One… Two… Three…
My fists slammed against the rough bark of a training tree, sweat dripping into the soil below. My bandaged knuckles burned, but I didn't stop.
Four hundred ninety-eight… Four hundred ninety-nine…
I had gone back to my routine. Push-ups at dawn. Squats until my legs shook. Runs in circles around the church courtyard while guards whispered about "the strange boy."
It was the only way to drown out the noise in my head.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Narsh collapsing, blood pooling on the floor.
Every time I exhaled, I wondered: Where did her life come from? Whose thread did I cut short to tie hers back together?
I slammed the tree one last time, gasping.
"…If this is a gift… why does it feel like a curse?"
---
"Because it might be both."
I turned. Malrik stood at the edge of the courtyard, his priest's robes as immaculate as always despite the exhaustion etched into his face.
He approached, folding his hands behind his back.
"The Council has spoken, Ark. Tomorrow, we will go to the Grand Hospital."
"The… hospital?" I frowned.
"Yes," he said firmly. "To test your power. To determine whether you can heal… or only revive."
---
The words sank into me like stones.
"Heal…?"
Malrik's eyes glimmered with something ancient, something almost wistful.
"Five hundred years ago, there was a priest—blessed beyond measure. They say he could mend bones with a touch, cure plagues with a prayer, even restore sight to the blind. His name was sung in every corner of the land."
I swallowed. "But…?"
Malrik's voice grew heavy.
"But the miracles stopped. One by one, the divine blessings faded. It was as if the Gods turned away. The world learned to live with wounds, with sickness, with death. We priests became… caretakers of the body and soul, not healers."
He looked at me directly, his gaze sharp as a blade.
"That is why they fear you, Ark. You are an echo of something lost—something people thought the heavens abandoned forever. They do not know if you are salvation… or heresy."
---
I sank back against the tree, chest heaving.
Salvation… or heresy.
Was I reviving Narsh because the Gods willed it… or because I was stealing from the threads of fate?
Malrik laid a hand on my shoulder.
"Tomorrow will tell us much. Be ready."
---
As he turned to leave, Narsh's voice rang out from a window overhead.
"Oi, Ark!"
We both looked up. She leaned out of her bedchamber window, bandaged throat gleaming white, grinning like the demon she was.
"Don't worry about tomorrow. If you screw it up, I'll just stab myself again and we'll call it round two!"
"NARSH!!" I roared.
Malrik covered his face with his palm, muttering, "Merciful Goddess… give me strength."