The next few weeks brought change.
The church closed its doors. Fear gripped the people of Haven. For generations, the priests and healers had been the pillars of their daily lives—births blessed, wounds mended, souls guided. Without them, it felt like a rug had been ripped out from beneath the entire town. Families huddled in dim kitchens, whispering of curses, of divine punishment for sins they couldn't name, of the kingdom itself crumbling into rift-torn chaos. At first, the panic teetered on the edge of true disorder: fists pounded on barred doors, voices cracked in the square demanding answers no one could give.
But slowly… things began to settle.
Brother Toby stepped forward. One crisp morning, with Hela at his side, he kicked in the heavy oak doors of the old church. Dust swirled in shafts of light as they entered the shadowed nave. Together they worked: stripping away the gilded icons of the old god—whose worship had curdled into judgment and greed—replacing them with simple white cloth draped over altars, fresh herbs and candles arranged in humble patterns. No grand statues, no fearful icons. Just a shrine for the goddess Sera.
He was no longer a priest of the old church. He was the first priest of the Church of Sera.
Sera's following had always been small; she needed no vast priesthood. She hand-picked her believers as they died—those who had sacrificed themselves for others in their final moments. She was a picky goddess. Yet when Toby chose to direct his faith toward her, something shifted in the divine ether. She felt it fully for the first time: the warm, living pulse of a mortal's devotion, raw and growing, different from the quiet surrender of the dead. Artemis wasn't very religious, despite his quiet love for her; she knew she would never draw much true faith from him. But this priest… his belief was new, insistent, almost everyday stronger. It stirred her in ways she had never known.
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Toby's words were different—softer, yet filled with an unyielding strength. His healing gift had not left him; if anything, it burned brighter now, untethered from old dogma. When the people saw him lay hands on a fevered child in the square and watch the flush fade from her cheeks, they began to listen. Day by day his following grew, until the panic faded like smoke on the wind. His faith became their pillar.
What surprised Hela most was how he preached. He didn’t cling to the rigid rules of the old church, nor did he reject everything he once believed. Instead, he wove the familiar with the new. He blended the stories Hela and Lokey had shared—how priests in their old world spoke in parables, in everyday truths, drawing people in with questions rather than decrees.
It was strange, hearing the old hymns give way to tales of sacrifice and the boundless love of Sera’s faith—love that healed rather than condemned. And yet, it worked. The people who had once feared change began to embrace it, tentative at first, then with growing certainty.
Hela would never admit it aloud, but she was taken aback. Toby had made his new beliefs shine so brightly that even she felt their warmth. She was proud of her friend—quietly, fiercely proud.
He also helped them see her in a different light. Toby leaned heavily into the stories Lokey had told him about the goddess of death: a gentle guide for lost souls, not a reaper of terror, but a merciful hand in the dark. Since Hela shared that name, whispers spread. "Hela… like the one the priest speaks of? Could she be divine, sent from their world?" People began to glance at her with a mix of awe and gratitude when she passed. Some even left small offerings—flowers, bread—at the edge of her garden.
One day, as Hela knelt in the dirt tending her herbs, Lokey called from the house.
"Hey, when you're done, I want to talk to you and Artemis for a minute."
She wiped her hands on her apron, brushing soil from her palms, and followed him inside to hear her brother's new plan to grow their strength before it was too late.
