"…it is not theirs..... It is yours."
The priest's voice cut through the gloom. Clear, steady, neither soft nor thunderous, but with a weight that made every syllable fall like a stone into water.
"You are a prophet, Atlas. Our savior."
Atlas let out a slow exhale through gritted teeth. "I've heard worse lies down here."
But the priest did not flinch. He raised his hands—not in blessing, not in theatrics, but as though to hold the truth steady between them.
"If I had not spoken those words," the priest continued, "you would be dead already. The Seraphim would have judged you unworthy not though faith but in rsge.
Yet I spoke, and the spiral of eyes bore witness, and it deemed the words true."
The memory returned, unbidden. The towering Seraphim, its single great eye wreathed in rings upon rings, each etched with unblinking eyes of its own.
