The Saint and the Silence
The tea was perfect.
Steam curled from the porcelain cup like a ghost too tired to rise—soft, fragrant, fleeting. The scent of lavender and roasted barley drifted through the air, warm and earthy. In the stillness of the clinic, it felt almost sacred.
No screams. No ruptured veins. No cursed wounds thrashing beneath the skin.
Just silence. And tea.
Saint Mariane let her weight settle into the chair. The wood creaked beneath her, familiar and forgiving. For once, the world outside her door wasn't bleeding. For once, she could breathe.
It had been a while since she relaxed this much.
Ever since her reassignment—far from the capital, tucked deep in the quiet reaches of a forest outpost—she hadn't stopped moving. The palace had stationed her here to watch over Princess Seren's patrol group, a precaution in case disaster struck in the wild. A safeguard. Just in case.
Still, mornings like this made the assignment feel like a quiet blessing. The forest shimmered beyond the round window, sunlight catching on dew-slick leaves. Birds called from the trees. She let her shoulders drop.
They'll be fine, she told herself. Again. Firmer this time.
Seren was competent. Focused. But more than that, she was a force in her own right. At just fifteen, she commanded the respect of seasoned warriors. Mariane had always been impressed by her quiet strength and unshakable resolve. While others saw a young princess—someone still learning her place—Seren saw herself as a leader. And she led.
Her mission wasn't just duty. It was personal. A chance to prove she was worthy of the trust placed in her, capable of carrying the weight of a crown. Seren didn't crave power—she craved purpose. And she bore that purpose like armor.
Ever since she was small, Seren had carried that fire. Not to rule, but to protect. Her loyalty was fierce, her instincts sharp. The harder the path, the more determined she became. This mission into the wild—filled with unknowns and peril—wasn't just a trial. It was the measure of everything she'd trained for. Her chance to prove she wasn't just a girl with a title. She was someone who would shape her own legacy.
And Elara, her captain, was the steel guiding that flame. A commander whose gaze seemed to cut through lies and shadows alike. She led not with volume, but with presence—each order precise, each step deliberate. Mariane had watched her train her squad like a master craftsman sharpening blades. The Vengeful Thorn wasn't just a name. It was an oath.
Elara's knights were blades in motion. Each one singular. Lethal.
Riven, the wild card—her arrows flew before her enemies had time to blink. Eyes like a hawk, and just as merciless. Her reputation was earned with every shot that never missed, every ambush turned to massacre by her hand.
Lira, the buffer and mid-tier healer, was the invisible pulse of their strength. Her spells didn't just mend—they fortified. A quiet anchor, she amplified her comrades, made their victories possible by weaving magic that turned precision into devastation and resilience into myth.
Nia, the shadow. The scout. The ghost in the trees. She moved like smoke and struck like lightning, never seen until it was too late. She didn't speak much, but when she did, every word mattered. Every movement was calculated.
Together, they were storm and silence. Fire and ice. The Vengeful Thorn didn't fail. They didn't retreat. Their victories were swift, brutal, and clean.
Mariane had seen the reports. Dry, efficient. As if none of it required effort. As if heroics were a checklist.
They didn't need saving. Especially not from her.
She reached for the tea, fingers curling around porcelain.
She was just about to take a sip when the door slammed open.
A priestess stumbled in, breath ragged, eyes wide. "M-Milady! The knights—they've returned—they found a boy—he's—he's dying—!"
Mariane blinked at her.
A long pause.
Then she gently set the teacup back down, untouched.
"Of course," she murmured, already rising.
The girl said something else, voice climbing toward panic, but Mariane had stopped listening. Her boots struck the stone, steady and sharp. Her robes swept behind her like wind chasing footsteps. Her braid swayed, tight and purposeful.
Probably something dramatic. It usually was. A lung collapsed. A limb lost. Something that sounded fatal until you looked closer. Nothing she hadn't mended before.
She was the Sacred Hands of Mercy.
Not a title. A fact.
She had reattached limbs chewed off mid-battle, purged poisons that clung like rot to bone, and stitched together shredded organs with a hum and a flicker of light. No theatrics. No grand incantations. Her magic didn't need spectacle. It moved like breath—precise, clean, unshakable.
Villagers whispered that she'd once revived a man whose heart had stopped for three minutes. That dying within earshot of her voice was a gamble Death rarely won.
Mariane didn't care for legends.
It was just work.
Complicated. Bloody. Relentless. But work.
As she crossed into the ward, she was already forming the spell—diagnostic threads, restorative flow, pulse mapping. Another broken body to mend. Then, maybe, if fate had mercy, her tea would still be warm.
A chill traced the back of her neck.
No breeze. No sound. Just a hollow flicker brushing against her thoughts, sharp and out of place.
She exhaled through her nose. Ignored it.
Probably just nerves.
A child, they said.
How bad could it be?
She opened the door.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Silent Threshold
She stepped into the ward without hesitation.
The door creaked open, the groan of aged wood swallowing the quiet. The scent of blood hit her first—sharp, metallic, overwhelming. A dark trail stretched across the stone floor, leading to the boy's cot. The knights stood like statues, unmoving, their eyes fixed on the figure sprawled before them. Some bore bandages, others were on the brink of collapse themselves. No one spoke. No one moved.
They parted in silence as she approached, the tension in the room so thick it might've been carved with a knife. Their eyes—flat, unreadable—were locked on the boy, as if afraid to break the quiet with a single breath.
Mariane's gaze dropped to him.
She stopped.
The scrape of her heel on the stone echoed in the stillness.
"...What is this?" Her voice was a murmur, barely above a whisper, but it cut through the silence with an edge.
The boy's body was beyond recognition. His chest was a ruin, raw flesh exposed beneath the shredded remnants of his tunic. Deep bruises marred his sides, jagged claw marks that seemed too large for any beast she knew. His skin had turned a ghastly gray, the color of death itself. Dried blood caked his left side, and the rancid stench of decay clung to him like a shroud.
Her gaze flicked upward.
His face.
She had to force herself to look at it.
No one should look like this. No one should suffer like this.
Her breath hitched in her throat, and for a moment, the world felt hollow. It wasn't the blood, or the disfigurement of his body that unsettled her—it was something deeper. The weight of his suffering pressed against her chest, suffocating her.
"Why bring me a corpse?" she asked, her voice flat, though it cracked at the edges. Her eyes couldn't leave his face.
Elara stepped forward, worry etched deep across her brow. Seren stood by her side, a shadow of her usual self—her face pale, drawn, haunted.
"He's not dead," Seren said, her voice thick with exhaustion.
Mariane's eyebrow arched in disbelief. "Not dead?"
She moved closer, her hands instinctively seeking to assess him. Fingers pressed against his throat, then his wrist. Time stretched—each second a weight upon her. She didn't need to hear it.
His pulse—faint, but undeniable.
"Fine," she muttered under her breath, stepping back.
Her knees hit the ground beside the cot. Sleeves rolled up, she focused, clearing her mind. The spell matrix was already forming in her thoughts, the familiar sequence of light and warmth—a ritual as ingrained as breathing. The magic unfurled inside her, each line of energy humming to life. She felt the cool pulse of power in her hands, guiding her.
This would be quick. It had to be.
"Five minutes," she murmured, more to herself than to anyone else. "That's all I need."
Her hands hovered over the boy's chest, the other resting gently against his temple. Light seeped from her palms—warm, steady, flowing into his body.
She focused.
For a moment, the magic hummed, familiar and comforting. It was working. It had to be.
But then time stretched. One minute. Two. Five.
The air in the room thickened. Each second dragged like the slow crawl of dusk. The knights' breaths seemed louder now, each exhale a faint whisper beneath the weight of the silence. No noticeable change. No softening of his wounds. No gradual easing of his ragged breath. Nothing.
Riven shifted uncomfortably, her sharp eyes never leaving the boy, but even she couldn't hide the flicker of doubt that crossed her face. They had seen healing magic before—countless times. Wounds closed. Flesh mended. Broken bones knit back together as swiftly as a breath. But here, now, nothing happened. No miraculous restoration. No pulse of light or warmth that followed the rhythm of Mariane's hands.
"Why isn't it working?" Riven's voice cut through the stillness. It was barely audible, but heavy with a growing unease. Her gaze flicked between the other knights, but none spoke. Their faces were unreadable, their posture frozen. They waited. They all waited for something—anything—to change.
Mariane didn't answer. The tightening of her jaw, the way her hands hovered without shifting, betrayed her mounting frustration. Her magic should have worked by now. It always had.
This wasn't supposed to happen.
The boy's chest still rose and fell with shallow, uneven breaths. His skin, the unnatural shade of gray, refused to warm. His injuries—raw, torn, unhealed—remained exactly as they were.
Something was wrong. Something far beyond what she could touch with her magic.
Her fists clenched. No panic. She was Saint Mariane. She never failed.
She could fix this.
Her heart pounded against her chest, but she forced herself to stay steady. Thoughts swirled like smoke, blurring her focus. She had healed the dying, brought back those teetering on the edge of death. This… this wasn't supposed to happen.
There was no resistance to her magic. No pushback. No natural pull of the body fighting to live. Just emptiness. A hollow, unnatural stillness beneath her touch. That alone chilled her more than the wounds.
This must be some kind of curse, she thought, the realization hitting like a cold blade. Nothing else made sense. No ordinary injury resisted her healing like this. Not without cause.
Her fingers twitched again, and a flare of white light burst from her eyes.
"Appraisal," she whispered.
The hum of divine magic buzzed in her skull. Her vision blurred for an instant as the boy's status unfurled before her eyes.