Ophelia felt more elated than she had in years. Apart from obligatory parties, she could count on one hand the number of times she had left the house over the past four years. This outing with Chadwick was her first proper outing.

What made it even better was the snow. Unlike the relentless blizzards of previous years, it was falling softly today, blanketing the ground in a delicate layer of white the moment she stepped into the carriage.

Tearing her gaze from the window, Ophelia stole a glance at Chadwick, seated opposite her. With his long legs crossed, he silently turned the pages of his documents, looking as composed as ever.

“Chadwick.”

Her voice was soft as she called his name.

He looked up from the papers to see her.

“Where are we going?”

At her question, Chadwick faintly furrowed his brow before replying.

“Did I not tell you?”

“No.”

She laughed quietly in response. It was almost unheard of for him to forget anything.

In response, Chadwick said in a dry voice:

“We are on our way to the Temple.”

“…The Temple?”

The words struck her like a blow. Just moments ago, her heart had felt light and fluttery, but now it plummeted to the pit of her stomach.

Her trembling fingers clutched at the folds of her dress as she asked, her voice unsteady.

“…Why the Temple?”

Her attempt at a smile faltered beneath his indifferent gaze. Chadwick turned back to his papers and spoke.

“Weren’t you unwell?”

At his words, Ophelia’s lips trembled and parted slightly. Chadwick put the folder down and looked at her.

“It would be best if you received healing at the temple. After all, you cannot heal yourself.”

Although she smiled at his words, Ophelia’s hands trembled as she clasped them together tightly.

“I’m all right. I’m better now.”

When she replied, Chadwick’s eyebrows drew together slightly. She was clearly unwell, so why was she insisting otherwise?

Those blessed with holy power were rarely subject to sickness, being shielded by the goddess’s grace. For Ophelia, hailed as the most gifted bearer of holy power in generations, such vulnerability should have been unthinkable.

In truth, he had never seen her ill in the five years he had known her, except for that one night long ago when they had slept together.

“If word spreads that the Grand Duchess herself fell ill and could not even visit the Temple, it will be a disgrace to the house. Just go.”

An unbidden memory stirred, and Chadwick’s brow furrowed more deeply as his voice dropped to a low, cold tone.

At that frigid tone, the clarity in Ophelia’s violet eyes dimmed. The Pope’s face surfaced in her mind — sharp, vivid and inescapable.

‘Please… let it not be so.’

A pain she should not have felt swept over her like a phantom.

“…Phelia.”

“…”

“…Ophelia!”

Chadwick’s voice jolted her back from her daze.

“Yes?”

“We’ve arrived. Step down.”

Ophelia turned her head, dazed, toward the window. The carriage had already come to a stop, and beyond the glass rose the gleaming white marble of the Temple.

“…Chadwick.”

She called to him just as he was about to disembark.

“What is it?”

He paused, glancing back at her.

Meeting his indifferent gray eyes, Ophelia steadied her voice, though it trembled faintly.

“You… you won’t leave, will you?”

At her words, Chadwick’s brow drew together as he asked back,

“What are you talking about?”

“I mean…”

Clutching at her dress, Ophelia held his gaze.

“You won’t leave until I’ve finished healing, will you?”

Chadwick regarded her a moment, then replied with a dry expression.

“You’re being foolish. With only one carriage, where would I possibly go?”

“…Yes. That’s enough.”

In response, Ophelia gave a fragile smile, as though she had been reassured. It was so fragile that it looked as though it might shatter at any moment.

Chadwick closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again. His voice was restrained as he spoke.

“Get down.”

“…Yes.”

Taking his gloved hand, Ophelia stepped down from the carriage. Heavy snowflakes drifted down onto her silver hair.

She reached out one pale hand and watched the flakes melt against her warmth. Then she turned and lifted her violet gaze to Chadwick’s.

“Chadwick.”

At the sound of his name, he looked back, and there she was—her face flushed from the cold, smiling.

“I’ll be back soon.”

The sunlight streaming behind her was so bright that Chadwick had to narrow his eyes against it.

In that moment, her slender hand slipped free from his grasp.

The warmth vanished in an instant and he unconsciously clenched his empty hand.

“Don’t… don’t go anywhere.”

“I won’t.”

At her voice, Chadwick answered lowly.

“…Mm. Truly, just for today—no matter what happens… please don’t leave me, Chadwick.”

Ophelia smiled brightly and took a step back. For a moment, it seemed as though Chadwick was going to take her hand, but then he pulled his arm back.

Unaware of his gesture, Ophelia turned and started walking forward.

Before her stretched the sacred stairs of the Grand Temple of the North. The stone pillars lining each step glowed brilliantly, welcoming her ascent.

At the top stood a figure with pale, sky-blue hair.

“…Your Holiness, Silveron.”

“Welcome, Ophelia. What a delightful coincidence.”

The Pope’s blue eyes shimmered in the light. Wearing a lavishly embroidered gold robe, Silveron descended the steps at an unhurried pace.

“Don’t you think so, Ophelia?”

A smile twisted across his white, serpentine lips.

A great crystal, a sacred stone that shone with a cold azure light, gleamed at his throat.

Ophelia stiffened at once beneath its glow.

Noticing her slight tenseness, the Pope lifted his lips in a feigned smile as he stepped closer.

“What brings you here? It is not yet the day you were meant to come…”

At his words, Ophelia’s hand clenched tightly as she met his gaze. Her violet eyes lost focus, her face frozen like a wax doll.

“…I came to receive healing.”

“Healing, is it…”

The Pope narrowed his eyes and smiled as he took her hand in his, his touch disarmingly soft.

His touch sent a sharp chill through her body, raising gooseflesh.

“Of course I will, Your Grace. Are you not our precious saint?”

The Pope spoke in a smooth, almost tender tone as he stepped closer to Ophelia and bent down to whisper in her ear.

“But first, you must surely be tired from the journey. At least share a cup of tea with me.”

His damp breath brushed against her skin, making her shudder with instinctive revulsion. Yet Ophelia only nodded.

After all, he was still waiting just behind her.

“…Yes.”

As always, the Pope’s chambers were immaculate and almost cold to the touch. There was a reception room at the entrance, and beyond that was the inner sanctum, whose walls were made of sacred stone. Although smaller than the grand sanctuaries of the southern temples in which Popes had once lived, Silveron seemed to prefer it. At least, that was how it appeared to Ophelia.

Sitting in one of the chairs in the reception room, Silveron smiled as he watched her enter after him.

“It seems relations with the Grand Duke have improved.”

“…That could never be.”

“Is that so?”

At her quiet denial, Silveron’s lips curved into a sly smile.

He thought back to the man who had been standing behind her moments earlier. Chadwick had pretended to stand there indifferently, but…

Silveron’s smile lingered as he spoke in a leisurely tone.

“Well then, perhaps try a little harder to mend things.”

“…”

“If you do, maybe—just maybe—you’ll finally have that ‘happy family’ you once wished for.”

He said it with full certainty that such a thing would never come to pass.

“…Yes. I’ll try.”

Ophelia’s reply was scarcely more than a murmur as her violet eyes lifted to meet his.

Pleased by Ophelia’s obedient reply, Silveron laughed softly before shifting the subject.

“But tell me—healing, you said? Were you unwell?”

At his question, Ophelia shook her head faintly.

“No. It was only a slight cold.”

“The Saintess, bearer of Sheryard’s divine power, stricken with a cold… That will not do.”

The corners of Silveron’s eyes curved gracefully.

The Pope had the handsome features befitting his office, and his smile exuded an air of sanctity. However, Ophelia knew what had prompted that smile.

It was the smile of a man who had found amusing prey. It was the same expression that a child might wear while cruelly tearing an insect apart for fun.

All his wickedness seemed to spring from that same chilling innocence.

“Well then, shall we begin?”

Silveron rose from his chair languidly. He stopped in front of the chamber veiled by sacred stone walls and turned back to face Ophelia.

Seeing the fanatical gleam in his eyes, she bit down hard on the soft flesh inside her cheek.

Slowly, she stepped into the room. In its centre stood a massive stone chair, and at the sight of it, she trembled.

She had first learned of such chairs when she was six.

Dragged into the Temple at five, without knowing why, she had cried day after day.

—”I want to go home.”

Her memories of that peaceful house were already fading, but for the child she once was, it was everything she longed for.

On the first anniversary of her life in the Temple, as she cried out for her mother once more, Ophelia realized with despair that she would never return to that warm, gentle refuge.

From that day until her tenth birthday, every time she was released from the Temple’s ‘training’, she was dragged back to that chair.

The only reason she had not been brought there since her tenth birthday was that she had started taking part in the hunts against the fiends.

However, four years ago, on the day Chadwick was wounded, she was forced into the chair once again.

“Hm. Since it hasn’t been a full month yet, it wouldn’t be right to push you too hard.”

Silveron seated Ophelia on the stone chair, humming lightly to himself as he did so, a soft smile on his lips.

“Well, shall we keep it light and halve the time?”

Silveron chuckled through his nose as he tightly bound her arms and body with leather straps. Then he dragged a wooden box over to him.

Inside, crystals glimmered, cold and bright.

At that piercing light, Ophelia squeezed her eyes shut.

A chill seeped into her body, spreading swiftly through every vein.