In the temple's highest spire, the scent of myrrh interlaced with the mustiness of ancient stones, where young Katsuki lay amidst silken cushions. The reflected stories in his eyes shimmered with unspoken dreams, as his nanny's voice wove through the air like a gentle melody.
"... and the dragon's roar thundered across the realms!" Nanny's weathered hands mimicked the creature's might, her voice a subtle echo.
Katsuki, with the gleam of pretend adventure in his gaze, tightened his hold on a small, intricately carved wooden sword. "What's next?" he breathed, the sword raised in silent vow.
With her eyes holding a solemn light, she murmured, "The knight's blade shone, crafted of star's heart, its destiny to cleave through shadow with its pure radiance."
He didn't clap or shout but simply nodded, a quiet understanding flickering in his eyes. He moved the sword as if warding off unseen foes, a silent protector of their sacred space.
The soft gray strands of hair escaped her modest bun as her smile held a touch of sorrow. "You shine brighter than any star, my young knight. But remember, wisdom is your ally. It's the unseen armor around your heart."
The wooden sword tapped against his palm with a soft, rhythmic knock that echoed slightly in the vast chamber, a soft acknowledgment of her wisdom. "I'll be the bravest and wisest knight! And I'll have adventures far beyond these walls!"
Her fingers, gentle as a whisper, attempted to smooth his rebellious gold spikes of hair, the lines on her face deepening with her smile, each wrinkle a story of her devotion. "I have no doubt you will, Katsuki. And I'll be here, waiting to hear of all your grand tales."
Their moment of shared solitude fractured as the door burst open with a sharp crack. Robed priests, their presence as cold as the marble they walked upon, entered.
The High Priest's silhouette filled the doorway, his stature as rigid and imposing as the ancient pillars of the temple, his thin lips a straight line below a hawkish nose that seemed to sniff out disobedience.
As he spoke, a voice, devoid of the warmth they had just felt, sliced through the chamber. "Enough," he commanded. "These frivolous stories serve no purpose for our young Saintess."
The nanny's words were a whisper of resistance, her hand resting on Katsuki's shoulder, a silent shield. "They're just stories," she pleaded with a gentle firmness, her eyes seeking a sliver of compassion. "Tales to comfort his nights and fill his days with a bit of joy?"
As they led his nanny away, her resistance soft but resolute, Katsuki's small fingers wrapped around the symbol of his resolve, the wooden sword held aloft, not in rebellion, but in silent promise to the tales that had cradled his childhood.
The room seemed to shrink; the air growing denser around Katsuki. "No! Leave her be!" he cried, his voice breaking the oppressive silence of the room as his voice crashed against the stone walls. Losing his nanny's protective presence made the room's ancient stones feel colder, more imposing.
Yet, as the fear gripped him, the tears that threatened to fall were willed away, transforming into a steely resolve. "She's done nothing wrong!" Katsuki's voice, usually full of wonder and play, now bore the weight of genuine protest.
The High Priest, an embodiment of stoic authority, stood unmoved. His ceremonial robes, woven with the deep reds and dark shadows of his office, seemed to swallow the surrounding light. His hair, the color of storm-tossed seas, was a rigid halo beneath the weight of an ornate headdress that proclaimed his rank and the unbending will that came with it.
"You bear the mantle of the Saintess, chosen at birth. Your path must be uncluttered by such fanciful diversions." He decreed, his voice echoing off the stone with an authority that seemed to resonate from the very depths of the temple.
His expression, already severe, took on the impenetrable quality of the carved idols that stood sentinel along the temple walls. "Enough!" he commanded, and the word struck the air like a whip. As he seized Katsuki's arm, the boy felt the cold, iron grip biting into his flesh, as his slight frame shook with a mixture of fear and defiance.
Amid this struggle, the High Priest's other hand shot out, quick as a striking serpent, and wrenched the wooden sword from Katsuki's grasp. The young boy's eyes followed the trajectory of his treasured sword as it arced through the air and landed in the open jaws of the fireplace.
As the flames devoured the wooden sword, a bitter taste of ash and ruin filled Katsuki's mouth, stifling the sweet memories of his nanny's tales.
"Why?" The single word fell from Katsuki's lips, the taste of his own despair and confusion bitterer than any herb from the temple's gardens. It wasn't just a question; it was the embodiment of his incredulity, his loss, his shattered sanctuary.
But the High Priest did not falter, nor did he offer consolation or explanation. His silence was the final blow, as unforgiving as the stone walls that now witnessed Katsuki's spirit being tempered by fire and trial. With relentless determination, he dragged the boy from the room, leaving the echo of crackling flames to mingle with the ghost of tales untold and adventures unfulfilled.
Katsuki's heels dragged against the stone floor, the chill of the hard surface seeping through his thin garments and numbing his skin. His heart, still ablaze with the embers of rebellion, beat against the cold reality of his fate. The High Priest's relentless march echoed down the corridor, a stark rhythm that seemed to count the closing of doors upon Katsuki's world of tales and wonder.
In the barren chamber, the priest's command was as stark as the room itself. "Kneel," he ordered, his tone leaving no room for resistance. Katsuki, standing amidst the desolation, could no longer look to the comfort of silken cushions or the warmth of fire-lit stories. Here, he faced the stark truth of his destiny, with only the cold stone to witness the surrender of his wooden sword to the flames—and perhaps, in time, the surrender of his spirit to the temples' will.
Katsuki's feet remained planted firmly, his body a statue of rebellion. The hesitation was clear in his eyes, a fierce unwillingness to submit to the man before him. But the High Priest held a different card, one that he knew would crumble the boy's resolve. "Kneel, or she shall bear the consequence of your insolence. Each refusal you give it will be her cries we hear, not yours."
The threat against his nanny was a cruel blade to Katsuki's heart, and the room seemed to spin with the horror of it. His resolve wavered as he grappled with the realization that his defiance could bring harm to the one he held dear. With the oppressive weight of a mountain pressing down upon his shoulders, each breath became a struggle as Katsuki finally knelt, the soft rustle of his garments against the stone barely audible as his knees met the unforgiving floor.
The High Priest's gaze never wavered from Katsuki, his voice a firm undercurrent beneath the sharp, incessant crack of the whip that punctuated each dire proclamation. "You are not simply a child; you are the chosen vessel," he intoned, emphasizing the gravity of Katsuki's birthright. "In you, the divine has manifested with unmistakable signs—gold hair, crimson eyes. Such fancies of youth you cling to must now fall away in favor of your sacred duty."
Katsuki's defiance was palpable even in the silence that followed, his jaw set, his eyes a tumultuous sea of rebellion. "I didn't ask for this," he uttered, his voice barely a whisper, yet in the vast silence of the temple, it carried like a solitary note of discord against a symphony of obedience.
"Choice is a luxury not afforded to the divine," the High Priest countered sharply, the whip cracking in synchrony with his stark pronouncement. "Your awakening is inevitable, where you will enter the sacred cycle of bearing life. "
With a deliberate pause to let the words sink in amidst the echo of lashes, he continued, "You will journey to the capital blessing our lands in a divine pilgrimage of the flesh and spirit. It is there, in the royal chambers, that you will meet our current king, your purpose entwined with his. From your union, a new sovereign will arise as the harbinger of peace."
The whip sang through the air, each strike landing with a searing bite that Katsuki felt through the thin fabric of his clothing, the pain a harsh contrast to the numbness setting in his heart. "This ordeal," he declared, "is but a prelude to the sacrifices you will make for the greater good. As the Saintess, you will endure, you will comply, and in your compliance, you will embody the peace our god promises."
The final lash fell with a note of finality that resonated through the hollow chamber. The High Priest, looking upon the boy with a gaze as cold as the surrounding stone, concluded, "Your days of childish stories are over. You will no longer require the services of a nanny. You shall not see her again."
The words struck Katsuki with a force greater than the whip's sting, slicing through the layers of his young heart. A deep, hollow pain expanded within him, its taste like gall rising in the back of his throat, a silent scream for the loss he was forced to swallow. Yet he was too weary, too beaten down to utter a single word of protest.
At the High Priest's final decree, a procession of priests filed in, their countenances as unreadable as the stone idols lining the temple walls. Their gait was steady and assured, a stark contrast to the turmoil that seethed within Katsuki. They reached for him, their hands warm against his chilled skin, a gentle touch that was an eerie comfort in the starkness of his situation.
The journey from his place of punishment to his gilded chamber was a blur of shadows and torchlight, a passage through the threshold of two worlds—one of pain and one of suffocating luxury. The room that awaited him was a theater of opulence, designed to honor a role he never wished to play.
Upon entry, a mingled scent of jasmine and myrrh failed to fully mask an underlying tang of smoke that Katsuki could almost taste, a bitter and acrid reminder on his tongue of what they had taken from him. The smoke of his lost sword had seared itself into the very stone, a sharp contrast to the incense that now sought to cleanse the air.
As he was gingerly placed upon the bed, the fine linens whispered a sardonic lullaby against his torn skin, the rustling fibers a stark contrast to his raw senses. The priests withdrew, leaving him in the hollow embrace of his chamber, a place where the echoes of his nanny's warmth now seemed so distant. His gaze fell upon the wooden knight figurine, the last vestige of her presence. The innocent toy now stood as the sole piece of a life rapidly unraveling, its silence resounding in the chamber like the hushed breath of a bygone world.
Katsuki's hand brushed against the figurine, the smooth contours a comforting balm to his calloused fingertips, a tangible link to the innocence he was desperate to preserve.
A surge of protectiveness welled within him. The idea of hiding it away, safeguarding the final token of his previous life, flashed urgently through his mind. He could not risk the High Priest or any other person deciding that it, too, should be engulfed by the hearth's unforgiving maw.
In the knight's carved form, Katsuki saw a defiance mirroring his own—a resilience that the flames which claimed his sword could not consume. It was this spirit, embedded in the wood, that seemed to whisper to him, reminding him of the tales of valor and courage that had shaped his young mind.
Katsuki's room, bathed in moonlight, felt less like a sanctuary and more like an exquisite prison, each shadow a bar and every glimmer of light a glimpse of the freedom he longed for. The moon's glow caressed his tear-streaked cheeks, like a mother's soothing touch, an ethereal comfort in his solitude.
In the stillness, he found a defiance that the High Priest's whip could not beat out of him. Clutching the wooden knight to his chest, Katsuki let out a breath that carried the remnants of his resolve, whispering into the darkness, "They faced dragons and tyrants, I can face tomorrow," he whispered, his voice a fragile thread weaving through the dense silence, a secret pact with the night.
Katsuki's eyes, now closed, were windows to a soul that yearned for a reprieve from his reality. Yet, even in his imagination, where he should have been free, the shadows of doubt crept in. The heroes of Nanny's tales had never faced a foe like this—a battle not against dragons or tyrants, but against the very fabric of his existence.
Come dawn, the temple would awaken, and with it, the heavy expectations of his role and the steely gaze of the High Priest. But in the tender mercy of the night, cradled by the soft embrace of silk and shadow, Katsuki allowed the grief to rise, its acrid taste like a thick smoke he had to swallow, filling him with the essence of his lost innocence and the warmth of a hand now absent.
The tender silence of his room encased him as the salty taste of his tears dried on his lips and a new defiance took root in his soul.