They sighed, their brow furrowing as they continued. ‘When you use your affinity, there is a … darkness … that fuels it. An energy I haven’t sensed before. I’d hoped perhaps it was the Enforcer affecting you,’ they murmured.‘That his darkness was calling to yours and affecting your power in some way. You have a likeness in you. It’s why I suggested you train alone.’
Go ahead, he’d once told her.Tell me what a monster I am so you don’t have to face the fact that you’re one too.
‘But Evie …’
‘Evie’s power was nearly boundless. It also wasn’t fueled by the dark acts of the practitioners. Heressence, if it did indeed help further her power, was light. Perhaps it’swhyshe was able to wield such great affinity.’ Natali didn’t have to continue for Aya to know what they were implying.
Whatever was in Evie, it was not found in her.
You didn’t think you could be a saint, did you?
‘But the prophecy says a second of her kind,’ Aya pressed, fighting to keep the tremor out of her voice. ‘So if I’m not like Evie—’
‘The prophecy is layered. Complex. Misunderstood by the devout and by the Saj, regardless of what we study. Your power is raw, like Evie’s, and it is far deeper than any well I’ve sensed before. All would indicate you are the one the prophecy speaks of. But the prophecy says nothing about one’s essence, and how such power is fueled. And this power … it is also killing you.’
Aya stilled as Natali’s words washed over her, her pulse pounding in her throat.
Had the gods truly chosen wrong?
‘What does that make me? Some sort of Dark Saint?’
Natali shook their head. ‘I do not know.’
Her throat constricted, her next plea burning beneath her panic. ‘So … so help me fix this. Surely the practitioners found some way to offset these effects. Their forces were rumored to be over a thousand strong.’
The Saj snapped the book closed. ‘While the Saj of theMaraciana may not adhere to the Old Customs, there are sins even we don’t dare speak of,’ they said sharply. ‘We don’t concern ourselves with the inner workings of dark-affinity work.’
Aya’s eyes narrowed. ‘You’re the Knowledge Keepers. You have studied the affinities for centuries.’
‘I cannot train you.’
Aya’s breath punched out of her lungs. ‘You can’t be serious,’ she breathed as dread, heavy and unrelenting, pooled in her stomach.
‘Using small amounts won’t hurt you. And physical exertion can help offset the pressure of your unused power. But the power you would need to make a difference in the coming war could devour you entirely.’
‘And yet you don’t even truly know how the saint’s power is to be used at the helm of an army to right the greatest wrong, do you?’ Aya snarled. Natali didn’t bother to answer. Aya swore as she stepped away from the Saj, her anger rising rapidly. She whirled back to Natali, her fingers digging into her palms, as if she could contain her rage. ‘I cannot aid in the war if I do not understand my power!’
‘And you cannot understand what you refuse to acknowledge,’ they snapped.
That death has always followed in my wake. That I’ve never been one filled with light.
‘I will not help you feed yourself to an insatiable host, nor will I unleash another wave of darkness on this realm.’
‘I am not practicing the Decachiré!’
Her fury seemed to linger, ringing in the silence that followed her outburst.
Natali raised a brow. ‘Yet your power reacts just the same. And the Saj of the Maraciana have limits. We do not study darkness.’
Aya’s hands shook as she unclenched her fists. Her power did react the same. Because it wasn’t just feeding on her energy. It was taking parts of her, pulling her deeper into a darkness she had tried desperately to keep locked away.
‘It would be far safer for you, and the realm, for you to stay far away from this war,’ Natali murmured.
‘So, what?’ Aya seethed. ‘The entire prophecy gets ignored because the gods chose wrong? Darkness wins regardless, is that it? I cannot simply stand by.’
‘Your power alone does not fulfill the prophecy. You forget the Second Saint mustrise.’
Another non-answer. Another riddle she couldn’t parse.
