~A half hour later

"This is decidedly not a princess." Mirhalim grumbled at the sheaf of age stained parchment that Seshuan had set on the solid oaken desk.

Seshuan eyed him suspiciously.

"You had to have been there, brother" Rior said and Seshuan dropped his gaze, looking once again at the pile of parchment.

"So why am I being allowed to participate in this unknown quest when such secrecy is to be had even amongst your own family members?" Mirhalim asked Seshuan with a slight amount of disbelief in his voice.

"Rior will be travelling far with this document, and I thought not to send him with experienced knights that would look as if they were guarding something of import, thus attracting attention. You are the closest among the young knights I will send with you to Rior and thus will be his second and will carry out his duty of deliverance if he should be incapacitated. That is why you must know about these. However you may not read these papers nor will you, Rior, be allowed to read them. I will rather tell you all you need to know about them."

Seshuan paused, getting his breath and stroked his light-blond beard.

"They were written over the past few decades and are a collection of heresy, simply reading them now is punishable by law, unless allowed by high ranking members of the clergy, and the man who has written them has been burnt as a heretic."

"Then why haven't these writings been burnt!" shouted Rior "The heresy in them should be purged!"

"They would have, had a mistake not been made in the trial." Seshuan responded, trying to calm Rior down. "Just before the trial a new law had been introduced by King Delita that said that any writings done by nobles contains on them a death sentence to any who destroys the writings. It was supposed to stop the burning of tax statements that seems to happen every so often. Nowadays they have understood that law and in heretical trials simply strip the man of his title and then destroy his work, but then they did not know and as a man attempted to set fire to the papers a king's knight brought up the point of law and prevented the burning. The heretic, Olan Durai a conspirator with the heretic Ramza, was still a noble when he was burnt at the stake. Our father, one of the juror Knight-Templars, claimed responsibility for holding onto the work so that they would not profane the halls of any sacred building they would be stored in."

A now much calmer Rior asked his brother "Where then will we take them?"

"I do not know. Your specific instructions are in the envelope on the desk to its right"

The envelope was stained deep with age and sealed with three distinct seals. One, of house Illu, showed the sun and the Illu crest in it. The other two neither recognized. One was two wolves fighting for dominance and the other was a seal of the church but what the specific seal was different than any they had seen before.

"Why the three seals brother?" Rior asked, after some time of staring at the envelope.

"These appear to be the three groups that sealed the instructions of the bearer. They are the bearer's seal, ours, the churches, though I have never seen this specific seal before, and a witness, another seal that seems to lurk on the edge of my memory. Perchance opening will bring about more knowledge but I would ask that you not open these instructions in anyone's presence, as well as not opening them till you are ready to set out."

"So we should gather the knights first then Seshuan?" Mirhalim asked, despite seeming to already know the answer in his eyes

"Yes, Mirhalim. You also must not tell these knights that you choose the instructions in the letter, even if they ask most pointedly about it." Seshuan sat back in his chair and folded his hands on his chest "Now stop asking questions you already know the answers too and get ready to leave. You should depart in a maximum of three days from now".

With that he ushered them out the room he had briefed them in and one of Rior's other brothers, Jemrik, went in fully armoured. In his hand he carried a knight-sword, brilliantly embossed with gold runes. It was Rior's father's sword, obviously his task had something to do with it.

Rior whispered to him as he was staring at the magnificence of the sword, even sheathed as it was, "So have any ideas about who to bring with us?"

Mirhalim put his hands behind his head and replied "I can definitely think of who I don't want to bring. I have a few ideas, but I'd rather wait till we get to the field. Besides we don't even know if they will accept when we ask them."

"Who wouldn't take such an opportunity?"

"I wouldn't know myself, but I'm sure someone in the barracks would refuse"

Rior tried changing the topic with Mirhalim "So you ever seen those seals before?"

"I only recognized your house's seal, other than that I have no idea. Probably just some branch of the church, and perhaps a superior Knight-Templar's seal."

"Maybe the letter will tell us."

"Maybe." Mirhalim paused, "So this is your grand quest? Delivery boy? It's better than nothing, and I suppose it gets us out of the hardest month of training. Pretty much everyone will clamour to come and skip that. You have any ideas about who to ask to tag along?"

"I'm thinking maybe Cape. He is really good, you know."

"Too good. Besides, he is the only one I think that would enjoy remaining here to train."