Exile: The Book of Ever

17: Of Two Minds

"Three stars, three stakes, so the passverse claims," said Thayne, crossing one long leg over the other in his creaking wooden chair. Every now and again Ever saw a glint of his strange, frightening blue eyes, like a sliver of sky peeking out over the black glasses. "Three stakes remaining of the faith that became the Blessed people. But there was another."

Stake was an old word, rarely used anymore, for a large territory of the Church. After the Fall, when the Blessed had first fled the Desolation, they divided into stakes for protection and survival.

"There were only three," said Chy. "Everyone knows that."

"Everyone in Bountiful maybe," said Thayne. "Everyone in Camora and Serai too, most likely."

The fact that he knew the names of the other two Blessed communities was worrisome; they were even more clandestine than Bountiful was, being closer to apostate lands, and the faithful in those communities had hidden their holdfasts well.

Thayne leaned forward toward Ever and waggled his fingers upwards into the air as if traveling along a map.

"Far to the north and west, over the vast Desolation that is the remains of the American Empire, there was a territory known as Denali, which in even more ancient times was called Alaska. Great and beautiful it was, and wide and rugged and dangerous—a place of dreams and fantasy and, ultimately, death. Not a place for man."

"What's the point of this?" asked Acel. "Are we supposed to sit here and believe there were more of our people, hidden from us, all this time? Why should we believe anything you tell us?"

"As I've already explained, you shouldn't," said Thayne. "But as you are in my power, you will listen to what I have to say. Whether you decide to believe any of it is a different matter entirely."

Clearing his throat, he continued.

"But since you're all so intent on making this an interactive exercise, tell me, children: where was the Sundering? It's all right, you can tell me, I already know. I just want to know if you know. Let's see what they're teaching you these days in your little bubbles of paradise."

"A town called Lebanon," answered Rolan.

"That's right!" said the Prophet, brandishing his pointer finger in the air over his shoulder as if Rolan were a schoolchild who had solved a math problem.

The history of the Blessed had been passed down from father to son and mother to daughter since the first days after the Fall, though some said that the tale changed in the telling. Everyone knew the Sundering, however; it was, arguably, the most important part of the Blessed's exodus from the West.

"Lebanon, in Missouri," explained Thayne, "was announced, by whatever methods of communication the Old People had at the time, as a meeting place, a rawndayvoo, as they used to say. Those members of the Savior's Church were to meet there by a certain date so that the faithful who survived the Fall and the turmoil afterward would have a place to gather and decide on their next step."

"And so they gathered," said Ever, "four thousand of them, and a great conference was held, and the High Priests decided they would travel east—"

"Even into the very throat of the Fire," said Thayne. "Yes, yes, that's right. And so they split into different groups, to increase the chances that some of them would survive the journey, and traveled east. And thus were born the stakes of Camora, and Serai, and lastly Bountiful.