The ruined chapel did not empty when the ash dispersed. Its walls wept grey powder from cracks in the stone, and every breath carried grit into the lungs. The altar, buried beneath heaps of soot, seemed to pulse faintly, as though something beneath it still breathed. The silence here was not peace. It was suffocation.
Seraphine lowered me against a splintered pew, her iron arm still hissing from the fight. "This place stinks of unfinished work," she muttered, scanning the chamber. Her scarred hand rested on her blade, though we both knew steel did nothing against debt. "We broke the saint of ash, but not the chapel that birthed it."
The Ledger confirmed her suspicion, opening itself on my lap despite the weakness in my hands:
Phenomenon Persisting: Chapel of Soot.
Nature: Vessel site. Ash renews itself here each night.
Directive: Collapse the chapel or it will write another saint.
I rasped through torn breath: "Options."
Ink bled across the parchment:
Burn Candle: Scorch chapel and altar. Cost: Five marrow beats.Confess: Speak why you deserve no sainthood. Cost: Integrity fracture.Spine of Iron: Break the chapel's foundations. Cost: Bone rupture, permanent.
The choices twisted my gut. My marrow was hollowed to ash, my truths nearly spent, my bones cracked already. Any cost here might be my end.
Seraphine crouched before me, her grey eyes sharp as blades. "If you fall, the city crowns your corpse anyway. Don't give them what they want. Find another way."
But there was no other way. The Ledger never lied.
We explored deeper into the chapel. The nave was lined with faceless statues, each sculpted from compacted soot, their arms outstretched as if pleading. When I brushed one with my sleeve, it cracked apart and dissolved into the air, whispering faint fragments of the hymn. The altar loomed above all, a black mound of fused ash that seemed to pulse with marrow-light.
As we approached, faces rippled across its surface—half-formed saints, shifting masks, my own reflection flickering in and out. My throat closed. The altar was not just residue. It was rehearsal.
The Ledger screamed:
Debtor Identified: The Chapel of Soot.
Nature: Foundation of ash. Writes masks into belief.
Directive: Sever or the Saint of Ash rises anew.
Seraphine snarled and struck with her iron fist, pistons howling. The altar cracked, soot spraying in black waves. Faces screamed from the fracture, voices of those who had smeared ash across their lips outside. The sound clawed into my marrow, demanding more truth, more cost.
I fell forward, candle-mark blazing faint. The Ledger's options blurred across the page, demanding choice. I forced air through my raw throat and whispered: "I deserve no sainthood because I am already hollow."
The altar wailed, fissures spreading. Ash gushed upward in a storm, filling the chapel like a blizzard. Faceless statues collapsed one by one. The roof groaned as cracks spidered through the beams.
Seraphine seized me in her arms, iron grip tight, and hauled us both toward the doorway as the chapel came apart. Black soot howled behind us, bursting outward into the canals as the building caved in on itself.
We staggered into the street just as the spire collapsed with a roar. Ash billowed across the Mirewalk, a tide of dust that coated windows and seeped beneath doors. Citizens screamed and fled, though some knelt in the clouds, lifting their hands as though catching blessing. Their whispers followed us: "Saint of Ash, Saint of Ash…"
The Ledger burned its judgment into my bones:
Debtor Severed: Chapel of Soot.
Balance: Partial. Ash dispersed, faith fractured.
Cost: One confession. Integrity bleeds further.
I collapsed against Seraphine's side, vision dimming, throat bleeding silence. She carried me through the fog, her iron arm steady, her jaw set in grim defiance. "They'll keep building saints from your bones," she said. "But I'll keep breaking them until nothing is left to crown."
The Ledger pulsed faintly against my chest, whispering its cruel refrain:
Curtain shifts. Next stage prepared.
—End of Chapter 38—