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Disgusting.
He was disgusting.
The word of God had blessed him — anointed him with power, with purpose, with the holy duty to protect the righteous and punish the unclean. He was to be the instrument of divine judgment, his cross carved not only into his flesh but into his soul. And yet, in one blinding moment, he had failed to protect her.
Nathaniel’s hands trembled. Blood — her blood — clung to his skin in warm, sticky rivers, glistening faintly beneath the fractured light that leaked through the church’s shattered windows. The smell of iron mixed with incense; holiness and death danced together in the air.
Margaret lay crumpled before him, her chest rising weakly.
He had prayed to God before every mission — “Grant me the strength to serve You faithfully.” But tonight, his prayer had been met with silence. Or perhaps, worse, indifference.
She had shielded him.
That ignorant, stubborn, infuriating woman — she had shielded him.
His mind replayed it over and over again: the enemy’s blade descending like a judgment, his own body frozen in that instant between life and death, and Margaret — foolish, reckless Margaret — throwing herself in front of him without hesitation.
Why?
Why would she do that for him?
“Margaret,” he whispered hoarsely, gripping her shoulders, feeling the tremor of her breath beneath his palms. “You shouldn’t have—”
Her lips curved faintly, even as pain clouded her eyes. “If I hadn’t, you’d be dead, Nathaniel.”
Her voice was steady, unrepentant. It made him want to scream.
“You don’t understand,” he said, his tone sharp, desperate. “It was my duty to protect you. The Word of God chose me. You were meant to be saved — not to sacrifice yourself like—”
“Like what?” she interrupted softly. “Like a fool? Like someone who loves you?”
The words pierced deeper than any blade. His breath caught. The sanctuary around them seemed to crumble into nothing, leaving only the echo of her voice and the faint crackle of dying candles.
Nathaniel could not look at her. Love — such a word was foreign to him. It had no place in scripture, no purpose in the hierarchy of salvation. To love was to disobey, to place human emotion before divine command.
And yet, when he finally forced his gaze downward, her eyes — clouded but still burning — were fixed on him, not with judgment, but with unbearable mercy.
“You’re not disgusting,” she whispered, as though she could see the storm that tore through his thoughts. “You just… forget that you’re human sometimes.”
He shook his head violently. “Don’t say that. Don’t speak like that as if I’m—”
“As if you’re allowed to be forgiven?”
He froze. The words lingered, heavy and undeniable.
The world around them had once been built on absolutes for him: sin and virtue, purity and corruption, heaven and hell. But now, kneeling in the half-light beside her broken body, everything blurred into shades of gray.
The “Word of God” had made him a weapon. Margaret had made him a man.
Her fingers brushed against his wrist — frail, trembling. “Promise me… you’ll keep living,” she murmured. “Promise you won’t waste the gift He gave you.”
Nathaniel’s throat constricted. “How can I promise life when I failed to preserve yours?”
She smiled faintly, the ghost of her old defiance flickering through her pain. “Then protect others. Protect them the way you tried to protect me. That’s what faith really means.”
Faith.
He had spoken of it all his life. Preached it. Killed for it. But now, hearing it from her — a woman bleeding on a cathedral floor — it felt like something altogether different. Something divine.
Her breathing slowed.
“Margaret,” he whispered again, but this time it was not anger that filled his voice — it was fear. The kind that claws at the soul, raw and merciless. “Don’t you dare leave me.”
“I’m not leaving,” she said softly, her words fading with each syllable. “I’m just… going where He calls me first.”
He wanted to tell her that God was cruel. That no merciful being could take her away and leave him behind. That if holiness meant enduring such emptiness, he wanted no part of it.
But before he could speak, her hand slipped from his, and her body went still.
The church was silent again.
For the first time, Nathaniel understood what it meant to be forsaken.
He remained there for hours — motionless, kneeling in the pool of her blood, whispering prayers that had long lost their meaning. He prayed for her soul, for his own damnation, for forgiveness that would never come.
Then, slowly, he rose.
When he turned toward the altar, the candles flickered — as if some unseen force stirred the air. He picked up her cross pendant, now stained with red, and tied it around his wrist.
“I will protect them,” he murmured, his voice low but resolute. “Not because God commands it… but because you would have wanted it.”
Outside, dawn broke — pale, cold, unfeeling. Nathaniel stepped into the light, carrying her memory like a wound that would never heal.
He no longer served out of blind faith. He served out of love — the most painful, human, and sacred thing of all.