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Chapter Zero — Orekh Milchamah
The Art of War
“You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’
But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.
I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in fire, so you may truly see,
and I will raise a sword—not forged by man, but shaped by his surrender.”
Steel didn’t sing like this. Only Spirit-forged blades could.
Their swords weren’t metal—they were manifestations. One, flickering with scripture and shielded by obedience. The other, edged with prophecy, trimmed in pride, and burning with borrowed brilliance.
The duel began slow. Measured. Controlled.
Two students stood in the center of the hall, surrounded by a wide circle of peers. This was the upper tier of Orekh Milchamah—where students tested not just reflexes, but righteousness. Every strike was spiritual. Every movement, a prayer—or a performance.
The younger fighter stood tense, his blade trembling like a candle in the wind. His gaze shifted nervously, scanning the crowd as if he didn’t quite belong here.
His opponent—the academy’s golden girl—grinned, twirling her blade in slow, deliberate circles. Her weapon burned bright and hot, glowing like a torch for all to see.
“Is this who I’m fighting?” she said loudly, turning to the crowd with a smirk. “Really? They couldn’t give me someone with actual skill?”
A ripple of laughter moved through the students. Even one of the instructors chuckled softly, arms crossed as though he, too, doubted the boy’s worth.
“Relax, little lamb,” she added, looking back at him. “I promise I won’t hurt you. Too badly.”
She lunged first.
Her blade cut through the air in a spiral of prophetic speed. She didn’t just swing—she declared, each strike punctuated by a mocking shout. Her Divine Force radiated outward, a heat that filled the hall and pressed against every chest like a storm front.
Weighty. Impressive.
Almost holy.
Almost.
He blocked—barely.
Sparks of scripture flared where their blades collided, but the weight of her Force made his arms ache as if they were shackled with iron.
Stay centered. Stay focused. Enter the Spirit. Don’t fight her—feel Him.
He inhaled, trying to reach into the Spirit, but her taunts cracked his concentration.
---
“Oh, come on!” she barked. “That’s all you’ve got? I’ve sparred with kids tougher than you!”
The crowd roared with laughter.
One instructor leaned forward, nodding approvingly, while another whispered, “She’s making him look like a novice.”
Her strikes came faster now—backhand, slash, upward cut—each one sharper than the last. She wasn’t just fighting. She was putting on a show.
“Don’t just stand there like a deer in headlights! What’s wrong? Afraid of a real sword?”
The boy’s grip faltered. His blade shook violently.
---
She spun once—twice—striking with a flourish that sent a ripple of Divine Force across the floor like a shockwave. Several students in the crowd staggered under the pressure, shielding their faces.
Not because it was holy.
Because it was overwhelming.
The boy stumbled back. Dropped to one knee.
She grinned wide, savoring the dominance.
“Pathetic,” she said, tapping her blade against his shoulder. “You might want to crawl back to beginner class before you embarrass yourself further. Oh wait—you’re already doing that for free.”
The instructors didn’t rebuke her. One clapped, slow and deliberate, like a judge applauding a performer on stage.
“Finish it,” one instructor murmured with a smirk. “He’s not ready for this tier.”
She flicked her sword near his face, just short of his nose—more insult than threat.
“You don’t belong here,” she said, voice dripping with mockery. “Maybe try the prayer room longer next time. But then again, it probably wouldn’t help your weak will anyhow.”
Laughter erupted.
Some students whistled and hollered. A few even shouted, “Show him how it’s done!”
But the boy rose.
Barely.
His breathing was ragged, his blade dragging, but his eyes—his eyes weren’t on her anymore.
He looked upward.
He pressed into the Spirit again.
This time, he touched it.
A pulse of Divine Force rippled outward from his chest—small, flickering, but pure.
The girl’s smile faltered for half a second.
“Cute,” she said, twirling her blade. “The lamb found its baa. Let’s see if it can stand against a lion.”
She charged.
Their blades met in a flash of pressure and light.
The Divine Force collided.
His: pure, quiet, trembling but sincere.
Hers: loud, aggressive, dripping with self-assurance.
The room shuddered. Scripture rippled across the floor like a current. A few students fell backward from the unseen blast.
For a moment, it looked like he might hold.
But then—he hesitated.
Not because of her strength.
Because of his own self-doubt.
She struck like a whip, sweeping his legs.
He crashed to the floor, the breath ripped from his lungs. His Divine Force flickered out like a candle in the wind.
Her blade hovered over his chest.
“Yield,” she said, already smirking in triumph.
He did.
The crowd erupted.
Some clapped. Some cheered.
The instructors smiled, as if her pride was something worth praising.
Far at the back of the hall, a man stood watching.
Unmoving.
Silent.
Unseen.
They called him The Watcher—though none truly knew who he was.
He hadn’t moved the entire class. Hadn’t spoken.
But now?
Now his spirit churned with grief.
He scanned the students—laughing, clapping, feeding off the arrogance of the victor.
Then his gaze shifted to the instructors.
One leaned against the wall, smirking. Another nodded in approval, arms crossed, as if this duel had been exactly what they wanted. No correction. No call for humility.
The Watcher’s jaw tightened.
This wasn’t training.
This was entertainment.
And the teachers applauded it.
Finally, his eyes landed on her—the prideful student, still twirling her sword as if she’d just won Heaven itself.
“That’s not fire,” he whispered.
“That’s performance.”
“And they—” his gaze swept across the instructors—“they’re raising performers, not soldiers. Noise without weight. Powerless Presence.”
The veil tore open behind his eyes.
The same hall—but years later, or perhaps just moments ahead.
Only now, it reeked.
The Divine Force was still present, but it was warped—bent inward, twisted, turned into spectacle.
Demons walked freely in the halls, blending with students, unchallenged, unafraid.
The instructors stood on the sidelines, smiling, their own eyes clouded. They congratulated the performers. They bowed to the noise.
The duels continued, but the swords were dull. The Presence of God was gone.
And the worst part?
No one noticed.
Familiar spirits filled the classrooms, posing as “mentors.”
False prophets anointed one another with oil black as tar.
The instructors laid hands on students, but their hands dripped with a mixture not sourced from Heaven—muddy, tainted.
From the stage, a beautiful woman with a spirit of seduction preached with perfect scripture quotes—but every word dripped with death.
Chains wrapped the pulpit like garlands.
The altar cracked in two.
The Word sat closed on every desk.
The students shouted.
They danced.
They spoke in tongues.
They laid hands on one another.
But they were bound.
Empty.
Possessed by their own pride.
The Watcher tried to speak—wanted to shout, to warn them.
But his mouth would not open.
Chains now lined the ceiling like a web.
The flame—the real flame—was gone.
“Lord,” he cried within himself, “is this where we’re headed?”
And the answer came.
Not gentle.
Not soft.
---
“They are like the church of Laodicea.
They believe they are rich, but they are naked and blind.
They have grown gifted but godless.
Trained in power but absent of Presence.
They have built a house without Me—and demons have made it home.
The leaders bow to applause and call it anointing.
The instructors praise performance but do not weep for My absence.
So I will send one who does not belong.
He will not impress them. He will not fit their image.
But the earth will tremble and hell will remember when I raise him up.
I will send a sword—not forged by man, but by fire and surrender.”
A final flash.
A lone figure.
Ash on their skin.
Breath like smoke and flame.
A weapon in hand unlike any other—alive, singing, burning.
A Divine Force that didn’t roar with ego but whispered with surrender.
Kneeling in ashes—yet rising like thunder.
“I will send My sword.”
Chapter 1: The Wrong Kind of Gifted
I used to think God made a mistake when He made me.
The other kids in Sunday school had new shoes, perfect smiles, and answers that made the grownups clap. Me? I had dreams I couldn’t explain and questions no one wanted to answer.
Like why I saw fire behind the pastor’s words but smoke in his eyes.
Why angels stood beside the pulpit but looked so tired.
Why I could hear my mother crying in tongues behind closed doors—and why it made my chest hurt instead of feel holy.
They told me I was “just being dramatic.” That I should stop dreaming so much and pray like a normal boy.
But I wasn’t normal.
Not when the dreams kept coming—vivid, loud, alive.
Not when I woke up speaking things I didn’t remember learning.
Not when I laid hands on a bird with a broken wing and it flew again the next day.
By the time I was seven, I already knew I wasn’t like the others.
That should’ve been beautiful. But it wasn’t.
It scared them.
Even the church folk.
Especially the church folk.
They whispered.
Told my mother I was troubled.
Warned her that “dramatic nature” could open doors to the wrong spirits if she wasn’t careful.
And she—God bless her—tried to shut every door.
She prayed harder. Anointed my head with oil until my scalp stung. Made me fast when I didn’t understand what we were fasting for. Told me over and over:
“You belong to God, Elias. You belong to Him.”
But the more she clung to that truth, the more I started to doubt it.
Because if I belonged to God, why did His people keep pushing me away?
I was nine the first time I saw something that looked like a person who had died.
It was at Sister Janine’s funeral — she’d passed unexpectedly, and the whole church came out in lace gloves and sorrow. Mama made me wear a clip-on tie and promise not to fidget.
I tried.
But about halfway through the service, the room shifted.
It always started with my ears ringing—like I was underwater—then the air would turn heavy, thick with something invisible. That’s how I knew it was about to happen. That something was about to… show up.
And that’s when I saw her.
Up near the rafters, floating just above the choir stand.
She had Sister Janine’s face. Same dimpled cheeks. Same purple church hat. But her eyes… her eyes were all wrong. Too wide. Too dark. Like they were hungry for something.
Still, I didn’t know any better.
I stood up, pointed, and said with childlike wonder:
> “She’s not gone! She’s right there—can’t you see her?”
The room fell quiet.
Then chaotic.
People shouted, rebuked, prayed in tongues. One woman fell out. Another started wailing. The pastor rushed down from the pulpit, eyes locked on me like I was the devil himself.
Mama dragged me out before they could ask too many questions. Slammed the car door so hard it shook. But she didn’t scream. She didn’t spank me. She just stared at me and whispered:
“Don’t you ever speak on the dead again.”
“But Mama—she looked just like Sister Janine. I felt her—”
> “That wasn’t her.”
Her voice was steel. Her eyes, wet.
“That wasn’t from God.”
That night I asked God to close my eyes forever if I was seeing the wrong things.
He didn’t.
But from that day forward, I stopped trusting what I saw.
Because no one told me there were familiar spirits.
No one taught me discernment.
No one said that the devil could wear a church hat, too.
They just told me to be quiet.
So I stayed quiet.
But my eyes kept seeing.
After that day, everything changed.
The church still smiled at Mama, but they looked at me differently. The choir director stopped letting me sit up front. The youth pastor kept “forgetting” to invite me to events. Sister Claudine once laid hands on my shoulder and prayed under her breath the whole time.
By the time I was ten, the whispers followed me everywhere.
Even the other kids stared.
One called me “Death Boy.”
I laughed it off. Pretended I didn’t care.
But I did.
I started sitting in the back row. Kept my head down during altar call. I learned which parts of me to hide and which parts to perform. They liked when I said “Amen” loud and read my Bible in public. So I did.
But I didn’t trust them anymore.
I didn’t trust what they said about God, either.
Because if I was really made in His image—
If I was really “called” or “anointed” like Mama kept saying—
Then why did the people who claimed to know Him treat me like I was cursed?
And if what I saw wasn’t from God… then where did it come from?
That question stayed with me.
It lingered in the dark when the dreams came.
It pulsed in my chest when I’d see shadows flicker past my bedroom door.
It echoed in the silence after another Sunday service where no one spoke to me.
Eventually, I stopped asking God to take the sight away.
By eleven, I had stopped talking to Him altogether.
Because no one ever said it like this, but I could feel it in the way they looked at me:
If I saw demons, I must be one.
So I started to believe them.
Chapter 2: The Mask They Gave Me
The next morning, the whispers still followed me.
“Troubled.”
“Cursed.”
“Death Boy.”
Fine. If that’s what they wanted me to be, I’d give it to them.
By Monday, the story had legs.
Church kids ran their mouths faster than fire in dry grass, and by the time I walked into school, everybody already knew.
DeShawn spotted me first. Loud, grinning, chest stuck out like he ran the yard. “Here come Death Boy!” he hollered, and the whole playground lit up with laughter.
I stopped, turned real slow, and let my eyes drag down from his crooked hair to his leaning sneakers. Then I grinned.
“Boy, you talkin’ ’bout Death Boy? Look at them busted shoes—you walkin’ like they already in the grave! Shoes leanin’ harder than your grandma’s recliner.”
The kids screamed. Some doubled over, some slapped the slide.
DeShawn’s face got tight, but he snapped back. “At least my mama ain’t crazy, prayin’ over you like you some demon!”
The crowd went wild—“Ooooh!” echoing across the yard.
I stepped closer, grinning wider. “Man, hush! Your breath so hot, I know why the swings squeak—they cryin’ for help every time you talk! You got the nerve to call me Death Boy? Please. You built like the Grim Reaper’s sidekick—Lil’ Dusty!”
The playground lost it. Some kids fell in the dirt. Others started chanting, “Lil’ Dusty! Lil’ Dusty!”
That’s when DeShawn snapped. His face turned red, and before I could blink, he shoved me hard in the chest.
I stumbled, but didn’t fall. The chant only got louder. So I shoved him back.
He swung wild, catching my shoulder. I ducked, swung back, and in seconds we were tangled in the dirt, fists flying, kids circling us like it was Friday Night Fights.
It didn’t last long. A teacher’s whistle cut through the noise, sharp enough to make my ears ring. She yanked us apart, both of us breathing hard. My lip was bleeding, his shirt stretched out like laundry left too long in the dryer.
By the time Mama walked into the office, Bible still in her hand, I already knew I was done for.
The teacher started explaining, but Mama didn’t need details. Her eyes were locked on me.
“In a fight?” she asked, her voice low and dangerous.
I kept quiet, pressing ice to my mouth.
She shook her head, leaned down so close I could smell the peppermint on her breath.
“You got one time to let the devil trick you into actin’ a fool. One. You understand me?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Her hand pressed firm on my shoulder—steady, not soft. A reminder that I belonged to her.
We walked out together, her heels clicking against the tile. But even with my lip throbbing and the sting of her words still in my chest, I couldn’t stop thinking about how it felt when the playground laughed at him instead of me.
And I liked it.
Three days.
That’s how long I was suspended.
Three days of Mama’s silence — not the angry kind, but the heavy, disappointed kind.
Three days of her praying extra long, slipping oil on my forehead while I “napped,” humming hymns in the kitchen like she was trying to drown out the thought of me fighting in front of God and everybody.
DeShawn got five days, ’cause he swung first.
But that didn’t matter.
By the time I came back Friday, the whole school had already picked sides.
The moment I stepped on the playground, eyes followed me.
Some kids gave me a nod — like I was a legend.
Others looked at me like I was contagious.
That’s when Marcus, one of DeShawn’s boys, walked up. Bigger than me, meaner too, with a scowl like he’d been saving it just for this moment.
“You think you tough now, huh?” he said, bumping my shoulder.
“You think you somebody, clownin’ on DeShawn like that?”
The crowd started forming fast — kids love a sequel.
I didn’t answer right away. Just stared at him, chewing on my lip. Part of me wanted to back down, keep quiet, let it slide.
But then I heard somebody whisper, “There go Death Boy.”
And that old heat rose up again.
I smirked, loud enough for everybody to hear.
“Man, DeShawn ain’t mad ’cause I was roasting him. He mad ’cause the whole school found out his shoes lean harder than the Tower of Pisa.”
The playground hollered.
Marcus’s face twisted. He stepped closer, lips curling.
“Funny you talkin’ about shoes when you wearin’ the same busted ones three years straight. Only thing leanin’ harder than DeShawn’s kicks is your mama’s light bill.”
“OOOOOOH!” The crowd screamed, doubled over, slapping backs. My chest burned, fists itching, but I stood my ground.
I shot back quick:
“Boy, please. You talkin’ about light bills when you still lightin’ candles ’cause roaches cut the switch before Georgia Power did.”
More howls, the circle bouncing with noise. Marcus leaned in like he wanted to swing, but the whistle blew sharp from across the yard. Teachers stormed over. The crowd scattered like ants, still laughing, still buzzing.
No punches. Just words. Just whispers that clung to me long after.
Death Boy.
Trouble.
Cursed.
That night, Mama’s eyes cut through me at the dinner table.
“Elias, you keep lettin’ folks bait you, you gon’ end up just like them whispers say. And I didn’t carry you this far for the devil to carry you the rest of the way. You hear me?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
But lying in bed, jaw tight from clenching instead of fighting, I couldn’t stop replaying the noise of the crowd.
Not at me.
At him.
At us.
And somewhere deep down, I knew—
Schoolyard or sanctuary, trouble wasn’t just following me.
It was waiting on me.
Chapter 4: The Lonely Pew
If church trauma were a sport, I’d have a trophy, a gold medal, and a Bible verse engraved on both.
It wasn’t always like that. There was a time I actually liked church.
Thought the stained glass was pretty.
Thought the choir was fire.
Thought the pastor really heard from God.
(Spoiler: he mostly heard from the deacons.)
But after the funeral incident?
Yeah. Things got awkward.
People stopped looking me in the eye.
Hugs turned into handshakes.
Handshakes turned into holy side-eyes.
But to be honest…
I was never really “one of them.”
I didn’t come from one of the big tithing families.
Didn’t shout. Didn’t sing.
Didn’t know how to fake the Holy Ghost dance on cue.
They didn’t call me gifted.
They didn’t call me called.
They called me “Zariah’s boy,” and that was the only reason I even got a seat.
The funeral just gave them permission to say out loud what they had always whispered—
That I was strange.
Unsettling.
Too much.
I started sitting alone.
In the back.
Second pew from the sound booth.
You know, just far enough away to be forgotten,
but still close enough to prove I was trying.
They called it “the overflow section.”
I called it “spiritual exile.”
The youth group stopped inviting me to lock-ins.
(Which honestly felt like a blessing, because sleeping on a church floor surrounded by hormone-riddled teens and stale Doritos was never my calling.)
One time, during prayer circle, someone actually moved their hand off mine like I was contagious.
I remember thinking, “Cool, now I’m leprous.”
I laughed on the outside. Shrugged it off.
Told Mama I was fine.
But deep down, I was cracking.
Because you can only be treated like a problem for so long before you start believing you are one.
And I wanted to believe in God, I really did.
But every Sunday I sat in that lonely pew, it got harder.
Not because I didn’t feel Him—
But because I did.
And that made it worse.
Because how could I feel God…
and still feel so unwanted in His house?
I still dressed up every Sunday.
Polished shoes. Pressed pants.
That one button-up shirt that screamed,
“I don’t have a lot of options, but my mama raised me right.”
It became a ritual—
not out of devotion, but survival.
If I looked the part,
maybe they’d forget I was the weird kid
who saw church ghosts and talked in his sleep.
Spoiler:
They didn’t.
One Sunday, Pastor Devon preached a whole sermon about “false prophets and strange fire.”
He never looked at me directly,
but the way Sister Claudine kept nodding in my direction?
Felt real personal.
I remember thinking:
Is this my villain origin story?
But I stayed.
Because Mama needed me to.
Because part of me still hoped someone would explain what was happening to me—
why I could feel people’s pain before they opened their mouths.
Why sometimes, during worship, I saw things moving in the shadows behind the pulpit.
But no one asked me how I was.
They asked me to hand out fans.
Pass the offering plate.
Smile more.
So I smiled.
And I kept my dreams to myself.
But I remember one night in particular.
I was twelve.
I knelt beside my bed and prayed harder than I ever had before.
“God… I don’t want to be like this anymore. Please. Just make me normal.”
I wasn’t asking for money.
Or fame.
Or power.
Just peace.
Just rest.
Just silence.
The next morning,
the dreams were louder.
That was the day I stopped praying out loud.
At night, I’d stare at the ceiling and whisper to God like we were old friends who hadn’t talked in a while.
“Hey, it’s me again. Just wondering if You actually made me this way, or if I’m on the wrong spiritual Wi-Fi.”
Silence.
Then the dreams would come.
The colors. The voices.
Sometimes Scripture.
Sometimes shadows.
Sometimes I woke up sobbing and didn’t know why.
I stopped telling Mama.
She already looked tired enough.
She still believed I was chosen—her little prophet-in-training.
Said God had marked me.
But marks feel a lot like targets
when people are aiming holy suspicion at you.
Eventually, I stopped lifting my hands in worship.
Not because I didn’t believe—
But because I didn’t want to be noticed.
I learned to look busy during altar call.
How to clap just enough.
How to blend in.
It became a game I played with myself:
“How invisible can I be while still being present?”
Turns out,
I was really good at it.
But God?
God wasn’t playing the game.
Because even in that back pew,
where rejection wrapped itself around me like a too-tight choir robe…
I could still feel Him watching.
Not in a scary way.
“I see you, even when they don’t”
kind of way.
And that made me angry.
Because why would He still show up
if I wasn’t even sure I wanted Him to?
It happened during Youth Sunday.
The choir was off-key.
The ushers wore matching T-shirts that said “Next Generation for Christ.”
And the sermon was being delivered by a 17-year-old
who said “like” every four words
and kept calling Jesus his “ride or die.”
I tried to focus.
Tried to nod.
Tried to act like everything was fine.
But then—it happened again.
Not the full shift like before.
Just a flicker.
A shadow behind his eyes.
The way his voice dropped an octave mid-sentence.
How the Scriptures he quoted got twisted—sharp like barbed wire,
wrapped in charm, but laced with something else.
It wasn’t him.
I knew it.
There was something standing behind him.
Something whispering while he preached.
And I felt the room shift—just a little.
Like the Spirit was holding its breath.
A spirit was moving.
Not the Holy One.
And I should’ve said something.
I wanted to.
But I remembered the funeral.
The way they looked at me.
The way Mama dragged me out before they could throw me out.
So I said nothing.
Even when my chest got tight.
Even when my hands started shaking.
Even when I felt the same pull from that day—
when Sister Janine floated above the choir stand with hungry eyes.
I said nothing.
I bent forward in the pew, pretending to tie my shoe.
But really, I was trying not to pass out.
Or scream.
Or both.
I don’t remember the rest of the sermon.
I don’t remember the altar call.
I just remember slipping out the side door while everyone else had their eyes closed.
Sat behind the building next to the dumpster and tried to breathe.
Tried to pray.
But the words got stuck.
So I cried instead.
Not loud. Not ugly.
Just… enough.
Enough to let it out.
Enough to feel human again.
And when I looked up, the sky was gray.
Not stormy. Just… indifferent.
And I remember whispering:
“God… I don’t think You like me very much.”
That was the first time I said it out loud.
Didn’t feel brave. Didn’t feel holy.
Felt like admitting something I should’ve kept buried.
But it was the truth.
And in that moment,
truth was all I had.
So I wiped my face.
Dusted off my pants.
And walked home.
Not with God.
Not without Him.
Just…
alone.
Chapter 5: Shadows in the Hall
By Monday, DeShawn was back.
Which meant the whispers were too.
Some kids dabbed me up like I was a legend.
Others looked at me like I was radioactive.
But DeShawn? He just glared.
Five-day suspension didn’t soften him—if anything, it sharpened him.
And where DeShawn went, Marcus followed.
Big, mean, always ready with a scowl or a shove.
He didn’t even wait till lunch to test me.
“Look who finally crawled out from under church-boy probation,” he said, bumping my shoulder in the hallway.
His boys laughed. Not because it was funny, but because that’s what you do when the biggest guy in your crew talks.
I wanted to clap back.
Wanted to swing.
But I caught something.
Not on Marcus—behind him.
A shape flickering in the locker glass.
Too tall to be a reflection.
Its grin stretched wide, teeth too long, eyes empty.
It leaned over his shoulder like it was whispering the next insult for him.
And suddenly, Marcus’s words didn’t sting as much as the chill that crawled up my spine.
Because I knew this wasn’t just Marcus being Marcus.
Something else was riding shotgun.
I saw more of them that day.
Not full-bodied like the funeral.
Just shadows. Flickers.
Hovering behind kids while they laughed.
Squatting in corners of the cafeteria, licking their lips like they’d been fed.
Most people saw noise.
I saw hunger.
And nobody else reacted.
Nobody else blinked.
It was like I was trapped in a double world—one with lockers and textbooks, the other with spirits lurking in plain sight.
By the time the bell rang, I wasn’t just tired.
I was haunted.
Mama was in the kitchen when I got home, stirring a pot of something that smelled like collard greens. She hummed while she cooked, slipping “Thank You, Jesus” between notes. Oil stains spotted her apron. Her Bible sat open on the counter like a co-pilot.
I sat at the table, trying to figure out how to start.
Finally, I blurted:
“Mama… I think something’s wrong with me.”
She turned, wiping her hands on a towel. “What you mean, baby?”
I swallowed. “At church yesterday… and today at school… I see things. Behind people. Like… shadows. And they don’t feel right.”
Her eyes softened—too soft. Like I’d just confessed to being scared of the dark.
She walked over, cupped my face.
“Elias, you’re chosen. That’s why you see what others don’t. You ain’t crazy. You’re sensitive to the Spirit, and that’s a gift.”
I wanted to believe her.
I really did.
But it didn’t feel like a gift.
It felt like a curse.
“Mama, it’s not just church. It’s everywhere. At school. On people. They look… hungry.”
She squeezed my hand, hard enough to cut me off.
“That’s just the enemy trying to distract you. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Pray more. Fast if you have to. You’ll be fine.”
I nodded, but inside? I felt like she hadn’t heard me at all.
She spoke faith.
I needed understanding.
It was like we were having two different conversations.
She was talking in Scripture.
I was talking in scars.
And the gap between us only made me feel more alone.
That night, I lay in bed staring at the ceiling.
Whispered to God like I always did when the house went quiet.
“Hey… it’s me again. I told Mama what I see. She don’t get it. Nobody does. If this is supposed to be a gift… why do I feel so cursed?”
Silence.
Then the air shifted.
Not a full dream—just a flicker.
A shadow curling in the corner of my room.
Watching.
Waiting.
I pulled the covers over my head, heart pounding.
And in that dark cocoon, I whispered the truth that scared me most:
“God… if You’re the only one who hears me, why do I still feel invisible?”
No answer came.
But I swear—
something else was listening.
Chapter 6: The Voice That Answered Back
I wasn’t trying to get found.
After that Youth Sunday meltdown, I just wanted silence, shade, and maybe a snack.
Instead, I got Nyxion.
Of course, that wasn’t the name he gave me at first.
Back then, he was just the boy leaning against the graffiti-tagged brick wall behind the church—hands in his pockets, hoodie up, one eyebrow raised like he’d been expecting me.
“You okay?” he asked, voice low—not fake-concerned like a youth leader, but chill. Curious.
Like someone who knew what breaking felt like.
I didn’t answer.
Mostly because I didn’t have the words.
Partly because I didn’t trust them not to shake.
“You came out during altar call,” he said. “Didn’t even wait for the benediction. That’s bold.”
I glanced at him, squinting. “You were watching me?”
“Nah,” he said, smirking. “I was watching the sky. You just happened to walk into frame.”
I should’ve walked away.
Should’ve muttered a polite excuse and gone home to hide under my blanket with a half-eaten bag of Hot Cheetos and questions for God.
But something about him felt… steady.
Not safe. But steady.
Like a ledge on the side of a crumbling cliff.
“Church ain’t really for people like us,” he said after a moment.
I flinched. “Us?”
He tilted his head.
“You see things, don’t you? Feel stuff in the room before it happens. Hear voices that sound like thunder but come in dreams.”
I froze.
Because no one knew that. Not really.
Not the heat I felt during prayer, like fire crawling under my ribs.
Not the shimmer of light I saw around angry people.
Not the way I once begged God to silence the dreams—and they got louder.
“Who are you?” I asked, barely whispering.
He smiled. Not soft. Not cruel. Just… sure.
“Someone who used to feel crazy too,” he said. “Until I found out what I really was.”
I should’ve run.
Or prayed.
Or both.
But instead, I listened.
And that’s how it started.
With a boy named Nyxion.
With stories about power, control, and hidden truths the church was too scared to teach.
With me—bruised from a thousand little rejections—finally hearing a voice that didn’t call me broken.
Just… different.
---
That night, I tried to talk to Mama.
Tried to put into words what I’d been feeling—
not just the dreams, but the pull.
The sense that something inside me was waking up,
and I didn’t know if it was God or something else.
She was folding laundry at the kitchen table, humming a worship song under her breath.
I stood there for a full minute before I spoke.
“Mama… do you ever hear God even when you’re not praying?”
She looked up, gentle, curious. “Sometimes.”
“Like… feel something before it happens? See it, even?”
Her brow furrowed.
“You talkin’ about dreams?”
“No. I mean—kinda. But not always when I’m asleep. Sometimes when I’m just… there. Like I can feel people’s anger in the air. Like the room shifts. And sometimes I hear things—like voices, but they ain’t mine.”
She went quiet.
Folded one more towel. Set it down slow.
“Elias, you’ve always been sensitive to the spirit. But that don’t mean every feeling you have is from God.”
I nodded, trying to hold it together. “But what if it is? What if it’s… Him trying to speak and I just don’t know how to listen?”
Her face tightened—barely, but I saw it.
“You pray. You read your Word. That’s how you listen. If you start chasin’ feelings and signs, the devil’ll give you just what you’re looking for.”
I looked down at my hands. They were shaking.
“But what if God’s not in the church anymore? What if He’s not in the places we keep looking?”
She stiffened. Her voice gentled, but her spine stayed straight.
“Don’t talk like that. God’s always in His house.”
I wanted to believe her.
But I couldn’t forget the spirit behind the youth speaker.
The way the sanctuary felt hollow that day.
Like God had moved out and nobody noticed.
She kept folding clothes. Humming again like nothing happened.
I nodded, thanked her, and went to my room.
But that night, I didn’t pray.
I just laid there, staring at the ceiling, replaying Nyxion’s voice in my head.
“You’re not crazy. You’re gifted.”
And for the first time,
I wondered if maybe Mama couldn’t hear me either.
---
The next time I saw Nyxion, he didn’t look like someone who belonged behind a church.
He looked like he belonged in a coffee shop that didn’t play music with lyrics—just humming bowls and synths and the occasional haunting flute solo. All black everything. Boots with silver buckles. Rings stacked on every finger like secrets.
I didn’t mean to find him again.
But maybe I did.
He sat at the edge of the park near my bus stop, sketching something in a notebook. I walked past like I didn’t see him.
He didn’t look up. Just said:
“You been dreaming again?”
I stopped.
Because yeah. I had.
This time it was fire. Not hellfire—just… light. Blinding and blue.
And a voice I didn’t understand, speaking in syllables that rattled the bones in my chest.
But I hadn’t told anyone that.
“Do you follow me?” I asked.
He laughed without smiling.
“Nah, man. You follow energy. You just don’t know it yet.”
I didn’t even sit down. Just stood there, staring at him like he was a riddle I didn’t want to solve.
He closed his notebook and finally looked up.
“You’re not crazy, Elias,” he said. Like he already knew my name.
“You’re gifted.”
That word again.
Gifted.
The church used to call me that once—until my gifts got inconvenient.
Then I was “confused.”
Then “rebellious.”
Then “troubled.”
Apparently being “gifted” had an expiration date—like milk.
“What kind of gift?” I asked.
His grin was slow and strange.
Like he was proud of me for asking.
“The kind they’re too scared to explain,” he said.
“The kind that comes with fire… and a price.”
I should’ve walked away.
Instead, I sat down.
---
That’s when he started talking about energy. About intuition.
About ancient practices that helped people unlock their true selves.
Words like chakra, aura, divine alignment.
Stuff I’d only heard church folks mock in between praise breaks and altar calls.
But it didn’t feel evil.
It felt… freeing.
“You ever feel like people only see the parts of you that make them comfortable?” he asked.
I nodded.
“What if I told you there’s a world that sees everything—and doesn’t flinch?”
That’s how it began.
Not with a spell.
Not with a ritual.
Not with a book full of demons.
Just with a boy who offered me something the church never did:
A place to belong.
---
Nyxion didn’t push anything the first time.
No candles. No circles. No blood oaths under a full moon.
Just a question.
“You ever meditate?”
I shrugged. “I’ve prayed.”
He grinned like I’d said something adorable.
“Nah. I mean sit still and listen. Not to talk to God, but to hear you.”
That sounded harmless enough.
Self-care even.
The kind of thing therapists recommend and youth pastors side-eye.
So I said yeah. Why not.
We sat cross-legged on the grass, the kind of thing I would've made fun of six months ago.
He told me to close my eyes. Breathe in through my nose. Out through my mouth.
Focus on the center of my chest like there was a light hiding under my ribs.
And something happened.
The air around me shifted.
Not in a spooky way—more like awareness. Like the wind had eyes.
Behind my eyelids, I saw gold.
Pulsing. Alive.
Then warmth in my palms.
And I heard something—not in English, not out loud—but it landed in my chest like a truth I already knew:
You were never broken.
And I believed it.
For a second, I believed it more than anything the church had ever told me.
When I opened my eyes, Nyxion was watching me.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“Like I touched something holy.”
He nodded.
“Not holy,” he said. “Real.”
That should’ve been my first red flag.
But it wasn’t.
Because I walked home that day feeling more connected, more powerful, more seen than I ever had under a church roof.
What I didn’t notice?
The stillness didn’t last.
By nightfall, the dreams came louder.
The voices came sharper.
And the warmth I felt that afternoon?
Gone.
Replaced by a restlessness I couldn’t name.
--
A week later, Nyxion invited me to his place.
Not gonna lie—I expected candles. Maybe a pentagram. Something dramatic.
Instead, it looked like a minimalist Tumblr witch’s dream: salt lamps, black curtains, incense that smelled like burned oranges and secrets.
There was a small glass bowl in the middle of the table, filled with water so clear it looked fake.
He motioned for me to sit.
“You ready?”
I hesitated.
He’d called it a mirror ritual.
Said it would help me “see beneath the surface.”
And I wanted that warmth again.
That wholeness. That fire that said I wasn’t crazy.
I wanted to feel chosen.
“Yeah,” I said. Lying a little. “Let’s do it.”
Nyxion lit a white candle. Dropped something dark into the bowl—herbs maybe? Ash? I didn’t ask.
Then he placed a crystal in my hand—clear quartz, he said, “for focus.”
“Now breathe,” he whispered. “Don’t think. Just feel.”
The flame flickered.
The room felt like it tilted.
I stared into the water.
At first—just ripples and smoke.
But then—
Images.
My face… but older.
My mother, crying, holding a letter.
A church sanctuary filled with shadows and fire.
And then—a girl.
Reddish hair. Brown skin. Eyes like storm clouds.
She didn’t speak. Just stared.
Like she knew something I didn’t.
I gasped.
Nyxion leaned in.
“What did you see?”
I told him. The girl. The fire. The way it felt—urgent. Like a warning wrapped in beauty.
He looked pleased. Like a teacher watching his star student level up.
“That’s your spirit vision,” he said. “You’re awakening.”
And I wanted to believe him.
I did believe him.
Because the church told me I needed deliverance.
Nyxion made me feel like I’d finally been delivered—from judgment.
Later that night, though…
I tried to write it all down, but my hands trembled.
I tried to sleep, but something pressed on my chest.
Not heavy. Just… present.
Watching.
Whispering.
And for the first time in weeks, I remembered what I’d prayed when I was twelve:
God, please make it stop.
He didn’t.
And now I wasn’t sure if He ever had.
Because if this was light…
why did it cast so many shadows?
Chapter 7— The Rescue
DeShawn spotted me before the bell even rang.
“Look who crawled outta church! See any dead people lately death boy?” he hollered, and Marcus laughed like it was the funniest thing he ever heard.
The chant started quick:
“Death Boy! Death Boy!”
I smirked, loud enough for the crowd to hear.
“What I see should be the least of your worries, at least my mama ain't ground me for flunkin’ math twice. Boy, the only bars you should know are the ones on your multiplication table!”
The crowd howled.
“Oooooooh!” kids shouted, some slapping the fence like it was a drum.
DeShawn’s smile flickered, then snapped back wide. He puffed his chest, turned to his audience, and grinned.
“Bars, huh? Lemme show you bars.”
He broke into song, Marcus already beatboxing behind him.
🎵 “Death Boy, Death Boy, talkin’ to the air,
Say he seein’ people, but nobody there!
Eyes all big like a cartoon face,
Always lookin’ spooky all over the place!” 🎵
Marcus beatboxing: “Boom-chh, boom-boom-chh.”
Random kids yelling between lines:
“Booooo!”
“Spooky spooky!”
“OoOoOoOoohhh!”
“Somebody call Ghostbusters!”
By the second verse the whole playground was clapping and stomping, chanting along:
🎵 “Deeeath Boy! Deeeath Boy!
Spooky like a church toy!” 🎵
DeShawn spread his arms like he’d just dropped the hottest mixtape of fifth grade.
“How about them bars?”
The playground exploded.
Kids doubled over, pointing at me.
“Bruh, you stupid!” one kid shouted.
“Yo, Death Boy look shook!” another hollered.
Laughter rolled across the blacktop like a wave, and every giggle hit like a punch in my chest.
My fists clenched, heat rising in my face. My mouth had ammo, but for once, it didn’t matter. His song was louder than my words.
That’s when a voice cut through the noise.
“Bars? Man, that was nursery rhymes with bad breath.”
Everything stopped.
Heads turned.
Even Marcus’s beatbox died mid–boom-chh.
Nyxion stepped out from the edge of the blacktop, hands in his hoodie pocket, taller than the rest of us, steady like he’d been here the whole time waiting for his cue.
He shook his head, smirking.
“Y’all call that talent? Same tired joke, same weak punchlines. If that’s the best y’all got, no wonder everybody clownin’ instead of listening.”
A ripple moved through the crowd. Some kids laughed nervously. Others backed up a step.
DeShawn’s face hardened. “Ain’t nobody talkin’ to you.”
Nyxion took one slow step forward.
“Looks like I’m talkin’ to you, though. And judging by how fast you shut up, you already know you don’t want this smoke.”
Silence fell heavier than any fist.
Marcus muttered something under his breath, but his eyes darted away. DeShawn swallowed hard, trying to stand tall, but the laughter had already thinned out. The circle scattered, restless, disappointed the show was over.
And me?
For the first time, I wasn’t the target.
I wasn’t the punchline.
I wasn’t Death Boy.
I was just… standing there. With somebody on my side.
Nyxion glanced at me, his eyes steady. Then he turned like it was nothing, like shutting down a whole playground was just another Tuesday.
“Come on,” he said, jerking his chin for me to follow.
And I did.
Because in that moment, Nyxion wasn’t just the older kid with the hoodie and the smirk.
He was protection.
He was belonging.
He was proof I didn’t have to stand alone
---
All weekend I replayed it in my head—Nyxion shutting down DeShawn like it was nothing. The way the crowd scattered. The way, for once, I wasn’t the joke.
But when I caught my reflection in the bathroom mirror that night, I froze.
Was that really me they were laughing at?
“Death Boy.”
The name stuck like gum on my shoe.
I tried pulling my hoodie low, tried shrinking small at school, but I could still feel their eyes. Like every whisper was glued to my back.
Self-conscious didn’t even cover it.
I didn’t feel seen. I felt exposed.
Except when Nyxion showed up.
With him, the weight shifted. His voice made me feel bigger, steadier. Like I had an answer for the laughter.
Mama noticed the change. She kept studying my face like she was searching for the boy she’d prayed over. She’d hum hymns louder when I walked in the room.
“You’ve been carrying something, I can see it in your eyes,” she said finally. “Sunday, we’re going to church. You need covering.”
I didn’t argue.
But inside, I was torn.
One voice said I was chosen.
The other said I was cursed.
And I didn’t know which one was true.
chapter. 8
Time stretched in ways I didn’t notice until I looked back.
Fourth grade felt like another lifetime. Back when they called me Death Boy loud enough for the whole playground to hear, back when I still cried where people could see me, back when I thought church might save me.
Three years had passed since then. Three years with Nyxion.
Somewhere between nine and twelve, he stopped being just the older kid who talked to me after school. He became my best friend, my mentor. Only two years older, but he carried himself like he’d already figured out secrets the rest of us couldn’t touch. And he shared them with me—piece by piece, whisper by whisper.
He showed me how to read the air around people, how to notice the colors that clung to them like smoke. He called it their aura. He taught me how birthdays weren’t just numbers but signs, how the stars were a map if you knew where to look. He never pushed me to go deeper—said I wasn’t ready—but he gave me enough to sharpen the edges of my reputation.
And I used it.
By seventh grade, I wasn’t the boy people laughed at anymore. I was the boy they whispered about.
Fear was cleaner. Fear was better.
Nobody dared call me Death Boy now. Not when I showed up in black from head to toe. Hoodie zipped up to my chin, jeans stiff and dark, nails painted with a bite of polish that still smelled faintly chemical. A thin leather wristband Nyxion had given me hugged my left wrist like it carried secrets.
Whispers followed me through the hallway like shadows.
“That’s him…”
“Don’t stare too long.”
“I heard he sees things.”
And I didn’t even have to say a word. Silence had become my weapon. The right kind of stare, held just long enough, kept people in line.
Nyxion walked beside me, all smirk and swagger, two years older but carrying himself like a prophet. He didn’t need to say much either. His presence was enough to let everybody know: mess with me, and you had to answer to him.
At lunch, we claimed the back table. Not because anyone gave it to us, but because people learned to stop sitting there.
“You see the colors, don’t you?” Nyxion said, leaning close so only I could hear.
I shrugged. “Sometimes.”
“Not sometimes. Always. Stop doubting it.” He pointed across the cafeteria with his fork. “Her—”
A girl in a pastel hoodie, giggling with her friends, froze when she noticed us looking.
“Birthday’s in May,” Nyxion said.
I blinked. “How do you know?”
“I don’t. You do.” He tapped my forehead like he was unlocking something.
I looked again, and it slipped out of me before I could stop it. “Taurus. She keeps her friends close but her secrets closer. She doesn’t even trust the one sitting beside her.”
The girl’s smile faltered. Her friend’s face dropped. A ripple of murmurs spread down the table.
Nyxion grinned like a proud teacher. “See? You know.”
It became our game. Calling out birthdays, colors, numbers, things we shouldn’t have known but somehow did. Word spread fast. Kids who once avoided me out of disgust now avoided me out of reverence. Nervous curiosity brought them to our table.
“Is my boyfriend cheating?”
“Am I gonna fail math?”
“Why do I keep dreaming about fire?”
They asked. I answered. Not all of it was real—some guesses, some tricks—but the shock in their faces when I got it right felt like power.
Nyxion leaned in one day, his voice lower than usual.
“You’re not Elias anymore. That name’s weak. That’s the name they mocked. You need a name that carries weight.”
He held up a piece of onyx from his pocket, black and smooth, catching the cafeteria light.
“Onyx. Dark stone. Pressure makes it stronger. Fire doesn’t break it.”
Then he lit a match, let the flame dance close before blowing it out.
“Nero. Black flame. That’s what you are. Fire that doesn’t die.”
The name hit something in me I didn’t know was waiting. Heavy. Sharp. Untouchable. I repeated it in my head until it fit.
Onyx Nero.
And the more I wore it, the more it wore me.
At home, Mama noticed. She always noticed.
She saw the black hoodie I wouldn’t take off, the polish on my nails, the silence at dinner. She asked questions I wouldn’t answer. Hummed louder than usual when she prayed over her food, like her voice could cover what she didn’t understand.
I kept my eyes on my plate.
The boy who once cried in church pews was gone. The one they called Death Boy didn’t exist anymore. Now they stared. Now they whispered.
And I liked it.
I liked it too much.
That night, lying in bed with the name Onyx Nero echoing in my head, I admitted the truth to myself:
“I used to wish people would stop laughing at me. Now they don’t laugh. They stare. They whisper. And I like it. I like it too much.”
chapter 9
That night sleep felt heavy and strange. I didn’t dream in pictures so much as shadows that slipped away the moment I tried to grab them.
But the sound stayed.
“Elias.”
I stirred, half awake, half caught. The name echoed like it came from down the hall, like someone was calling me from the front door.
I sat up, heart beating too loud in the dark. Nothing. Just the hum of the air vent, the quiet of the house. Mama’s humming from dinner still seemed to linger in the walls, though I knew she was asleep.
I lay back down. Closed my eyes.
“Elias.”
This time it was sharper. Closer. Like the whisper was inside my head but not mine.
I pressed my palms against my ears, waiting for it to fade.
When it came a third time—low, certain, unshakable—I bolted upright.
“What?!”
The word escaped before I could stop it. My chest heaved like I’d just run laps in gym class.
Silence answered back.
The quiet stretched so long it almost felt alive. I waited for Mama to stir, for the creak of her door, but nothing moved. Just that stillness—the kind that feels like something’s watching, but you can’t tell from where.
I sat there staring into the dark until my eyes blurred. The shadows on my wall looked like shapes, almost faces, but when I blinked they vanished.
I didn’t hear the voice again. Couldn’t remember the dream either. All I had was the echo of my name, still ringing in my chest, refusing to let me fall back asleep.
By morning, I convinced myself it was nothing. Just a weird dream. Just my imagination.
But deep down, I knew better.
School felt different that day. Not louder or meaner—just distant. Everyone’s chatter seemed to fade like I was underwater. Nyxion noticed before I said anything.
“You look like you saw a ghost,” he said, dropping his bag beside mine.
“Didn’t sleep.”
“You thinking too much again?” He smirked. “You gotta protect your mind, man. That’s where they get you.”
“Who?”
He shrugged, stabbing at his lunch. “Dreams. Spirits. Whatever. They only mess with you if you let them.”
I wanted to tell him it wasn’t just a dream, that I’d heard something real, but the words stuck in my throat. If he laughed, it would crush whatever certainty I had left.
He looked at me then, slower, eyes narrowing like he could see past the lie. “Hey… what’d it say?”
I hesitated. “It said my name.”
Nyxion leaned back, grin flickering across his face. “Then maybe the universe is calling you. Finally waking up.”
“The universe?”
“Yeah. Some people hear messages from energy. From their higher self. Maybe that’s what it was.”
He said it so confidently that for a moment I wanted to believe him. Wanted to believe it wasn’t something sacred, something I’d pushed away long ago.
But Elias—the name itself—carried too much weight to sound like the universe. It sounded holy. It sounded like home.
That night, I tried not to think about it. But the moment I turned off the lamp, my room felt different again—too still, too watchful.
I pulled the blanket over my head, whispering, “Please, not tonight.”
I didn’t hear the voice again, but sleep wouldn’t come either. Every creak of the floorboards, every flicker of the streetlight outside, made me feel like I wasn’t alone.
When morning came, Mama was already in the kitchen humming softly over her coffee.
“You look tired, baby,” she said, eyes scanning my face.
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“Bad dreams?”
“Don’t remember.”
She nodded, but her humming changed. Lower, deeper. The tune turned into a prayer I’d heard before—quiet, trembling, the kind she whispered when she thought I was asleep.
I slung my backpack over one shoulder, ready to slip out before she could look too closely. But before I reached the door, her hand caught my arm.
“Come here,” she said softly.
I hesitated, then stepped closer. She wrapped me in her arms, warm and strong, the smell of cocoa butter and morning coffee filling the space between us.
“Lord, keep my boy,” she murmured against my shoulder. “Don’t let the wrong voices have him.”
I didn’t move. Didn’t answer. Just stood there, stiff at first, then slowly leaned in until my forehead brushed her collarbone. For a second, the noise in my head went quiet.
When she let go, she looked at me the way only Mama could—like she saw the boy I was and the man I’d become, all at once.
“Be careful what names you answer to, Elias,” she said.
Her voice didn’t shake this time. It broke.
I couldn’t meet her eyes. I just nodded and slipped out the door before the tears in her voice could reach mine.
That night, the silence felt heavier than the voice had.
And for the first time since I met Nyxion, I wasn’t sure which side of me the darkness belonged to.
chapter 10
Mama’s voice woke me before the alarm ever could.
It was Sunday, and that meant no sleeping in. Church started at ten, which meant we had to be out the door by nine. That was her rule. Always had been.
By the time I rolled out of bed, the house already smelled like starch and perfume. Gospel radio played low in the kitchen, somewhere between a hum and a sermon. Mama was moving fast, hair pinned, Bible open on the table, giving instructions like a general getting her troops ready for battle.
“Elias, you ironed your shirt?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You eat?”
“Not yet.”
“Then move faster, baby, we’re serving today.”
It was always the same rhythm—hurry, press, go. The kind of order that came from years of faith and habit.
I didn’t complain. Not anymore. After what happened a few nights ago, I didn’t want her looking too hard at me. I just followed her lead, pretending the call in my dreams had never happened.
The drive to church was quiet. Mama prayed under her breath the way she always did, asking God for strength, for mercy, for her children.
When we pulled into the parking lot, I stared at the familiar brick building through the window. The sight didn’t feel holy anymore—it just felt heavy.
When we stepped through the doors, everything looked the same: the cracked steps, the sun-faded welcome sign, the smell of coffee drifting from the fellowship hall. But stepping through didn’t feel like safety anymore. It felt like walking into a room full of people who had already decided who I was.
They greeted Mama with smiles that didn’t quite reach me.
“Good morning, Sister Kai!”
Then their eyes landed on me and softened with something else—pity, maybe, or quiet suspicion. I’d learned to look past it.
I took my usual seat in the back. Not because I was told to, but because it was easier that way. Out of sight, out of expectation.
The choir started up, the drums too loud, the hands clapping just a little off-beat. Mama’s voice carried somewhere near the front, steady and sure, but it couldn’t reach where I sat.
The pastor preached about hearing God’s call—how Samuel had woken to his name in the night.
My heart skipped.
I stared at the stained-glass window behind the pulpit, watching colors bend across the wall. His words washed over me like static, too close to what I’d heard in the dark a few nights ago.
Maybe it was coincidence.
Maybe it wasn’t.
Nyxion’s words whispered back through my thoughts: “The universe is calling you. Finally waking up.”
I wanted to believe that—wanted to believe it wasn’t God, because if it was, why hadn’t this place ever said so?
When I was younger, I’d tried to tell them what I saw.
The lights that shimmered when people prayed.
The way certain words made the air tremble.
But instead of teaching me, they told Mama to keep me in Sunday school and “pray that strange stuff out.”
They said I was sensitive.
They said I imagined things.
They said it wasn’t from God.
So I learned to keep quiet.
Now, sitting in that same church, I watched the same people shout, dance, and fall out—but none of it felt like the thing that had called my name.
When the altar call came, Mama turned, eyes wet, motioning for me to come up. I shook my head.
She didn’t force it. Just bowed her head and prayed harder.
The room grew loud—music swelling, hands lifted—but all I felt was that same quiet from my bedroom. Watching. Waiting.
For a second, I thought I heard it again. My name. Soft. Almost drowned out by the tambourine.
I turned, but nobody was behind me.
Maybe it was the air vent. Maybe not.
When service ended, I waited by the door while Mama spoke with the ushers. A few people walked past, offering polite smiles and half-hearted greetings. I didn’t fit there, and everyone knew it.
On the ride home, Mama asked, “You felt anything today?”
I stared out the window. “Just tired.”
She sighed but didn’t push. The hum came back, quiet and low, filling the space between us.
I wanted to ask her why God would call me if He’d never made room for me here. But the words wouldn’t come out. I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer.
That night, when I closed my eyes, I didn’t hear the voice again.
But I felt it.
Waiting.
Patient.
The house was quiet that night, the kind of quiet that hums inside your bones.
Mama had gone to bed early. Her Bible still lay open on the couch, one page lifted slightly by the fan’s breath. The lamp in the hallway buzzed, then steadied. I passed it slow, like the air itself might break if I moved too fast.
My room felt different—too still, too aware. I cracked the window for air, but even the night outside held its breath. The streetlight threw a pale beam across my wall; it flickered once, like it was listening.
I sat on the edge of my bed, elbows on my knees, staring at the space between the blinds.
“God,” I whispered, almost ashamed of saying it out loud. “If You’re real… say something.”
The words hung there, thin as smoke.
Nothing.
I tried again, softer.
“Anything.”
The air shifted. Not cold—warm. A weight pressed against the room, gentle but sure. The kind of stillness that makes your chest tighten, like something unseen has entered and doesn’t need permission to stay.
For a moment, I thought I heard the faintest sound—like breath drawn close to my ear—but when I turned, it was gone.
“Guess not,” I muttered, half a laugh, half a wound.
I switched off the lamp. Darkness swallowed the room, but the air didn’t move. It felt alive, patient, watching.
I pulled the blanket over my head and whispered into the dark, “I’m listening… I just don’t know what to listen for.”
Silence answered.
But it wasn’t empty anymore.
It pulsed.
Waiting.
And somewhere—beyond my knowing—He did speak.
I just couldn’t hear Him yet.
chapter 11
Four years.
Four years since I asked Heaven to speak.
Four years since I swore I heard nothing back.
Silence became its own language.
I stopped waiting for thunder or visions or voices in the dark.
After a while, the quiet stopped feeling empty—it started feeling normal. Safe.
I learned to fill it with other sounds.
Nyxion’s voice. His lessons. His certainty.
He said things like “Truth is power,” and “The universe don’t need to shout when you finally learn to listen.”
So I listened—to him.
At seventeen, I’d mastered calm the way some people master breathing.
No one saw the old Elias anymore. Not the boy who cried in pews or begged for God to answer.
That version of me was long buried under black clothes and practiced composure.
Nyxion called it evolution.
Said I was finally standing between worlds—part prophet, part realist, part everything the church was too afraid to name.
But some nights, when the noise in my head got too loud, I’d stare at my reflection and wonder if I’d actually gone anywhere at all.
If silence was still speaking and I’d just tuned it out.
He once told me limbo isn’t punishment—it’s potential.
“Stay here long enough,” he said, “and you can pull power from both sides.”
I believed him for a while.
Now I’m not so sure.
Because lately, the silence feels heavier again.
Different.
Not patient this time—pressing.
Like something that’s been waiting too long is about to break its own rules.
And if it’s what I think it is…
it isn’t the universe calling back.
It’s Him.
Days bled into weeks, and weeks folded into months.
Same streets. Same rituals. Same quiet.
I’d meet Nyxion behind the old library most nights.
The benches were cracked, the lamplight dim, but he said that was the point—“the world hides its truths where nobody bothers to look.”
We’d talk about vibrations, about energy, about how thought shapes matter.
I used to hang on every word like scripture.
Now, sometimes, the words just… floated past me.
“Your aura’s different lately,” he said once, halfway through rolling a sage stick. “Still sharp, but calmer. You finally found balance.”
I smiled because that’s what he wanted to see.
Balance. Peace. Enlightenment.
But inside, something buzzed—faint, insistent, like static before a storm.
He didn’t notice.
He never did.
Nyxion kept talking about alignment and ascension while smoke curled around us in lazy circles.
His voice was steady, rhythmic—like a lullaby for minds that didn’t want to dream anymore.
“You ever think,” I asked quietly, “that maybe the silence isn’t just silence?”
He laughed under his breath, like I’d told a joke.
“If you can name it, it’s not silence anymore. You’re thinking too small, Eli. Still looking for faces in the clouds when you should be looking inside yourself.”
“Yeah,” I said, but my chest ached.
He used to call me Onyx. Hearing Eli again hit different—like the name still had breath in it.
He waved his hand through the smoke. “You worry too much about what talks back. Real power doesn’t need to speak—it just is.”
I wanted to agree. I almost did.
But the memory of that night—the one I swore I’d forgotten—brushed the edges of my mind like a whisper I couldn’t quite shake.
If You’re real… say something.
It came back out of nowhere, and for a second, the air shifted the same way it had four years ago.
Warm. Heavy. Present.
“Yo,” Nyxion said, snapping his fingers. “You good?”
I blinked. The air cleared.
“Yeah. Just tired.”
He nodded, satisfied, already talking again about star maps and portals and the language of fire.
But I wasn’t listening anymore.
Because for the first time in four years, the quiet wasn’t quiet.
It was humming again.
And something in me—something I’d buried deep—had started to hum with it.
He watched me longer than usual that night.
Didn’t speak at first—just stared, eyes half-lidded like he was listening for something under the noise of the world.
The sage burned slow between his fingers, smoke twisting upward like a question he already knew the answer to.
“You feel that?” I asked.
He smiled faintly, not denying it, not confirming either.
“Energy shifts all the time. Means you’re catching rhythm. Don’t fight it.”
His tone was casual, but his eyes said more than his mouth ever would.
He felt it too.
Something in the air had changed.
But Nyxion wasn’t the kind to flinch when the current shifted—he watched it. Measured it. Let it test the line.
You can only lead a horse to water.
He’d done his part—hooked me with knowledge, reeled me in with belonging.
Now he just had to wait and see which voice I’d answer next.
He tossed the last of the sage into the dirt and stood, brushing his palms together.
“Go home, Onyx. Rest. You’ve been stirring waters you don’t understand yet.”
I hesitated.
His voice was calm, but the words landed heavier than usual—like they carried more meaning than he’d let on.
He didn’t meet my eyes as I turned to leave.
Didn’t stop me either.
Just let me go, quiet and deliberate, the way a fisherman lets slack on the line—knowing the catch will tug again soon.
And as I walked away, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was tugging.
Not from the earth.
Not from him.
From somewhere higher.
The hum was back, threading through my chest like static and heartbeat all at once.
And deep down, I knew—
the silence was done waiting.
chapter. 12
I didn’t want to be there.
Not after the week I’d had.
Not after Nyxion.
He had this way of talking that made the whole world slow down, like the noise in my head finally had somewhere to rest. With him, I didn’t feel like the church’s reject. I felt seen. He called it awakening. He said I was stepping into who I really was.
And I believed him. At least, part of me did.
But Mama didn’t care about any of that. She saw my eyes, the circles under them, the weight in my shoulders, and dragged me to church anyway. Said I needed “covering.” Said God had a word waiting for me.
So I ended up here—back on a pew I didn’t feel at home on, in a sanctuary that never stopped reminding me I didn’t belong.
The sanctuary hummed like it was alive—choir belting, tambourines rattling, people swaying like they were standing in wind. Even the kids my age, who usually scrolled their phones through service, sat up straighter. Everyone was waiting for the guest prophet.
Me? I kept to the back pew, hood half-up, trying to sink into the shadows.
But even in here, Nyxion’s words followed me. His promise of belonging tugged at me, like a second altar call no one else could hear.
Then altar call started.
People surged forward in waves—hallelujahs, weeping, worship thick like honey in the air.
The prophet moved among them slowly, his voice low but firm, praying over bowed heads, touching foreheads with oil, calling down peace like rain. Every step he took was deliberate, like he wasn’t just walking—he was being led.
I kept my head down.
He was moving toward my side of the sanctuary now, working his way down the aisles. Each row he passed, I exhaled a little deeper. He was going to walk right by me.
And then—
He stopped.
Turned.
Locked eyes with me.
For a moment, he didn’t say anything. Just stared.
Not through me—into me. Like something in his spirit had already met something in mine.
Then, without breaking his gaze, he raised one hand and pointed directly at me.
“You,” he said. “Come.”
It wasn’t loud.
Wasn’t harsh.
But it cut through everything—Nyxion’s voice, the sanctuary noise, even my own heartbeat.
My legs moved before I could think.
I stood, chest tight, and stepped into the aisle like I was being pulled. Each step felt heavier than the last, like I was walking through memory and prophecy all at once.
The prophet didn’t move to meet me.
He waited.
When I reached him, he placed a hand on my shoulder—warm, calloused, gentle but unmoving.
He didn’t shout.
Didn’t call me out by name.
Didn’t make a scene.
He just bent low… and spoke into the hum, like he’d heard it too.
“Son,” he whispered, his voice steady but warm. “You’ve been carrying more than anyone your age should. But God’s hand is still on you. If you walk with Him, your days will be marked with peace, with purpose, with fruit that remains. You will see things many only dream of—healing, hope, and joy overflowing.”
His eyes locked with mine, like he was seeing past the mask I wore.
“You will choose,” he went on softly. “The fire in you is meant to restore, not destroy. To guide, not scatter. If you let Him, He’ll make your life a light others follow. But if you step away… what comes will glitter like gold, but it won’t last. It won’t be what was promised.”
He gave my shoulder a firm squeeze, then moved on, his voice booming back into the mic for someone else’s word.
For a moment, I sat frozen. His whisper still burned in my ears like it had been carved just for me.
But Nyxion’s voice burned too.
And the two of them clashed inside me, light and heat, both promising I was more than what I’d been told.
By the time I hit the aisle, I heard them.
Not snickers this time—whispers.
“He’s the one that runs with that… that spiritualist, right?”
“I heard he doesn’t even go by Elias anymore. Calls himself Onyx or something. Sounds demonic if you ask me.”
Another voice, hushed but sharp:
“Did you see the way that prophet looked at him? Like he saw something dark.”
They didn’t know I was near.
I kept walking. Silent. Calm.
Until I stopped.
Right at the edge of their row.
Three heads snapped up. Eyes wide. Like they’d been caught touching something sacred they didn’t understand.
“Say it louder,” I said.
I didn’t raise my voice. Didn’t curse.
Just stood there. Still. Watching.
The hum from earlier hadn’t left. It buzzed behind my ribs like a warning, and for a second, I wondered if they could feel it too—if it leaked out of me like smoke.
One of them looked away.
Another cleared her throat like she was about to speak in tongues just to cover the tension.
But nobody said anything.
I held their gaze a second longer, then turned and walked toward the door—slow, deliberate.
And behind me?
Silence.
Not reverence.
Not respect.
Caution.
They weren’t laughing anymore.
Because whatever they thought I was…
They weren’t so sure it could be mocked.
And still…
Even with all that fear clinging to my name—even with a prophecy that felt carved into my bones—
I couldn’t tell if it was really God…
or if the prophet had just been kind
chapter 13
Chapter 13 — The Whispering Path
I couldn’t sleep that night.
The prophet’s whisper clung to me like smoke: “If you let Him, He’ll make your life a light others follow.”
But so did the church’s sideways glances. So did the voices that whispered when they thought I wasn’t near: “He’s the one that runs with the spiritualist.” “Did you feel that when he walked past? Cold, right?”
I didn’t care what they thought. At least, that’s what I told myself.
But something about that altar moment clung to me too long. Not just the words. The weight. The way the air had shifted—again.
It was familiar now. This feeling. Like I was being watched by something ancient, something quiet… something waiting for me to choose.
I rolled from one side of the bed to the other. No comfort came.
So I knelt. Not as Elias. Not as Onyx. Just… me.
Seventeen, exhausted, torn in half. Not sure which name still fit. Not sure who was listening.
Take the dreams. Tell me what to do with the voices. If You want me, say it again—louder this time.
Nothing.
Silence laid next to me like a second body. Familiar. Heavy. Comforting… and cruel.
The next morning, I went back to church. Not because I wanted to—because I needed the noise.
If I stayed home, I’d hear it again. The prophet’s voice. The weight in his hand. The way the air felt when he said “You will choose.”
I thought maybe if I sat through a sermon or two, sang loud enough, or drowned it out with tambourines and hallelujahs, it might fade.
So I went. Sat near the back again. Watched the light fall through stained glass like colored smoke.
The pastor preached about obedience. The choir sang about surrender. Everyone looked free.
I tried to mimic it—hands raised, eyes closed, lips moving—but all I felt was static.
The silence wasn’t gone. It had only gotten smarter. It sat between verses, between my breaths, waiting.
When the youth group prayed over a kid who twisted his ankle at basketball, I watched him limp to the altar and jog back like nothing happened. People shouted. Cried. Praised.
And me?
I still woke up with visions pressing on my sternum like wet concrete.
I told myself maybe my turn was next. Maybe God was pacing Himself.
Days passed. Nights got heavier. The silence didn’t move.
So I decided if God wasn’t going to lift the weight, I’d learn to carry it myself.
That was the day I started thinking maybe He only answered the easy prayers.
The name Onyx Nero had already taken root.
It wasn’t a moment or a ceremony. No cloaks. No chanting. Just… familiarity. The kind that slides into your bones when you stop questioning it.
I was sitting in the metaphysical shop the first time I said it out loud.
Not to anyone. Just to the space.
Nyxion was busy in the back room, talking to someone about stones and frequencies. I was seated near the altar shelf, flipping through a deck of cards I didn’t recognize, when a voice behind the counter pulled me back to earth.
“Onyx,” she said, like she’d known it before I did.
I looked up.
She was dark-skinned, mid-twenties maybe, with locs that fell like a waterfall down one shoulder. A silk headwrap cradled the top of her crown, tucked perfectly—like it had been wrapped with intention. Her lips were full and painted plum, like she wasn’t afraid of being looked at. Her eyes were the kind that didn’t just see you—they measured you. Slow. Warm. Dangerous.
She wore rings on nearly every finger, and they clinked softly as she adjusted a jar on the counter. Her nails were long, black, and glossy, curved like talons, but elegant.
“Is that your real name?” she asked.
“It is now,” I said, before I could stop myself.
She smirked, satisfied.
“You carry it well.”
She turned back to her work like she hadn’t just branded something inside me.
Nyxion returned a few minutes later and introduced her properly.
“This is Imani,” he said. “Don’t let the pretty face fool you. She’s walked through more fire than most people survive.”
I just nodded, trying not to stare at the way she moved—like smoke with weight.
She felt like a song I didn’t know I’d been humming. Like something older than me had already recognized her.
Nyxion called my hesitation growing pains.
“Your spirit’s expanding,” he said. “The old shell always fights before it breaks.”
He’d told me that early on, back when I still flinched at the idea of letting go of God completely. Back when I still prayed just in case.
That was when he gave me the second journal. The black one. “Shadow work,” he said casually, like it was no different than stretching before a run.
I’d barely touched it back then. I wasn’t ready.
But after the prophecy? After the way the air felt that night—and then dried up again like nothing had ever touched me?
I opened it.
The prompts were already written in Nyxion’s neat, sharp script:
What part of you did the church make you bury?
What would you become if guilt wasn’t in the way?
Where did you stop trusting your prayers?
At first, I told myself I was just journaling to clear my head. But I kept going. The pen moved faster than my thoughts. Whole pages filled before I realized how much I’d let out.
I wrote about the fear I never voiced. The guilt that didn’t leave after every ritual. The ache that Elias still whispered from somewhere deep, even when Onyx stood tall in his place.
The questions pulled at pieces I thought I’d outgrown.
But I answered them anyway.
Sometimes I couldn’t tell if the page was a mirror or a mouth.
Nyxion said shadow work was holy if you looked hard enough.
“Even the dark can tell the truth,” he told me. “It’s the light that lies to keep people comfortable.”
I believed that. Most days.
The journal helped. So did the rituals. So did the shop.
Imani moved through that space like it was her altar. Every jar she labeled, every herb she blended, felt like part of a quiet language only she and the air understood.
Even when she wasn’t looking at me, I felt seen.
That day, she slid a card deck across the counter. No devils. No skulls. Just geometry and tension and color.
I pulled one. A hand reaching through a curtain of stars.
“Initiation,” she said, eyes locking with mine.
The word didn’t scare me anymore. It just… settled.
Like something I already knew but hadn’t said out loud yet.
By the end of that month, Onyx had shape. Form. Routine.
Black rings like Nyxion. Painted nails. Quiet fire.
He read rooms by vibration, shielded when people pulled at him, burned incense, and trusted his gut more than any sermon.
Elias still lived in me, but only in whispers.
Onyx was louder. Bolder. Hungrier.
And when I wrote Onyx Nero at the top of a new page in the black journal, something inside me locked into place.
Not peace—never peace.
But control.
The restlessness didn’t leave. It just stopped asking for permission. It curled up at the foot of my bed like a patient dog and waited for its next command.
Sometimes at night, I still felt it.
The presence.
Not Nyxion. Not the Root. Not even them.
Something else.
Watching. Waiting. Not angry—just there.
And I wondered if it had been there at the altar. Or if it had been waiting for me to finish choosing.
I told myself all power asks for something. I told myself I could afford it. I told myself names have power.
And I kept writing mine.
chapter 14
A month had passed since I first met Imani at the metaphysical shop. She’d gone from being “Nyxion’s friend” to a name my days started and ended with.
We’d found a rhythm without meaning to—me leaning against her porch rail while she sipped tea, her slipping me random facts about crystals, both of us pretending I wasn’t there just to hear her talk.
She noticed things, too. The way I always left the second sugar cube in the bottom of the mug. How I hated incense that smelled like flowers but burned anything that smelled like spice. Some days, she felt like the silence I’d been fighting—except warmer.
Today, she had me inside the shop again, the deck on the table between us. The rain clouds outside were thick enough to dim the room, and the incense smoke curled like it knew secrets.
“Shuffle,” she said, pushing the cards toward me.
I picked them up. “You’re just trying to see if I’m clumsy.”
She smirked. “I already know you’re clumsy. I’m trying to see what’s chasing you.”
I shuffled anyway—probably too rough—and handed them back.
“You think these cards are gonna tell you something I haven’t?”
“Baby,” she said, cutting the deck with one hand, “these cards been telling me about men like you before I could spell my own name.”
I raised a brow. “Men like me?”
“You’ll see.” She flipped the first card.
A tall stone tower split down the middle by a jagged bolt of lightning. People falling from the windows, the whole thing coming apart.
“Well, that’s… comforting,” I said.
“That’s The Tower. Sudden change. Chaos. Old structures burning down so something new can rise.”
“So basically my life.”
She grinned. “Exactly. Now hush.”
The second card turned over—a wheel with strange creatures around it, half in shadow, half in light.
“That’s The Wheel of Fortune,” she explained. “Cycles, fate, shifts you can’t control.”
“Sounds like a gamble.”
“Life is a gamble,” she said. “But the trick is knowing when to spin and when to step back.”
Then she pulled the third card: two figures standing under an arch of flowers, their hands almost touching.
The Lovers.
She tried to keep her voice even, but I caught the corner of her mouth twitch.
I leaned forward, elbows on the table, and let my eyes move from the card… to her.
“Now, see, that’s us right there. Only difference is, I wouldn’t be standin’ that far away.”
Her fingers hesitated just a beat as she straightened the card. “Is that so?”
“Mmhmm.” I let a slow grin creep in. “Cards don’t lie, right? Guess you and the universe just admitted you’ve been thinkin’ about it.”
That earned me a low laugh—the kind she didn’t give away easy. “Boy, you got more confidence than sense.”
I shrugged. “Maybe. But I’m right.”
She shook her head, but she was smiling now, and when she reached for the deck, she didn’t quite meet my eyes.
Before I could push it further, the wind outside shifted. The chimes over the door rattled without anyone coming in.
Imani glanced toward the window. “Charged night,” she said. “Be careful what you think about when the sky gets like this.”
By the time I stepped outside, the first drops were already falling. The air was heavy—humming under my skin like something alive.
It started on one of those nights when the sky doesn’t just cry—it hollers.
Thunder stomped across the roofs like somebody mad at God. The streetlights buzzed, dimmed, and flared again.
I didn’t care about superstition—about spirits getting bold when the veil thinned. I just wanted quiet.
Rain hit me like it had something to say. And I let it. Past the streetlights. Past the corner store. Past the point where Mama would’ve called me back. I walked until the trees leaned in like they wanted to eavesdrop.
That’s when it came.
A voice.
Low. Steady. Too close to be outside me.
“Many are called…”
I froze. Not because I was scared—at least, not exactly—but because it felt like it was coming from inside me, from the part I’d been trying to silence since I was a kid.
“…but few are chosen.”
Then, softer.
“Elias.”
My name. Spoken like it had never been forgotten.
“I have seen thee from thy mother’s womb.”
The words tightened something in my chest. I hated how they felt—like they knew me better than I knew myself.
I hadn’t asked to be seen. Hadn’t asked to be called.
But I had heard it. And now it was stuck in me like a splinter I couldn’t pull out.
I turned to leave—ready to bury the whole thing—when the voice thinned, fading into the rain.
That’s when I heard footsteps. Slow. Measured. Like they’d been waiting for the exact breath after the voice.
Nyxion.
He stepped out from the shadows, hoodie low over his brow, water dripping off him like he didn’t notice.
“Rough night?” he asked, voice smooth as temptation in a bottle.
I didn’t answer.
“Funny thing about storms,” he said, moving closer. “They make folks think God’s talking. But sometimes… it’s just thunder.”
His eyes searched mine. “What’d He say? That you’re special? Chosen?”
He smirked before I could respond. “Let me tell you something, O. God talks a lot. But He ain’t the only one with a plan for you.”
Nyxion tilted his head, eyes narrowing like he was letting me in on something private.
“You know, your book got one thing right—be hot or be cold. None of that lukewarm mess. Says it plain… God spits lukewarm out His mouth.”
He let that hang in the rain-heavy air, like he’d just dropped deep wisdom instead of flipping scripture inside out.
“So quit sipping both cups, O. Pick one. The one that answers back.”
His tone softened. “You got power in you, Elias. Real power. But only if you stop running from what you are.”
And just like that, the warmth was gone. The invitation replaced by a hunger I couldn’t name.
Nyxion turned and started walking, not looking back. Not begging. Just expecting me to follow.
And I did.
Not because I trusted him. But because I was tired.
Tired of being pulled in two.
Tired of being called gifted by people who only gave me guilt.
Tired of a God who stayed silent for years, then showed up in a thunderstorm like that was supposed to fix everything.
Chapter 15; — The Rift
Even the air in my room felt different now—
heavier, closer, like it had been listening.
Three days since the storm, and I still couldn’t shake the way Nyxion’s voice had fit into my head like it had always belonged there.
Be hot or be cold… pick the one that answers back.
I had picked—
or at least, I was practicing how to.
The circle on my bedroom floor was almost done. Chalk dust clung to my fingers, fine enough to taste if I licked them. A candle burned in each corner, their flames steady despite the draft from my half-cracked window. The incense was thick, spicy-sweet—the kind that curled into shapes if you stared too long.
I leaned over the deck of cards, flipping until I found the three Nyxion told me to focus on: The Lovers. The Tower. The Wheel.
They sat in a perfect line beside a bowl of water that shimmered with the flicker of flame.
The quiet hummed—like it was waiting.
Then I felt it.
Not a sound. A presence.
“What is this, Elias?”
Mama’s voice—low, steady.
But the kind of steady that comes before something breaks.
I turned slowly, chalk still between my fingers.
She stood in the doorway, framed by the hall light, her robe loose around her shoulders. Her eyes moved from the candles to the cards to the half-finished circle on the floor.
“Art project,” I muttered.
Her brow lowered, a shadow cutting across her face.
“Don’t lie to me.”
I dragged the chalk another inch. “Maybe I just like circles.”
She stepped farther in. The carpet didn’t even sigh under her house shoes, but the air shifted with her.
“This is witchcraft.”
The word cracked like a whip.
I laughed—short, sharp.
“Funny, I thought it was truth. Freedom. You know, all that stuff you said God wanted for me.”
“That’s not freedom, Elias.” Her voice trembled, but her eyes stayed firm. “That’s chains dressed up pretty.”
I straightened, meeting her gaze.
“Chains? No. This is power. And at least this answers back when I call.”
Her lips pressed into a line.
“You don’t even hear yourself. You’re repeating lies like they’re gospel.”
“Better than repeating gospel that don’t work,” I snapped.
The words hit the air like broken glass. I tasted the bitterness, but I didn’t take them back.
Her eyes glistened—not with anger, but something worse. Hurt.
“You’re not the son I raised.”
I exhaled, letting Nyxion’s voice slide in over my own.
“Maybe I’m not. Maybe that’s the point.”
Silence.
I stepped past her, the air between us colder than the rain outside.
She didn’t call after me. Didn’t reach out.
But when I reached the door, I heard her sink to her knees—her voice cracking into prayer.
I didn’t look back.
Chapter 16 — The Prophetic Dream
The car smelled like old fries and dust.
I hadn’t planned to sleep here, but after the way Mama looked at me when she saw that circle, I couldn’t make myself go back inside.
Couldn’t make myself go to Nyxion either.
So I parked three blocks away, cut the engine, and sat in the silence until it felt heavier than the night itself.
The seat wouldn’t recline right. My bag dug into my side.
The journal and the blade lay on the passenger seat like passengers—like they were waiting on me to choose where we were going next.
I told myself I’d just close my eyes for a minute. Just breathe.
But the minute stretched too long.
And then I wasn’t in the car anymore.
I was standing in a hallway that stretched too far to make sense—marble underfoot, golden sconces flickering like they were holding back something darker than shadow.
At the far end was a throne.
Big. Regal. Empty.
It pulsed like it was alive—like it knew I was watching.
I took a step forward.
A voice echoed down the hall, soft but strong enough to shake the walls.
“Many are called…”
My feet froze.
“…but few are chosen.”
The hallway shifted. Turned to smoke. Became fire.
I stumbled backward, but the floor caught me—now smooth black stone, etched with symbols I didn’t recognize but somehow understood.
A door opened behind me.
And I saw it.
A school—but not like any school I’d ever seen.
The walls breathed. The windows glowed. Students moved in robes that shimmered like constellations, each one carrying weapons that looked both ancient and alive.
They didn’t see me.
Didn’t feel me.
I was watching, but I wasn’t there.
Then I saw her.
She walked through the courtyard with her head high, fire trailing in her wake like it followed her out of respect.
Her eyes caught me first—dark but alive, shot through with gold like embers refusing to die.
Her hair wasn’t just coiled—it burned. Every strand tipped in crimson, glowing faint as though flame itself had kissed it and claimed her.
A faint scar traced her cheek, catching the light—not disfiguring, but declaring survival.
And on her wrist, for just a flicker, I saw it—a mark, glowing faint as ember, like fire had branded her and refused to leave.
She didn’t see me.
But I felt her—felt the fire she carried.
And in that instant, it burned into me—a truth I couldn’t shake even after I woke.
The girl with the fiery red hair.
She paused. Tilted her head like she knew I was there.
And just as our eyes almost met—
“Not yet.”
The Voice.
I turned—and the throne was full.
A figure sat upon it, cloaked in light too bright to look at, face hidden behind a veil of flame and glory.
But the presence? Unmistakable.
Holy.
Other.
Familiar.
I dropped to my knees—not because I wanted to, but because my spirit did before I could argue.
“You were not made to serve two kingdoms.”
I tried to speak, but my throat closed.
“You were not made to sit in shadows.”
The figure raised a hand, and suddenly I was back in the courtyard.
Except this time, I was inside it.
Watching students train—sword to spirit, voice to flame, Scripture as weapon.
Some fell. Some rose. All looked chosen.
All except me.
When I reached for a weapon, it burned my hand.
When I tried to enter the building, the doors shut.
And across the stone was carved the same words, over and over again:
MANY ARE CALLED.
MANY ARE CALLED.
MANY ARE CALLED.
Then, like a whisper in my own voice:
But you... you are not ready.
I jerked awake.
The car windows were fogged from my breath, my shirt clinging with sweat. My hands trembled on the steering wheel even though I hadn’t touched it.
My throat was raw, like I’d been screaming a name I didn’t remember learning.
The Voice was silent.
But my soul was not.
Something had been stirred. Shaken loose.
And all I could think was—
If God’s got a throne... then maybe I want one too.
I sat forward, staring at my hands like they weren’t mine. They were still shaking—still tingling from something that wasn’t touch, but something deeper.
The words kept ringing in my head like a bell that refused to stop swinging:
You are not ready.
My pride flinched. My flesh curled.
My soul didn’t know whether to bow or run.
But one image wouldn’t leave me.
Her. The girl with the fiery red hair.
I grabbed my phone. Didn’t check the time. Didn’t care.
Nyxion answered on the second ring, voice groggy but amused.
“You good?”
“No.”
I swallowed. My throat was dry.
“I’m in,” I said.
Pause.
“In what?”
“You know what.”
Silence. Then a low chuckle.
“Told you He talks too much.”
“I want the noise gone,” I said. “I want the power. All of it.”
He exhaled slow, like he’d been waiting for this.
“I’ll make the call,” he said.
Then he hung up.
The phone slid from my hand into the seat. My eyes burned.
I sat there in the dark, the car creaking like it was holding its breath.
And I thought—
If He won’t have me yet... then I’ll make sure someone will.
Chapter 17 — The Departure
Morning came like a bruise—purple around the edges, tender to the touch.
I didn’t sleep after the Voice spoke.
Its words stayed in the room with me all night—uninvited, stubborn, the kind of guest that doesn’t take hints.
By sunrise, my mind felt like a locked jaw.
If I couldn’t shut Him up, I’d shut everything else out.
Be hot or be cold, Nyxion had said.
Fine.
I chose cold.
I started with the easy things—clothes, charger, toothbrush, the black journal with the gold edges.
The deck.
The obsidian blade I told myself I only kept for focus.
The little velvet pouch of stones.
The cheap lighter that always sparked on the second try.
I packed like a thief in my own house—fast, quiet, as if pulling shirts off hangers could set off alarms.
Then came the hard things.
Bottom drawer—wrapped in an old T-shirt—the Bible Mama gave me when I turned twelve, my name in gold on the cover.
A page still folded where I’d underlined that part about God being close to the brokenhearted.
It felt heavier than paper.
Warm, not from the room, but from memory.
I put it back.
Top shelf—a photo of me and Mama on the church steps.
I was small enough to hide under her arm then, grinning with my eyes closed, a plastic crown from children’s church tilted to the side.
I held it until the edges bit my fingers.
Back it went.
I wasn’t taking souvenirs of the war I was choosing.
From the kitchen came the sound of a pan—and that song.
Soft. The one Mama hummed when mornings were merciful.
It slipped under my door and curled around my feet.
The same melody that broke something loose in me last night tried to stitch it back together now.
“No,” I whispered—to the air, to myself, to Him. “Not today.”
I zipped the bag.
The salt line from last night still chalked the floor, bright and stubborn.
I kicked it with my heel until it scattered into dust.
The circle went quiet—like a mouth finally shut.
I slung the bag over my shoulder.
When I opened the door, she was already there.
Not blocking the hallway.
Not dramatic.
Just standing with her hand on the frame, like she’d been holding the house together while I decided whether to collapse it.
“You’re leaving,” she said.
“Yeah.”
My voice sounded too steady. Borrowed.
“For how long?”
“I don’t know. A while.”
Her eyes searched mine.
“Elias… you don’t have to do this. There’s another way. You don’t have to throw yourself into something that’ll break you.”
“I think I’m already broken.”
“That’s not true. That’s not God talking.”
“I know. That’s me.”
Her mouth tightened.
“What’s out there isn’t freedom. It’s slavery dressed up like choice.”
“At least it talks back.”
The words sounded like Nyxion—but they also sounded like me.
I hated that I couldn’t tell the difference.
She shook her head.
“Not everything that talks to you is for you.”
“I can’t breathe here, Ma. This house, this church—it’s all sermons. Every silence feels like God won’t leave me alone. I need space where I can think.”
“You think running will give you peace?” she asked. “It won’t. The fight out there is real. And it’s hungry.”
“I’m not scared of a fight.”
“You should be. Because this one doesn’t play fair. And you don’t even see what it’s already taking from you.”
I swallowed.
“I just… I need to do this.”
She looked at me a long time, then nodded once.
“If you’ve already decided, I won’t stop you. But listen, Elias—God will still come after you. He’s not going to let you go easy.”
“I don’t want Him to find me,” I said before I could stop myself.
Her face fell, but her voice stayed steady.
“Even if you don’t want Him, I’ll still pray for you. I’m not giving up on you.”
The pan hissed behind her—something egg-like going from soft to hard without anyone watching.
The hall clock clicked once.
Somewhere outside, a car door shut.
The world kept doing ordinary things, disrespectful to the fact that mine was splitting.
We stood there—too many words behind us, not enough in front.
At the end, she only said, “Go then, before I make this harder for both of us.”
I stepped outside.
The morning had the nerve to be beautiful.
Sky washed clean.
Air cool enough to feel new in my lungs.
A dog barked down the street like it was in on a joke.
My bag thumped my back with each stair—a heartbeat trying to keep up.
Nyxion’s text from last night still glowed on my screen:
Door’s open. Couch until we set you up.
A second message blinked in: Proud of you for choosing yourself.
The words slid down easy, like bad liquor.
The screen dimmed.
Behind it—in the house I was abandoning—I heard her voice.
Low at first, then rising.
Not begging. Warring.
Scripture braided into breath.
That kitchen melody turning into something with teeth.
It chased me to the curb.
I stopped anyway.
Looked at my hands.
They were steady now.
That scared me more than the shaking had.
A rideshare crept onto the block.
I raised my arm—then lowered it.
I didn’t need a witness to my exit.
So I walked.
Past the mailbox we’d fixed twice.
Past the crack in the sidewalk that looked like a map to nowhere.
Past the spot where I’d fallen off my bike at eight and bled loud enough to bring the whole neighborhood outside.
Every step felt like tearing Velcro—loud in my head, sticky in my chest.
Halfway down the street, I did the thing I swore I wouldn’t.
I turned around.
Through the front window I saw only shapes.
A flicker of candlelight.
The outline of a woman on her knees.
I couldn’t hear the words anymore—maybe she’d switched to whispers, the kind that move slower but sink deeper.
Maybe the walls were holding them for later.
“Don’t,” I told myself. “Don’t go back in there. Don’t let one song undo a decision.”
I faced forward and kept walking—until the house became another roof on a line of roofs, until it was just an address I wasn’t using.
At the corner, I pulled out my phone and typed: On my way.
I didn’t send it.
I didn’t need to.
I’d already said yes with my feet.
A train wailed somewhere far off—long and low, mourning or warning, I couldn’t tell.
The sun climbed higher.
The cold I’d chosen settled into my bones like it had been waiting for a room.
I adjusted the strap on my bag.
“I’m done,” I said—to no one, and to Him at the same time.
The wind didn’t answer.
Neither did the Voice.
For the first time in days, the quiet didn’t feel crowded.
I stepped into it—and kept going.
Chapter 18 — The Company You Keep
Nyxion’s door was already open—like a mouth that had been waiting to say my name.
Inside smelled like smoke and something sweet—sage, cinnamon, and orange peel drying in a bowl. Candles stood in tall glass cylinders like saints dressed for a nightclub. A mirror leaned against the far wall, draped in beads and scarves that caught the candlelight and tossed it back in color.
“Shoes off,” Nyxion said without looking up. He sat cross-legged on the floor, bracelets stacked up his forearms. “We honor the ground here.”
I kicked my sneakers by the door and set my bag beside them.
“You knew I’d come.”
He smiled like he’d just won a bet with himself.
“I knew you’d arrive. Coming is just feet. Arriving is agreement.”
The space felt crowded with quiet—heavy, but not the kind that pressed. The kind that invited.
Imani slid past me from the kitchen, barefoot, silk whispering. The crystal at her throat swung like a slow clock.
“Welcome to your first day, birthday boy,” she said, her voice like tea left to steep too long—warm, but strong.
“Birthday?” I asked, trying not to sound caught off guard.
“Eighteen,” she said, sipping from her chipped mug. “That’s a doorway number. You step through one world into another.”
Nyxion chuckled. “And what better day to arrive than the one you first came into this world?”
The words hit harder than they should have. Somewhere behind the walls of memory, I could still hear Mama’s morning song—soft, humming through the smell of fried eggs and butter.
Here, the air was thick with incense and change.
“Pilgrim,” Imani added. “On a journey—not religious. Spiritual.”
Nyxion tapped the rug in front of him. “Sit.”
I sat.
He lifted a round chart from the table—circles inside circles, symbols like arrows and squiggles, a sky drawn on paper.
“Astrology first,” he said. “The church told you the heavens were wallpaper. They’re maps.”
He pointed. “Sun sign says how you burn. Moon says what you hide. Rising says the mask you meet the world in. The day you were born, the sky left fingerprints.”
“You can tell all that from some lines?” I asked, but my voice wasn’t daring him to prove it. It was already measuring where I fit.
Nyxion’s bracelets clinked as he traced the chart.
“I can tell you why you hear too much. Why silence feels like a crowd. Why you run to noise when God gets close.”
His eyes flicked up. “And why He feels like an intruder in your own head.”
My throat tightened. Imani handed me a glass of water like she’d timed the breath I didn’t take.
Nyxion set the chart aside and reached for a deck of cards.
“Tarot isn’t fortune-telling,” he said. “It’s reflection. You don’t kneel to it; you look through it. Church calls it witchcraft because it works without them.”
He cut the deck and laid three cards on the rug, face down.
“Past. Present. Path.”
He flipped the first.
The Tower.
A spire breaking in lightning. Figures falling. Fire in the windows.
I didn’t need a sermon to get it.
“Structure collapsing,” Nyxion said gently. “But not as punishment. As correction.”
He turned the second.
The Lovers.
Two figures beneath an angel, hands almost touching.
“Choice,” he said. “Not romance. Alignment.”
He touched the last card like he already liked what it would say and turned it with two fingers.
The Hierophant—reversed.
A crowned priest upside-down, keys crossed beneath his feet.
Nyxion looked up at me and didn’t smile.
“Tradition broken. Gatekeepers losing their grip. You’re not running from God, Elias. You’re running from their version of Him.”
A heat stirred in my chest—uncomfortable and satisfying at the same time.
“So this—” I gestured around us: the candles, the beads, the mirror. “This is… what? A different version?”
“This,” he said, tapping the cards, “is a mirror. That—” he pointed to the chart, “—is a map. And this—” he lifted a small velvet pouch and shook a stone into his palm, black and glassy, “—is a vessel.”
Imani plucked the stone from him and pressed it into my hand.
It was cool—a tiny night with weight.
“Onyx,” she said, like she was just naming the rock out loud, like it had nothing to do with me.
“It absorbs what doesn’t belong to you.”
“What doesn’t belong?” I asked.
“Stray intentions,” she said softly. “Words you didn’t ask for. Prayers meant to chain, not heal.”
Her eyes flicked, quick and knowing.
“You’ve had a few of those slung your way.”
Mama’s kitchen hymn bled through my memory; my jaw tightened to keep it out.
“Before you get spooked,” Nyxion said, reading my face like a page, “listen to my language. I don’t worship rocks. I don’t bow to stars. I honor tools. I honor patterns. I honor the Divine where He actually shows Himself—everywhere.”
“He?” I asked, unsure if I meant to test him.
“Call Him He if you need,” Nyxion said without blinking. “Call Her She if you finally want to breathe. Call It Breath. Call It the One. Names are doorways. We use the ones that open, not the ones that lock.”
“That sounds like—” I started, then stopped.
“Like freedom?” he said.
“Like blasphemy,” Imani said cheerfully, sipping her tea. “And look at you—alive.”
Nyxion stood and offered me both hands. I took them. His palms were warm, dry, steady.
He closed my fingers over the stone.
“This isn’t about rebellion, Elias. I’m not asking you to hate the church. I’m asking you to stop letting it name what God can and can’t touch.”
He tilted his head toward the mirror.
“Lesson one.”
A faint buzz cut through the incense-heavy quiet.
My phone, face-down by the door, lit once and went still.
I didn’t move, but my eyes flicked toward it.
From Ma – Happy 18th, my son. I love you wherever you are, regardless of who you think you are or should be. I always will. – Mama
The glow dimmed, but the words didn’t fade.
They pressed against my chest like a heartbeat that wasn’t mine.
For a moment, the air in the room shifted—warmer, gentler—like something unseen had leaned close.
Then Nyxion’s voice pulled me back.
“Lesson one,” he repeated, turning me toward the mirror.
In the reflection, the candlelight rippled behind us like breath.
And beneath the hum of the room, her words still echoed—
soft, steady, unrelenting.
Chapter 19 — The Last Bell
Three weeks disappeared like breath on glass.
I didn’t mark them with Sundays or sermons. I marked them with little silences—how the air in Nyxion’s place settled when the incense stopped smoldering, how Imani’s bracelets chimed once and then went shy, how the onyx in my palm cooled and warmed like a living thing learning my name. I stopped counting days and started measuring distance: how far I’d drifted from the boy who flinched at altars, how close I stood to a voice that answered back when I spoke.
Then the last week of school came anyway—loud, fluorescent, ridiculous with posters and yearbook signatures and songs leaking from somebody’s portable speaker like soda fizz. I stepped onto campus and the building met me like an old joke: same lockers, same gum-smudged tile, same bell with that familiar metal throat. I walked past it all feeling like a tourist who knew the language but had forgotten the grammar.
“Elias!”
The voice made me turn. A classmate—Jalen, I think—was weaving through the crowd. We’d done a project together once. He’d been nice in that easy, forgettable way people are when they mean well but don’t mean much.
He grinned, like we’d been close enough to miss each other. “Man, you vanished.”
“I had… stuff,” I said. It wasn’t a lie.
He chuckled. “Yeah, senior stuff. I feel that.”
But his laugh didn’t quite reach me. The sound bounced off the hallway walls and kept going. My eyes slid to the floor’s long stripe of reflection. For half a second, I thought I saw candlelight moving across it. When I blinked, it was just sunlight and sneaker prints.
“You good?” he asked, a little quieter now. “You look different. Taller, maybe.”
“Yeah,” I said, smiling just enough. “Been learning things school can’t grade.”
He nodded, unsure whether I was joking. “Guess that’s deep,” he said, already drifting toward his friends. “See you at graduation.”
I didn’t answer. And he didn’t wait to hear one.
By third period, the halls were sweating chatter. Seniors wore their gowns around their waists like giant skirts, sliding across floors like parade floats. Two girls compared tassel charms. A boy practiced tossing his cap and watched it bounce off the ceiling and spin down into someone else’s hands. The ceiling gave everything back in echoes and dust.
At my locker, I found a folded handout—the paper soft and handled, like a palm. Commencement Itinerary. The word sat there like a slow drumbeat. My fingers were automatic on the metal dial—left, right, right—like I still believed in combinations that opened things.
Inside: three years of notebooks with old names written on their lips, a half-broken pencil sharpened down to a complaint, a scripture scribbled on an index card from some forgotten good week: Be still and know… The rest of it torn off. I let the card fall back into the metal mouth and took the itinerary instead.
My phone buzzed once. The sound threaded the locker’s clank and the hallway din. I pulled it out, and the screen bloomed with a new message—fresh date, same sender, same gentleness that never learned how to quit.
From Ma — Just thinking of you, Elias. I don’t know where you are these days, but I pray peace finds you. Remember — you don’t have to run to be loved. Always, Mama.
I read it twice.
Her words didn’t press the way they used to; they hovered, light but stubborn, like they were waiting for somewhere to land.
For a second, the fluorescent hum softened. The hallway heat gentled. The onyx cooled.
My thumb hovered over the keyboard. A reply crowded my throat and wouldn’t shape into words.
I slipped the phone away and found the stone instead, its weight a small certainty.
It didn’t beat like a heart. It just existed—solid and black and patient.
I let it sit in my palm until my breathing remembered how.
“Elias?” A voice like chalk dust. Ms. Durant—English. Her cardigan a polite cloud, her eyes kind in a way that made me want to confess things that had no detention attached to them. “Your poem for the senior lit mag—did you want to swap it out? Final submissions are today.”
“I didn’t submit a poem,” I said, and she tilted her head, surprised.
“You’re listed.” She fished a paper from a manila envelope. My handwriting waited on it, slanted and familiar. The Mirror That Breathes. I couldn’t remember writing this version, not exactly, but there were my fingerprints: a line about silence that wasn’t peace, a line about names being doorways, a line about a voice that asked questions without a mouth.
“Keep it,” I said.
“You sure? It’s… strong.” She smiled—proud, not possessive. “Feels like you found something true.”
I thought of Nyxion’s hands closing mine around a stone. I thought of Imani’s voice calling blasphemy a spice that kept meat from going bad. I nodded. “Yeah. I found something.”
Between classes, reflections kept catching me. Not mirrors—any shining thing. A trophy case, a glass door, the silver belly of a vending machine. The world shivered around my outline like heat lines on summer asphalt. It wasn’t dramatic. No angel wings, no glowing irises. Just a tremble, like the surface of water when a fish turns beneath it and never breaks through.
In ninth period, Henderson’s windshield-wiper voice went back and forth across “systems of power” while he rained grades onto desks. I answered what he asked because it was easy to be correct. But the whole time, a hum under my ribs. Like the bell was hiding in me somewhere, waiting.
After the dismissal stampede, I stayed behind and let the room empty. Dust insurance-danced in the windows. I touched the back of a chair and felt its stubbornness. When I closed my eyes, I could map the room by the way air moved around objects. A laugh in the hall broke apart and reassembled itself three times before it died. The onyx cooled. My shoulders dropped. You can be alone in a place and still feel looked at. Not watched. Witnessed.
The last day arrived carrying heat on its back. The gym became a stage became an ark—bleachers groaning under people dressed like they believed in endings that lasted. Dad-less kids like me learned to fold our faces into something that didn’t need explaining. Caps and gowns turned us into a choir, and somebody’s baby cried through the welcome like prophecy.
When I put my gown on, the fabric whispered down my arms like an old river. I pulled the zipper and it made a soft, metallic prayer. The cap sat on my head like a joke that needed me to laugh first. In the locker-room mirror, our class smudged into a herd of black squares and identically bright tassels. For a heartbeat, the room behind me wasn’t a locker room at all. Candlelight breathed in the corners. Beads and scarves caught light and tossed it back like yes, like yes, like yes.
“Yo, Elias!” a voice called—a flash of movement, a grin. That same classmate from the hallway—Jalen, probably. His face blurred with a dozen others I’d never see again. “You ready?”
Ready for which ceremony? I almost asked. The one with diplomas or the one where bone and breath write down your soul and call it aligned?
“Yeah,” I said, and the word felt like it came from the bottom of a dry well.
We lined up, alphabet hurting some people’s feelings and favoring others. A girl in front of me cried without smearing her mascara, which felt like a talent. A boy behind me bounced on his toes like the floor would launch him into his future if he asked it nice. I held the onyx between two fingers and then slipped it into the inside pocket of my gown, over the left side of my chest. Not my heart. A little to the outside of it. Like a shoulder leaning in.
The principal talked about horizons with his hands. People clapped at the parts where the speech let them, and at the parts where it didn’t but wanted to. He said the word world like he was handing us a wrapped gift. He said responsibility like a fence. He said legacy and half the parents straightened up. I thought of Mama at her kitchen window, humming into prayer, mustard-colored light on her cheek. Love isn’t a speech. It’s a room that finds you.
Names rolled out like a river reciting all its stones. A girl tripped and took a bow like she meant to. A boy flexed for his cousins. When my name rose—Elias Kai—the room didn’t hush, but something in me did. I walked like the floor agreed. The principal’s hand was dry. The diploma cover was empty, a promise of paperwork in an office later. The camera light flashed. For half a blink, I saw myself the way I’d been seeing everything else—edges quivering, the world behind me almost another place entirely.
Back in my seat, I slid the cover open and closed like a mouth. The onyx warmed. It didn’t tell me anything. It didn’t have to. Its warmth was a simple sentence my body understood: Here.
When the last name landed and the last small bow was taken, the principal lifted both hands like a referee blessing a goal.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the graduating class—”
He didn’t finish because the room finished for him.
Caps went up like blackbirds startled from a tree.
The sound of them leaving our hands was a thousand soft pops.
The sound of them returning was thunder with a sense of humor.
I didn’t throw mine.
I watched the sky above the rafters swallow the flock and spit it back.
I watched people laugh with their teeth, and cry with their mouths open, and hug as if this moment earned all the moments before it.
I clapped, because I wasn’t a hater.
But the clapping didn’t climb into me.
It stayed around my waist like shallow water.
Then—soft, familiar, realer than the noise—
someone called my name.
“Elias!”
The crowd kept roaring, but the sound curved through it, gentle and certain.
I didn’t need to turn to know the voice.
It reached me like sunlight through a cracked door—too kind for where I was standing.
Zariah Kai, my mother, calling out from the bleachers in her Sunday dress,
hands cupped around her mouth, pride poured out like prayer.
For half a second, my feet wanted to move.
Wanted to find her.
But the onyx in my pocket warmed like a warning,
and something in me chose stillness instead.
I froze.
Didn’t wave.
Didn’t look.
Just let the moment slide past me like a song I’d already decided not to dance to.
The crowd swallowed her voice.
The air thinned.
And somewhere in that hush, the bell inside me stirred.
After, the parking lot became a carnival of horns and cameras. Aunties turned into paparazzi, cousins turned into DJs, trucks turned into altars with coolers on them. Ms. Durant found me once more and pressed a thin booklet into my hands—the lit mag stiff with fresh ink. My poem nestled inside, a mirror that didn’t apologize.
“Congratulations,” she said. There was a question behind it she didn’t ask. I thanked her anyway.
A breeze moved through the crowd and lifted everything easy: tassels, voices, the edge of some woman’s floral dress. For a second, it smelled like orange peel and smoke. For a second, it smelled like butter and eggs.
My phone buzzed again. I didn’t look. I already knew which room the words were coming from.
I slipped off to the side of the lot where the shadows pooled behind the gym. The metal door threw my shape back at me, a dark cutout pasted on gray. I touched the place where the onyx sat, just off my heart, and counted down in my head—five, four, three. The bell inside me waited.
It rang at last in the small way a bell can when it only means to call you, not a whole school.
Not loud. Not a command. Just a clear note that knew my name.
People would call this a beginning because it had a stage and an ending because it had a bell.
But the truth stood still and simple in my mouth:
They said we were stepping into the world.
I’d already left it.
Chapter 20 — The Shadowed Anointing
I woke up with wax in the air and a stone still in my fist.
Nyxion’s couch had molded to me overnight. The candle he’d left burning had drowned itself—a little sun collapsed into wax. For a second I didn’t know where I was—then the bracelets chimed from the kitchen and the room remembered me.
Imani was already at the table, legs folded beneath her like she’d been poured there. She slid a mug toward the empty chair.
“Drink. Power shakes hands with nerves in the morning.”
The stone—Onyx—was warm in my palm. I hadn’t meant to sleep with it, but my hand had refused to let go. The weight steadied me in a way prayer never had.
And I thought of her—the way she’d pressed the crystal into my hand, her eyes steady, her voice soft. The memory lingered like smoke.
Nyxion leaned against the counter, watching me like a craftsman eyeing his tool.
“Feeling different?”
“Like the room’s listening,” I said.
He nodded once.
“Good. But listening isn’t enough. Not anymore. Next step is speaking. Creation began that way—you’ve just forgotten who listens when you speak. Your tongue is a blade. Learn how to cut chains with it.”
“On who?”
“Whoever’s ready.”
By afternoon, we found her.
Cross ring on her thumb, church hoodie swallowing her frame, sitting at a café table with a folded bulletin she wasn’t reading.
Nyxion stayed outside, leaning against the brick, arms crossed. Trial by silence.
I slid into the chair across from her.
“You okay?”
She startled, then forced a smile. “I’m fine.”
“Lying is exhausting,” I said.
Her eyes flicked to mine. Not offended—just tired.
The words rose smooth, half mine, half Nyxion’s:
“Religion is chains. The silence you feel? That’s not God abandoning you—it’s Him pushing you to find yourself.”
Her lip trembled. “That... makes sense.”
She nodded. Softened. Something shifted in her shoulders like she’d set down a weight.
I felt it too—not the burn of visions, not the thunder of God—but a counterfeit warmth, a small applause in my chest that sounded like victory.
When I stepped back outside, Nyxion gave me a sharp nod—precise, nothing extra. But Imani smiled like she’d been listening from the marrow of the world.
She brushed my shoulder as she passed. “Careful,” she teased. “One day your words might even work on me.”
Heat climbed my chest before I could stop it.
Later, when Nyxion ducked into a shop, she leaned closer, her voice a whisper with teeth.
“What if the cards were right about The Lovers?”
I tried to play it off. “Then I guess the universe knows something you’re not saying.”
Her laugh was soft, low, dangerous. The sound hooked into me like a line I didn’t want pulled free.
That night, the storm broke.
Thunder cracked open the sky, and the rain smacked the roof until the whole house was wrapped in static.
I sat by the window, journal open, the stone warm in my pocket and the pendulum tapping my wrist like a second pulse.
I didn’t beg for answers anymore. I gave them.
I wrote about the girl in the café—how she listened, how her eyes shifted, how my words landed.
But when I tried to keep writing about her, the ink curved toward someone else.
Imani’s laugh. Imani’s eyes. The way she said my name like it belonged to her already.
And that’s when it hit me. I wasn’t just running from God anymore.
I was running with her.
I pressed the pen hard, underlining the words until the page nearly tore.
If I can turn one, I can turn many.
The storm outside didn’t scare me. It applauded.
The pen slipped in my grip, ink smearing the edge of my palm like oil. I stared at the page, the words still pulsing there—a vow disguised as a note.
The room crackled. Every thunderclap shook the glass, like the sky was laying hands on me from the outside in.
I lifted the stone from my pocket and pressed it flat against the page.
Cold. Heavy. Claiming the words as if it had written them.
Something inside me whispered:
This is your anointing. This is power that answers.
It wasn’t fire. It wasn’t Spirit. No tongues of heaven resting on me.
Just the quiet thrill of knowing a stranger in a café had listened—and for the first time, I had sounded louder than her silence.
Outside, a siren wailed under the storm, and for a second it braided with the thunder until I couldn’t tell them apart. Alarm or applause—it didn’t matter. They were both saying the same thing:
Go on.
Nyxion’s voice carried from the other room, low and certain, like a priest preparing an altar.
I couldn’t make out the words, but the rhythm matched the lightning. Every flash painted him in silhouette, tall and still.
Imani passed behind him, her bracelets chiming like bells in a temple. She didn’t look at me, but I felt her smile anyway—as if it had been set in my chest instead of her face.
I shut the journal and held it close, as if the pages had weight enough to anchor me through the storm.
And that’s when I knew.
This wasn’t wandering anymore.
This was assignment.
Not chosen, but claimed.
Not holy, but binding.
I stood and whispered to the window, to the storm, to myself:
“If I can turn one, I can turn many.”
The thunder answered back, low and long, sealing it like an Amen.
And for the first time, I believed it.
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