Chapter 24: A Sinister Conspiracy
Elian knelt beside the injured boy, his white-and-silver robes folding like silk as he extended a hand over the child's brow. The boy, still dazed, whimpered softly as his father gently cradled him.
The crowd held its breath.
The Vestarch began to chant — not loudly, but in a tongue older than the common tongue, each syllable laced with a cadence that vibrated faintly in the bones of those nearby. His voice sounded like embers crackling under snow, and the runes stitched into his cuffs began to glow faintly.
Then — a pulse.
A halo of golden light bloomed around the boy's body, soft and radiant, like sunrise after a bitter winter. The light didn't burn, it warmed. It pulsed once, then again, slowly fading into the skin.
The boy gasped.
The gash on his forehead vanished — not simply sealed, but gone as if it had never existed. The pallor in his cheeks flushed pink again. His eyes fluttered open and focused on the man above him.
A ripple of gasps swept through the square.
"He's... completely healed," someone whispered.
"I've never seen healing like that," muttered a merchant at the back. "Not even in the Temple Halls."
Even a few of the nobles, once skeptical of church authority, exchanged glances of stunned approval.