The tongues of fire in the hearth fluttered like torn cloth, casting flickering light on the three very different expressions in the room. This had once been a bedroom—perhaps still was—but now, Sather had claimed it as a temporary ritual chamber.
He gripped Jeanne's wrist, her sleeve pulled up to reveal her freshly washed, pale arm. Twisting labyrinths of ancient, blasphemous script etched across his skin like blood from a dying man's mouth, crawling from his shoulder to his fingertips. And now, those fire-hued glyphs began to creep across her skin as well.
Fine, intricate runes bloomed in crimson flame along her forearm. Jeanne's fingers locked around the sorcerer's arm with bone-cracking force, veins bulging across the back of her hand like steel cables.
"By the truth above… Inquisitor," Sather hissed, straining to twist her hand away. "You've piled enough charges and suggested enough ways for me to die to fill a cistern. Wasn't it yesterday you said I should kill myself on the spot?"
Jeanne's expression twisted—though to be fair, it always did, especially when she smiled. But when she reversed their grip and clamped his arm down with hers, Sather's expression finally faltered.
If those fingers had been wrapped around his throat, his windpipe might've shattered instantly.
"Mind your tone, black sorcerer," Jeanne said in a rasp that pretended at calm. Her pale gold eyes glinted with fire—mad, gleaming fire. To Sather, her grip felt like trying to snap a bamboo stalk with bare fingers—against a steel rod. "When speaking to a superior, you should show respect. Especially when she's in a bad mood."
Sather glanced down and saw that same gleam in her eyes—the kind of gaze one only gave prey. His eyelid twitched. Her strength was absurd, violently out of place with her slender wrists.
"Could you please cooperate like a corpse and let me finish the ritual?"
"Corpses don't channel divine energy, black sorcerer. They just hang from trees or get raised from graves by filth like you." Jeanne's tone grew fiercer. Her eyes, despite their beauty, gleamed with pure savagery. She coughed twice, body trembling with strain. Her palm bent back Sather's tattooed wrist like rebar forced into a U-shape.
Light forked and writhed beneath her skin, streaming up her arm like molten wires. It felt like someone had shoved burning coals into her veins.
Her blood felt like it had turned to gravel.
And oddly—she thought she could control the flow. Jeanne resisted the temptation to test it, though her fingers tightened—enough to snap a table leg in half—because that somehow made the pain slightly more bearable.
"It's only fair, isn't it?" she growled, glaring into the sorcerer's eyes. "You want to share power? Then share the pain, too. Just like how you made me sign that damned contract before unbinding me."
Sather glared back.
I must've lost my mind, sharing pain with you, he thought grimly.
"What if I screw something up and botch the ritual?" he muttered, voice hoarse from the spell's side effects.
"Then I'll return your words to you—'I believe you can succeed, so you should believe in someone who believes in you,'" Jeanne said, baring her teeth in a twisted parody of a smile. There was no trust in her tone—only sarcasm so sharp it could cut steel.
Sather hadn't meant that sincerely either, back then.
As he struggled to stabilize the flow of energy from her faith through the spell, he didn't stop taunting her—his voice now rough and grating like rusted iron.
"Coming from your mouth, that line's disgusting."
"It's even worse coming from yours."
"My only real risk of failure," Sather growled, "is that you're about to snap my wrist in half."
"And your only real risk of failure," Jeanne countered, staring into his reptilian eyes as if trying to look straight into hell itself, "is that you're too weak to channel pain without breaking."
"Weak? Once I finish mutating this body, I'll show you who's really weak."
"You'll prove that by jumping into a bonfire and timing how long it takes to scream?"
"You won't be around to see that," Sather spat. He released her wrist and drew back the flame-like glyphs that had crawled up her arm. The markings receded like the tide pulling away from shore.
"One of the purposes of this ritual," he said with grim satisfaction, "is to make sure your flames can't kill me so easily next time."
As the tide of pain ebbed away, Jeanne finally exhaled in relief. She loosened her grip on Sather's wrist, revealing five deep, finger-shaped impressions carved into his skin.
At the same time, Sather muttered another incantation. His voice scraped through the air like a file against stone—and the runes on his body began to change. The blasphemous red glow faded, replaced by a brilliant, sacred white. The halos of fire circling around him began to shift in color as well, slowly coalescing into translucent white rings, luminous as beams torn from a lighthouse—so bright they seemed almost tangible.
The glow should have been unclean.
But instead, it looked profoundly holy.
It shimmered, swirled, and pulsed with a brilliance that was almost painful to behold.
Viola instinctively took two steps back.
She ducked behind Jeanne, gripping the hem of her coat and peeking out at the spectacle with wide, cautious eyes.
Sather's feet left the ground as he began to float. The brilliant arcs of light spun around him in intersecting paths, weaving together like a mantle stitched from the northern lights—an aurora made into a robe.
For a long moment, Viola stood frozen in awe. She raised one hand to shield her eyes, but couldn't tear her gaze away from the radiance.
She watched, stunned, as the black sorcerer rose into the air, wrapped in white fire. In her emerald eyes, a flicker of longing gleamed.
She saw light blazing from his eyes and mouth. She saw the beams of fire encase him like divine robes, setting the ceiling and rafters ablaze as though sunlight itself had begun melting the world around him.
"I thought you'd fall flat once your clothes burned to ash," Jeanne remarked dryly, looking him up and down.
"This spell has undergone centuries of refinement," Sather replied wearily, settling down onto the edge of the bed. "Its documentation—variations, derivatives, theoretical models—could fill an entire bookcase. You think it's so crude it can't preserve clothing?"
"And where's that documentation now?"
"It blew up with my lab a few days ago. Nothing left."
"Tragic," Jeanne sneered. "Saves me the trouble of burning it myself."
"They're all preserved in my soul," Sather grinned, tapping his temple. "I could print ten thousand copies tomorrow and distribute them for free to every magical society on the continent."
Jeanne gave a sour grunt in response.
She didn't speak again, only sat down on the opposite end of the bed like she was waiting for something.
Her face was lined with fatigue.
"I'm a bit tired now," Sather said, patting Viola on the shoulder. "But before sleep, I'll teach you the basics of soul magic—something simple and clean. The kind you can use without getting burned at the stake."
He held out his right hand, fingers spread. "Give me your hand. I'll transfer some temporary mana first."
Viola exhaled softly and stared at him for a moment, saying nothing.
Her eyes shimmered with a mixture of hope… and fear.
She looked fragile.
Under the glow of the fireplace, her pale lips trembled faintly as though she wanted to speak—but no words came. Instead, she took a small but firm step forward and reached out, placing her small, childish hand into his rough, calloused one.
Their fingers intertwined.
"Seeking power is good," Sather said, holding her delicate hand, "but you didn't need to offer it in such a… couple-like pose. Now it just feels like I'm committing a crime."
"Eh?" Viola blinked, her expression blank.