"Either, my Lord," he said. "I am unsure. I am unsure what you would do with me."

"First, I would ask your name. " Msonus says, with a smile. "For certainly no one can decide what to do with you if they do not know what you are. "

"I have forgotten my name," said the man. "I am an orphan.. the villagers call me 'Blindeye'."

"And are you blind?" Msonus asks, with curiosity. He closes his own eyes, though with the pop of a small eye, he still sees through that proxy.

"No," he replied. "Just.. mundane. Not a mystic, not a seer, not a visionary or a sorcerer.. blind to the invisible."

"Well then, perhaps we shall find you a mundane task. And maybe someday you'll be truly blinded! Wouldn't you like that?" Msonus says, not waiting for a response.

"Come, we will talk again later, but it would be nice to see the others, the ones who discarded you."

"They're all meditating at the Monastery of the Third, Lord," he said. "I am not welcome there."

"Well then, we'll just have to take you there, " Msonus says.

"It seems to me that even a... ah, what do they call you? Blindeye? should be forgiven if he sees his lord himself," the god continues, gesturing vaguely at the horizon for some reason. His voice slows down, becoming contemplative, with a rising intonation as if asking more questions.

"But more to the point, (though perhaps it is the point we should loathe the most) it is certainly no accident that you are the one who has found me. "

"Lord?" said the man, confused. "No accident..? What do you mean?"

They begin to wander towards the Monastery of the Third.

As they continue, Msonus speaks, looking ahead.

"Meaning is found most where there is confusion," he says quietly. "And with you, there is more than enough of that. Certainly where it is that you do not understand is where it is that you must look, don't you think?

Those who decreed you Blind perhaps should try to close their eyes for a moment and see. "

"I.." the man's voice trailed off.

Soon they were at the Monastery of the Third, a grand building made of purple stone and erected in worship to the Great Msonus, Architect of the Universe.

As they arrive, Msonus stops the man on the outskirts, and waves a hand. With a pop, and eye appears, and jets off into the temple to look at what lay inside.

"Are there many here?" Msonus asks. "Our kind, I mean."

"Close to five hundred.. there are several temples like this throughout Som, but this is the main - and largest - one we've built."

Msonus's eye found that the man was right: the temple was filled with many people, lined up in dozens of rows of ten, bowing and praying towards a large bronze statue of himself. The statue showed some inaccuracies, but was mostly flattering.

Msonus looks on at the temple, still talking to his guide, though he asks some surprisingly direct questions, "And, does anything happen in these rooms? Is it just bowing and statue building?"


He stops, shakes his head. His voice becomes dreamy again. "I suppose one cannot know what is inside the forbidden. Then, what comes out of it?"

"Pardon, Lord?" he looked confused.

"There is an inner sanctum.. where the High Seers do their work. Only your clergy is allowed entrance, my Lord."

"How exciting. "

He starts to walk forwards. "Very well then, shall we go in?"

"I... I'm sorry, Lord, but I've been barred. I dare not. They'll cane me."

He was scared.

"Don't be ridiculous," Msonus says. "If they cane you in the presence of their lord, I will personally take the blows for you. You are my guide, and my guide is my own. "

"T-thank you, Lord," he replied, a little shocked at the kindness of his God.

They were at the great doors of the monastery, made of solid, purple wood. The doors, as always during worship, were barred from the inside.

Msonus, lacking anything better to signal with, knocks on the door.
"You would do best to stand at my side," he says to the guide. "For that is how a good guide should be."

The chanting inside continued, but Msonus had to wait for a few moments before the bolts were undone and a large, heavily-muscled priest stepped out of the chapel, glaring at the two of them. He wielded a long, heavy piece of wood - a beating cane.

"You," he said, pointing towards Msonus's guide, "You've brought a friend. How clever. Leave my presence, or I'll have the two of you drowned."

"Those who cannot see, perhaps don't deserve to," Msonus says, flicking his finger. With a slight sound of the wind blowing, the man's eyes suddenly cease functioning, leaving him blinded. He smiles and wags his finger, purely for his own enjoyment.

"Now, don't you think your lord should be able to enter with whatever guide he chooses?"

The man did not reply; he only screamed, clutching his eyes. The meditative ceremony within had halted. They were all looking back - looking at Msonus.

The god smiles silently as the man cries out and clutches his eyes uselessly.

"Now, are all of you going to see, or shall I open your eyes as well?" Msonus asks the room, leading his guide around the screaming man as if he were merely a disturbance. His voice is loud, but not shouted.

"What - what?" asked one of the high priests. "What.. who is this intruder? Who is this witch you have brought upon us, fool?" he asked, cursing the guide.

"Kill them both!"

The people began to stand up, drawing small ceremonial daggers.