Diviner [DISCONTINUED]

5. Safina

I knew it was wrong when I had to trick a twelve-year-old, a child, to get my way. How can anything in the world that is right and just, which the knights are supposed to stand for, involve tricking anyone into betraying their own mother, adoptive or not? I had never bought into the pompousness and virtue of the knights—we were humans like everyone else—but we weren't worse than the common folk, either.

But making a kid lead us to their parent to slaughter them? That was worse.

There was no excuse for this, but still I made myself believe it was for the better. I kept my eyes on the money and assumed there had to be a reason. A good reason our queen wanted the Diviner dead. She had to know something about the woman that made her guilty enough to justify an execution.

It didn't matter, regardless.

I only acted out the will of the queen. I was to be her hands and not her head. I didn't need to think. I only needed to kill a young boy's mother and lie to him about it in his face.

A small price to pay to save our world, according to the queen.

Excerpt (5/8) of an anonymous letter hidden in the wall of the Diviner's cenobium.

**

Chapter 5

The Diviner had vanished, and Safina was convinced she had foreseen her own death. Whether it was through a vision, or through common sense, the Diviner seemed to have sensed danger and fled the cenobium in the dead of night.

The 'why' she disappeared was crystal clear to Safina. The 'why' she needed to die was as illusive as ever.

Safina theorised the Diviner was a loose thread that needed to be cut; the prophecy was not the only thing she had seen in the future. Perhaps the Diviner had broken the law, read the mind of a member of the nobility, and shared secret information with enemies of the queen. The Diviner could read minds and was even allowed to, if only under very specific circumstances. As much as the Diviner was revered, she was also feared. This Diviner would not be the first to be tempted to use her powers for riches. She would be the first to get assassinated for it.

A grave mind reading crime was the only explanation Safina could come up with. She had told herself she wouldn't involve herself with the Queen's reasoning, but couldn't stop her mind from wandering. Especially not now the disappearance uprooted the entire palace and threw everyone into chaos. The Queen's orders were as strange as they were unnerving, and the plot had only thickened now the Diviner had vanished from the cenobium.

Safina's orders hadn't changed. The queen had said nothing to Safina, except that she had to join the search for the Diviner, along with the other knights from the palace. Safina had retreated into her room, just like the others, to suit up and prepare to leave. She spent some time checking her equipment carefully until she sensed a presence behind the door.

There was the message she'd been waiting for.

"Avery," Safina said. "Come in."

The old librarian opened the door and peeked into Safina's bedroom.

"You have to find the Diviner's son. His name is Karis," he said. "He's been adopted into the Damaryl family as of today, but you need to be the one to escort him to the palace. Queen's orders."

Safina nodded. "I see," was all she said in response.

Avery opened the door further and stepped inside. He frowned. "And that doesn't surprise you?"