[Benyah]

---

Inbetween prayers to the to Enarr with hushed breaths, secretive reading and recitement of his commandments, and holding steadfast in the life of fugitive, a fugitive of an Aphrosi Inqusition. A certain Enarran finds herself incredibly alone. Between nights, fearing awakening to immediate death, she threads upon a secret parchment her thoughts most dear.

Words acquired from dreams, dreams never spoken, secrets hidden yet not revealed.

In this Responsum, Garetta weaves her religion with hidden aspects of her life, creating a soliloquy to Enarr's doctrine. In parts a lament, in parts poetry, in parts wrestling with the ideas of her God.

---

I told her that..

Then it came down to this...

I told her I shouldn't say it...

But I did.

Now this?
I'm the worst...

She told me - they all told me to change my ways...
But I refused.
They told me it was my choice...
I should've noticed the set up when I started feeling coerced into Athelitism.

I was tricked, fooled, and caught off guard,
I spent so much time trying to get my family not to persecute me,
Trying to make them feel shame for the past of it,
Lecturing them about Goldlight,
I had even advocated against its return due to its persecution of Enarrans...

But there were no promises ...

Just as I feared, I was disposable to my own family from the beginning.

From that day he said it, I have always felt like the problem...

And I feel like I became everything the Aundeoth sees in "us".

I tried so hard not to be who he believed us to be.

I was the fool, so blinded by a belief of achieving acceptance and peaceful coexistence with others as an Enarran,
I truly thought that my worst struggles would be social and emotional...
Now that very reality has turned legal,
The laws have been weaponised against me to brand me a criminal,
But this is all religious. He told me since I was young;
"I think you are in for an uphill battle."

Maybe that is why I trusted him..
He was nice to me when I was a child,
Still confused, when others would judge me for believing in Enarr.

Maybe I should have accepted it,

Became an Athelite like the rest I wouldn't be here now if I had...

But this crown and your word my God I swear that I have lived by it truly,

Inspite of the coercion to see belief in the ideals of your siblings,

I have kept your commandments, God-King;

---

• Let fairness be the bedrock of your decisions, in agreement with the facets of justice and law.
  
  Was I not justified when I called for the punishment of the one whom broke the law in such a brutal way? Had I been unfair with my decisions to empower others? My God, I was fair, but this fairness brought me no favor when men who call themselves your opposition unite against reason to inflict darkness and brutality upon one of their most loyal and committed allies.
  

  ---

• Knowledge is the greatest of your wealth; treasure it, pursue it, for it endures even when gold fades.
  Did I not, my King? But all of the knowledge within this world tells me to betray you. And I will not abandon you, so I must refuse, poised and profuse I recuse my right to muse if it means I must sing of anyone but you.
  

  ---

• An oath once sworn is sacred. Break it not, for even unwitting failures will stain the honor of its keeper.
  I was harsh, but I was fair, I kept my oath - she knew the risks she took, seeking to bring me before your enemies, my demise and the figure imposing this unrighteous Inquisition. The charges lay bare, and the verdict is certain, they are all liars and being born in your image, being proud of you is a deeper sin to man of this new found age than it is to betray someone you helped raise.
  
  Perhaps that is why they despise you, my King. For disloyalty runs deep in their bones, and their honor means not but a glance when it comes to their agendas.I do what I must. You may judge me, my Lord, but I have never forsaken my bonds, even if they had me. I don't believe in chivalry but my life has been lived honorably.
  
• Few are bonds stronger than blood; do not forsake your family lightly, or the vows that tie you to your kin.
  And what if they rise up against me? Sealed my fate would have been if I swore an oath as a child to my Great Grandfather...A terrible thought.
  

  ---

• Conquest begets glory and growth, yet little beyond chaos is brought by violence without purpose.
  Then what of these sinners? How do they repent in their insolence?
  

  ---

• The realm is your hearthstone; protect it, cater to it, and bring ruin to any who dare defile its sanctity.
  I did my best.
  

  ---

• Preserve the sanctity of death, and of the cosmic order that binds all.
  In the smallest ways of lighting those ritual flames slowly and carefully, to trying to introduce people to her faith, protecting the land and writing the laws - I had my lord. Writ by writ, step by step. History knows this to be true.
  

  ---

• Spare not the wrath for those who sin, be they high or low, strangers or kith. Retribution discriminates naught.
  They too, say I have sinned;
  And they seek retribution no matter how swift.
  

[Benyah]

Secluded within the Mountains, sheltered by a lush tundra - in the wake of a battle which had laid devastation upon the lives of many...

A child is born. A child removed from the blessings of Nemea yet, ordained in the love of Caius, the Authority of Enarr, and other latent observations. The child was born at a time where these worlds were in mortal opposition - but perhaps, this child could be the one to break this cycle of hatred.

A child of prophecy, a child with a destiny, a child who had the power to do great harm, or repair generational wounds.

 Before the child was born, debates, discussions, negotiations and inquiries into who would raise the child had been made. The mother knew it could not be raised by her - given her precarious life as refugee where the need to run, or fight might present itself at a moment's notice.

 Its mother wanted it to survive - ironic, that she had told a distant cousin that she could have been an Enarran orphan if things had gone differently.

Yet, her child was made an Orphan.

The mother considered keeping the child and not sending them away, but wisdom saw to it she considered otherwise.

Even so, within this moment, that child remained within its mother's arms. Golden chains flood the lodging it was located within - protectively, unwilling to let any harm come to what was now - her child.

Upon the child's forehead, a cross is marked - not a scar, but a symbolic gesture imbued with Enarran Aether. It serves as a ward of protection, following a rite of prayer, intended to soothe its tears rather than subdue its spirit. The child's mother - an Enarran, wanted to raise it in Enarr's image. Yet;

"I will love them and treat them as my own children, protect them, and guide them with acceptance just as I have you. But I am not a teacher of Enarr faith. This is something that will put them in danger if they seek it out before adulthood, and thus, I will not encourage it until they are adults and able to make that choice for themselves."

A somber reality of the weight of the wind, a birthright denied, a mother unable to change the circumstances she found herself within. The child bears the middle name; "Aundeoth" and last name 'dul Equisol', yet, it remains a question as to if they will ever embrace such; 

"They may remain aware of their true names, but these will be kept in heavy secrecy, until they are old enough to make their own decisions and protect themselves from the backlash of accepting those names."

But, for now, and for a few more years, they would suffer the fate of being raised by the reviled and wayward daughter of the Equisols. 

---

I know not what they will make of you,

So I bestow unto you,

A blessid ordination, 

A sorrowful lamentation, 

A hymn from your muse;

You shall suffer the calamity,

Of being born to me,

But in this life,

You must remember,

You are watched over,

By only one King.

---

The mother of this child recites - imbuing the child's youthful mind with the Eight Divine Commandments, so that its spirit might remember its one true master, not man, not entity, but the God-King;

"Let fairness be the bedrock of your decisions, in agreement with the facets of justice and law."

[*]

"Knowledge is the greatest of your wealth; treasure it, pursue it, for it endures even when gold fades."

[*]

"An oath once sworn is sacred. Break it not, for even unwitting failures will stain the honor of its keeper."

[*]

"Few are bonds stronger than blood; do not forsake your family lightly, or the vows that tie you to your kin."

[*]

"Conquest begets glory and growth, yet little beyond chaos is brought by violence without purpose."

[*]

"The realm is your hearthstone; protect it, cater to it, and bring ruin to any who dare defile its sanctity."

[*]

"Preserve the sanctity of death, and of the cosmic order that binds all."

[*]

"Spare not the wrath for those who sin, be they high or low, strangers or kith. Retribution discriminates naught."

And after such praise, the child falls into a lull - silence and then rest. Their mother embraces them, upon the bed to which they laid, she ensured they would be comfortable and safe. And so, the child and the mother fall into the land of dreams - but only one of them had been haunted by nightmares of Mestra.

Fear within her heart toward the child's future and that of its parents...