A cruel lord tries to make the temple of helping hands illegal. They come to regret it and repent. -- Anon Guest
"Encouraging vagrancy and generating an atmosphere of listlessness," Pastor Tolerance read the highlights of the notice in her hands. "Sheltering the criminal element... if the building remains, I'll be arrested for masquerading as a woman of the cloth?" She passed it to Bathild, the Priest of Freja.
They had to don their reading glasses to examine the myopic script. "Charity is the bane of honest labor and a poison on the soul of my good citizens? What levels of horseshit...?"
"Ocean deep ones," said Tolerance. "I think ze hates the Church of Kind Hands because of all the otherwise Unwelcome who come to the doors."
"A common symptom of the generous faiths," tutted Bathild. "We're going to talk about this, but first? We help the prime target.
The Church of Kind Hands vanished before the next dawn. Followers of it and all the generous faiths had helped move out every single building. Every stick and stone that made it, too. Even the plants in the garden. The land it stood on looked like a disaster site. The same thing had happened to every Church of Kind Hands in the realm. Moved in their entirety to sites just outside the County's borders.
The next day, all the temples to Aurorus, the Dawn Lord, had the same thing happened to them. As a deity of forgiveness, second chances, death and rebirth, he allied with the followers of Wraithvine.
Freja, goddess of the hearth and hospitality, followed soon after. Following her was Meridia, the goddess of love and lovers. Then, Mastorava, the goddess of fields and harvests.
A decent half of the temples to Tyr, god of justice, also followed suit.
The people couldn't always afford to leave, but they could get their churches and temples out of danger. Acolytes, fostered children, plants, cattle, and all.
As for what happened next...
Those who weren't involved in the big move noticed. They kicked up a stink about it. Those who had been involved also kicked up a stink as if they had no knowledge of it at all. Even the hospices of Lenus, deity of health and healing, 'vanished' or had a reduced capacity to help.
Even though some temples remained - usually to the gods one prayed to prevent their attention - the county quickly became known as the land without gods.
A literally godless country.
And then the Count fell sick. Many who were opposed to hir at this point figured it was a curse. Some blamed it on hir leaving plenty of room for the Unspoken Ones. Mistress Dark(Death),The Pustulent One (Resheph), The Unfated (Tychae)... they had a lot of reign without other gods to block their way.
Or it could be that a lot of hir staff had left without notice, thus leaving hir with many important tasks undone. Such as emptying the privy, or cleaning hir plates. Or cooking hir meals properly. Or making sure hir chimneys were clean, or hir hearth... or hir clothes...
It's amazing how many overlooked jobs become important when they're left undone.
The Count called for Clerics. Begged them to cure hir disease. Though those Clerics prayed as hard as they could, no cure came.
The report was always the same. "My god is not welcome in your lands. My prayers are unanswered."
Finally, in desperation, ze called for Tolerance. She came, and carried the Count to a clean bed. Gave hir clean clothes. Fed hir good soup. Eased hir fever with herbal simples. And, finally, prayed.
The Count recovered, and had the decency to be embarrassed about it all.
"I am... truly sorry," said the Count. "I will rescind my order immediately."
All Tolerance said about it was, "Thank you for learning."
[Photo by Rasmus Gundorff Sæderup on Unsplash]
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