I helped save a life the other day.
A life that I had some small part in putting in jeopardy, it’s true, but when one weighs the life against the soul there is no question of the outcome.
It was harder than I had expected, controlling the tremble in my hands. With every stitch I recalled Madi’s face, waxen and still. I’ve seen dead bodies before, friends and foes. Yet never before was it so apparent – what was lost, I mean. Her spirit was sick, but it always filled up the room with pure vitality. Seeing her so lifeless like no corpse I’d ever seen before… it was probably just my imagination that made it such a searing moment, or the knowledge that her soul was already wandering lost and confused in the darkness it would call home for the rest of time. And while I was sitting there there was a thirteen-year-old girl about to join her in the same fate, again courtesy of me.
In shorter and more colloquial terms, I’m amazed I didn’t lose my shit all over the place. I don’t know how I didn’t scream at Jei. Yes, she’s a mage or heretic or something; yes, she was wielding a blade against us; no, that doesn’t mean we should run the risk of seeing her dead and her soul condemned forever. I wonder if it’s just what happens, after you’ve been a Knight for a while. To care about their souls could give you that split-second hesitation they need to end your life. Probably it’s a luxury, caring, that they can’t afford.
But she survived… as far as I know, anyway. She survived, and with that another of the chains left on my soul has relaxed. It’s not the first of those moments, when a burden has dropped away from me of its own accord, and I have hope it shall not be the last. I come to think there will be a time where I am… not the man I was before, no. Going backwards is never possible. But I come to think I could even be a better one.
Right now, the future looks as bright as it ever has. Four years ago, I could never have guessed I’d be a rich, respected bard in Lithmore herself, accepted heir to the Orban family. Oh, I might have told everybody that was the plan… come to think of it I think I did tell everybody that was the exact plan… but it’s not as if I ever expected it to -happen-. I have my troubles, but they pale in the face of my blessings. For that, I will ever give thanks to my Lord… and my lady.
