Page 24

“You found her,” I say. It is not a question. It never is. My words are scripture—declarations that reshape the air.

“No, Your Holiness.”

The follower bows so low his forehead grinds into the stained floorboards. His breath trembles like a sinner awaiting the flames.

“If…if you command it,” he whispers, “we could bring one of the Withmarked. Offer them in her place⁠—”

I turn slowly, savoring the silence that thickens around fear. I crouch, robes crackling as dried blood fractures like ancient parchment being unrolled for judgment.

“No,” I murmur, voice edged with something like fondness. “Only she is worthy.”

I slip a hand beneath the man’s chin, lifting his face with the reverence one gives a relic before shattering it upon an altar.

“You know why.”

The follower nods, trembling.

But I hunger for confession.

“Speak,” I command, a scripture made flesh.

“H-He…Malek…Malek took our beloved Red Sermon.”

A shadow passes across my face—not mourning, but a holy starvation.

“The Red Sermon,” I breathe, the words hymnlike. “My first psalm. My herald. The mouth through which the Gospel thundered.” My smile splits, cracked and reverent.

The follower whimpers.

“But creation,” I say softly, “begins where the faithful are broken. What is taken from me must be returned.”

I rise, the stiff scrape of my robe echoing like a congregation kneeling in unison. My silhouette stains the wall like smoke from an unholy offering.

“She is what he cherishes,” I continue. “His mercy. His weakness. His hope of redemption.” My head tilts reverently. “Proof that the Gospel did not finish its work.”

My smile softens, “She’s the tether that keeps the beast leashed.”

From a hidden fold of my robe, I withdraw a creased photograph— stolen from the wall beside Malek’s mattress. Not hidden. Not forgotten. Kept. The edges are worn soft from years of forbidden handling. Selah’s face stares up, sunlit and unsuspecting.

I study it with priestly stillness. My thumb sweeps across her cheek, leaving a faint smear of old blood—a consecration.

“This,” I exhale, “is his idol.”

I lower the photo into shadow.

“She will not die. Death is mercy.” I smile because mercy is a sin I’m proud to refuse. “She will be remade.”

At the center of the room waits a warped wooden slab, its surface stained darker than rot—an altar shaped by a hundred unwilling bodies. Upon it rests the iron crown: jagged, rusted, hungry.

I set her picture beside it. A pairing. A prophecy. A promise.

“I will crown her,” I breathe. “Break her bones into prayer, peel the sins from her body, and carve the Gospel into whatever pieces remain.”

My voice softens into prayer.

“She will scream the verses, bleed the hymns, kneel where the Red Sermon broke…and rise as the obedient hymn of my dominion, a testament shaped in flesh.”

The follower sobs—fear turned inside out until it looks like worship.