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“Those men will not stop at the convent gates,” she argued. “Men like that do not fear God, Father. And whatever they want from her was worth chasing a wounded woman into a church in the middle of a storm. Think.”

I looked towards the bed.

The woman lay motionless beneath the blankets, her bruised face turned towards the wall. She looked small and fragile.

“What would you have me do?” I asked. “I can’t take her back. They’ll return, and next time they’ll search properly.”

Sister Marina stepped closer.

“She needs someone who can learn who she is, what those men want, and how to make them stop. She may need to vanish entirely. A new name. New documents. A life no one can trace.”

The room seemed to tighten around me.

Sister Marina’s voice dropped.

“You know how this ends if she’s connected to men like that.”

I looked at her sharply. She held my gaze. For one cold, suspended moment, I wondered what she knew. What she had guessed. What she had seen in me over the years while I convinced myself the collar, the quiet parish, and the measured voice had buried the man I had once been.

Then the woman on the bed made a sound. A broken, frightened sound. I turned instantly. She was moving weakly beneath the blankets, her fingers clutching at the sheet. Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused and glassy with pain.

Sister Marina moved to one side of the bed. I approached the other.

The woman’s gaze darted around the room, wild and disoriented. The shutters. The crucifix. The lamps. The habit at Sister Marina’s throat. My black cassock.

“No,” she rasped.

“You’re safe,” I said, lowering my voice.

Her eyes found mine. Recognition flickered. She tried to sit up and cried out, one hand flying to her ribs.

“Don't move,” Sister Marina ordered.

The woman ignored her and reached for me. Her fingers caught my sleeve. Weak. Desperate. Terrified.

“Please,” she whispered. “Please don’t leave me.”

The words came out so raw that something inside me recoiled from the pull of them.

I had heard people beg before. For mercy. Money. Forgiveness. For their lives. Begging had many faces. Some were ugly. Some were false. Some were nothing more than another form of manipulation. This was none of those. This was a person standing at the edge of death and recognizing the shape of the only hand near enough to pull them back.

I looked at where her fingers clutched my sleeve. There was blood under her nails. Her skin was torn at the knuckles, telling me that she had fought.

“You’re safe now,” I told her.

It was the priest’s answer. The gentle yet useless answer. Her eyes widened. A violent tremor went through her. Her grip tightened with what little strength she had. The woman swallowed as tears slipped sideways into her hair.

“They will kill me.” Her voice cracked. Then she said the words that closed around my throat like a chain. “Just like they killed my father.”

6

ADRIANA

Adeep, vicious ache spread through my side every time I breathed. Then my throat, raw and bruised; someone had pressed their fingers into my skin hard enough to leave their hatred behind. My wrists burned. My head throbbed. My mouth tasted like blood.

For a few seconds, I didn’t open my eyes. I just stayed very still beneath the comfort of blankets and listened. That was the first rule that fear had taught me.

Somewhere nearby, women murmured in low voices. Fabric rustled. A cup clicked gently against a saucer. I could hear the soft pitter patter as rain tapped against shutters. My body wanted to believe that sound meant safety, but my mind refused. Safe places no longer existed for me.