Vested in Glory

The robes were heavier than she expected.

Not in weight.

In meaning.

Aveline knelt at the center of the temple floor, palms resting against cool marble veined with gold. Incense burned in quiet spirals along the perimeter, and the vaulted ceiling carried the low hum of gathered voices—priests, magistrates, soldiers. Witnesses.

She kept her eyes lowered.

Before her stood the High Cantor, ancient hands steady despite the years. Draped over his forearms lay the sigiled robes: deep indigo, embroidered with thread that caught the light like distant constellations. Along the hem and collar, intricate symbols interlocked in perfect geometry—wards of restraint, oaths of clarity, bindings of purpose.

Every sigil represented a vow.

Every stitch, a sacrifice.

“Do you understand,” the Cantor asked softly, “that these marks are not ornament?”

“I do,” Aveline replied.

Her voice did not waver.

She had earned this place. Years of study in the cloisters. Years more in the field, where sigils were not ink on parchment but living structures woven in the air to shield caravans, to mend shattered arches, to contain fires that would have swallowed whole districts. She had bled through two campaigns, not as a soldier but as a stabilizer—holding collapsing lines together with threads of luminous script.

Glory had never interested her.

Precision had.

The Cantor lowered the robes onto her shoulders.

The fabric settled with a whisper.

For a breathless moment, nothing happened.

Then the temple floor responded.

Lines flared outward from beneath her knees, gold light racing through channels carved centuries ago. The sigils along her collar shimmered and aligned, each symbol turning minutely until they faced true north, true intent.

A warmth spread across her back—not heat, but recognition.

The robes were not empowering her.

They were measuring her.

She felt it like a thousand small questions pressing gently against her spine.

Will you bind what must be bound? Will you stand where others fall back? Will you accept the burden of being right when right is unwelcome?

Aveline inhaled.

“Yes,” she whispered—not to the Cantor, not to the crowd—but to the weight of it all.

The sigils brightened.

Across the chamber, a cracked pillar shuddered. Dust fell in a thin cascade. The stone’s fracture lines traced themselves in gold, then sealed as if stitched by invisible hands.

A murmur rippled through the witnesses.

Aveline rose slowly to her feet.

The robes moved with her, not flowing but settling into place, their embroidery faintly luminous. The air around her felt taut, disciplined, like a bowstring drawn but not loosed.

She did not feel larger.

She felt narrower—focused to a single edge.

The Cantor inclined his head. “You are vested.”

Aveline turned toward the temple doors. Beyond them waited disputes that would not resolve cleanly, rival factions who would test the limits of sacred law, threats that required containment rather than conquest.

The robes did not make her glorious.

They made her accountable.

And as the doors opened and light spilled in, she squared her shoulders beneath their measured weight.