"Ah! So you did post the bounty after all? That surprises me."

"Yes. It has started to interfere with pilgrimages."

"I am certain you won't regret it," he says, smiling gently, before turning to the party to address them fully. "I am Zhed Bekento, High Priest of the Sessrúmnir, but you may just call me Zhed; the formalities tire me."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, High Priest," says Taharqi, who's been drinking these people's every word.

"Now what did I just say, young man? Zhed is fine."

"If the outsider doesn't feel comfortable acting so informally you oughtn't insist, Father," she says, in a firm tone.

"Oh, very well." Then he covers the side of his mouth with a hand to hide it from Niren and stage whispers, "But I won't tell if you won't," with a wink.

"We'll keep that in mind, Zhed."

She sighs tiredly. "In any event, you have your duties to attend to, Father Zhed, as I do mine. If you'll excuse us."

"Of course, of course. May the love of the Goddess accompany you in your path, Mother."

"And you in yours," she replies, then resumes walking.

Annika is like 80% sure there was a ton of subtext there she was entirely missing.

"Apologies for Father Zhed; he is sometimes forgetful of the weight and responsibilities that come with his station."

"Not to worry, I'm sure he means well."

"He always does," she agrees, with a small amount of fond exasperation leaking into her voice.

They arrive at the cathedral and the High Priestess gives them directions to the chapel then excuses herself to prepare for the sermon.

"Why are we doing this?"

"Oh I mostly wanted to have that conversation we just had. It was... enlightening. About the way things work around here, and factions and all."

"Is that necessary for the bounty?"

"It's, um, probably good in general? Adventurers are meant to be nosy, not everything we do is bounties." Or so she surmises. Plus, honestly, even if that weren't the case, it's kind of what she wants to be, proactively solve people's problems and all that. It's not clear how this particular conversation will help with anything, but...

...she's not in this just for the Rebellion, is she. It's kind of obvious in retrospect and a little embarrassing to have taken her this long to realise it.

...right. Her goal is the flourishing of all peoples, Surt is just a means to that end. A pretty big means, to be sure, but when it's not costly it's good for them to try to just... help people. 

"One of us should go back to Ræl," she realises.

"—what for?"

"We're not going to get more details about the bounty until the sermon is over, so this time is" wasted "available to us to do other things, and if it's important to learn more about the local situation then it's worthwhile using that time wisely."

"Oh, that's a very good point. ...Lucky?"

"—yes?"

"You're probably the one of us that's best positioned to do that. I was the one who said we'd watch the service so it would not look good for me to miss it, and you're a lot better than Annika at tracking, let's call it 'social reality'."