Chapter Text
Rumi glowered at the back of the last nun to leave the dining hall, their stoic blue and black attire vanishing from sight as they stepped through the doorway and out of the hall. Her hands tightened around her almost-empty glass, and she tossed back the last mouthful of juice, the seventh bell reverberating through the stone wall against her back, before rising and following in their steps.
She would be joining today’s morning Bible study scheduled at the half hour, but first, she swung by her chambers to retrieve her things.
Rumi slipped back inside her rooms — desk clean, books shelved and away, coffee table empty minus her tea set — and to her bedside, where her Bible sat waiting. Its worn leather cover, a cross indented in the middle, stared back at her as she picked it up, its weight in her hands familiar enough that she mistook it as her own, sometimes.
She’d been rereading it extensively over the past couple of days.
And now, she also grabbed her notebook and pen — to take notes during the session — and left for the study rooms, her skirts billowing around her ankles as she walked.
The rooms were located upstairs, above the infirmary, and were outfitted with a table and chairs for people to gather. Bordering them was an empty room used for prayer circles, as well as the craft rooms which housed workstations for activities like art, candlemaking, and bookbinding.
Now, Rumi ascended the spiral staircase, bringing her to a low-lit hallway, and pushed open the second door on the right.
She only made it two steps inside before freezing, inhaling sharply and rocking back on her heels.
Mira — Priest Kang, that was — was lounging in a chair next to the oak table like she owned the place, her legs stretched out in front of her, one hand splaying her Bible open against the lip of the table and the other draped over the back of the chair, playing idly with a rosary.
She glanced up from the book and spotted Rumi, and a smile broke out almost immediately.
“Welcome,” she said, a slight rumble to her voice.
Rumi exhaled, slow and steadying, and managed a stiff “thank you” before taking the furthest chair away from the priest.
She quickly busied herself with opening up the notebook and flipping to the next blank page. She pretended not to feel Priest Kang’s eyes still on her as she scrawled the date at the top, wallowing in regret at arriving early.
Neither of them said anything, but if the silence bothered the priest, she didn’t show it, radiating the same calm assuredness as always. Unfortunately, the table wasn’t all that big, and of course Priest Kang was sitting in the middlemost chair, so even the furthest seat away from her wasn’t far at all. Rumi suspected that if they both reached out their arms, they’d be touching.
Which, she was not thinking about.
The door opened again, and a few nuns entered in a wave of black and blue in her periphery, each with their own copy of the Bible. Rumi didn’t have to look their direction to notice the way they stumbled at the sight of her, the one leading the pack nearly tripping over her own feet before catching herself.
One-by-one, suddenly rather subdued, the nuns filed in and chose a seat. There was only one seat next to Rumi, to her left, which the last nun pushed further away from her, creating a distance between them, before taking.
The moment they were all seated, Priest Kang cleared her throat. “Okay, let’s begin. Flip to John 16:33, if you will. Would one of you read it aloud, please?”
Rumi found the passage in question, the book’s pages soft and slightly textured beneath her fingertips. One of the nuns read the verse as requested, and after, Priest Kang began to break it down and provide context. Rumi followed along for a few minutes, but it was hard to stay focused on the words given that the priest’s low, rhythmic voice was the one reading them.
Mind wandering, Rumi dared a glance in her direction.
The first thing she noticed was her hands.
One gripped the side of her book, balancing it against the edge of the table, giving Rumi an ample view of the backside of her palm.
Most priests — every priest she’d met before, anyway — got the back of their hands tattooed with a rose as a symbol of their everlasting devotion and service to God.
But Mira? She had spiralling lines instead, like vines curling over her skin, with steep, pointed thorns and occasional leaf jutting out from them. They continued up her wrists before disappearing from sight, obscured by clothing. They were beautiful, in a strange sort of way, in the kind of way Rumi found a darkened, hollow room and the sway of bodies framed by cut cloth to the lilt of unidentifiable music to be beautiful.
Rumi stared. And stared. She tilted her head slightly, as if that would help her get a better look, and studied every visible centimeter of it, from how each spiral curled and connected, to the angle and shape of every thorn crafted of ink.
She wanted to see it closer, to trace it, to discover where it led after vanishing behind the carefully-buttoned cuffs of her suit.
Priest Kang’s hand lifted off of the book without warning, drifting up and up, until it reached her chin, and then her lips. The priest stuck out her tongue slightly and dragged it up her thumb, slow and deliberate. And then she pressed the finger against her bottom lip and sucked lightly, teeth flashing as she drew the tip of it into her mouth.
A rush of blood warmed her face, and Rumi glanced up, once, to find Priest Kang staring at her, eyes sparkling with mischief.
She smirked and lowered her wet thumb to the page, flipping it.
Rumi whipped her head back down, directing all her attention to the open book in front of her, but not comprehending a single word of it. Her heart picked up its pace, a pattering thunder behind her ribs.
She lifted her pen to the notebook, fully intending on taking notes, but as her hand moved, she found herself sketching out a familiar, comforting set of shapes. After a minute or two, she blinked down at the rough drawing of an eagle-owl — she’d seen one yesterday before dawn.
The sketching calmed her, at least a little, so she continued, adding a leafbird, a myna, and then a raven to the page. She paused to survey her work, already imagining how she’d compare her eagle-owl sketches later to her guidebooks and see where they could be refined.
Then, unwittingly, Rumi peeked up again.
Her gaze landed on Priest Kang’s other hand this time, which was propping up the side of her jaw, a rosary wrapped around her palm and tangled between her fingers. The little metal cross dangled down from her hand, glittering by the side of her throat.
Rumi blinked, entranced, watching the way light caught on the pendant, and the curve of the jawbone and stretch of neck she could see behind it.
“Sister Ryu, could you tell us what this next passage means to you?”
Rumi jolted, and realized Priest Kang was looking back at her with an insufferable, knowing grin on her face.
And then everyone swivelled their heads to look at her, waiting, and the question registered.
She swallowed, and opened her mouth. “I, uh, well, you see. This verse is actually one of my favorites. Because….”
And, oh, Priest Kang looked delighted at that. “Oh, is it?” she asked when Rumi trailed off. “Go on. Tell us why.”
“Of course,” Rumi said, gritting her teeth faintly. She glanced down at her notebook briefly, like the birds there might hold the answers she was looking for. No such luck. “It’s because it signifies… His eternal love… and, uh, His eternal trust in us to better ourselves by living according to His word. Which He gives because He loves us, and wants what’s best for us, as long as we listen to Him.”
Each of the nuns nodded sagely, looking awed, as if she’d just rewritten the laws of the universe. Meanwhile, Priest Kang’s eyebrows raised, and her hand lowered to the table. “What a unique interpretation that was. Thank you, Sister.”
The priest returned to her teachings, and Rumi buried her head back in her notebook, trying not to sweat. Somehow, she felt like she’d just had a brush with a wild animal and only nearly come out the other side.
Rumi twirled the pen in her hand, distracted and nervous. She scanned over the sketches once more, lingering on the raven. On an impulse, she added one more bird to the page — a swallow, mid-flight.
She tried to focus on the rest of the study session, but her mind proved to be preoccupied, circling from birds to Priest Kang and her audacity to everything that had just happened and then back again. Thankfully, Priest Kang didn’t ask for her to explain any more passages, and given the chance to reflect, she was able to come to a conclusion.
Namely, that she needed to put a stop to… whatever all that had been, before it continued or even possibly worsened. She couldn’t have the priest under any, er, false impressions about where they stood, and now was the time to nip it in the bud, while she still could.
Finally, Priest Kang drew the session to a close, thanking everyone for their time, and each of the nuns were quick to grab their things and leave, the heavy door thudding shut behind them.
The priest paid them no mind. Seemingly in no hurry at all, she closed her Bible and stood, lacing her fingers together and stretching her arms above her head with a slight groan.
Rumi flushed and rose from her seat, looking away.
She heard Priest Kang stand and raised her eyes, just in time to catch her striding for the door, crossing the space in a few long steps.
“I’ll see you at the next session,” Priest Kang said, her hand reaching for the handle, and Rumi decided to seize the opportunity while they were alone.
“Wait.”
The priest halted right away, turning around to face her — her demeanor not confused, just waiting. Like she’d almost expected it, which angered Rumi for a reason she couldn’t pinpoint.
“What… happened, between us—” Rumi breathed in and then back out again, her grip on her pen tight enough that she feared for a moment it might break right open and spill onto skin, before continuing. “It’s not happening again.”
Priest Kang cocked a brow. “I didn’t say it was.”
Rumi glared, instantly aggravated by her cavalier response. “Well, you keep—” she gestured dramatically, like that captured it. “Looking at me, staring, like…”
Amusement, bright and unmistakable, shone across her face. “Oh, really? How might that be?” She took a step closer and leaned in slightly, pinning Rumi beneath dark, keen eyes. She spoke low, pointed. “How exactly do I look at you, Ryu?”
Unbidden, a memory prodded at her, a sudden whisper on the tip of her tongue.
(Like you wanted to eat me alive).
Rumi shoved that thought far away. Instead, without thinking too much, she went with: “Like you want something from me.” Which wasn’t exactly wrong.
Without missing a beat, Priest Kang pressed, “And what do you think I want from you?”
Rumi crossed her arms defensively. “I—I don’t know!”
“You’re the one who started this conversation,” the priest pointed out, unfazed. “Just like you’re the one who asked for me to—”
“Okay, enough,” Rumi hissed. Under no circumstances would she be letting Priest Kang finish that sentence. She thundered on. “You are the one who keeps acting like—like you’re trying to start something. You know. Cause trouble.”
And Priest Kang laughed, as if what she’d said was meant to be funny. “Trouble, huh?”
Rumi nodded firmly.
“Like I said.” The priest leaned back, seemingly unaffected, that glimmer of amusement unfading. “You’re the one who pulled me aside to talk. Are you sure you don’t want a little trouble… Rumi?”
Rumi stilled.
A knock echoed against something deep within her.
“What did you just say,” she bit out, not as a question.
Priest Kang only grinned. “I said, ‘are you sure you don’t—’”
“Not that! You know what I meant,” Rumi snapped. “My name.”
“Oh, that,” Priest Kang said innocently. “What about it?”
“How’d you — where’d you hear it?” Rumi’s heart rate had kicked up again, jumpstarted by the sound of her name — those two syllables that she hadn’t heard spoken by another tongue since… well, it had been a long, long while. No one called her that, not anymore, not in years and years.
“I knew your name before we’d even spoken for the first time,” the priest answered casually.
Rumi gaped at her openly. “What?” The shock rapidly morphed into indignation as she remembered their first encounter, and she demanded, “Then why did you—”
“I wanted to hear it from you.” Priest Kang studied her, then muttered, “Which you made unnecessarily difficult, Rumi.” Her voice dropped, even lower now, and teasing. “Besides, it’s fun to watch you squirm.”
Rumi sputtered. There it was again, like it was so very easy to say, as if it rolled off the tongue like nothing. Her name sounded so potent in Mira’s mouth, so intimate, like it meant something more than a collection of sounds — an effect she wasn’t sure came from hearing it somewhere other than her own head and murmured to herself late at night, or from Priest Kang being the one to say it.
But she could hazard a guess.
“You can’t call me that,” she said, even though it ached a little, in all the places it shouldn’t. “No one calls me that.”
“Would you prefer I call you the ‘Chosen One?’” Priest Kang questioned.
Rumi wasn’t sure she liked how flippantly Priest Kang said her title, but she chose not to push on that particular front. Instead, she asked, making no effort to hide her offense, “What do you have against Sister Ryu?”
Priest Kang hummed consideringly. “It’s a little stuffy, don’t you think?”
Rumi gasped. “It’s a sign of respect!”
“To who?”
“To my status!”
“Hm,” the priest said. She glanced at behind Rumi, where there was a clock mounted to the wall, and added, “Well, this conversation has certainly been riveting, but if you’ll excuse me, I have to run.”
Rumi was strongly considering biting back with something along the lines of, you’re not excused, actually, but Priest Kang wasn’t hanging around to hear it. She turned and left briskly, the sound of her footsteps echoing down the corridor behind her, muffled through the door.
Rumi grumbled to herself all the way back to her quarters.
To her relief, Priest Kang wasn’t leading tonight’s mass. Priest Cain, with his suit that always seemed a size too big, his dark slicked-back hair, and his Bible with smudges on the leather was.
Rumi crossed her legs at the ankles as he took the stand, placing his Bible on the proffered wooden surface, and led them through an opening prayer.
“And we honor Him with our worship, and will strive to live in His image every day forth. Amen.”
An echo of amen rippled through the congregation.
Priest Cain opened the Bible finally and launched into his sermon. “The word of God is a gift He gave us to guide our steps, to navigate our human lives, and to trust in His judgment over our own, which is inherently flawed because we are swayed by mortal desires. He calls upon us to let go of our sense of self, to give ourselves over to Him by sacrificing our desires. He says… now listen closely, everyone. He says: ‘For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.’”
Rumi took notes — real notes — as he spoke, jotting down the verse and a summary underneath. Priest Cain highlighted the sin of selfishness, citing more verses, and she wrote those down, too. She didn’t want to miss a word.
Once the sermon concluded, they all lined up for communion with Priest Amon, with Rumi at the front. She sipped the wine from the large, ornate glass and opened her mouth for her wafer. Priest Amon didn’t touch her skin.
She swallowed it down and headed back to her rooms, not looking back. A weight pulled at the bottoms of her feet with every step, threatening to inch upward and wrap around and hold tight, following her all the way to bed.
Rumi didn’t bother looking up from her table. She’d given up on keeping an eye out for her everyday — she never showed, and it had all been nothing but a waste of her time.
She picked at the hard-boiled egg on her plate with targeted disgruntlement, clawing off bits of shell and throwing them down on the ceramic, where they clinked softly as they landed. They’d amassed into quite the pile by the time she was mostly through with its shell, her the tips of her fingers starting to ache from the force with which she held the sharp-edged pieces.
She barely registered the sound of approaching footsteps and the swish of fabric against fabric, but the scraping of a chair against the floor and the plate set down on the table across from her was harder to miss.
“This seat taken?”
Rumi swung her head up, eyes wide, and stared open-mouthed at the priest who had already sat down across from her, wholly relaxed and without a care in the world, as though this was an everyday occurrence. Her appearance was as immaculate as ever, suit perfectly unwrinkled and hair unfairly silky-looking, as if it would part beneath her fingers like water. She looked like she’d just come from a meeting rather than her bed. Her own plate was stocked with fruit and yogurt, as well as slices of meat and cheese.
“Mi— you—” Rumi stammered out. “What are you— people don’t just — come up and talk to me—”
Priest Kang grinned, effortless. “Yeah, yeah, you’re so special. Too special to have breakfast with me. What’re you having?” She surveyed Rumi’s plate, seemingly unimpressed by her little eggshell collection and the few slices of fruit which had been conveniently pushed towards the edge.
Rumi frowned at her. “I ate most of it already,” she muttered, before remembering she definitely should not be indulging the priest, who seemed to have no idea what she was doing by sitting with her. Already, Rumi could feel the stares of just about everyone else in the hall, drawn in by the unusualness of the circumstance and waiting to see what would happen.
Abruptly, Rumi shifted, asking roughly, “What are you doing here, anyway? You never come to breakfast.”
Priest Kang pierced a slice of fruit with her fork, irritatingly normal about the whole thing, as her lopsided, smug smile widened. “Oh? So you’ve been paying attention?”
“No,” Rumi denied vehemently, watching the priest pop the slice into her mouth and chew. She didn’t watch the way her fork slid over her tongue, or the way her throat bobbed as she swallowed.
Undeterred, Priest Kang smirked, spearing another slice and drawing it to her mouth. She didn’t even try to argue with Rumi.
Instead, she reached out and snatched up Rumi’s glass, bringing it to her nose and sniffing, ignoring Rumi’s appalled look.
“Apple juice?” She set the glass back down. “I thought you’d have a pretentious drink like sugared white elderflower tea or something.”
At that, Rumi scowled. “I do like tea,” she grumbled, offended, and moved the glass further away from Priest Kang, as if the whole table wasn’t within arms’ reach to begin with.
The priest laughed softly. “Of course you do. What do you do, sit back in the gardens and sip it while you read?”
“I don’t like the gardens,” she said reflexively, before catching what she’d said and the blatant ingratitude in plain sight and rushing to correct it. “I mean— they’re lovely, I just—”
“Well, where do you prefer?” Priest Kang’s gaze bored into her.
Rumi paused, poking at something on her plate to buy her a breath. “I like the gardens just fine, thank you.” She took a long sip of apple juice and held it in her mouth for a moment before swallowing.
For a few moments, neither of them spoke, just picked away at their plates. Rumi ate the remainder of her egg and hoped that the rest of breakfast would prove to be as peaceful as this.
Priest Kang quickly dispelled all such hope. She said, without even looking up from the table, “They’re staring.”
Rumi snorted. “Yeah, because you’re not usually here.”
“No,” she said, casual, matter-of-fact. “They do that anyway.”
Rumi straightened in her seat, eyes narrowing. “Oh, so you’ve been paying attention?” she parroted.
Priest Kang grinned again, unbothered. “Yeah.” Her eyes lifted, meeting Rumi’s. “Guess I have.”
Rumi looked away first, crossing her arms and glaring at the floor.
Unfortunately, through no fault of her own, she soon found her attention drawn back upwards, latching onto those hands, and not for the first time. Her tattoos moved slightly as she did, the whorls and thorns shifting over bone as her hands flexed and gripped.
Rumi, unthinking, blurted out, “Your hands.”
“What about them?” Priest Kang asked sweetly, taking a sip from her own glass.
Rumi glared. “Your tattoos.”
Priest Kang, clearly amused, lifted a hand between them, splaying out each of her fingers, her tattoo on full display. She didn’t say anything — like she sensed Rumi had more to say.
Eventually, only a little lost in following the vine-like patterns and the ink shooting off from them, Rumi found the words. “Why didn’t you get the rose?”
Priest Kang wiggled her fingers slightly. “These suit me better, don’t you think?”
Rumi tried not to choke and was only partially successful. But, regardless, finger wiggles or no, she wasn’t about to let the priest derail her so easily, because she wasn’t done with her questions yet.
“How’d you get assigned here, anyway?” she asked, spooning a blueberry into her mouth. It was notoriously tough to do, with high demand and few openings, and only the best were meant to be considered.
Priest Kang shrugged, as if her assignment here of all places was no big deal. “There are some higher-ups who like me.”
“I can’t imagine why,” Rumi said dryly.
Priest Kang smirked. “Sure you can.”
It took a second for the implications to hit, and when they did, she gasped, thoroughly scandalized. “You did what?! You…”
Priest Kang let Rumi gape at her for at least a full minute before confessing, “I didn’t, actually. I just wanted to see the look on your face.” She grinned, wide and unrepentant.
Rumi sputtered, indignant.
“The truth is, they just really like me. I guess it’s my natural charm.” Priest Kang winked.
At that, Rumi snorted again. “Yeah, right.”
“Is that so hard to believe, Rumi?” And now she was staring again, molten and heavy, like she could see right through her and back to the moment when they were pressed together on the floor of the confessional, wrapped around each other, weapons undrawn.
Rumi tensed at the sound of her name, her heart flipping, and she resisted the urge to look around and make sure no one else had heard. Priest Kang had said it quietly, but Rumi didn’t want to take any chances. “I thought we agreed—” she began in a loud, angry whisper.
“I didn’t agree to anything,” Priest Kang interrupted.
Rumi’s jaw clenched. “You’re not allowed to call me that,” she emphasized.
“If you can look me in my eyes and tell me you don’t want me to call you that, I’ll stop.” Mira set down her fork and gave Rumi her full attention with that same weighted stare, now edged with a challenge.
Rumi swallowed hard, her mouth dry. “I want you to call me Sister Ryu, as is proper.”
“I don’t believe you,” Mira said softly. “And that’s not what I asked.”
She tried. She really did. She opened her mouth and willed the words to come, imagining how easy it would be to say. I don’t want you to call me that. But something, whether deep in her throat or on the tip of her tongue, resisted her.
The words never came.
After a moment, when it became clear she wouldn’t speak, Mira smiled again, but this time, it was a little different. Rumi couldn’t quite parse how, but that didn’t stop her from staring, immediately drawn in by the curve of her pink-hued lips.
“Thank you for a lively breakfast,” Mira said, picking up her plate and glass — both empty, Rumi realized — and standing. “I’ll see you around, Rumi.” She spoke quietly, a shared whisper, a secret spilled wide open between them.
Her heart squeezed. Rumi watched her retreat, breathless and unblinking, until she was out of sight.
