The Giants at Hebron
Part 1: When is Past Prologue?
Yannick Lorenz, Nun of the Order of the Blood Cup, watched from the window below the church steeple. The beams of light that lit the night sky had already cut down some of the taller buildings. These cutting beams came from a weapon unknown to her personally, though it seemed to treat stone and wood as giving little more resistance than clay before a sculptor’s finger.
These “Giants” as they were called had many of these beam weapons, and they illuminated the evening sky on the eve before the battle. Despite the beams that struck their city, the armies that attacked them were not yet visible to her eyes. Was it some trick or deception played by the Warmonger Cultists, or were the giants simply so tall that they could see the city over the horizon before her own eyes could see them?
In her youth, Sister Yannick had a voracious appetite for scientific and technical manuals. A life as a Red Bishop was spread out before her, perfect in its sterility and chastity. She hated the emotional messes that most people were, frowned on tired ideals like love and compassion, and thought sex was an act of animals not enlightened humans. In other words, she was completely wrong about almost everything.
The coup de grace of her extreme wrongness about how she viewed the world was when she attended Thomasville at the age of fifteen. They told her that her genetics weren’t good enough to be a Red Bishop. She was not born an immutable. In her rage at herself, her upset and frustration, she locked herself up in a convent. It was there that Inquisitor Lord Siedermann found her at age nineteen and brought her to live in Bartsport as his personal scribe.
Sister Yannick had loved the position. The wise old Inquisitor would allow her to read his scientific texts on starships, magnetic rail technology, even on cybernetics and nanotechnology in her off time. He encouraged her to work in his lab despite what she saw as her genetic handicap.
Sister Yannick was unlike an entire generation of Church of One girls, who had been relegated to be nothing more than breeding stock for a new generation of knights of Dunesphere. By the time she reached the age of thirty she could assemble a plasma pistol blind folded, knew thirty different types of explosives by texture and smell alone, and could rebuild a damaged engine with only the available scrap and a metal file.
Now an adult woman, a full member of the Order of the Blood Cup, she had watched the haughty Red Bishops of Thomasville get their just desserts. When she had learned the Olgogs had sacked the town and leveled its walls, and gave the Red Bishops a good beating, Sister Yannick had nearly celebrated. Then she had remembered how she was supposed to avoid pride. So she simply thanked god for working in mysterious ways.
When Inquisitor Lord Siedermann had her sent to the Provisional Colony of Hebron, she knew her orders were to keep an eye on the “knights” following the apostate Lord Grimaldus and his heretic knight Sir Resugent.
As far as the High Inquisitors in Dunesphere were concerned, these provisional colonies were only useful if they were in the hands of men loyal to the Church of One.
The Noble Lords of Dunesphere disagreed, knowing a church of one friendly colony also open to other races would allow much needed trade. In fact many of the Noble Lords of Dunesphere already had merchants in the Provisional Colony, setting up trade deals that would push profit to Dunesphere while paying hefty sums to the Provisional Colony as well while keeping the clients in the dark that they were dealing with Dunesphere. This along with offworld colonies being scouted by General Vulfrym, would open a new gilded age of trade for Dunesphere. The Church of One coffers would once again fill with coin.
Lord Siedermann had told her neither side was right. The Provisional Colony would be a source of instability for Dunesphere as the High Inquisitors expected, but that was fine by Siedermann. They would also be a source of mercs and other Olgog agents that Siedermann could bring his war back against those who had hurt him two years prior by destroying Bartsport.
Sister Yannick remembered the glee that Sidermann had as he recounted how it had played out. Those who destroyed his beloved Bartsport and all who helped them were now beset, trapped or moments from springing the trap on themselves. Sister Yannick remembered the pictures of the civilians killed at Bartsport, frozen solid by the Olgog’s attacks using the weather itself.
Siedermann had spoken with such joy.
Bill of Gultor’Uf had been driven from his lands, and now he was a refugee living in the ruins of Karov. As Bill had taken Bartsport from Siedermann, so Bill had lost his own home.
Glog of Or’Lur had become a test subject and subject to terrible experiences, and now he had lost the trust of the United Tribes of Refuge and the Lur Union.
As Glog had cost Siedermann the trust of the his fellow Inquisitors, so Glog had lost the trust of his fellow tribals.
Kolgol of Ka Rhug watched his entire tribe be consumed by the worship of his dark god Kalok, and become something evil and twisted.
As Kolgol had ended the family of Siedermann, so Kolgol had lost his own family.
And the list went on through each and every tribal leader who had personally taken part in the death of his beloved family, his oasis of genetically engineered perfection in Bartsport.