As was fitting for a junior Kessentai, Ro'moloristen took an obscure position towards the back of the oddly designed, auditoriumlike, assembly room. The floor, to the extent an Aldenata-based ship could be said to have permanent floors, swept upward as it swept back, allowing the young Kessentai a full view of the assembling God Kings and the central raised dais against the far wall.
While himself relegated to the rear by his junior position, the young God King's betters—elders, in any case—took more prominent positions towards the front. Centered at the very front, right against the cleared semicircular area that had been left around the raised dais, stood Athenalras, arms crossed before the massive equine chest in the posture of supplication and serenity.
The thousands of other God Kings present in the auditorium likewise matched Athenalras' pious posture as an elderly Posleen, a Kenstain—Bin'ar'rastemon—a once prominent Kessentai who had given up the Path to become a very special form of Kessenalt. No mere castellaine was Bin'ar'rastemon, no mere steward for another God King. Once the toll of years and wounds had begun to tell, he had turned his clan and its assets over to his senior eson'antai, or son, only keeping control of sufficient to support himself in a modest style as he entered the Way of Remembrance.
Something between historians and chaplains, the Kessenalt of the Way of Remembrance served to maintain and remind the People of their history, their values, their beliefs . . . and the very nasty way of the world unwittingly inflicted upon them by the Aldenata and their one-size-fits-all, cookie-cutter, philosophy.
Clad in ceremonial harness of pure heavy metal, Bin'ar'rastemon—old and with the Posleen equivalent of arthritis creaking every joint—ambled up the steps of the dais, ancient scrolls tucked into his harness.
Though Kenstain normally received little respect as a class, except perhaps from the God Kings they served directly, the followers of the Way of Remembrance were widely and highly valued. As Bin'ar'rastemon centered himself upon the dais, he ceremonially greeted the assembled God Kings, who ceremoniously answered, "Tell us, Rememberer, of the ways of the past, that we might know the ways of the future."
Bin'ar'rastemon unrolled a scroll formally, placing it upon a frail-seeming podium. On this he placed a hand. Yet he was a Rememberer, still in full possession of his mind, however much his body may have aged. In any case, he needed no scroll for this tale.
"From the Book of the Knowers," he began . . .