It was a dark time for the Light.

Another of the Divine champions of the Light passed into the
void of uncertainty; prominent members of Celest shared membership
with His Order. New Celest was thrown into disarray; its role-model
citizens went quiet without notice, others finally stopped caring.

I was approached to form the Brotherhood; by who I am not sure.
Never once was I given any specific instruction - never told to
hunt this person, or treat people a certain way. All the letter
said was I had been watched, that I had worked tirelessly to
strengthen the Light; that I should bind together those who
dissented and give them direction.

And so the Brotherhood of the Light was formed.

It was never a large group; no more than thirty followers from
Celest joined. Scholars, writers, fighters - came together in
unity to fight a common cause. This was not the Taint; although
it certainly should be fought. It fought Apathy. It fought decay.
It seeked to give the mortal followers of the Light a reason to
be here; to have faith in themselves and other Brothers (not all
of who were male!) but above all - to have faith in the power of
the Light.

For a time this worked; people looked inwards and found this
fledgling Light and kindled it; slowly feeding it with their
hopes, their desires, their friendships. They saw that if they
worked together they could achieve great things - and soon the
malcontent, the unhappiness was gone, replaced only with action,
happiness and respect.

But, as happens in Celest, this isn't enough. Those who joined the
Brotherhood swore an oath of secrecy to each other but an oath
of fealty to the Light. Never once did I or anyone else attempt
to be a leader; we did things because they needed to be done and
everyone wanted to do it. This worked for a while; but then
the Brotherhood attracted the attention of the Celest government
and Lady Terentia.

I thought members of the Brotherhood - indeed, anyone who swore
fealty to the Light - would put the Light above all else.
This is all I asked. Lady Terentia did not see things this way.
She demanded her followers swear undivided loyalty to Her and Her
Order and this upset a number of people. Some left Her Order;
others left the Brotherhood. I tried as best I could to mitigate
this - we're all in this together, I thought - but to no avail.

On one side were Her followers who left - the other, Brotherhood
members who had 'words' with Her. I do not know what transpired
but whatever it was it drove a stake through the heart of our
little group. Soon the remaining Terentia followers decided they
were being hated and left us; some Brothers channeled their own
hatred into the remaining followers branding them traitors.

Everything fell apart.

I've now dissolved the Broterhood of the Light. It will, like all
things, fall into the annals of history as a mere curiousity on
Celest's bumpy road forward. I've put my heart and soul into this
place for nearly 40 years; I've seen city and guild leaders come
and go. I've seen Divine come in, attract a following, try to change
things, but fail - They always do, because they forget that the
behind all change must be the will of mortals. No flood, no fire,
no sword, no form of coercion can change what Celest can and will
do. Mortals have to want to do it themselves - we've all seen
what happens when mortals put everything they are into a Divine.
Bless Aesyra.

One day, many moons from now, the followers of the Light will do
great things not because their Divine of the day shows them what
to do, but because they want to do it. They will, I hope, find
strength not in an Order, but in themselves - and when this happens
they will find true happiness. Until then, Celest is doomed to
repeat the same mistakes it has in the past because its members
keep looking for something to cling onto - when everything they
never needed was right there with them.

Morik Whitbaum

Penned by my hand on the 1st of Dvarsh, in the year 146 CE.