monopolize her power. No, he wouldn't have made that face when he found her again if it was just for that. He was genuinely worried that she would be alone again. No one knew at the time – or for a long time after that – but the Saintess had actually been around much longer than anyone knew. She had existed since the beginning of the world. In a way, she was like a personification of the world. Her mother, the Goddess Yvara, had tried explaining it to her many times, but the whole thing was beyond her understanding. At least, for now. It was supposed to become easier once she was granted her own Godhood. But that was going to take millennia, from what her mother had said, so the Saintess just went along with it. When the First Priest moved on to reunite with Yvara, she made sure to be by his side. Her name then was Nellie, but he only ever called her by the name he'd given her – the name that had come to him like a bolt of lightning from the Goddess Yvara herself, once his eyes met those of a small, dirty child. Islanor. After the First Priest died, the Saintess made herself known to the Vatican in Azria every generation after that. She was given a new name each life, but the only one she would ever answer to was her first name, given by the First Priest – Islanor. At some point, the Vatican stopped calling her by any particular name at all. Within their temple walls, she would only be called Saintess. For a time, this was fine. She went on, doing everything as she should, giving out blessings and sharing her mother's divinity with their followers. But humans are humans, and they are fallible. It didn't take long for some of the higher priests to get their own ideas regarding the Saintess. After about a hundred years or so, facts became legends, and then legends turned to myths. Everyone forgot that the Saintess is the same person each time, only with a different face. As time rushed by, all her lives began to blur together in a haze of torment. They stopped waiting for her to come to the temple, and instead the priests would go out to find her themselves, conducting all manner of tests on every child they came across until they found one whose body held both natural magic and divine affinity. Before turning the age of five, each incarnation of the Saintess was a normal child. She didn't start to regain her sense of self or previous memories until after she turned five years old, so there was nothing she could do to avoid being dragged back to the Vatican time and time again. Each life became more horrific than the last. Her body parts would be removed while she still lived, the taken pieces dubbed “Holy Artifacts” as if they themselves could hold any of her divinity without part of the whole. They would drug her, tie her down, and force her to carry and birth children they hoped would be the next Saintess, as if her power was tied to her blood and not her soul. Life after life whizzed by, the overuse of her power causing her to age rapidly each time. Her hair would grow long and silver, her skin became thin and mottled, her sight dimming prematurely. But with every breath she released, defiance grew in her belly. Day after day, she heard her mother's voice inside her head. Most days, it was nothing but apologies. The Saintess knew she wasn't abandoned by her mother, but her mother had been tied to this place and these people for so long that she didn't know what to do about this matter. Gods like Yvara got their power from their followers and the strength of their belief, and the Goddess was obviously conflicted. But there was something she could do. Finally, with her last breath as an overworked Saintess locked deep in the underground cells of the Vatican in Azria, Islanor murmured back to the Goddess Yvara: “Show them your wrath.” Her heart quivered and stopped, her vision darkening to black as it usually did when one lief ended and the next was about to begin – but the time, when she opened her eyes again, the stone walls of the Vatican were nowhere to be found.