Brother Candle reached St. Jeules ande Neuis after noon prayers, on the third day of Mantans, in the third year of the Patriarchy of Sublime V in Brothe.

Man and boy, adult and child, the villagers should have been getting ready for the bitter long hours of spring planting.

They had been preparing, naturally. But with little enthusiasm. Word had come that a Perfect Master was headed their way. The peasants were eager to see a famous holy man, even if few of them were believers themselves. The people were eager to hear and debate the message the Perfect Master would bring.

Even poor farmers in the Connec enjoyed an active intellectual life. Many minds still could not understand the Maysalean divergences from Episcopal creed—but most Connectens were willing to argue.

The Maysalean Heresy had been around for decades but only lately had it begun to catch on. Though there was as much nationalistic fervor in that as philosophical conviction. The Heresy's growth was a response to the incessant outrages practiced by the illegitimate Patriarchs of Brothe.

ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-SIX YEARS HAD PASSED SINCE THE election of me Connecten Ornis of Cedelete to the Patriarchal throne. Within hours the unheroic Ornis fled the Holy City, harried by a mob whipped into a frenzy by agents of the Brothen Five Families. Who considered the western religious Patriarchy a part of their birthright.

Legitimate Patriarch Ornis, taking die reign name Worthy VI, established himself in the Palace of Kings at Viscesment. Though legitimate in canon law, Worthy's Patriarchy in exile was impotent His own countrymen in the End of Connec did not take him seriously.