Ahraan’s tapping fingers had ceased their movements, and a worried crease pulled at his lips.
Long enough passed for Saer’s thin patience to crack.“Are you not satisfied?”
Once more, that faint and enraging tilt of his hood said so much and so little.“No,” Ahraan murmured.
“You think you can do better?”Saer sneered.
At last, without subterfuge or evasion, Ahraan lifted his gaze to meet Saer’s.
The hood cast his features in mild shadow, but the metallic glaze of the man’s features couldn’t be denied.Gold, gold, and gold: burnished bronze coating his brows, rose gold dusting his lips, and an orange-gold saffron reflecting from his irises.
Allgold.
Saer’s nostrils flared, his frown hardening while Ahraan analyzed him with a stare that reminded him of a blaze’s core.Though he perched on a stage and above him, the hooded man didn’t shy from Saer’s fiery attention.
Ahraan’s eyes narrowed.“Stars, there’s not an inkling of humility in you, is there?”
Even though Saer’s teeth bared with his non-answer, Ahraan pressed his palms flat into the stage and flexed his forearms, pulling himself atop it.
The urge to shove him away flared, but Saer quelled it for the sake of their audience.Whatever Ahraan meant to do, surely he’d embarrass himself, and Saer’s station would be further solidified.He could only win from this point forward.
Positioning himself on the opposite side of the wounded guard—who now had too much white showing around his eyes—Ahraan lifted a palm and brushed it against the man’s cheek.“You’ll be healed this day.I’ll show you the one Grandfather’s power where you’ll experience eternal life in the Heavens after death.I’ll ask for nothing in return.”
Ahraan’s chosen words stuttered through Saer’s heart.He froze.
Inclining his head, that sad smile of before bled into Ahraan’s words as his other hand floated over the guard’s mortal, abdominal wound.“May I?”
The guard offered a stiff nod.
Ahraan bowed over the injury while Saer’s mind whirred.
From under the hood, a brilliant wash of white light bloomed.Ahraan’s fingertips lit with white ribbons of flame that snaked along the guard’s abdominal dressing.Nothing smoked or sparked, defying Saer’s expectations.How could this man create fire as aDaemoenic, yet not catch anything alight with it?
Saer squinted, angling his neck to see under Ahraan’s cowl—
The soldier gasped, a sharp and encompassing intake of breath, like he’d never used the entirety of his chest before.It startled the enraptured audience into further cries of surprise, unrest expanding through the villagers.
The luminosity from under Ahraan’s hood faded, his shoulders relaxing.Any remnant of magic flames dissipated from his fingers.
Blinking, the soldier flexed his stomach and pressed a hand to the front of the bandage.Cautious at first, he pressed harder with more incredulous blinks.“What…”
Ahraan rested back on his heels, casting his gaze upon the sea of villagers, and raised his voice.“One might ask themselves who is worth following.”
Saer rose to his feet while the guard unwrapped his bandage with hasty jerks.
Ahraan offered an indifferent gesture his way.“The arrogant tyrant who plays brilliant tricks and demands your loyalty in exchange for vague promises?”
A snarl erupted unbidden from Saer’s lips.Many of the villagers’ faces pinched, skeptical.
But too many nodded along with Ahraan’s words.
“Or the one who offers your lives as your own, without expectation beyond a stance against”—Ahraan offered a meaningful pause and skewed his glance towards Saer—“trickery?”
Saer’s lips parted to condemn the man who dared speak against him.
The wounded guard released a sudden whoop of joy, pulling everyone’s focus.
Bloodied bandage ripped free, the sunlight caught along the flesh of the soldier’s stomach, where no trace of injury—cauterized, scarred, or otherwise—shown.
