"Your life as a Confessor ended the moment you chose to side with demons plotting against the Marquis," Percivus said, his voice cold and clinical as he began to cut through the laces that held her vestments closed. "Why else would the Holy Lord of Light have punished you so severely for attempting to use his power for a healing miracle?"
He gestured to her gaunt features and withered hands with the point of the knife, the blade hovering dangerously close to her throat.
"My faith is still pure," Eleanor insisted, staring defiantly into the flame-haired Inquisitor's merciless hazel eyes even as fear made her voice tremble. "The Holy Lord of Light demands a price for his miracles, and I paid the price willingly to protect Lady Jocelynn. If I served demons, he would have withheld his miracle from me, and if Lady Jocelynn was a heretic then the miracle would never have saved her life."
