White light bloomed beneath the Saintess's palms.
It spread across the boy's chest, illuminating the torn edges of his shirt. For a moment, the tiny wound disappeared beneath its brightness.
Sir Luke watched without breathing.
Then something black moved inside the light.
His brows drew together.
As the blessing pressed into the wound, the power of Simon's Chaos Flame rose to meet it.
A narrow line climbed from the wound onto the Saintess's finger. Another followed, branching across her knuckles. Their edges flickered like flames, rising from her skin before sinking into it again.
The white light pressed against them.
They kept spreading.
Across her fingers.
Over her hands.
Toward her wrists.
Luke's stomach tightened. Every instinct recoiled from the darkness moving beneath her sleeves.
Do not touch it.
The warning was so strong that his hand stopped halfway toward her shoulder.
He felt that even he might die if those black lines reached him.
"Saintess?"
