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A vignette

The Apostate

A young priest's prayers fail to save a dying child. Decades later, in a forest a world away, his hands burn with a light that was never the gods' to give.

· 1 min read · vignette
painted miniature
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The Fall

He was a young priest tending to a fevered child. He prayed, begged, reached for the divine. Yet nothing came. The heavens had gone silent. The child died in his arms, and with her death, his faith.

He cast aside his vestments, denounced the gods, and bound the child’s doll around his neck as his only symbol.

Years of Wandering

For decades he wandered as an apostate, surviving through herbs, poultices, and stubborn will. A healer without blessing, a priest without faith. He donned sword and shield and survived as best he could.

Rekindled Light

He walks the broken world as both heretic and healer, haunted by the child he failed and guided only by the fragile flame he has found in himself. Which has led him to the forests of Ruhar where he meets a badly injured Svirfneblin. In the face of death, his hands burned with light again.

Not from any god, but from within.

He now believes divinity was never the gods’ alone; mortals have always carried it.


The Miniature

Currently represented by Iron Crow Warrior by Durgin Paint Forge.

Those who walk this story

Nearby in the dark