Selina puffed her cheeks, body clenched, curled on the bed—like a stubborn beast snapped in a hunter’s steel trap.

Her eyes burned bright; when she looked over, sunlight seemed to sit in her pupils—far-off mountains and rivers glinting like a distant blade.

But that face, especially the little upturned smirk at the Holy Maiden, was the kind that begged for a fist, like a kitten baring milk teeth.

Melvina had made Selina cry on purpose, probably because of that look, a thorn set just so.

Though deep down the Holy Maiden was curious how Melvina saw her, the crybaby’s words soaked into her mood like rain into cotton.

She sighed, deflated like a paper lantern losing air. “If you won’t talk, fine. Answer the officer’s questions.”

“You haven’t answered mine!”

“Melvina was in my room because—” The Holy Maiden propped her chin, careless as a cat in a sunbeam. “Exactly what you’re imagining.”

Selina’s puffed cheeks collapsed, a punctured balloon hissing. She spilled air through her teeth, panicked. “I... I wasn’t thinking... much...”

“Enough.” Mandele checked his watch, voice like a knuckle on wood. “I’m here to ask questions, not watch you circle the drain.”

The Holy Maiden jolted, like a sparrow startled from a branch; she’d forgotten the officer standing in the rain’s shadow behind her.

“Talk to me,” Mandele moved to the bedside, looking down at Selina like a cliff over a stream. “What happened then?”

“There was a man... pinching the Professor’s hand... like playing house, pretending with toy cups.”

“And then?”

“I fought him,” she said, a spark under wet ash.

“Not lying?”

Selina narrowed her eyes, weighing words like pebbles in her palm. “Why would I lie?”

“With that tiny frame, he could’ve killed you in one punch—like swatting a sparrow.”

“My bones are hard—like iron rods.”

“Sure, sure.” Mandele felt the argument pulling like a riptide and cut across it. “Did you see anyone else? Or just him?”

“No idea.”

“Did you see any device that made lines appear in the sky, or anything odd?”

“No idea.”

“So what do you know?”

“He touched the Professor with his filthy hands!” Selina’s anger flared; her fist hammered the bed like a mallet on a drum. A short, muffled thump came from inside, a broken mechanism barking once.

Mandele stepped back and his heel met a hard edge, something sprung from under the bed. Before he could track it, the whole frame tipped left; through the mattress, Selina had snapped a bed leg—strength coiled where you wouldn’t expect.

“Now I get why you didn’t die.” Mandele sized her up, scanning her like a craftsman gauges steel. “But we didn’t gain much.”

The Holy Maiden gathered the splintered pieces, set them on the nightstand like shells from a storm. “Melvina was probably the first one there.”

“I want to ask her.”

“She’s still unconscious.”

Mandele stared, surprised, a blade’s edge catching light. “You didn’t use healing magic—”

“It’s not that. Something’s blocking my magic, like frost on a window.”

“What something?”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t look this helpless,” she said, smile thin as paper.

Selina parted her lips, then let silence close them. If Dark Realm Erosion spilled out, the Professor would drown in suspicion like ink clouding clear water.

“Alright.” Mandele missed her flicker, and said to the Holy Maiden, “If you can, step outside.”

Brooding clouds stretched like a black sail from horizon to horizon. Everywhere was pitch-dark, life pressed flat and silent. The soil drank deep and swelled into blisters, little mounds like pus under skin. The rain pounded the roof, a thousand pebbles thrown into a well, rings rippling layer on layer.

“I want a squad to search the mountain woods near the Sacred Cathedral,” Mandele said, eyes on the rain’s veils. “The Canary could be hiding in there.”

“You sure?”

“Naghtown’s small—if not here, then only the forest, like a shadow beyond a fence.”

“You mentioned the Dark Realm earlier. Where exactly?”

“Here,” he said, a finger cutting the air toward the Sacred Cathedral like a knife to a knot.

The Holy Maiden watched his profile, chiseled like a stone icon; under it, faint dark circles smudged like soot.

“Relax.” Mandele guessed her worry, raised a cigarette to his nose but didn’t light it, a ritual like a charm. “I haven’t told the others—well, I did talk—but I didn’t tell them the Dark Realm sits in the Sacred Cathedral.”

“Considering the Cathedral’s place in the hearts of the residents—”

“It’s just wood and stone; knock it down, build it again, like a bridge after a flood. The point is you. You’re why they believe in the Sacred Cathedral—the Holy Maiden John and Bertha entrusted.”

“Mm.”

“So—why did she call you a fake?”

The Holy Maiden drew her neck in, tension like a string pulled tight. “She was in pain. I hadn’t eased it. She snapped and threw words like thorns.”

“I see.”

“What else could it be?” she asked, a brittle laugh like ice cracking.

“I checked Naghtown’s entry records and asked around. Melvina was confined for only a few hours, then left. She came back, but the confinement was a show.”

“I can’t keep Melvina locked up long,” the Holy Maiden said, her throat trembling like a reed in wind. “It’d betray why we reformed the confinement room.”

“Alright.” Mandele watched the rain; pressing further would just drown the talk. “I want the Sacred Cathedral closed for a while. But faith runs deep, so the final call’s yours.”

“We can close it,” she said, voice steady as a closed gate.

“Then you need to give a reason, like a lantern held up for a crowd.”

“Recent events rattled everyone. They might not accept it,” she said, worry moving like a shadow under water.

“You’re the Holy Maiden. It’ll be fine.”

“If so, why let outsiders sway us?” Her face shifted, a bruise of anger blooming like ink.

“Because there’s only one person here named Hedi Melvina,” Mandele said, simple as a sign on a door.

“The Empire allows duplicates—like Jack, Alice, Tom—names passing like common birds.”

Mandele drew a long breath, holding it like a diver. “Stop. That’s a trap to make you prove yourself until you fall.”

Silence.

The rain devoured every sound like a mouth without a bottom. A black, round bird flitted under the eaves, lifting its red beak now and then, as if to spear the cloudskin.

“We’ll move as discussed,” Mandele said, breaking the hush like a stick snapped clean. “Soon I’ll lead officers to sweep the forest.”

“I’ll close the Sacred Cathedral once you leave,” she answered, resolve settling like stone.

“Wake Melvina. If she reached the scene first, her clues will shine like pins in a map.”

“I’ll try.”

“If the Dark Realm wakes early, work with Selena Viola. She’s a Dark Realm Investigator and knows those shadows better than we do.”

“Mm.”

Hedi Melvina.

Mandele studied the Holy Maiden; she would never answer to that name, like a bell that refuses a wrong hand.

He turned without a word, thought heavy as wet wool, and vanished into the blurred, pounding rain.