Cassian's POV
The doors closed behind me with the finality of a tomb.
No turning back.
The chamber wasn't what I'd imagined. No wood, no stained glass, no saints weeping from carved alcoves. Just obsidian—endless, silent, oppressive. Towering columns curved around me in a perfect circle, each so tall they vanished into a roiling, smoke-colored sky above, as if the ceiling had been torn away and replaced with a storm caught between worlds.
Lightning flickered across that false sky, silent and distant.
Twelve seats lined the edges of the circle.
Eleven were filled.
Each figure wore a mask, each unique. A blindfold of gold. A snarling wolf. A crescent moon bisected by a blade. A single unblinking eye. Symbols of roles, not people. Ideals, not identities.
Only one seat remained empty—at the center, raised high above the others.
The Seat of Inquiry.
A throne made of bone-white wood and thorns. Its branches twisted upward like the ribs of a corpse clutching at heaven.
Then came the sound of measured footsteps.
And the twelfth arrived.
He wore no mask.
High Inquisitor Marcell Vane.
His face was gaunt, skin pale as parchment. His left eye was not an eye at all, but a silver implant etched with concentric glyphs, glowing faintly beneath his brow. An ancient prosthesis from a forbidden time—frowned upon, yet paradoxically revered.
He did not sit.
He stood before me, arms clasped behind his back, and spoke the first words.
"Cassian of Elderwill. Healer. Exorcist. Alchemist. Initiate of the Church, unrecognized by any Order. No noble blood. No official sponsor. Claimed, however, by Her Holiness."
He said the last part like a curse.
"Do you understand where you stand?"
I met his gaze. "The Tribunal."
A nod. "Then you understand what is at stake."
I said nothing.
[The Tribunal is not a trial. It is a Reckoning—a soul-deep judgment. A ritual drawn from the founding flames of the old Church. Most never make it here. Most who do… are never seen again.]
"Initiate Cassian," said another masked voice—high, feminine, but cold as winter glass. "You claim no heritage, no House. And yet you bear three sacred disciplines. Who taught you?"
"I learned," I said, "from those willing to teach."
"And what of your soul?"
"I don't understand it."
"You carry something old," another voice murmured. "And not yours."
"Agreed," said a third. "The resonance is not from this time."
They leaned forward as one. "We will see."
The stone beneath my feet pulsed softly.
But before the ritual could begin, I hesitated.
I reached into my coat pocket.
And pulled out the scroll.
The moment I did, the air changed. Grew tight, heavy—like the whole chamber leaned toward it.
I held it up.
"It was given to me by Lysander," I said. "He said I would need it."
Vane's eyes narrowed. "Lysander is dead."
"No," I said. "He isn't."
I unsealed it.
Light erupted—not warm, but scorching. Like truth laid bare.
They all flinched.
The words inside were not meant for me.
They were meant for them.
"He is not someone you can touch anymore.
He is chosen by flame itself.
Touch him—and the Church will burn."
Silence fell like a guillotine.
Sweat beaded on masked brows.
The scroll continued:
"This message is not to be read aloud to the subject.
Burn it. Now."
Before I could ask what it meant, the scroll disintegrated—bursting into golden light, then dust.
The light faded.
One of the masked judges coughed. "He… he invoked it."
"Inconceivable," another whispered. "That clause hasn't been activated since—"
"Thorneglass," someone breathed.
Every voice fell silent.
"Explain," said the Arbiter at last, voice tight.
"I don't know what Thorneglass is," I answered. "Lysander gave me that scroll before the escort arrived. Told me not to open it unless I felt cornered."
"Do you claim ignorance of the clause's meaning?"
"I do."
They didn't like that.
But they didn't challenge it either.
Finally, Vane spoke.
"Arch-Scribe Lysander invokes ancient clause 5-Va. A sealed project clause," he murmured. "This grants the subject temporary immunity from scrutiny during initial induction."
A moment of hesitation.
Then the Arbiter said, "We will test sincerity. Initiate the Trial of Echoes."
The floor beneath me ignited in runes.
Warm at first.
Then—white-hot agony.
The vial in my pocket—the one with the flickering blue ember—flared violently.
The fire wasn't outside anymore.
It was inside.
It tore through my ribs like a blade, up my spine, into my skull.
I screamed.
And the world shifted.
The Trial of Echoes
I stood now in a place far from the Tribunal.
A ruined cathedral, bent by forces that hated beauty.
Steel ribs twisted through broken marble. Glyphs carved into stone wept blue light. Everything smelled of ash and old magic.
Twelve robed figures stood in a ring.
Each one young.
Too young.
Boys and girls with faces drawn in pain, defiance, or calm surrender. Their eyes glowed—each a different hue. Each wore a thin silver circlet.
Then came the thirteenth.
She stepped barefoot into the circle.
Hair white as frost. Skin like untouched parchment. Eyes—lavender, burning faintly, like the last light of a dying star.
She looked at me.
"You're early," she said.
"I don't understand."
"No," she agreed. "But maybe that's why it worked."
"Who is exactly are you?"
She stepped forward, tilting her head.
"No one. And everyone. The breach. The price. The thirteenth mistake."
"What does that mean?"
She took my hand.
"The flame remembered you," she said. "Even when you forgot yourself."
"Why?"
"Because it passed through the void," she whispered. "And found someone who didn't burn. It left a tether."
She pressed her palm to my chest.
"You can give it form again. But they'll never let you. Not while they fear what comes next."
The twelve around her began to dissolve—some screaming, some silent, one laughing. Flames rose in their place, bright and unnatural.
The girl didn't move.
"When the bell tolls twelve," she said, "go to the Tower. Bring the vial. Watch the flame bloom."
Then she vanished in fire.
Back in the Tribunal
I collapsed.
Gasps echoed around me.
One of the judges backed away. "That… that wasn't memory. That was intrusion."
"He spiked past the limit," another muttered. "It nearly cracked the circle."
Vane leaned forward, watching me like a scholar observing a sacred wound.
"You have something," he said. "Not a gift. Not divine. Something carried. And I suspect even you don't understand it."
"I didn't ask for it," I said, breathing hard.
"No one does," another judge whispered.
The Arbiter raised a hand.
"Immunity stands. For now. Dismissed."
Vane's silver eye lingered on me as I stood.
And walked out.
The flickering ember inside me pulsed.
Not quiet anymore.
Not dormant.
Hungry.
And in my ears, a whisper like wind through fire:
"When the bell tolls twelve…"
To Be Continued…