A week passed by with me confined to my tent. Only members of Nigel's squad knew about what happened, and only they were allowed entry. Two guards were posted at all hours outside my tent, and I was forbidden to leave it unsupervised. The first few days, I complained to Nigel about this, but this was at the request of the chaplain. I didn't know the church held so much sway over the military.
After a few days, I was allowed to leave my tent under supervision. That meant I could continue training with Kona and Nigel.
Eventually, the time came, and the missionary of the church arrived at the gates of Red Beach Outpost and was escorted into my tent in the late hours of the night while I was trying to sleep.
"Écartez-vous." [Move aside]
I heard an unknown voice say from outside my tent. I opened my eyes and looked over towards the entrance, and saw a man enter. He was tall and donned a black robe with a white stripe in the middle that hung from his shoulders to his feet. He had short curly brown hair and had rounded glasses. He walked up to me, clutching a book in his right hand against his chest.
I sat up and rubbed my eyes; my bedsheet fell away, revealing a scar on my chest.
He stopped and looked down at me. He reached into his robe and pulled from it a pendant, holding it out by the chain as he approached me, holding the pendant over my head for a moment before putting it away.
"What was that about?"
He let out a soft sigh and cleared his throat.
"I'm surprised you speak Imperial. That was just for my protection; no need to worry. My name is
Disciple Drusus from the order of the seven saints. I have just arrived to check on you to find out how urgent this case is. If you don't mind, please lie back down and allow me to inspect you."
I lay back down in the bed, looking up as Drusus stepped closer. Opening the book he was holding and flicking through it. He held it with one hand and with the other held it out over my body. Hovering it just above my chest.
"In nomine sanctorum, qui miseris humanitatem dederunt, qui peccatum ab homine expulerunt, ut eos puros redderent. Divinam potestatem ultra murum evoco, qui animabus mortuorum susurrat. Purifica hanc animam."
As the man spoke, I thought I might feel something. Henri spoke of magic, about how it was nothing more than a fairy tale. If magic were real, though, I might feel something. But nothing happened, there was no convulsion, no pain, nothing more than a twitch in my eye.
Once Drusus finished, he snapped the book closed and looked down at me. Inspecting my face. I looked back up at him, trying to figure out what he was thinking.
"It seems to me that you hold nothing demonic within your body. I will go and talk with the chaplain who summoned me and return to you tomorrow. Goodnight."
The man turned and simply walked out of the tent. I sat up as he walked away, watching him go. No demonic presence in my body? Is he lying, or did nothing really happen? As I looked on towards the exit of my tent, in the furthest corner, I saw Wrath's eyes peering at me from the darkness, and his voice rang in my mind.
"Mere words can do nothing. Chants and totems hold no power. Magic is dead. There is nothing to fear from this man. He is weak."
"Dead? Does that mean magic was once real?"
"I'm real, what would you call me?"
"But you're ancient. Thousands of years old."
"As are the few things in the world that are still linked to that place. Where magic resided."
"What place? What are you talking about?"
His glowing eyes faded back into the shadows, but I feel like I knew his answer. He wasn't sure himself; it was just a feeling. A long-lost memory that lingered faintly enough to be recalled but too faint to understand. Perhaps in my dream tonight, he might show me something, something about magic, if it was real or not. I would like to know.
As I slept, I had a dreamless night. It felt as if I had simply closed my eyes for a few minutes, and when I opened them again, the sun had risen.
I ate, bathed, and clothed myself. All the while wondering what was happening outside my tent. Had Nigel spoken with this Drusus person? What was the plan? What were they going to do to me? I couldn't stop thinking about it. As I paced restlessly back and forth in my tent after some time, Drusus returned and, standing outside my tent, was stopped by the guards, Nigel and Kona, trying to peer inside.
"No, they can come in."
Drusus placed his book down on the table and turned to me.
"No, they can not. They will only interfere. Now I am told you apparently regrew a limb. While the body can heal on its own, even a scratch can take time, but a whole arm and hand, that is unheard of. But there is a simple way to test if what you say is true."
He sat down at the table, gesturing for me to sit opposite him. I walked over and sat down, not once looking away from him.
"And how do you do that?"
"By cutting it off again."
I looked at him with an annoyed look, taking a deep breath. He retorted with a smile.
"Of course, I could never do something like that, but that stands that if you can regrow limbs, healing a cut should be almost instant, no? Please hold out your hand."
I placed my hand on the table between us with my palm facing up. Drusus reached into his robe and pulled out a small and simple-looking knife. He reached over and grabbed a finger, placing the knife's blade edge against it. He quickly slid the knife across my finger.
He looked down at my finger, then back to me. I was looking away, but his strange movements caught my attention. There was no cut on my finger.
He looked at the blade again and once more tried to slice at my finger, but no cut formed. I didn't feel anything either.
He once again inspected the blade. Perhaps thinking it was dull, he ran his finger across the edge. He winced and pulled his hand back as a cut formed right away.
We exchanged glances for a moment, our brows furled in confusion. Suddenly, he drove the sharp tip of the blade straight down onto my palm as hard as he could, stabbing the blade into my hand.
I let out a small yelp, but the pain vanished quickly. I lifted my hand and looked at the blade sticking out of it through both ends. Amazed that even after what I was seeing, it didn't hurt at all. I gripped the handle of the blade and pulled it from my hand. The hole left behind leaked a small amount of blood but quickly healed, growing back the muscles underneath and then the skin in only a few seconds.
I placed the knife down on the table where my hand was. There was a small pool of blood I hadn't noticed before. I looked towards the man across from me, who wore a look of pure terror.
"That's weird."
He cleared his throat and tried to calm down. With shaking hands, he reached out and grabbed the knife, putting it back. Then he reached for his book. He clutched the book and held it to his chest tightly.
"It seems you are a marked child. The first one in four hundred years and the only one in recorded history to remain sane. I… I don't know what to do."
He spoke with his head lowered, his eyes locked to the small pool of blood on the table.
"What does that mean? What's a marked child?"
His head suddenly snapped up to look at me with wide eyes. Like he was shocked I was there. He released the book and covered his mouth with both hands loud enough to sound like a slap, almost covering the sound of his book falling to the floor. After a moment, he moved his hand down.
"I should not have said that. Nobody outside the church is meant to know that. I… I have to order you to be executed now."
"Sorry, but that won't work."
"Well… I suppose it doesn't matter now. You are harbouring a sin. We know of two, but never one in the south. I don't know any more than that."
"Who does?"
"His Holiness, of course. He knows everything. That is why we follow him. I'm sorry, I will need to defer to a higher-ranking member of the order for what to do. In the meantime, I will make preparations to have you either beheaded or drowned. Whatever works. If you choose to run, know I can't stop you. But… You would make an enemy of the church, and we would spare no expense hunting you down."
Drusus stood and picked his book up from the floor. Wiping the dust off its cover and clutching it to his chest. As he went to leave, he stopped and turned back to me for a moment.
"I do not know how you came into contact with a sin, but it should have killed you on the spot. Know that you are living on borrowed time and should already be dead. I pray you accept your fate and death with dignity."
I watched as Drusus left the tent. As the fabric door was pushed aside, I saw Nigel and Kona standing out there, listening. For the moment, I saw their faces; they turned their attention to Drusus, who was leaving. I heard their voices grow fainter. No doubt they had listened to the conversation and were now arguing with him about my fate. It didn't matter either way; I'm not sure if I can die.