Chapter Text
The monastery slept.
Only the sanctuary lamp glowed, a red ember in the dark. Prior Matthaeus was walking his usual nightly round as he eased the chapel door open.
Someone was kneeling before the altar.
“Brother Jan?”
The monk’s fair hair caught the lamplight like a pale halo. His shoulders were hunched, rigid, as if bracing against an invisible blow. The rosary in his hands clicked in uneven bursts between his bony fingers, the rhythm of a man fighting panic rather than praying.
Matthaeus approached slowly. The soft brush of his sandal against the floor made Jan flinch so sharply the beads nearly spilled.
“Brother,” the prior said gently. “It is well past Compline. You’re supposed to stay confined in the infirmary.”
Jan didn’t look up. His blue eyes stayed fixed on the crucifix, wide and unfocused, as though he were trying to anchor himself to something that kept slipping away.
“I know,” he whispered.
Matthaeus knelt beside him. Jan’s eyes were raw as if begging it to answer.
“Tell me,” the prior murmured.
Jan swallowed hard. “Father… I just… I had been thinking… I can’t accept it. I can’t.”
“Is your mind playing tricks on you again?” Matthaeus asked, his tone firm but not unkind. “We have spoken of this many times. The Devil sows confusion where he can. Whatever whispers at you—it is not truth. Pray, and God will steady your steps.”
Jan looked back at the crucifix, eyes shining with something between grief and defiance. “I want to believe that,” he whispered. “Truly. But if it were all illusion… if none of it were real… then why does it feel so close? So familiar? I just… it can’t be nothing. Why do I remember faces? Names? Why do I remember...?” His voice cracked. “It feels too real to be nothing. Just… so real. It must have happened, it must have, I’m sure of it.”
The sound of his voice was anything but sure.
“Familiar does not mean true,” Matthaeus said quietly. “The mind can cling to shadows. You must let them pass.”
Jan’s eyes glistened. “I try. I do. But something in me keeps saying—” He broke off, shaking his head. “It doesn’t matter. It shouldn’t matter.”
“Pray, brother.” Matthaeus laid a steady hand on his shoulder. “Let the rest go.”
Jan closed his eyes.
“It’s not just thoughts,” he whispered. “It’s… someone. Someone I keep seeing.”
Matthaeus’s expression didn’t change, but his hand on Jan’s shoulder grew firmer. “That man from your imaginings? Again?”
Jan shook his head, breath catching. “No. Not imaginings. He’s as real as… real.”
“Brother,” Matthaeus said softly, “such attachments are snares. Shadows. They come from wounds, not truth.”
“But I remember his voice,” Jan insisted shakily, “I remember—” He stopped, swallowing hard.
A shadow crossed Matthaeus’s face. “Jan. Those thoughts lead nowhere good.”
Jan shook his head, breath catching. “But what if they’re not wicked? What if—what if he was sent to me? To comfort me?”
Matthaeus’s tone sharpened. “Sent? By whom?”
Jan hesitated, then whispered, “By God.”
The prior drew in a slow breath, steady but unmistakably stern. “Grace does not trouble the heart, brother. If this were from Heaven, it would lead you toward God, not into yearning that shakes your vows. What you describe unsettles you — that is not the mark of an angel. Do not deceive yourself.”
“But it didn’t feel forbidden,” Jan insisted, voice trembling. “It felt… gentle. Kind. As if he were meant to be there. As if he were meant for me.”
“That is precisely how temptation works,” Matthaeus said firmly. “It cloaks itself in sweetness. It mimics peace. It whispers that what is wrong is harmless.”
“But why would something wicked bring such comfort?“ Jan’s fingers tightened around the rosary until his knuckles whitened.
“Because the Enemy knows your weakness,” Matthaeus replied. “He knows what shape your longing takes. He uses it.” The prior’s voice softened, but the steel beneath it remained. “Let them go, Jan. Let them go. Go back to sleep.”
Jan bowed his head and stayed that way until the prior left.
Then, his gaze drifted—not to Matthaeus, not to the crucifix—but to the painted panel set just to the right of the altar. The sanctuary lamp’s glow caught the gold leaf, making the figure shimmer faintly in the dark.
Archangel Raphael.
Tall, serene, staff in hand, one gentle hand resting on the shoulder of a small boy. The angel’s face was soft, almost tender, the kind of expression that could make a frightened soul believe in safety again.
Jan’s fingers tightened around the rosary.
“My angel…,” he whispered desperately, “tell me I’m not wrong, please, tell me. My angel…”
But the icon stayed silent.