Seraphina Seraphel had learned very young that holiness made people careless.
Not careless with her.
Never with her.
The Church dressed her in white, surrounded her with attendants, placed guards outside her doors, and spoke of her future with the delicate reverence reserved for relics and expensive weapons. Every meal was measured. Every prayer recorded. Every lesson praised. Every mistake corrected with gentle voices that never needed to rise because disappointment carried farther than anger.
No, people were not careless with Seraphina.
They were careless around her.
They believed kindness meant blindness.
They confessed wounds because they assumed a healer would only see pain.
They lied because they assumed mercy had no teeth.
They smiled while hiding knives because they thought light could not cast judgment.
Cedric Valdrake Arkhen made none of those mistakes.
That was the first dangerous thing about him.
