Odessa's phrase hung in the stale air of the tavern.
'Involved.'
The word echoed in Raziel's skull.
Shit.
He had said it.
Odessa's face was a stone mask, but her eyes burned with fury.
Lucian, on the other hand, looked like someone had spoken to him in an ancient language.
He stopped his wine mug halfway to his mouth.
"Involved? Wait, wait," he stammered, looking from Odessa to Raziel like they were crazy.
"Are you saying the Church... our Church... is involved in... necromancy? That's ridiculous!"
"You think it's ridiculous that a novice disappears without a trace and nobody cares?" Odessa replied, with a voice so sharp it cut the murmur of the tavern.
Raziel felt a drop of cold sweat run down his back. He had to keep control.
'Calm down. You are a simple scared novice. Not a regressor who knows everyone is going to die if he doesn't do something.'
"I... don't know what to think," he said, lowering his head to look more vulnerable.
"I just know Seraphina wouldn't leave just like that and that symbol on the wall... was real."
"We can't investigate this in daylight. If what we suspect is true, any official move will alert the traitors," Odessa said, more to herself than to them.
She stood up suddenly, her armor ringing slightly.
"The Royal Monastery. Its library has restricted sections that not even the Arch-Lectors visit often. As a Paladin, I can get us access. If there is any record about that cult or that symbol, it will be there."
Lucian's eyes lit up, his fear replaced by the excitement of a rich kid offered a new toy.
"The Royal Monastery? Finally! I've always wanted to enter the forbidden archives!"
Raziel just nodded, his stomach in a knot.
*'Great. We are going into the lion's den.'*
"Let's go then," he said with the firmest voice he could fake. "For Seraphina."
---
The Royal Monastery wasn't like the academy.
It was a stone giant that seemed to scratch the sky, a monument to the power and arrogance of the Church.
As they approached the imposing gates, two guards with shining armor blocked their path.
Odessa didn't even blink.
She took a step forward, showed her Paladin badge and said a few words in a low voice.
The guards straightened up instantly, opening the doors as if the Goddess herself had given the order.
Lucian whistled quietly, impressed.
Raziel, instead, felt a sting of bitterness. That was the power he would never have.
The power of a last name, of a rank.
He was just an extra, a bug that could be squashed at any moment.
Odessa guided them through silent hallways to a hidden section of the library, behind a bookshelf that moved with a dull squeak.
"Here they keep the texts that are... delicate," she mumbled.
"If there is something about necromancers operating in the capital, it has to be here. Search for anything that mentions blood symbols, lunar rituals or disappearances of initiates."
Raziel nodded, his eyes scanning the titles of the dusty books. The smell of old parchment and secrets filled his lungs.
While his fingers brushed the leather spines, a sharp pain went through his head.
*CRACK!*
The image of Zion hit him without warning.
It wasn't a full memory, just a fragment.
Her mocking eyes, the shine of a strange power in her hands and a phrase that froze his blood: "You think you are saving them, but you are just delaying the inevitable, little hero."
"Raziel? Are you okay?"
Odessa's voice pulled him out of the trance. She had a hand on his shoulder, her look full of worry.
He blinked, disoriented, his heart beating a thousand times a minute.
"I... think I saw something," he stammered, not knowing how to explain the chaos in his mind.
Before he could say more, a scream resonated outside.
"WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS, LADY ODESSA?!"
The doors of the secret section opened wide.
An old and chubby priest, with a face red from anger, entered flanked by two temple guards.
His scarlet robe indicated he was a big shot.
"Father Luman!" Odessa exclaimed, standing firm, although Raziel noticed how her body tensed up.
"You know perfectly well that these sections are forbidden for novices," the priest thundered, his disdainful look passing over Raziel and Lucian as if they were trash.
"What business brings you to profane this sacred place with... them?"
"Father, I was just showing my cousin and his friend the greatness of our archives," Odessa answered with a glacial calm that contrasted with the man's fury.
Lucian, an idiot as always, let out a chuckle.
"Relax, Father. We aren't going to steal your fairy tales."
"Insolent! You nobles think you own everything! This is the Goddess's house, not your playground! Guards, get them out of here!"
Odessa took a step forward, putting herself between the guards and them. Her presence was overwhelming.
"Enough, Father Luman," she said, her voice now without a trace of diplomacy.
"We are leaving but I recommend you measure your words. My father wouldn't be happy to know that one of his... protégés, is treating his daughter like a criminal."
The priest went pale and stammered a clumsy apology while Odessa took them out of there with her head held high.
While they walked away down the hallway, Lucian kept complaining about the old priest, but Raziel barely heard him.
Odessa must have noticed his silence, because she stopped and looked at him intensely.
"This is more complicated than I thought," she said, her voice loaded with frustration.
"We can't trust anyone inside the Monastery, Luman is nothing more than a lapdog, but if he discovered us so fast, it means they are watching us."
Raziel felt his mouth go dry. "And now what do we do, Lady Odessa?"
The Paladin looked through a window towards the roofs of the lower city, the poor and forgotten zone.
"The path of light is blocked," she said gravely.
"So we will have to walk through the shadows. I know someone, he is an... associate who can help us. He is not a saint, and certainly not a friend of the Church, but he knows everything that happens in the dark corners of this city."
Lucian seemed intrigued. "A snitch? This is getting interesting!"
Raziel, however, felt a chill.
"Walk through the shadows." He knew exactly what that meant.
"Are you sure?" he asked. "Involving people from outside... could be dangerous."
Odessa gave him a hard look, but with a shade of respect.
"We are already in danger, Raziel. The only difference is that now we are going to look for a demon to hunt other demons."