“Pain is a blessing upon the wicked.”

Nannade rang the brass bowl standing between the three candles which stood on the wide table that had been brought into the basement below the unassuming house. It had become her secret workshop, laboratory and court room. Whenever possible – every fourth day she had no classes – she would work here, on the tools and garments of the priestess. The Serpent had shaped up nicely, the two of them had found an agreement after many rites, not all of which were trials of accused or punishment of guilty; no, others were deep meditations with the Serpent in a prolonged state as close to unreality as she could, refined dream powder helped her with that. It was a dangerous substance if not applied correctly, luckily, her acolyte was the one administering it, chaperoning her time of absence from the waking world and ensuring she did not fall into addiction or misuse.

She took tiny forceps from a set of jeweller's tools and grabbed a bone splinter from the small wooden box. In the light of her light vial, she inspected it closely under the standing magnifying glass. The splinter was about as big as a human’s pinkie's fingernail and on its flat face it had a rune carved into it, finely and intricately. She called the pain into her waking mind again, made herself aware of it. The pain of cutting open her own side, carving runes onto her own ribs while she was conscious, then breaking them out of the living bone with a pair of pliers, finally sowing her side back up again, all without anything to quell the pain or quicken the healing; abstinence from such substances or spells was one of the commandments she had taken upon herself, to show the Serpent she was willing to sacrifice for the powers the deity shall bestow upon the priestess. Every breath hurt, laughing and coughing were agony, a sneeze was like a kick to the shins, except across her entire ribcage. And as soon as it was all healed up, the procedure would be repeated, three times so far, and she would need at least three more.

Nannade laid the splinter into another small box and got to inspecting her staff. The spar of yew had been inlayed with many more runes, each on its own bone splinter of varying in size and shape. These inlays ran around the staff in a tight coil, its entire length, which had been cut to be exactly Nannade’s height. She got to carving out a new socket for the splinter, first rough, then she carefully filed the bone splinter into its final shape. Then, with a light tap from a wooden hammer, she forced the splinter into the socket-cavity. She finished up with fixing the splinter in place with three tiny silver pins by hammering them between wood and bone. Until this tool was finished and imbued with the power of the Serpent, it remained a mundane and delicate object, so great care was necessary. To remind herself of price and goal, she whispered another litany. “By their sin, guide me. By their guilt, crush them. By their pain, receive your due.” As her lips formed the last syllable, the light flickered, she only saw them from the corner of her eyes, but she was sure, they had changed colour, from their warm yellow to a caustic green. She closed her eyes and said the words again to herself. Yes, she could feel the flames in her soul flicker.

Another splinter was in place, another rune affixed to the staff. She tilted hear head back, groaned and rubbed her eyes. It had to be almost midnight and she hadn’t left the house since lunch with Teacher. She looked over to the armour stand. On it was her scapular – made from two layers tough green linen and the skins of sacrificed snakes in between, not unlike the banner she had made on Stakkarun and lost on Botrelandt – as well as the broad leather belt, now segmented into scales with rims of silver and joined together with the sinews of the sacrificed snakes. All done in painstaking detail ever since their first use in that combat with Irenus over four months ago.

She blinked, but the blink of an eye stretched into a second or two and she had to remind herself to open her eyes again; she was beat for the day. She put the staff back next to the armour stand, blew out the candles, grabbed the light vial and left the basement. She closed the hatch and covered it back up with the rug. Teacher Garetas was waiting for her, playing cards with his “trusted contact” Philander in the main room of the tiny house.

“I can’t go on for tonight, Teacher. I’ll head back to Master Paramonos’ house.”

Garetas stood up. “Need us to escort you?”

Nannade rolled her eyes, she couldn’t stop herself. “No, I’ll be fine!”

“Alright, fine then! We’ll be heading back to the harbour’s terrace then.”

Nannade merely hummed in agreement, put her student’s jacket on and left for the merchant’s terrace. She looked at Garetas and Philander lock the house and go their own way behind her and it made her think. She wanted to tell Garetas that she knew, but she had promised Elissa to never tell him she told her. Then again, Elissa had already broken her promise to never tell anyone. It seemed moot at this point, but still, she felt like telling Garetas, that she knew Philander wasn’t merely his “trusted contact”, that she knew he hid whom he loved, that she was okay with it, even if the thought of what two men did disgusted her. Maybe he wouldn’t feel so alone then. But he also didn’t want to make him feel as if Elissa betrayed his trust. Maybe Nannade could “catch them by surprise” for some contrived reason. Would he feel safer? Would he see it as an act of power by her above him?

She remembered Elissa’s words. “You have to be so careful with men, They’re so fragile on the inside.”

She inhaled and whispered her resolve back to herself. “I will protect you, Teacher. You would kill for me. I would kill for you.”

She decided to get back to her bed as fast as possible. The winters at the bay sea were timid, warm almost. Many places on the coast never saw snow, Chsyatana included, but it rained often. Not tonight, however. Only a very stiff breeze blew and she pulled her cloak closed to shield against it.

The house was still, not a creak to be heard. She quietly got into her bedroom, Korinna was already in bed. As Nannade laid down to sleep, she could feel Korinna’s eyes on her. She had grown more and more distrustful towards Nannade, but at the same time closer to Master Paramonos. Nannade assumed they were in cahoots with each other already. If anything important came up, she knew she had a reliable source on the inside. Nestled in a web of lies and secrets, she fell asleep, knowing who would wait for her on the other side.