"We congratulate you on establishing your family, Holy Son!"
One sentence. Perfect unison. Tens of thousands of throats delivering it as though every woman in the valley had been waiting so long to say the words that the timing came on its own.
'The announcement...' Lilith realized.
Then Isveth drew her sword.
The blade came free in a single clean motion, and the Head Maiden reversed it and drove it into the earth at her feet, point-first, both hands releasing the hilt in the same breath.
An offering. Her authority surrendered to the ground before the man it served.
Then she went to the ground after it, forehead touching the grass, palms extending forward, and behind her the army followed in a wave that swept from front to rear in one long breath.
Full prostration, foreheads to the earth, hands out.
Matriarchs in ceremonial white folding low.
Shrine elders who had shepherded the faith of their people for eight and nine thousand years laying themselves flat.
