Azriel James wanted to know the supreme deity of Judarah, and no one would tell him where to start. He had asked the market traders. He had asked the well women and the goat herders. They all gave the same shrug. Some touched their chests and looked away. One old baker finally spoke. "If anyone still knows," she said, "it's the old priest on the hill. But he doesn't take visitors." Azriel climbed the hill before noon. The old priest lived alone in a leaning house of mud and timber. Azriel knocked. No answer came. He knocked again and heard a cane strike the floor inside. The door opened on a withered man with a white beard down to his waist. This was Ezra, last of the priestly line, the only man who still remembered the old worship. He leaned on a carved staff. His eyes narrowed at the stranger on his step. "I have nothing to sell," Ezra said. "And nothing to confess." "I don't want either," Azriel said. "I want to learn about the supreme deity. Nobody will tell me where the knowledge is kept." Ezra studied him a long moment. Then he laughed, short and dry. "Of course they won't. They've forgotten. Fear made them forget." He turned back inside and left the door open. Azriel took it as an invitation. The room smelled of dust and old smoke. Ezra lowered himself onto a stool. "You ask where the knowledge is kept," he said. "That's the right question. Prayers won't teach you. People won't. The old words were written down and hidden." "Where?" Azriel asked. Ezra reached under his robe and drew out a braided cord. Its strands were woven tight, threaded with bands of red, blue, and green. He held it like something living. "The temple on the far ridge," he said. "The one that fell. Men say it's only broken stone now. But the writings about the deity were sealed in its walls. No one goes there. The stones are cursed, they say." He snorted. "They're not cursed. They're just forgotten." Azriel's heart beat faster. A place. A real place. "Then I'll go." Ezra held up the cord. "Take this first. Wear it. Any believer who still lives will know what it means. Walk into that ruin without it and you'll walk out knowing nothing." He pressed the braid into Azriel's hands. The strands were rough and warm. "Why give this to me?" Azriel asked. "Because I'm the last who remembers," Ezra said. "And I won't last much longer. Someone has to read what's left before the rain finishes the walls." Azriel looped the cord around his neck. He had his answer and his first step. The knowledge waited in the fallen temple, sealed in stone that everyone feared. Now he knew where to begin. He only had to reach the ruin before the old man's warning proved true.