1167 The Brionac Plateau, Western Fódlan

It wasn't often that Anthiese Celica Lima was allowed to stray far from the abbey grounds. In the last year alone there had been three attempts on her life, quite a feat for a girl orphan girl of the tender age of six.

The grass here was past her waist and the air felt sticky and wet. There was a strong pungent odor that she couldn't place with just a hint of sweetness. The sky looked heavy with rain and the clouds seemed to dip down from it until they scraped across the field as a mist. She didn't know why or how, but she felt that they were on the cusp of rain. Still she didn't feel that there was any danger here.

She shrunk back behind Cardinal Velarin, being careful not to brush up against him. She was never to touch them in any unwarranted way and they were careful to take heed of this and chastise her when she ignored the rule. Her whole life this had been drilled into her, it should have been second nature, but it was a constant thought.

There was a larger clearing ahead where the grass wasn't as tall where a rolling behemoth of a wooden structure sat on six massive wheels. There were chariots and wagons back in the Western Abbey, but nothing like this. Near the rolling building was a woman dressed in an ornate white robe with a midnight blue cloak draped over her shoulders. She was astonishingly beautiful with long light green hair. A beaded circlet encircled her forehead and atop her crown was an intricate gold headdress with dark and light stones adorning the front. No one had bothered to tell her who they were coming to meet, but Anthiese was sure this was Archbishop Rhea of the Central Church.

It felt oddly appropriate that someone so gorgeous and young could also be the head of the Church. Most of the Cardinals that Anthiese had interacted with and the Abbot who had helped raise her looked like they could have been this woman's parents. Still this had to be Rhea. There were never drawings or pictures of Rhea in any of the books she read, but that seemed to be Church tradition, something deep down inside of her just knew.

A group of Central Church Knights were clustered around the woman, the wore cloaks of gold and navy much like hers with the church insignia etched into the front part of the shoulders where it connected to their armor. Their faces were all hidden behind helms save for one man: a blonde with a lined face and his hair trimmed close on the sides. He kept his eyes on the field, watching the tall grass in the distance with such a distrust that it made Anthiese take note.

Sister Bogan had said that this place was routinely used by the students of the Officers Academy for practicing when someone asked if it were a safe place to meet. Anthiese had questioned, out of turn, what the Officers Academy was, but they only answered her with stern glances before turning away.

The blond man torched forward, his hands at his belt. His voice was surprisingly soothing and he spoke with a kind of familiarity that felt out of place. "This her?" He looked Anthiese over before squatting down in the grass to be at eye level with her. "She's no older than my daughter," he said.

Rhea seemed to glide forward, her dress flowing around her just out of happenstance, not because the movement of her legs. "Now Jeralt, everyone has to start somewhere. It is said that even the Goddess herself was but a child at one point." Rhea's voice seemed so light that it shouldn't have been audible, but it was still clear.

Jeralt scratched his head, leaving one hand to rest on his hip. "If you say so."

"Velarin. Grissom. It has been quite some time," Rhea said.

"Lady Rhea," Cardinal Velarin said with a bow.

"We know that there has been less communication between our branches in the past decade or so, but that's only because of the questionable nature of some discoveries made," Grissom said.

Rhea nodded. "You transgressions are forgiven, the world seems to have hit is stride if the histories are to be believed. We all might have become more lax with our duties in these times. I am not immune."

"Still, this latest bit of news is of the variety that we had to meet in person to share. There are eyes everywhere, you know?" Said Velarin.

"Indeed there are," said Jeralt.

"Did you bring what we asked?" Grissom said.

Rhea regarded the massive wooden structure on wheels. "It's all there, it wasn't an easy thing to mobilize, you're lucky that one of the foremost experts on Crests happened to come to us just a few years ago."

A slender man dressed in a scholar robes appeared through the crowd of knights, his sideburns were just beginning to gray, but he looked young in the face. His eyes seemed sadder than they had any right to be. He was clean shaven, but wore thin framed glasses.

"Hanneman," he introduced himself.

Cardinal Grissom went to shake his hand, but something about the name gave him a pause. "Hanneman? Von Essar—from the Empire?"

"I would prefer not to be called that name," Hanneman said. "We're to use this on the girl I'm guessing?" He pointed to Anthiese. "We had better start soon."

Jeralt shook his head. "I'm still not sure how you got this huge thing to work outside of a building, Professor."

"It wasn't easy, the Crest Viewer in my office was actually the oldest I've ever seen intact. Most of them are cobbled together things only working through extremely shoddy methods, but the Archbishop happened to have two on hand that were from the time of the Goddess on hand. They're much more compact and reliable than anything were are capable of producing today," Hanneman said.

"Most of the structure is just to sustain the weight of it all, we're still not sure how these older ones work, but with any luck Hanneman will figure it out," Rhea said with a soft smile.

Everyone went to setting up the Crest Viewer, the walls folded down to become ramps up to the center and there were hooked wooden supports that held up the ceiling. Jeralt directed the knights to encircle the thing pulling ropes and dragging the wood until the raised dais of the Crest Viewer stood in the center of the field.

As the Cardinals led her past and she followed Rhea up to the top of the platform, Anthiese felt someone touch the top of her head. Jeralt tussled her hair as she past and the Cardinals gasped, but did nothing about it.

Hanneman met them at the top of the structure and began to dust off the globe in the floor at the center with a clothe. "Whenever you're ready, Lady Rhea, the test can begin."

Rhea took Anthiese's hands in hers, they were incredibly warm and soft, but for some reason they were trembling. It had been a long time since anyone had touched her hands like that, especially anyone from the church. When she was younger and couldn't yet bathe herself they had a servant woman from Duscur named Zyah to help her with it and other tasks that she couldn't perform herself. Shortly after she turned five she had been told that Zyah passed away in her sleep.

"Young Anthiese, we have to perform a test, I am sure that you have done this before."

She walked over to the center of the dais and glanced around to Hanneman and then over at where the Cardinals waited. Then she held her hand out over orb set down into the floor.

A beam of yellow light erupted from the floor, passed through her hand and spread out to form a little orb with a sigil inside: a Crest. Hanneman clambered over to Anthiese's side.

"An as of yet undiscovered Crest?" He said pushing his glasses up onto his nose.

Rhea was clenching her robes between her hands. "That is the lost Crest of Mila," said Rhea.

Hanneman had pulled a small journal out of one of his pocket, opened it wand was scribbling inside of the matings of the first pages in what seemed like one single motion. His hand moving quick and deliberate, careful not to smudge the ink.

"I've—I've never heard that spoken of!" Hanneman said.

Rhea got down, squatting to Anthiese's level. "Who are your mother and father, child?"

"I don't know," she replied.

Rhea's eyes glistened with tear of remorse. "An orphan," she said. "Well, you have a family now. I am your family."

Jeralt turned, shock playing across his worn face. "You plan to take her back to Garreg Mach?"

"We can not allow it," Grissom said.

"What?" Rhea's eyes narrowed.

Cardinal Velarin's shadow darkened the space between Rhea and Anthiese. "She belongs in the Wester Church where she…"

Jeralt stepped in closer, his hands at his waist where there was a dagger and a sword. But Rhea pushed a hand into his chest as if to hold him back. "Jeralt, please. We came here to see something of interest and what we have found is nothing short of a miracle. If we must take our leave, I do so satisfied."