A broad hand closed round her wrist, the thumb pressing on a pulse that was and was not hers. Golden light blossomed, too bright to bear.

"You are the Triune's Marked."

The priest, or so she guessed from his long white robe, smiled. Over his chest a single silver moon was embroidered, the image shifting through its phases: waxing, waning, eclipsed, and whole, over and over again. Perhaps that was the Triune he spoke of.

She hovered beside the small girl, observer and inhabitant at once. Every emotion inside the younger girl coiled in her own chest.

Am I? Shouldn't honour feel lighter?

Beneath the child's icy composure stirred a thin, sour shame. She swallowed it, copying the priest's serene smile, wondering if anyone would ever ask what she wanted, or if they simply believed this grand title was every child's dream.

"It is a great honour, Father." She bent low.

His hand stopped her. "Remember, you bow before no one."

In the instant his skin met hers, child and woman stitched together.

Two minds, one body.

Light swept her again. She flinched and raised a hand. It was no child's hand. Long fingers, gold rings. Diamonds scattered brilliance onto snowflakes that melted the instant they touched her skin.

She looked down at an ivory gown, sleeves to her wrists, gold embroidery running down its length. A silver moon was stitched over her chest.

Red roses surrounded her in neat rows, their petals dusted with frost that never seemed to settle long enough to wilt them. Sunlight, snowfall, roses in bloom… None of it made sense.

A broad shadow blocked the glare. An umbrella tilted above her, cutting the snowfall.

Indigo? She turned. Not him, but a stranger.

Sunfire slid across his silver armour, turning his face molten. In the mirrored plates she saw herself: distant crimson eyes, silver hair braided in waterfall strands.

A woman now.

He was taller than Theo. Taller than any man she knew. Silver hair too, but longer, loose over burnished pauldrons, a golden eye engraved on his breastplate.

When he angled the umbrella to cut the glare, his face emerged, sharp and beautiful in a devout sort of way.

"Your Holiness, are you enjoying the first snow?"

"I don't understand its significance," she replied. "The first fall is usually the most impure."

He chuckled. "Ever the pragmatist, Callista. Impure, aye, yet still a cleansing."

Callista? Oh, that's right.

His gaze dropped to her throat. She followed and found an amethyst cut like a snowflake. Tucking it beneath her collar, she stifled a hiss as it seared her skin.

"Perhaps that is why they call you—"

"That is not the reason."

The words froze him. He drew breath and offered a new topic. "May I escort you to Mirror-Lake? The holy water keeps its snows pristine."

"I must decline. The journey is long, and the rites bind me to the Basilica. Violence has risen of late."

"Then spare some care for yourself." The words sounded as though he had spoken them before, as though she had ignored them before.

She offered the dutiful smile expected. Time taken for leisure meant time later spent in relentless catch-up.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"Leisure is a luxury I cannot afford, sir." The half-playful lilt startled her. Perhaps this young knight was more than a guardian.

Perhaps a friend.

He bowed and kissed her ring. Sorrow gathered at the corners of his eyes. When he spoke again, sound warped, petals shivered.

"Forgive me, for I have sinned, Your Holiness."

Sinned? The confession felt wrong, as if it had been dragged in from a darker tale by mistake.

At once the sky flushed crimson. Snow at her feet stayed spotless.

"We are under attack!"

Thunder cracked. A spear of gold tore upwards and vanished into spiralling violet smoke.

"Callista, I need your aid," a second voice called across the roses.

A priestess in white silk strode through storming petals, blonde hair whipping. She slammed a golden staff into the snow and a shimmering barrier swallowed the next surge of burgundy smoke.

"A Sin," the priestess hissed. "How did it breach our sanctum?"

The ground lurched. Rose petals spiralled into a whirlwind. Crimson petals became snow, became fire, became ash, became—

"Astra," another voice overlapped, her own yet nearer, as though a different world pressed close. "You can call me Astra."

The scene kinked sideways.

Realities merged. Indigo stood smiling in an impeccable suit, umbrella tilted to shield her from the rain. She hadn't seen him this young in a long time.

"Miss Astra. A rare name. But an unregistered Gifted? That is more than rare. It is… unprecedented. Except for—"

Except for whom? She had never asked. She should have asked.

Rain drummed steadily. Somewhere else, priests and High Templars screamed, two memories wrestling inside her skull.

Indigo aged before her eyes, each blink a year. Loose waves trimmed, spectacles glinting in low lamplight. She had always pretended not to notice the changes, yet part of her treasured the constancy of his presence, even when she tried to push him away for his own safety.

Now they sat opposite one another in a private bar booth. Her tongue shaped the question she knew by heart. "Why are you helping me?"

Indigo nodded softly, his voice slurred a bit after the third beer. They had finally rewritten her identity, and at last, he allowed himself to lower his guard.

"This world seems beautiful. People trade privacy for comfort, convincing themselves that if they neither see nor speak of evil, perhaps…" His glasses gleamed. "…evil will take the hint."

She thought of endless filing cabinets and biometric scanners, of how neatly civilisation sorted itself by labels and how violently it recoiled from outliers.

"A utilitarian dream, isn't it?" she said. "You even turned the whole dilemma into a riddle."

Indigo leaned back, eyeing his signal interceptor on the table. Even drunk, he was still paranoid. "I was a curious child. I accepted that peace stands on blood and I didn't mind that, until…"

"Until?"

Something shimmered behind his brown eyes. "Something happened. I realised… maybe, even if I could save just one person, it would still matter."

Astra scoffed. "Like me. Messiah complex. You will die trying, you know. You're not immortal."

"Unlike you. You have not aged a day since we met." Wrinkles framed his smile. "That is why I oppose your Council work. They'll connect the dots, no matter how thorough we are."

She tilted her head, considering. "An idiot once told me one life at a time is worth the trouble. Seems the idiocy is contagious."

Surprise lit his face. "I never imagined you'd make such a good fri—"

Burgundy smoke roared in from nowhere, devouring his words, the booth, the priestess from that other memory. Dark timber melted into rose petals, everything washed red, like blood steaming off paradise.

She was in the snow again, wool dress clinging damply to her skin. The vision insisted on replay.

Through the red mist the knight returned, armour stained, ash along his cheek. "Stay back, Callista. Run."

A broadsword shimmered into his grasp. One swing carved a crescent of light through the haze, glowing like a golden moon.

"How many enemies?" he shouted.

"Just one, sir."

"One? How can that be p…" The knight's words faded into a rising buzz.

She remained rooted, half longing to watch the scene unfold, half certain she had seen it before: those crescents of light, a rooftop, and…

Indigo.

Rain and snow folded one upon the other. The silver knight and Indigo blurred into a single shadow holding an umbrella over her head, trying to keep her dry from memories too heavy to bear.

The shadow tore apart.

A phone vibrated against wood.

Astra woke beneath a plain ceiling, grey blinds muting dawn. Eydis's arm lay draped across her waist, warm and reassuring.

The dream clung like incense. Since the battle with Lust the seals on her past had begun to leak. She saw them now: Basilica spires piercing an azure sky, then painted in ribbons of aurora by night; High Templars kneeling before the Saintess of Virtue, eyes on their breastplates blazing as they swore to her.

To Callista.

Yet each image felt like a stolen diary page. Under the warm duvet she could not tell if the Celestial Empire still breathed or lay in ruin. Loneliness threaded that doubt. If no one here, save Eydis, remembered her true name, did the name still belong to her, or she to it?

Yet she decided that, in this world, she had been and still was—

"Astra," murmured Eydis, breath warming the hollow of her throat.

Her name, spoken with such unguarded tenderness, glued the cracked pieces of her heart. Sweat cooled on her brow. The sadness was still there, but a trace of hope slipped in beside it.

"Come closer," Eydis muttered, eyes still closed. "Far too early to brood."

A thin line of white edged the blinds, morning already intruding, yet lavender and last night's dark sweetness drifted from Eydis's skin. Warmth pooled low in Astra's stomach, loosening every knot.

She let it carry her. Lids grew heavy. The world dimmed. All that remained was the steady beat of another heart.

And the promise that tomorrow could wait.

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