At first light, Goddess Aier’s tender gaze washed the land like warm dawn, and sleeping lives stirred like grass in a breeze. The faithful should mirror the goddess, and hold every life close like a lantern in snow, and prize every kindness like spring water drawn from the heart. Remember this like a bell in fog: all power rises from life, and if you profane it with magic abused, you’ll call down the goddess’s iron storm. To ride the current of magic, first bow to life like a tree to rain, heed the teaching like a path of stones, nourish with love like loam, lead with wisdom like a star, and hold the peace with firm hands like a gate against night.
In the cramped confinement cell, stale as a sealed jar, Hedi lay on the hard cot like a plank on a river, her white feet swinging and tapping a da-da beat like pebbles on wood. In the suffocating hush, heavy as wet wool, she droned through Chapter Six, paragraph two of the Sacred Scripture, voice flat as lukewarm tea, letting the watching nun hear like a candle wick catching, not to cleanse sin but to show her heart scrubbing itself clean like a stone in rain.
The cell had been improved like a cleaned scabbard, yet it still kept the nicked look of a prison, a place that once held sinners like shadows pinned to walls. There was only a little bed like a moored skiff, and a square mirror set on purpose like a still pond, meant to force a soul to face its own reflection like a moon in water. Light was meager, a pale thread from a high window like a slit in winter cloud, too high even on tiptoe, a white breath that the wind might snuff like a wick.
Other than that, everything was fine, Hedi told herself with a wry smile like frost, though worry slid in like a draft: where had Selina gone, a swallowed star? The nun had said, “She went to the refectory,” words cool as slate, while Hedi ate breakfast in the cell like a sparrow in a cage, the taste passable as thin porridge, yet to a tongue used to oil, the sudden blandness felt like chewing snow.
“Why’d you stop reciting?” the watching nun asked, voice like a knuckle on a door.
“I want to wander a bit,” Hedi said, her mood like a caged cat.
“Not yet,” the nun said, a wall of calm like stone.
“You said I could move freely,” Hedi said, a spark under ash.
“That’s true,” the nun said, a narrow path like a ribbon.
“Forget it,” Hedi sighed, the word a leaf falling.
She’d seen the cell and set her mind like a nail: she wouldn’t get out soon, even if this seclusion wasn’t the other kind, the word “confinement” still a chain like a thin cord. She flipped to a new page of the Scripture like turning a cool tile, when the nun lifted the door latch like lifting a veil, and the door swung open without a lock like a mouth unstopped.
The nun stood in the doorway like a tall cypress, robed in black twill velvet that trailed like night water, the cloth erasing her shape like fog over hills and leaving no hook for eyes to catch. A round black coronet circled her head like an eclipse, and over her cheeks lay a fine-drawn mesh of soot-dyed gauze like a spider’s veil, guarding her face from worldly dust like a screen.
“First,” she said, words stacked like stones, “you can’t step out of the Sacred Cathedral’s grounds, not even a foot past the gate like a shadow at noon. Second, the central nave is hallowed ground for the townsfolk’s prayers, still as a lake, so don’t disturb it like a flock scattered. Lastly, keep quiet at all times, like snow at dusk, and don’t raise a clamor like a drum in a shrine.”
“No problem,” Hedi said, the reply small as a pebble.
“After lunch, return to the cell and sleep an hour,” the nun added, a rule laid like a mat.
Hedi squinted up at her face like peering through reeds. “I’ll sleep straight till night,” she said, a lazy cat under a stove.
“You may read the Scripture in silence,” the nun said, a soft net like mist.
“So I just can’t leave the cell?” Hedi asked, a finger on the line like ink.
“Respect our rules,” the nun nodded, steady as a lantern, “and your seclusion will be comfortable like a warmed stone.”
Hedi agreed and slipped on her shoes like sliding on shells, then minced her way toward the Sacred Cathedral’s garden like a bird to a grove. The sky hung overcast, neither rain nor shine, a cold palette like slate, a winter face that wouldn’t turn. The wind kept threading the beds like a pale knife, and from lilies and bauhinia it plucked a sound like shattered jade. She brushed past several nuns like currents crossing, and they looked through her like glass, walking set routes like ghosts on rails.
Hedi sat on a bench like a pier in fog. Morning at the Sacred Cathedral lay empty as an airfield after all steamships had flown, wide and bare like bleached bone. Doves spread and pecked across the lawn like white scars on green, fixed to earth like chalk marks. Not far off, a clutch of young novices waved their paper slips like moths and spilled laughter like beads.
“This morning... you came too suddenly...” a voice came, thin as incense smoke. “I wasn’t ready...”
“Still keeping that routine?” Hedi tilted her head at the stiff-postured Holy Maiden like a willow at a stone, then let her gaze drift back to the playful novices like fish in sun.
“The Priest said children should play freely,” the Holy Maiden said, her words like soft rain.
“I meant the paper slips,” Hedi said, a finger tapping like a metronome.
“Ah, right... the Priest also told us to write our dreams,” the Holy Maiden said, sitting beside Hedi with care like placing a cup. “I remember yours—becoming the Demon King who destroys the world,” she added, a memory rising like steam.
“Yeah?” Hedi arched a brow, a crescent like a blade.
“Sister Bertha scolded you,” the Holy Maiden said, lips curved like a rueful string. “She planned twenty strikes with the ruler, and you cried at the sixth like a burst dam.”
“Crying is a child’s privilege,” Hedi said, a grin like a cat’s whisker. “Used well, it’s a shield that wards off punishment like a parasol.”
“That’s awfully utilitarian,” the Holy Maiden said, a sigh like a folded fan.
Hedi’s smile lifted like a kite. “Words meant to inspire are mist,” she said, “you can write anything and watch it vanish like breath.”
“Dreams are seeds buried in the heart,” the Holy Maiden said, eyes soft as fertile earth, “and one day they sprout like spring shoots.”
“Right,” Hedi said, mischief glinting like a spark. “Blowing a hole in that inn roof was my small step, and humanity’s giant step toward extinction like a cliff.”
“Still mad about this morning?” the Holy Maiden asked, gloom on her face like a cloud rim. She thought a moment, then confessed, “I considered it, and studying Dark Magic does fit your nature like a thorn to a rose.”
“What nature?” Hedi asked, gaze steady as a mirror.
“You look quiet on the surface like a lake,” the Holy Maiden said, “but your heart is full of playful schemes like fish under ripples.”
“You think I study Dark Magic just for fun?” Hedi asked, eyes on a cottony cloud like torn fleece.
“N-no...” the Holy Maiden stammered, throat snagging like a fishbone, even after a swallow like a gulp of sand. “You’re doing it to explore magic like a miner.”
“I only said that for you,” Hedi said, the words cool as shade.
“Want to say the real reason?” the Holy Maiden asked, voice like an unstrung bow.
“I was a week late, broke doctrine, and used magic in town,” Hedi said, stacking faults like stones. “With all that, you won’t scold me first like thunder?”
“If I could, I’d hit you,” the Holy Maiden said, a flare like a spark. “But I’m the Holy Maiden, and I can’t use violence like a sheathed blade.”
Hedi slid a little away like a crab sidling, in case a storm broke like a sudden squall.
Seeing it, the Holy Maiden laughed behind her hand like a bell under lace. “You’re still the same,” she said, eyes bright as dew.
“I’ve clearly developed,” Hedi said, a proud puff like a sail.
“You know I mean inside,” the Holy Maiden said, a pause like a held breath, a hint of helplessness drifting like smoke. “You were mature young, always pocketing your clarity like a coin, hiding everything in your chest like letters, then doing something no one expects like a firework.”
“Studying Dark Magic? You’ve looped us back,” Hedi said, a circle drawn like chalk.
“I want to know why,” the Holy Maiden said, steady as a candle flame.
“The Priest nagged ‘Holy Maiden, Holy Maiden’ in my ear like a buzzing gnat,” Hedi said. “Studying Dark Magic was one-and-done like cutting a knot.”
“You always decide by slapping your forehead like a drum,” the Holy Maiden said. “Even if it sparks serious fallout like embers in dry grass, you don’t hesitate; you only regret after like rain too late.”
Hedi said nothing, her silence a dark pool, and she remembered the trip to the Shattered City like a road of broken glass: if the nobles learned of it, she’d lose her footing at the Academy like a climber without a ledge. She hadn’t yet worked with Stratford, nor known the Dark Realm Research Institute, and the result was slander from high halls like crows and a ruined life like a house in ash.
“I want to make a call,” Hedi said at last, voice clipped like a snip.
“To whom?” the Holy Maiden asked, curiosity like a lifted brow.
“The Academy’s Headmaster,” Hedi said, the excuse neat as a folded note. “Say heavy rain caused landslides like a mountain bleeding.”
“Is it urgent?” the Holy Maiden asked, steps already turning like a path.
“Tomorrow’s a workday,” Hedi said, a calendar page like a blade. “I don’t want to skip like a missed beat.”
The Holy Maiden led Hedi up the garden’s long steps like a stair of pale ribs, walking and asking, “Have you visited the Priest?” Her words drifted like incense.
“No,” Hedi said, her answer a stone drop.
“You could tell him what changed in six years,” the Holy Maiden said, hope like a small flame.
“Talking to a tombstone is stupid,” Hedi said, blunt as an axe.
“Melvina...” the Holy Maiden breathed, the name a petal.
“It worked before. Don’t call me that now,” Hedi said, face smooth as lacquer. “Same name causes confusion like crossed wires. I’ll call you Holy Maiden, and you call me Professor.”
“Is that okay?” the Holy Maiden asked, doubt like a dim cloud.
“Until you remember your name,” Hedi said, promise tight as a knot.
The Holy Maiden dipped her head slightly like a bending reed, eyes fixed on the steps like counting beads, and kept her silence like a veil. Her white shoes tapped the risers with a patter, patter like light rain.
