THE BLACK KNOT

A grave-born girl escapes abuse to spark a secret rebellion against the church’s chains.

THE BLACK KNOT

PROLOGUE—GRAVE BIRTH
The storm had been clawing at Saint Bleitha's bones for three days when they found her.
But before the graveyard, before the blood-soaked marble and the crows that circled like vultures, there had been the castle. There had been King Aldric's chambers, where tapestries heavy with gold thread hid the screams that echoed from behind locked doors. There had been Isolde—not yet seventeen, hair like spun copper, eyes green as spring moss—kneeling on cold stone floors, scrubbing wine stains from Persian rugs while trying not to breathe too deeply of the stench that clung to everything in the king's private quarters.
She had been chosen for her beauty, plucked from her father's bakery like a flower for the royal table. "An honour," they'd called it when the king's men came with their polished boots and silver coins. "Your daughter will serve His Majesty personally." Her father had wept as he counted the gold—twenty pieces that would keep the bakery from the debtors but would cost him his child's innocence.
The first time King Aldric called her to his chambers after midnight, she thought it was to tend the fire or pour wine for his council meetings. She wore her finest servant's dress—grey wool with white lace at the collar that her mother had sewn before the fever took her. She knocked softly, was bid to enter, and found him alone in his nightrobes, eyes already glassy with drink.
"Come here, little flower," he'd whispered, voice thick as honey poisoned with hemlock. "Your king requires you."
She learnt quickly that refusal meant the lash. That screaming brought the guards, who only laughed and made crude jests about warming the king's bed. That tears were sport to him, something that made his breathing quicken and his hands grow rougher. He used her on his great oak desk, papers crinkling beneath her bruised back, sealing wax still warm from the candle flame dripping onto her bare skin. He bent her over the windowsill while dawn broke pink and gold over the kingdom, his weight crushing her ribs, her cheek pressed to glass cold enough to crack teeth.
When Isolde's belly began to swell with his bastard child, he did not send her away as was custom with soiled servants. Instead, his attentions grew more violent, more creative. He said the child growing inside her was an abomination, a thing that should never draw breath. He pressed knives to her pregnant belly and whispered of cutting it out, of feeding it to his hounds. He chained her wrists above her head and whipped her back until the welts wept blood, claiming he could beat the evil from her womb.
The final night, when the pains started and she begged him to call for a midwife, he only laughed. The sound was like glass breaking, sharp enough to cut. He grabbed her by the throat, pressed her against the stone wall, and told her that monsters should be born in darkness, among the bones of the forgotten dead.
"Go to the graveyard," he hissed, spittle flecking her cheek. "Birth your demon where it belongs."
He dragged her through the castle's corridors, past tapestries that depicted saints in golden glory, past windows where honest servants slept in their beds. The guards turned away when they saw her bloody nightgown, her bare feet slipping on the cold stones. At the postern gate, he shoved her into the storm, into the wind that howled like all the damned souls in hell.
Now she was here, among Saint Bleitha's old stones, her body splayed atop cold marble gnawed by centuries of moss and frost. The ancient saints watched with painted eyes as she writhed, their stone faces cracked and weeping rust-red tears that looked too much like blood in the flickering lightning.
Her thighs were torn wide open, flesh split and glistening wet in the storm's silver light. The king's final gift—a blade drawn across her skin as he cast her out—had opened wounds that would never properly heal. Blood pooled black beneath her battered hips, mixing with the rain that hammered the graveyard into mud. She clawed at the stone beneath her, nails already broken from her desperate crawl through the castle grounds, trailing dirt and fragments of her skin with each scrape against the marble.
Her screams punched holes in the thunder, each cry tearing from her throat like something with teeth, raw and animal, echoing off the abbey walls that loomed beyond the cemetery like the ribs of some great beast. The sound was nothing human—it was the voice of every woman who had ever laboured alone, abandoned by the men who had planted seed in unwilling soil.
No midwife. No candle. No blessed oil or prayers muttered over labouring flesh. Only the stink of blood and shit in the graveyard mixed with the petrichor that rose from rain-soaked earth. Crows circled closer on wings black as sin, their eyes bright and hungry for the afterbirth that would surely come.
Between contractions, Isolde saw her life unravelling like a tapestry with its threads pulled loose. She remembered her father's bakery, the smell of yeast and honey, and the way flour dust danced in morning sunlight. She remembered her mother's hands braiding her hair, whispering stories of saints and martyrs. What grace was this? What reward for enduring the king's brutality?
The pain came in waves now, each one stronger than the last. It felt like the child inside her was made of thorns and broken glass, clawing its way toward the light with talons instead of fingers. She could feel something else too—a coldness that spread from her womb through her limbs, as if winter itself was being born through her flesh.
Lightning illuminated the graveyard in stark relief. The marble slab where she lay had once held the remains of Saint Bleitha herself, the virgin martyr who had died rather than submit to a pagan king's lust. Now it was slick with the blood of another virgin, another victim of royal appetite, though Isolde's martyrdom would bring no canonisation, no golden halos painted on chapel walls.
The storm inside her belly ripped her apart from within. Her skin stretched tight as drum leather, marked with purple veins pushed to their breaking point. Then it tore with a wet sound that the thunder couldn't quite swallow, a ripping like fabric given voice. Her belly split open like overripe fruit, flesh peeling back to reveal the darkness within.
The child clawed its way free with tiny fists already curled for fighting. As she emerged, there was something deliberate about her movement, something that suggested consciousness beyond the blind instinct of birth. She was born with shoulders that wrenched the wound wider, with a mouth pried open in a howl that boiled steam from the frost-covered stones.
The sound was nothing like a typical newborn's cry—it was older, deeper, carrying harmonics that made the very air shiver. The crows took flight in a flurry of black wings, disturbed by something in that voice they couldn't name but instinctively feared.
The baby slithered from between her ruined thighs in a torrent of thick, steaming blood. She hit her thigh with a wet slap, the umbilical cord still pulsing between them. But where most newborns were wrinkled and purple, this baby's skin seemed to shimmer with an inner light, as if something luminous moved beneath the surface. Her eyes opened immediately—not the cloudy blue of most infants, but clear and cold as winter water, filled with an awareness that should have taken months to develop.
Isolde, breath heaving in ragged gasps, gathered that slick, squalling creature to her breast. Her nails dug deep into its slippery back, leaving crescents of broken skin. But instead of pain, the baby seemed to draw strength from the wounds, eyes brightening as if the taste of her mother's blood was sustenance itself.
She managed a single word—"Rayne"—her voice a ragged thread barely audible above the storm. The name came from somewhere deep in her memory, from stories her grandmother had told of women who could call storms and speak with the dead. It tasted of salt and iron and things that grew in darkness.
The baby seemed to hear it and understand. The crying stopped for just a moment, and in that silence, something else stirred. The shadows under Rayne's skin shifted and moved, and for an instant, her eyes reflected the lightning like mirrors made of ice.
Isolde's lips brushed the baby's temple. She whispered something else—words in the old tongue that her grandmother had taught her, words that tasted of salt and iron and things that grew in the spaces between life and death. A blessing and a curse wound together, a mother's final gift to a daughter who would need all the protection the old powers could provide.
"Let them fear you," she breathed, voice growing weaker with each word. "Let them know what they have made."
Then her eyes rolled back, showing only white in the lightning's glare. Her jaw slackened, and blood continued to seep from the yawning tear between her legs as her head fell back against the marble. The life went out of her like a candle flame pinched between fingers.
The child wailed—a raw, animal shriek that seemed to come from somewhere deeper than her tiny lungs could hold. It was the sound of grief and rage and power all braided together, a promise of retribution that would echo down through the years.
As the first pale light of morning touched the graveyard, those cries would bring the abbey's novices running. They would find the corpse, skin blue with cold, legs sprawled in the eternal posture of birth and death entwined. They would see the child still clinging to her mother's breast, mouth smeared with blood that was not her own, eyes bright with an intelligence that should have terrified them.
But they would see only an abandoned baby, a foundling to be raised in the church's care. They could not see the shadows that moved beneath her skin, could not hear the whispers that the wind carried from places where the old gods still remembered their names. They could not know that in trying to destroy his bastard child, King Aldric had instead created something far more dangerous than he could have conceived.
The root of vengeance had been planted in a graveyard, watered with a mother's blood and a king's cruelty. Now it would grow in the dark places of the world, sending out tendrils that would eventually find their way back to the castle where it all began.
CHAPTER 1—THE FOUNDLING
Dawn peels the sky open like a wound, bleeding pale light across the graveyard where death had given birth to something unholy. The novices find the corpse at first light, drawn by the crows that circle in patient spirals overhead. Brother Marcus reaches her first, his young face already pale from morning prayers, but what he sees turns his olive complexion the colour of old parchment.
Isolde lies sprawled across Saint Bleitha's marble tomb, her copper hair fanned out like spilt wine against the stone. Her legs are spread wide in the eternal posture of birth, thighs crusted with dried blood that has turned black in the cold morning air. Her eyes stare sightless at the grey sky, mouth frozen open in a scream that will never end. But it's what clings to her breast that makes Brother Marcus stumble backwards, crossing himself with shaking fingers.
The child—if child it truly is—still feeds from her dead mother's nipple, tiny mouth working at flesh that has grown cold and blue. Blood smears her lips like rouge, and when she turns to look at the approaching novices, her eyes are not the cloudy blue of newborns but clear and cold as winter ice. She watches them with an intelligence that should have taken months to develop.
"Sweet Mother of God," whispers Brother Thomas, the older novice whose hands shake not from youth but from too many years spent in service to mysteries he barely understands. "What manner of devil's spawn..."
But his words die in his throat as more novices arrive. They tear the newborn from her mother's arms—tiny gums still bright with the last of Isolde's blood, the umbilical cord hanging from her belly like a rope of flesh and sinew. The baby's chest heaves with strong, steady breaths, her skin steaming in the cold air.
Sister Agatha, the abbey's midwife, takes the child with hands that have delivered dozens of babies but have never held one quite like this. The infant doesn't cry as most newborns do when separated from their mothers. Instead, she watches everything with those unsettling eyes, as if cataloguing each face for some future reckoning.
They carry her through the abbey's corridors, past stained glass windows that cast coloured shadows like bruises on the stone floors. The morning light filters through images of saints and martyrs, their painted faces serene in their suffering. But something about the child's presence seems to dim the light, as if she carries shadows with her that no amount of holy illumination can dispel.
They lay her on the abbey's cold altar, the same stone where countless masses have been said. Wax slides down dying candles that have burnt through the night, their flames guttering in the drafts that whisper through the nave. The saints above stare down with painted eyes, blind and eternal.
The great doors of the nave swing open with a sound like thunder contained in wood and iron. Father Elias Stone glides in, his robes whispering against the marble floors like secrets being shared between conspirators. His white hair is perfect despite the early hour, every strand in place. His hands are gloved in soft leather, the colour of cream, immaculate and pale.
But it's his eyes that draw attention—grey as winter storms, filled with an intelligence that borders on the predatory. He's a man who has spent his life in service to God, yet there's something in his gaze that suggests he serves older masters as well.
The novices step back as he approaches, forming a semicircle around the altar. He's been the abbey's father superior for twenty years, cultivating a reputation for wisdom that borders on the supernatural. Nobles and kings seek his counsel, and even the Archbishop of Canterbury defers to his judgement.
Stone moves to the altar with steps that make no sound on the stone floor. He looks down at the child with an expression that might be wonder, might be hunger, or might be something else entirely. For a long moment, the only sounds in the nave are the guttering of candles and the distant call of crows.
He dips his fingers in the silver font of holy water beside the altar. When he flicks the cold droplets over the baby's brow, something extraordinary happens. The water hisses on her skin like drops of rain on a hot stone, and steam rises in thin tendrils that curl like serpents in the candlelight.
The novices exchange glances, some crossing themselves, others taking involuntary steps backwards. They've seen holy water bless countless children, but never has it reacted like this.
"Born screaming into a world that will teach her to scream louder," Stone says softly, his voice carrying perfectly in the acoustics of the nave.
He reaches down and presses a gloved thumb to the baby's lips. Most newborns would turn toward the touch, seeking nourishment with blind instinct. But this child does something that makes even the experienced Father Stone pause.
She bites down, tiny gums clamping onto the leather of his glove with impossible strength. Her teeth—and yes, there are already teeth, small and sharp as a kitten's—gnaw at the leather until it parts and blood beads bright on his thumb.
Any normal man might have flinched, but Father Stone does not move. If anything, his smile deepens, and there's a flicker of something in his grey eyes that might be recognition.
"Storms bend to those who know their true names," he says quietly.
Behind them, the great doors open again, and the sound of armoured footsteps echoes through the nave. The novices turn to see Sir Roderick, the king's messenger, his surcoat bearing the royal arms. His face is grim beneath his helm.
"Father Stone," he calls, his voice carrying the authority of one who speaks for the crown. "His Majesty has sent me with specific instructions regarding the bastard child found in your graveyard."
Stone turns slowly, his hands folded within his sleeves, his expression as serene as a painted saint's. "Sir Roderick. How unexpected to see you in God's house at such an early hour."
"The king commands that the bastard spawn be buried immediately, in the same unhallowed ground where its whore of a mother met her end. The bloodline ends here, Father. There are to be no traces left of this... mistake."
The silence that follows is complete. The novices look between their superior and the king's messenger, sensing currents of power and politics that run deeper than their understanding.
Father Stone's smile never wavers. "I see. And has His Majesty considered that this child was found on consecrated ground, making her technically a ward of the church? Canon law is quite specific about foundlings discovered within the boundaries of holy ground."
Sir Roderick's hand drops to his sword hilt. "The king's law supersedes canon law when it comes to matters of royal security. You would not want to be seen as harbouring threats to the crown, Father Stone."
"Threats?" Stone's voice carries just a hint of amusement. "Sir Roderick, what threat could come from one so small? Look at her—barely hours old, abandoned by those who should have protected her. Surely even kings need not fear the vengeance of foundlings."
"Nevertheless, the king's orders are clear. The child is to be disposed of immediately, with no record made of her existence."
Stone nods slowly, as if considering the weight of the knight's words. When he speaks, his voice is soft and reasonable.
"Of course, Sir Roderick. The church is always obedient to lawful authority. But perhaps there is a way to serve both the crown's security and God's mercy?" He gestures toward the child. "The child was born in darkness, found among the graves. What if she were to remain there, in a sense? What if she were to disappear so completely that even her name reflected her origin?"
The knight frowns. "What are you suggesting, Father?"
"I am suggesting that the bastard child you speak of died with her mother in the graveyard, as the king commanded. But foundlings discovered on holy ground must be cared for according to God's law. This child—should we choose to give her a name—might be called Gravis. From the Latin, meaning 'of the grave.' A fitting name for one born among the stones, don't you think?"
Sir Roderick is quiet for a long moment, parsing the implications. What the priest is offering is a fiction that serves everyone's needs: the king can believe his bastard is dead and buried, while the church can raise the child according to its own purposes.
"Gravis," he repeats slowly. "Born of the grave. Died with her mother." He nods. "I think His Majesty will find that... acceptable. Provided, of course, that this Gravis never has cause to remind anyone of her unfortunate parentage."
"Of course," Stone agrees smoothly. "Children raised in the church learn early to forget their worldly origins. Their only father is God, their only mother the Virgin Mary."
But even as he speaks these pious words, his hand remains on the child's chest, feeling the strong beat of her heart. This is no ordinary foundling, and he suspects that forgetting will be the last thing this child learns to do.
Sir Roderick turns to go, then pauses. "Father Stone... see that she learns her place early. Some children born in shadows have a tendency to seek the light, and that rarely ends well for anyone involved."
"Indeed," Stone murmurs, but his words are directed to the child rather than the departing knight. "But some shadows are deeper than others. And some graves give birth to things that make wise men reconsider what they truly fear."
The great doors close with a sound like thunder, leaving Father Stone alone with his novices and the child who is no longer nameless. He looks down at her—at Gravis—and sees something in her eyes that might be recognition.
"Gravis," he says softly, and the name seems to settle around her like a shroud, like a promise, like a prophecy waiting to unfold. "Born of the grave, but not destined to remain there. No, little one. You and I have much work to do together."
He lifts her from the altar with hands that are surprisingly gentle, cradling her against his chest where she can feel the steady beat of his heart through the fabric of his robes. She doesn't cry or struggle. Instead, she watches his face with those unsettling eyes, as if she's already learning to read the intentions of those who hold power over her.
Outside, the crows that have gathered in the abbey's towers begin to call, their harsh voices carrying news that will spread across the kingdom: the bastard is dead, buried with her whore of a mother in unhallowed ground. But something else has been born in her place, something that wears a human face and answers to a name that tastes of earth and endings.
Gravis. Born of the grave.
The storm that birthed her has passed, but the tempest she will become has only just begun to gather strength.
CHAPTER 2—THE FIRST CRACK
They gave her the name Gravis but whispered other things when they thought she could not hear. Witchborn. Grave's child. Saint's mistake. Some called her little relic when they were crueller—as if she were just another scrap of holy bone sealed in glass, something to be kept behind iron and prayers.
But they taught her all the same.
At five, her fingers smudged ink across parchment as she learnt to copy psalms in the cold scriptorium. The quill felt too large in her hand, the letters squirming on the page like worms. She stuck her tongue between her teeth as she wrote, brow furrowed, dark hair falling across her eyes. When she made a mistake, she licked her thumb and scrubbed at the page until the skin on her finger cracked and bled.
Father Stone watched from the shadows, robes whispering against the marble. He stood so still she sometimes thought he might be one of the painted saints come loose from the nave ceiling—all pale skin and blind eyes. But then he would step forward, lay a gloved hand on her head, and murmur, "Good girl, Gravis. So clever. So obedient."
She hated the word obedient, but she loved clever. Clever was the only blade she was allowed to carry.
She learnt her letters before the other girls. By seven, she was copying whole passages of the old texts into the abbey's ledger. The other novices huddled close when she read aloud in the dormitory—small, cold bodies pressed together under thin blankets as she whispered stories of saints flayed alive for refusing pagan kings and martyrs who bled rivers wide enough to swallow cities.
Sometimes the girls fell asleep with their heads on her shoulder. She'd feel their breath warm against her collarbone and hear them mumble their dreams. In sleep, they clung to her. By daylight, they feared her again—reminded by whispers that Gravis was not quite one of them.
Still, she kept their secrets. She bandaged skinned knees, shared stolen crusts, and braided hair by candlelight. She learnt to be the small mother they had all lost somewhere behind stone doors.
The abbey taught her more than words. She scrubbed reliquary floors until her knuckles split and bled into the cracks between marble tiles. She polished candlesticks so fiercely she could see her own reflection, warped and flickering.
When snow piled against the cloister walls, she and the other girls sneaked outside, built misshapen saints from ice and slush, and crowned them with withered holly. They laughed like children are meant to, breath misting the dusk.
But inside—always the weight of prayers, the taste of old dust, the shadows that crawled along Father Stone's hem as he moved from chapel to library to reliquary.
Stone never raised his voice. He never struck her. His hands were always gentle—that was the worst of it. When he found her alone in the scriptorium, he'd lift her chin with two fingers, his thumb brushing the ink smudge from her cheek. "You are a miracle," he'd murmur, voice soft enough to rot teeth. "Born from death, shaped by grace. Our precious relic."
Once, when she fell asleep at her desk, head pillowed on a half-finished page of copied psalms, he found her there. She woke to his breath close—felt gloved fingers brush her hair back from her temple. "Rest, child," he whispered, his voice so kind it scraped her bones raw. "The grave gave you to us. You must give us everything in return."
She pretended to sleep, her body frozen under his hand.
When she was ten, he let her help clean the library.
The abbey's library was older than its marble bones, built when the first saints were still warm in their graves. It was filled with relics that smelt of old leather, lamp oil, and mould.
Brother Marcus unlocked the door for her, then left her alone—trusting Gravis because Stone said she was trustworthy.
She dusted shelves taller than any man, her small hands grey with ancient grime. She polished reliquary cases where saints' fingers lay wrapped in silk. She wiped centuries of candle soot from painted pages so old they cracked like skin.
It was there, at the far end—behind shelves no one touched—that she found it.
A book that did not belong.
No gold leaf. No holy Latin script on its spine. No velvet slipcover to guard its secrets.
It crouched on the lowest shelf, hidden by stacks of forgotten ledgers—a slab of flesh and ink. Its cover looked like cured hide, but the longer she stared, the more certain she was that it had once lived.
When she brushed her fingers over it, the skin twitched under her touch—or maybe that was her heartbeat, hammering in her fingertips. The edges were sewn with thread the colour of old veins. A single rune was carved into its centre—shallow grooves that caught the lamplight like a wound that never closed.
She knew she should turn away. She should call Brother Marcus and run to Father Stone and confess she'd found something unholy.
But her cleverness was stronger than her fear. She knelt, pressing dust and grit into her stockings, and cracked the book open.
The pages smelt of iron and salt. The ink shimmered like fresh blood, though when she touched it, it was dry and warm—as if the book had been waiting for her fingers. The words made no sense at first: lines that curled like roots under the earth, tangled symbols that twisted if she looked too long.
But she'd been copying dead languages since she was five. She traced a finger under each line, sounding out scraps of a tongue older than the abbey's oldest saint.
Lilith.
Asherah.
Mother of storms, grave-born bride.
The words crawled under her ribs, settled beside the part of her that had never felt warm even under the summer sun.
She did not hear Father Stone until his shadow swallowed the page.
His hand came down on her shoulder—warm, gloved, deceptively gentle. "Precious child," he murmured, his voice sliding between her ears like a blade through soft fruit. "What have you found?"
She wanted to lie. She almost did. But the book's weight in her lap made her brave. She turned to face him, eyes bright, fingers still pressed to the ink that smelt like salt and skin.
"It called to me," she said. The truth felt like a bruise under her tongue.
Father Stone's smile cut deeper than any switch. He crouched beside her, his robe whispering across the dust. He did not pull the book away. Instead, he laid his palm flat on the cover and felt the pulse she felt.
"Such a clever girl," he breathed. "Do you know what this is, Gravis?"
She shook her head.
He leaned closer, his breath warm against her cheek. "A relic older than our saints. A page torn from the grave where the first mother slept."
She did not understand. Not yet. But the seed was planted—the first crack in the abbey's cold marble.
Father Stone closed the book himself and slid it back onto its hidden shelf with ritual care. He pressed his gloved hand to her chest—right over her pounding heart.
"You are not ready, little one," he whispered, and the warmth in his voice was worse than any blow. "But you will be. When the time comes, I will show you what lies under the stone."
He lifted her chin again—thumb brushing ink from her jaw, so tender it made her bones ache.
Then he sent her back to the dormitory, back to the cold cots and the girls who slept curled around each other for warmth.
But in her dreams that night, she felt the book under her palm—warm, breathing, alive.
Outside, the abbey's bells called the faithful to vespers. Inside, Gravis lay awake among soft breathing and rustling blankets. She mouthed the word Lilith into the dark.
The first crack had split the stone. The root beneath it stirred, waiting for flesh to ripen.
CHAPTER 3—THE BLEEDING
She was fifteen when her blood came.
It found her in the scriptorium, alone except for the painted saints overhead, their eyes cracked and blind. She felt it first as a warmth—a heat between her thighs that made her press her knees together, fingers damp with ink trembling as they hovered over the half-finished psalm.
She slipped her hand beneath her shift, fingertips brushing the slick, hot seam where childhood ended. When she drew her fingers back into the candlelight, they were red. Red like fresh-cut roses in the abbey garden, red like relic rubies pressed into old chalices, red like the birth-blood her mother spilt onto Saint Bleitha's grave.
She knew what it meant. All the girls did. Womanhood. The moment when Father Stone's attention would shift from gentle guidance to something far more dangerous.
But the stories never told the truth. Not the way it smelt—salt and iron, too warm for cold stone corridors. Not the way the blood stuck to her palms, already drying into brown flakes as she pressed her knees together and shivered.
Brother Marcus found her like that—hunched over the psalm, palms hidden in the folds of her shift, eyes wide and glassy. He didn't smile. He only stared at the crimson stain blooming under her skirts, then turned and ran down the nave, sandals slapping marble like beating wings.
They came for her within the hour.
Two novices first—Sister Agatha, her soft hands turned cruel as she grabbed Gravis's hair and yanked her upright. Another girl—one Gravis had once read to by candlelight—wouldn't meet her eyes as she bound Gravis's wrists in rough cloth. The scriptorium door slammed shut behind them, sealing the psalms and ink inside.
They dragged her through the abbey's stone ribs—archways echoing with whispered prayers and the scrape of her bare feet on marble. Her shift stuck wetly to her thighs. The other girls watched from doorways and alcoves, faces pale, lips moving in silent prayers. Some turned away when Gravis's gaze met theirs. None stepped forward.
They stopped before Father Stone's study—an old door carved with saints who looked down with hollowed eyes. The novices forced her to her knees on the cold flags, their fingers digging bruises into her shoulders. One rapped the door twice, then fled, footsteps fading into the nave's gloom.
The door swung open on oiled hinges. The smell of ink, candlewax, and old wine. The silence that followed was worse than any prayer.
Father Stone stood by the hearth, robe pristine, white hair smoothed back as if not even the wind dared touch him. His gloved hands were folded—soft kid leather, cream-coloured, pale as milk left too long. His eyes found hers immediately—the same way they always did, as if she were the only shape in the world worth seeing.
"Gravis," he murmured, tasting the name like sweet wine. He stepped forward, boots silent on the old carpet. "You've come of age."
His fingers brushed her chin. Gentle. So gentle it made her jaw ache. He lifted her face so the firelight painted shadows under her eyes.
"Stand." The word cracked like bone.
She rose on shaking legs. Blood slid down her inner thighs, warm against skin that had never felt so cold. Stone's thumb brushed her cheek, then pressed to her lip—the same way he did when she was small, when he called her precious child.
But there was nothing fatherly in his eyes now. The warmth was a mask—the last mask he would ever wear for her.
"You are no longer a child," he said, his voice a priest's psalm twisted into corruption. "Come."
He turned, and she followed. Not by choice—but by the cloth binding her wrists, by the grip he took at the nape of her neck when she stumbled. He pushed her through a narrow corridor, candle flames guttering in old sconces, saints carved in the walls watching with blind eyes.
Down. Down into the abbey's belly, where the reliquary door waited—iron-banded oak older than the nave above. He unlocked it with a key worn smooth by centuries of hidden sins.
Inside: stone, cold, and slick with centuries of candle soot. The marble floor was stained darker where old blood had dried. A single iron chain bolted into the far wall. Saints painted overhead—their eyes wide, cracked, and blind.
Gravis tried to speak—tried to shape why? With her split lips—but her mouth would not open. Her breath clung to her teeth, sharp and bright with fear.
Stone pushed her forward until her knees hit the marble. He ripped the cloth from her wrists and let it drop. He circled her once, gloves brushing her hair aside, fingertips ghosting the curve of her throat.
"So obedient," he murmured—his breath sour with old wine. "So pure. The grave gave you to us. Now you give yourself back."
She shivered. The blood between her thighs dripped to the stone—a soft patter that sounded too much like rain.
Stone knelt behind her. His hands were steady—patient—as he lifted the hem of her shift. Cold air kissed raw skin. His breath rasped against her neck as his gloved fingers parted her thighs, finding the warmth there.
He was speaking. Words she could not hear over the roar in her skull—prayers twisted into commands, the saints invoked as witnesses to what he claimed. His belt hissed free of its buckle. Leather brushed her spine.
When he forced himself inside her, her scream cracked the reliquary's silence. No one came. The painted saints stared through blind eyes. The chain rattled where it lay coiled on the floor—waiting its turn.
It tore her open in places she did not know could split. Flesh that had never been touched now split around him—heat and iron, blood and salt. She clawed at the marble, nails cracking. Her forehead struck stone over and over, trying to find some place to hide inside her own skull.
He grunted prayers into her ear—fragments of Latin salted with filth. He called her relic, lamb, and grave's bride. He told her she was his now—his blood and bone, his holy ruin.
When he finished, he did not withdraw immediately. He pressed his palm flat to her belly, feeling the slick warmth of her blood there. His other hand cupped her throat—thumb pressing just hard enough to choke her vision with stars.
He pulled free with a sound that was part grunt, part benediction. Her body sagged forward—slick, ruined, red.
That's when it appeared.
The black knot. Not carved. Not branded. No relic blade touched her. It crawled out of her own flesh—a knot of tangled root under the skin of her inner thigh. At first, it was a bruise—then the skin split just enough for the black lines to show through, pulsing like a vein that did not belong to any human thing.
Stone saw it. He crouched, breath ragged, eyes wide with something too bright to be called devotion. He touched the edge of it—a fingertip brushing the knot. It pulsed under his glove, rejecting him, feeding only on her.
He laughed—a sound like a psalm dragged over broken glass. "Mother's mark," he whispered, voice half-sung. "Lilith's root—sleeping in your blood. The grave's promise."
He struck her then, backhand, the leather splitting her lip. When she did not flinch, he struck her again until her vision filled with frost and fire.
He dragged the chain across the marble—the iron links clattering like bone. He forced her wrists up above her head and locked the manacle tight around raw skin. The cold bit through her flesh, the iron too heavy for her to stand fully. She hung there—half-kneeling, half-slumped, knees pressed in her own blood.
Stone knelt again. Pressed his mouth to the black knot—a parody of benediction. His lips left a smear of her blood across her thigh. "My relic," he murmured against her skin. "My ruin."
Then he stood, robes swishing. He left her there in the reliquary's cold gut—the saints watching, the chain humming in the silence.
It did not end that night. It did not end the next.
For three years, the reliquary was her grave. The chain was her cradle. The black knot was her only inheritance—pulsing when Stone came, searing when his prayers turned to grunts, when his hands turned to fists.
He broke her body but never found the bottom of her. Each time, she waited for the root under her skin to wake, to bloom teeth. It did not—not yet. But it whispered behind her eyes when she dreamed—Wait. Wait. Let the ruin grow.
She waited. She counted the days in bruises and ragged breaths. She dreamed of frost and black feathers. She dreamed of a girl with soft hands and a soft voice who would come carrying warmth instead of chains.
The marble wept in winter. Her wrists grew raw. Her thighs never fully healed. But the black knot pulsed under her skin—a promise. A grave's gift that no relic prayer could scrub away.
When the door finally opened, and Paige's candle flickered into that cold, iron silence—Gravis grinned through split lips, her ruin blooming in eyes that never begged.
CHAPTER 4—THE LAMB AND THE WOLF
Paige finds the reliquary door by accident the first time—or so she tells herself.
It's past midnight when she slips the stolen key into the lock, heart hammering so hard it rattles her teeth. The corridor is stone cold under her bare feet. Her candle stub flickers every time her breath catches.
She tells herself she's just curious—a clever novice, hungry for secrets. But the truth is folded in the pit of her belly like a prayer she doesn't dare speak yet: she wants to see the monster they keep chained under the saints' painted eyes.
She pushes the door open. The smell hits her first—sour rot, old blood, stale seed, straw left to mould on cold stone. Her stomach clenches, but she does not gag. She pulls the door just wide enough to squeeze through, then eases it shut behind her.
The reliquary is colder than the nave above. Candles gutter in iron sconces, their flames bruised with drafts. Old saints painted on the vaulted ceiling look down with cracked eyes. Their prayers have rotted in the stone so long they don't know how to look away anymore.
She sees her then—not a relic, not a saint—but a ruin.
Gravis is naked, shackled to the far wall by wrists rubbed raw and red. Her arms hang slack, but her back is iron taut—muscles knotted under skin gone half-purple with old bruises. Dried blood crusts her thighs. Her hair is matted—snarled around her face in greasy ropes. Her eyes flick open when Paige's candle breathes light across the filth.
Eyes like cracked ice. Not wide. Not begging. Just watching.
Paige's throat tightens. She wants to say something clever—some greeting that won't taste like fear. But her mouth sticks to her teeth. The only sound is the soft drip of water from an old iron sink in the far corner.
Gravis shifts—the chain clanks, iron teeth against stone. She bares her teeth—a grin that shows blood dried between molars.
"Little lamb," she says, her voice scraping the marble. "Did he send you? Or did you wander in here on your soft feet all by yourself?"
Paige kneels before she can think. She sets the candle on the filthy floor—the flame flickering like a dying heartbeat.
"I'm Paige," she blurts. Stupid. Childish. She laughs at herself—the sound cracks the silence.
"I brought you—" She fumbles under her novice cloak, fingers closing around the crust she stole from the dining hall. A hunk of stale bread, too hard for a novice to chew.
Gravis doesn't reach for it. She tilts her head, eyes slitted like a feral cat's.
"Bread." Her grin widens. Her lips split—fresh red. "Do you think I'm starving?"
Paige looks at her. Really looks. The sunken belly, ribs sharp enough to cut through bruises. The sores on her hips where stone bit through skin and never let go.
She knows Gravis is starving. But she nods anyway, voice small. "Yes."
Gravis laughs. The sound is low, thick with ruin. She pulls at the chain—the iron clatters, cuffs biting deep enough to weep pink.
"Come closer then, lamb." She curls her fingers—beckoning. Her nails are cracked, rimmed with old black.
Paige crawls on her knees—the hem of her novice shift dragging through muck. When she's close enough, she lifts the crust—small hands steady though they tremble at the edges.
Gravis leans in—mouth inches from Paige's palm. Then she snaps forward—teeth closing over the bread and Paige's thumb. She bites down—not enough to break skin, but enough to make Paige hiss. She jerks her hand back. Gravis spits the crust to the floor—it lands in the straw, soggy where old filth clings like mildew.
"I don't eat scraps," Gravis snarls. Her voice is all broken glass and pride. "Take it back to your master. Or feed it to the rats."
But Paige doesn't leave. She stays kneeling, watching the way Gravis's chest rises and falls, the way her eyes never quite close even when she seems to rest.
The Second Night
Paige returns with two crusts hidden in her sleeves and a dented tin cup stolen from the washroom. This time, when Gravis snaps at her—teeth bared, wrists yanked against iron—Paige tries a joke.
She lifts the crusts like a juggler with no skill at all. The lumps of stale bread fumble between her clumsy hands. One bounces off her shoulder and rolls into the filth.
Gravis laughs. A real laugh—bitter but bright enough to fog her teeth.
"Stupid lamb," she spits, but there's less venom in it. When Paige presses the other crust to her lips, Gravis holds it there for a moment before deciding to bite. Her teeth snap Paige's thumb again, but gentler this time—a warning softened by the crumb that stays down when Paige pulls her hand back.
The water is harder. Paige crawls to the old sink, the faucet squealing when she twists it open. Rust-streaked water dribbles into the cup, iron-heavy and cold enough to numb her fingertips. When she offers it, Gravis eyes her suspiciously.
"Water," Paige says simply. "No soap. No scent. Just... drink."
Gravis dips her mouth to the cup. Paige holds it steady, knuckles white where Gravis's cracked lips graze them. Gravis drinks only enough to wet her tongue—then lets the rest trickle down her chin. But she doesn't spit it back at Paige. Progress.
"You're still soft," Gravis says when she's done.
"You're still chained," Paige replies.
Gravis's grin splits her cracked lips wider. "Touché."
The Tenth Night
By the time spring creeps through the abbey's cracks, something has shifted between them. Paige no longer flinches when Gravis tests her with sharp words or sharper teeth. Gravis no longer spits the water back or throws the bread in the straw.
They've developed a rhythm—a careful dance around the things too dangerous to say. Paige talks quietly while Gravis eats, telling stories about the other novices, the books in the library, the way sunlight looks through stained glass. Gravis listens with half-closed eyes, occasionally offering a bitter comment that makes Paige laugh despite herself.
"You know he'll smell this on me eventually," Gravis says one night, water still dripping from her chin.
"I'm careful," Paige insists. "I wash my hands. I change my clothes."
"He has other ways of knowing." Gravis's voice drops lower. "He's been doing this longer than you've been alive, lamb. He can smell rebellion like rot."
Paige is quiet for a moment, then: "Then why haven't you warned me away?"
Gravis looks at her—really looks, eyes bright in the candlelight. "Because you're the first person who's treated me like I'm still human."
It's the most honest thing either of them has said in weeks of careful conversations.
"You are human," Paige whispers.
"Am I?" Gravis lifts her shackled wrists, lets the chains rattle. "Or am I just his relic now? His broken thing?"
Paige reaches out without thinking, her fingers brushing the raw skin around Gravis's wrist. Gravis flinches but doesn't pull away.
"You're Gravis," Paige says firmly. "You're clever and sharp, and you make me laugh even when I shouldn't. You're the bravest person I've ever met."
"Brave?" Gravis laughs, but there's no humour in it. "I haven't fought back in three years."
"You're still alive," Paige counters. "You're still yourself. That's the bravest thing of all."
The Breaking Point
It's summer when Paige brings something different—not bread or water, but a book. She pulls it from beneath her cloak with trembling hands: The Rise and Fall of the All-Mother.
Gravis freezes when she sees it. Her eyes go wide, then narrow to slits.
"Where did you find that?"
"The same place you did, I think. Hidden behind the rotting hymnals."
Gravis stares at the leather cover, at the rune carved into its surface. "Stone took it from me. Before..." She gestures at the chains with bitter humour.
"I've been reading it," Paige says quietly. "Learning about women who refused to bow. Women who fought back."
"Pretty stories," Gravis says, but her voice lacks conviction.
"Not stories. History. Real women who chose freedom over safety." Paige opens the book carefully. "Listen to this."
She reads about Lilith, about the first rebellion, about women who carried marks of resistance beneath their skin. Not supernatural nonsense, but real accounts of women who organised, who resisted, who refused to accept the roles forced upon them.
When she finishes, Gravis is quiet for a long time.
"You think we're like them?" she finally asks.
"I think we could be."
Gravis looks up at the painted saints, their cracked eyes and faded halos. "And what would we do? Two women against the entire church?"
"We'd start small," Paige says. "With ourselves. With each other."
She closes the book and sets it between them on the filthy straw. "Tomorrow night, I'm going to bring tools instead of bread. A file, maybe. Something to work at those shackles."
"Paige—"
"You said he'd smell rebellion on me eventually anyway. So let's give him something worth smelling."
Gravis stares at her for a long moment, this soft-faced girl who speaks of rebellion like it's a simple choice. Then she smiles—not the bitter grin she usually wears, but something warmer, more real.
"Alright, lamb. But when we do this, there's no going back. You understand that?"
Paige nods. "I understand."
"And when we're free—if we get free—we don't just run and hide. We make sure no other girl ends up in chains like these."
"Yes."
Gravis leans back against the stone wall, chains settling around her like old friends. But for the first time in three years, they feel temporary.
"Then tomorrow night, little lamb, we stop playing their game and start playing ours."
Above them, the painted saints watch with their cracked eyes, silent witnesses to a pact that will shake the abbey's foundations. In the flickering candlelight, two women plan the end of their captivity and the beginning of something far more dangerous.
The lamb has finally found her teeth. And the wolf is ready to teach her how to use them.
CHAPTER 5—THE RISE AND FALL OF THE ALL-MOTHER
The candle's stub weeps wax into Paige's palm as she settles beside Gravis in the reliquary's cold embrace. The book rests heavy across her knees—not with supernatural weight, but with the gravity of forbidden knowledge.
"Are you certain you want to hear this?" Paige asks, her fingers tracing the worn leather cover.
Gravis shifts against the stone wall, chains rattling softly. Her eyes are clearer than they've been in months, focused with a hunger that has nothing to do with the bread crumbs scattered in the straw.
"Read," she says simply.
Paige opens the book carefully. The pages are old, brittle at the edges, but the ink is clear—copied by careful hands over generations. No mystical properties, just words preserved by women who understood their value.
"This was written by a scholar named Marguerite de Navarre," Paige begins, reading from the introduction she'd studied. "She collected accounts of women who defied the church's authority across three centuries."
She turns to the first chapter and begins to read:
"Before the church claimed dominion over women's souls, there was Lilith—not the demon of Christian mythology, but a symbol of the first refusal. The name itself became a rallying cry for women who would not submit to the roles forced upon them."
Gravis leans forward, despite the chains' bite. "Go on."
"The church fathers rewrote her story, made her a cautionary tale about the dangers of female rebellion. But in hidden texts, in whispered stories passed from mother to daughter, the truth survived: Lilith was the first to say 'no' when commanded to bow."
Paige's voice grows stronger as she continues. "Throughout history, women carried their names as a secret. They formed networks, helped each other escape arranged marriages, and protected daughters from abuse. They called themselves the daughters of Lilith—not because they worshipped demons, but because they remembered what it meant to refuse."
"The black knot," Gravis whispers, her hand moving unconsciously to her thigh where the mark mars her skin.
"Not supernatural," Paige says, reading from a passage she'd marked. "Listen to this: 'The women who carried Lilith's legacy often bore scars that resembled twisted roots or knots. These were not mystical brands but the physical evidence of their resistance—scars from chains, from beatings, from the violence inflicted on those who dared to fight back. They wore these marks not as shame, but as proof of their refusal to be broken."
Gravis touches the raised skin on her thigh—the scar tissue that formed around repeated injuries, creating a pattern that looked almost deliberate in its twisted complexity.
"They were like us," she breathes.
"Yes. And they didn't just suffer in silence." Paige turns several pages, finding another passage. "Here—accounts from the Abbey of Saint-Denis, 1347. A group of novices exposed their superior's abuse, led by a woman named Catherine who had been imprisoned in their reliquary for two years."
"What happened to them?"
"They escaped. Catherine and six others. They established a shelter for women fleeing violent marriages, operated it for nearly a decade before the authorities found them."
"And then?"
Paige's voice grows quiet. "Catherine was burned as a witch. But the shelter had already saved dozens of women. The network continued, run by those she'd taught."
They sit in silence for a moment, the weight of history settling between them. Above, the painted saints watch with their cracked eyes, and Paige wonders how many of them were based on real women whose stories had been sanitised and rewritten.
"There are more accounts," she continues. "Women who organised. Who learned to read and write in secret, who preserved knowledge, who fought back in whatever ways they could."
She reads about Eleanor of Aquitaine's hidden court of women scholars, about the Beguines who created independent communities, about unnamed women who simply refused to be broken despite everything done to them.
"They weren't magical," Paige says when she closes the book. "They were just... stubborn. Stubborn enough to survive, smart enough to plan, brave enough to act."
Gravis stares at the book's cover, at the simple rune carved there—not a mystical symbol, but an old mark meaning 'remember.'
"Stone knew what this was," she says finally. "That's why he took it from me. Not because it contained spells, but because it contained proof that women like us have always existed. Have always fought back."
"And won, sometimes."
"Sometimes." Gravis looks up at Paige, and for the first time since they met, there's something like hope in her eyes. "Do you really think we could do it? Escape this place?"
"I think women with less preparation and fewer resources have done it before us."
"And after? What would we do with freedom?"
Paige thinks of the accounts she's read, of Catherine's shelter, of networks that passed information and aid from woman to woman across centuries.
"We'd do what they did. Help others. Make sure no other girl ends up chained in a reliquary while priests speak of God's love."
Gravis laughs—not the bitter sound Paige has grown used to, but something warmer. "You really are planning a rebellion, aren't you, lamb?"
"We both are."
Gravis shifts, testing the chain's hold on her wrist. Over the past weeks, Paige's small file has done its work. The shackle is weaker now, though not yet broken.
"Tomorrow night," Gravis says. "Bring the tools. We finish this."
"Are you ready?"
"I've been ready for three years. I just needed to remember that readiness and ability are different things." She looks at the book again. "And I needed to remember that I'm not the first woman to be locked in darkness. Others found their way out."
Paige closes the book and tucks it safely within her cloak. "Others found their way out," she agrees. "And they left us a map."
Above them, the saints continue their eternal vigil, their painted faces serene in their suffering. But tonight, their silence feels different—not oppressive, but expectant. As if they, too, are waiting to see what these daughters of Lilith will do with the knowledge they've claimed.
The candle burns lower, but neither woman moves to leave. They sit together in the growing darkness, two points of warmth in a cold stone tomb, planning their escape not with magic or miracles, but with the same tools women have always used: intelligence, determination, and the stubborn refusal to accept that suffering is their natural state.
Tomorrow night, the real work begins.
CHAPTER 6—THE ESCAPE
Stone's footsteps echo down the stairwell before they hear his voice—wine-thick and slurred with evening prayers. Paige barely has time to blow out the candle and press herself against the damp wall before the reliquary door creaks open.
She clutches the small file and lock picks to her chest, tools stolen over weeks of careful planning. Gravis arranges herself against the far wall, the weakened shackle positioned to look secure. They've practised this deception, but tonight feels different. Tonight, the pretence ends.
Stone stumbles into the chamber, reeking of communion wine and something darker—the sour smell of a man who's grown too comfortable with his sins. His pale robes drag through the filthy straw as he approaches Gravis with the hungry look of a predator approaching familiar prey.
"My precious relic," he murmurs, his gloved hands reaching for her face. "Have you been lonely in the dark?"
For three years, Gravis has perfected the art of floating somewhere above her body during these moments, letting him use what he thinks he owns while her true self remains untouchable. But tonight is different. Tonight, she is fully present, every nerve alive with purpose.
As Stone fumbles with his robes, muttering prayers that blaspheme the very air they're spoken into, Gravis catches Paige's eye in the darkness. A single nod passes between them—the signal they've planned for but never quite believed would come.
Now.
With fluid grace born of weeks of careful preparation, Gravis slips her hand from the weakened shackle. The metal gives way with barely a whisper, falling to the straw like a discarded chain of office. Stone is too lost in his ritual of violation to notice as she reaches for the pottery shard she's kept hidden—a piece broken from the old water basin, sharpened over months against the stone wall.
"Father," she says, her voice honey-sweet and deadly calm. "Look at me."
He turns, confusion flickering across his features as his wine-addled mind tries to process what he's seeing. The confusion becomes shock as he realises her hands are free. Shock becomes terror as she drives the makeshift blade deep into his throat.
Blood sprays across the reliquary walls, painting the painted saints with crimson benediction. Stone staggers backwards, hands clutching at the wound, his eyes wide with the dawning understanding that his victim has become his executioner.
He tries to speak—to pray, to curse, to call for help—but only bubbles of blood escape his lips. His perfect white hair is no longer perfect, matted now with his own life flowing out through Gravis's carefully placed cut.
Paige emerges from the shadows, her face pale but determined. Together, they watch Father Stone collapse to his knees, then pitch forward onto his face, his pale robes soaking up his blood like altar cloth designed for this very purpose.
"Is he...?" Paige begins.
"Dead," Gravis confirms, checking for a pulse at his wrist with clinical detachment. "Very dead."
She stands on unsteady legs—it's been so long since she's borne her own weight without iron support. The freedom is dizzying, terrifying, and intoxicating all at once.
"We don't have long," Paige says, already moving. "Someone will come looking for him."
She wraps her novice cloak around Gravis's naked shoulders, the rough wool scratching against skin that hasn't felt fabric in years. Together, they slip from the reliquary into the abbey's sleeping corridors.
Paige has spent months memorising every passage, every loose stone, every window that might grant them escape. She leads them through servant stairs and storage rooms, past sleeping novices who will wake tomorrow to find their world forever changed.
They reach the small window in the outer wall that Paige scouted weeks ago. The glass is old and warped, the leading soft with age. Working together in desperate silence, they pry it open wide enough for escape.
Gravis goes first, dropping into the abbey garden where winter herbs grow wild and neglected. Her bare feet hit frozen earth, and she gasps at the sensation—cold, yes, but the cold of the open world, not the suffocating chill of stone walls.
Paige follows, clutching the book against her chest like a talisman. Not magical, but precious nonetheless—their proof that resistance is possible, that women have always found ways to fight back.
They run.
Through the garden, over the stone wall, across the moor where wind cuts like knives and the ground is treacherous with hidden bogs. They run until their lungs burn and their legs shake, until the abbey is nothing but a dark spire against the starless sky.
Only when they reach the edge of Thornwood—the wild forest that borders the moor—do they finally stop to catch their breath. Gravis sinks to her knees among the fallen leaves, her body shaking not from cold but from the enormity of what they've accomplished.
"We did it," Paige whispers, the words strange and wonderful on her tongue. "We actually did it."
Gravis looks back toward the abbey, barely visible now through the trees. Somewhere behind them, Stone's body grows cold in the reliquary where he tortured her. Somewhere behind them, his sins are finally catching up with him, though he's no longer alive to face the reckoning.
"He's dead," she says, and there's wonder in her voice. Not satisfaction—she feels oddly empty of triumph—but wonder that after three years of helplessness, she was finally able to act.
"What happens now?" Paige asks.
Gravis stands slowly, testing her freedom in the real world beyond stone walls. Above them, clouds part to reveal a crescent moon, its silver light illuminating their path deeper into the forest.
"Now we find shelter. Food. Safety." She looks at Paige, this brave girl who risked everything to free a stranger. "And then we figure out how to help others like us."
"The book mentioned safe houses. Networks of women helping each other."
"Then we find them. Or build them ourselves." Gravis pulls the cloak tighter around her shoulders. "Stone was right about one thing—I am dangerous now. But not in the way he thought."
Behind them, the abbey bell begins to toll—they've discovered the body. But it's too late now. The daughters of Lilith have escaped their cage, and they have no intention of ever being caged again.
They turn their backs on the abbey's distant spire and walk deeper into Thornwood, two women with nothing but their lives, their freedom, and their determination to ensure no other girl suffers as they have suffered.
The forest welcomes them with rustling leaves and night sounds, ancient and wild and utterly indifferent to the human concepts of sin and salvation that tried to break them.
They are free.
And freedom, they're beginning to understand, is just the beginning.

CHAPTER 7—SANCTUARY
They find the cottage three days into the forest, when hunger has made them light-headed and the winter cold has seeped into their bones. It squats in a clearing like a wounded animal, half its roof caved in, its windows dark as dead eyes.
But it's shelter, and shelter is what they need.
The front door hangs crooked on rusted hinges. Inside, they discover it was once someone's retreat—a scholar's refuge, judging by the books that line the walls and the writing desk positioned near the window. Whoever lived here left long ago, but they left behind things that matter: dried herbs hanging from the rafters, preserves sealed in clay pots, and most importantly, clothes abandoned in a wooden chest.
"Someone lived alone here," Paige observes, running her fingers along the dust-covered spines of books written in Latin, Greek, and languages she doesn't recognise. "A woman, I think."
Gravis examines the hearth, where cold ashes speak of fires long dead. "Look at this," she says, pointing to symbols carved into the mantelpiece. Not crosses or saints, but older marks—spirals and knots that echo the rune from their stolen book.
"She was like us," Paige breathes. "Someone who knew the old stories."
They spend their first day making the cottage habitable. Paige coaxes fire from the ancient hearth while Gravis patches the worst holes in the roof with branches and salvaged cloth. The work feels strange after years of enforced inactivity—muscles remembering how to move with purpose instead of merely enduring.
"We should burn these," Gravis says that evening, gesturing to the grey novice robes they've shed. They lie in a pile by the door like discarded snake skins.
"Not yet," Paige says. "We might need them. If anyone comes looking..."
But even as she says it, she knows they won't go back to pretending. The abbey's grey wool represents everything they've escaped—submission, silence, the slow erosion of self until nothing remains but obedience.
Gravis understands. She kicks the robes into the corner with her bare foot. "When we're ready, then. When we know we'll never need to hide again."
The cottage's previous occupant left behind a copper tub, dented but serviceable. On their second day, they heat water over the fire—a luxury neither has known in years. Gravis bathes first, and Paige helps her wash away not just the filth of imprisonment, but the lingering sense of being someone else's possession.
The hot water reveals the full map of Stone's cruelty—scars that crosshatch Gravis's back, circular burns on her shoulders where candles were pressed to flesh, the twisted scar tissue on her thigh that forms the pattern they've learned to call the black knot.
"It's not shame," Paige says quietly, her fingers gentle on the raised skin. "It's proof. Proof that you survived everything he did to you."
Gravis looks down at her body—no longer the broken thing Stone tried to create, but evidence of endurance. "The book called them marks of resistance."
"That's what they are."
When Paige bathes, Gravis sees different scars—smaller, more subtle. The calluses on her palms are from scrubbing stone floors. The permanent stoop in her shoulders from years of forced deference. The way she still flinches slightly when touched, even by gentle hands.
"He hurt you too," Gravis realises. "Not the same way, but..."
"All of us," Paige agrees. "Every girl in that place. Some with chains, some with words, some with the simple knowledge that chains were always waiting if we stepped too far out of line."
Among the cottage's abandoned belongings, they find clothes that transform them both. For Gravis: a deep red dress that fits like it was made for her, black leather boots that lace up her calves, and a wool cloak dyed the colour of dried blood. For Paige: simpler garments, but well-crafted—a cream linen shift, a green wool dress, and brown leather boots soft as butter.
In the cracked mirror above the washbasin, they barely recognise themselves. The abbey's broken novices have been replaced by something else entirely—women with clear eyes and straight spines, who move with purpose instead of fear.
"We look like the women in the book," Paige says, adjusting the green dress. "The ones who refused to bow."
"We are the women in the book," Gravis corrects. "We're writing the next chapter."
As the days pass, they develop routines that feel like freedom. Mornings spent foraging in the forest—Paige has a gift for finding edible plants, while Gravis proves surprisingly skilled at setting snares for rabbits. Afternoons reading by the fire, sharing books and planning what comes next. Evenings talking, really talking, without the constant fear of discovery.
They learn each other's stories. Paige speaks of her father's debts, of being sold like livestock to pay what he owed. Gravis describes her early years in the abbey—not just the horror of Stone's abuse, but the smaller cruelties, the systematic erosion of self that began long before the chains.
"I used to dream of my mother," Gravis says one evening, her head resting on Paige's shoulder as they sit before the fire. "Stone told me she was a whore who died in childbirth, but I dreamed she was strong. Fierce. That she would have fought for me if she'd lived."
"Maybe she did fight," Paige suggests. "Maybe that's where your strength comes from."
"And maybe your father's betrayal taught you to recognise real loyalty when you see it. You could have turned me in. Earned Stone's favour. Instead, you chose to free me."
They're both quiet for a moment, watching flames dance in the grate. Outside, wind moves through the trees with sounds like whispered secrets.
"What do we do now?" Paige asks. "We can't stay hidden forever."
"We don't hide," Gravis says, her voice gaining strength. "We build something. The book mentioned networks—women helping women, safe houses, ways to escape the life the church forces on us."
"Where do we start?"
"With ourselves. We heal. We learn. We become strong enough to help others." Gravis shifts, looking directly at Paige. "And then we find the other daughters of Lilith. The ones who don't even know they're daughters yet."
Over the following weeks, they transform the cottage into more than just shelter—it becomes a sanctuary. They repair the roof properly, strengthen the walls, and create hiding places for their growing collection of forbidden books. The previous occupant left behind a small library of works that would see them burned as heretics—texts on medicine, astronomy, philosophy written by women whose names were erased from official histories.
"She was preparing for something," Paige observes, running her fingers along margin notes written in a feminine hand. "Building knowledge, gathering resources."
"Maybe she was preparing for us," Gravis suggests. "Maybe she knew that someday, women like us would need this place."
They find evidence to support this theory—maps marking convents and abbeys across the region, notes about corrupt clergy, even detailed plans for helping women escape arranged marriages. It's as if their mysterious predecessor were building the very network they now hope to create.
"We're not the first," Paige realises. "This work has been going on for generations."
"Then we're carrying it forward. Making it stronger."
One evening, as spring begins to touch the forest with new green, they make love for the first time. Not the desperate coupling of survival, but something tender and fierce and entirely their own. Gravis maps Paige's body with hands that have learned gentleness, while Paige traces the scars on Gravis's skin with reverent fingers.
In the aftermath, they lie entwined before the fire, skin warm against skin, hearts beating in rhythm.
"Sisters," Gravis whispers, touching the place where Paige's own small scar has formed—not mystically, but naturally, where rough abbey stones cut deep enough to leave permanent marks.
"Sisters," Paige agrees. "In everything that matters."
Outside, the forest settles into sleep around their cottage sanctuary. Inside, two women hold each other and plan the future—not just their own, but the future of every woman still trapped in stone cages, still pretending that submission is virtue, still believing that suffering is their natural state.
The black knot pulses beneath their scars—not supernatural, but symbolic. A reminder of what they've survived, what they've learned, what they've become.
They are no longer victims. They are no longer hiding.
They are daughters of Lilith, and they are just beginning to understand what that means.
The real work starts tomorrow.

CHAPTER 8—THE RECKONING
Spring comes late to Thornwood, but when it arrives, it brings news from the outside world. A travelling merchant camps near their cottage, grateful for hot soup and a warm fire. He carries gossip from the villages, news from the abbey, stories that make Gravis and Paige exchange meaningful glances across the firelight.
"Terrible business at Saint Bleitha's," the merchant says, warming his hands around a clay cup. "Father Stone has gone missing, and the whole place is in chaos. Some say he ran off with the abbey's gold. Others whisper darker things."
"What kind of darker things?" Paige asks, careful to keep her voice merely curious.
"Well..." The merchant leans closer, relishing the chance to share scandal. "They found blood in the reliquary. Lots of it. And there's talk of a novice gone missing around the same time. Pretty girl with dark hair—some say Stone took her with him when he fled."
Gravis keeps her face perfectly neutral, but her hand finds Paige's under the table and squeezes tight.
"Course, the new Father Superior—Brother Marcus, young fellow—he's been asking questions. Found some disturbing things in Stone's private quarters. Letters that shouldn't exist, items that..." The merchant shakes his head. "Let's just say the Church is conducting a very quiet investigation."
When the merchant leaves the next morning, weighted down with supplies they've traded for information, Gravis and Paige sit in their cottage parlour and digest what they've learned.
"Brother Marcus," Paige says thoughtfully. "He was always kind to the younger novices. Never cruel."
"And now he's asking the right questions," Gravis adds. "Stone's other victims—they might finally have someone who'll listen."
Over the following weeks, more travellers bring more news. The investigation is expanding beyond Saint Bleitha's. Other abbeys, other convents, other cases of missing novices and corrupt clergy. What started as one dead priest has become something larger—a reckoning that's spreading across the region like wildfire.
"Twenty-three novices have come forward," reports a tinker who stops to repair their cooking pot. "All from different houses, all with similar stories. The Archbishop himself has gotten involved. Heads are rolling, as they say."
Gravis feels a complex mix of emotions. Satisfaction that Stone's crimes are finally being exposed, but also a strange emptiness. She'd expected to feel more triumphant when his sins caught up with him.
"Justice doesn't resurrect the dead," she tells Paige that evening. "It doesn't undo what was done."
"No," Paige agrees. "But it prevents future victims. And it tells the survivors that their pain mattered."
They're sitting in their garden—the vegetables Paige planted are thriving in the spring soil. The cottage no longer feels like a hiding place but like home, a sanctuary they've built with their own hands.
"I keep thinking about them," Gravis says. "The girls are still trapped in places like Saint Bleitha's. The investigation will help some, but there are others. Hidden away where no Brother Marcus will think to look."
"The book mentioned safe houses," Paige says. "Networks of women helping women escape."
"Historical accounts. But what about now? What about the girls who need help today?"
That night, they spread their predecessor's maps across the kitchen table. Marks in faded ink show convents and abbeys throughout the region. Some have notes in the margins—' Father Benedict, cruel but not clever' at one location, 'Sister Agatha helps when she can' at another.
"She was watching them," Paige realises. "Mapping the dangerous places, identifying potential allies."
"Building intelligence for a network that never got finished," Gravis adds. "Because she was one woman, working alone."
"But we're not alone."
Over the summer, they begin to travel. Not far from their cottage sanctuary, they have just day trips to nearby villages, markets, and places where women gather. They listen more than they speak, learning to recognise the signs they themselves once wore—the downcast eyes, the careful movements, the way some women flinch when men raise their voices.
In the market town of Millhaven, they meet Sarah, a baker's daughter whose father has promised her to a man twice her age. In the village of Thornbridge, there's Mary, whose husband beats her bloody every market day. Near the ruins of Greyrock Abbey, they encounter former novices living in desperate poverty after fleeing their convent.
They don't approach these women directly—not yet. Instead, they observe, they learn, they make careful mental notes. Some are ready to hear about alternatives to their current lives. Others are too frightened, too broken, too convinced that suffering is their lot in life.
"We can't save them all," Paige says after a particularly heartbreaking encounter with a young woman whose spirit seems utterly crushed.
"No," Gravis agrees. "But we can save some. And those we save can help others."
By autumn, they've made their first real contacts. Sarah, the baker's daughter, proves to have a spine of steel once she realises she has options. Two of the former Greyrock novices are eager to help other women escape similar fates. A widow named Margaret runs an inn and offers to provide shelter for women fleeing violent situations.
"It's beginning," Paige says one evening as they update their maps with new information. Red marks now show potential safe houses, green marks indicate trusted allies, and yellow marks warn of dangerous locations.
"Just the beginning," Gravis corrects. "The real work comes next."
They establish protocols, communication methods, and escape routes. The cottage becomes the centre of a growing network—not just a sanctuary for themselves, but a coordination point for helping others. The mysterious woman who lived here before would be proud, they think, to see her work finally bearing fruit.
One cold morning in late autumn, a desperate knock comes at their door. They open it to find a girl no more than fourteen, barefoot and bleeding, her novice robes torn and muddy.
"Please," she gasps. "I heard there were women here who help. I can't go back. I can't—"
"You don't have to," Gravis says firmly, pulling the girl inside. "You're safe now."
As Paige tends to the girl's injuries and Gravis prepares hot food, they exchange a look that needs no words. This is why they survived. This is what their suffering was meant to create—not just their own freedom, but the freedom of others.
The girl's name is Catherine. She escaped from Saint Agatha's convent, where the Mother Superior has been selling novices to wealthy men under the guise of "private service." It's a story they've heard variations of before, but Catherine has something the others didn't—names, dates, documentation she stole before fleeing.
"We can expose them," she says, producing a bundle of letters from beneath her torn robes. "I have proof."
Gravis and Paige study the letters by candlelight. Evidence of systematic abuse, human trafficking, and corruption that reaches into the highest levels of the church hierarchy. The investigation that began with Stone's disappearance has only scratched the surface.
"This goes to Brother Marcus," Paige decides. "He's proven he'll act on evidence like this."
"And Catherine stays here until it's safe," Gravis adds. "However long that takes."
As winter settles over Thornwood, their cottage sanctuary bustles with quiet activity. Catherine is healing, learning to trust again, and beginning to help with their work. Sarah has successfully escaped her arranged marriage and now helps coordinate their network in Millhaven. Margaret's inn has become a crucial safe house, and word is spreading through careful whispers that there are women who help women, places to run when running becomes necessary.
They've saved eleven women by Christmas. Not a huge number in the grand scheme of things, but each one represents a life reclaimed, a future restored, a victory against the system that tried to break them all.
"The old woman's book mentioned cycles," Paige says one evening as they sit before their fire, Catherine asleep in the loft above, planning their next rescue in whispered conversations. "How does this work pass from generation to generation?"
"And now it's our generation's turn," Gravis replies. "Our turn to carry the torch forward."
Outside, snow falls softly and silently over Thornwood. Inside, three women plan their next moves in a war that's been fought for centuries—the war for women's right to say no, to choose their own paths, to live as something other than property.
The black knot beneath their scars no longer feels like a mark of trauma. It has become something else—a symbol of survival, of sisterhood, of the unbreakable connection between women who refuse to bow.
They are daughters of Lilith, inheritors of her first rebellion. And their work has only just begun.
The reckoning is no longer coming.
The reckoning is here.