DELETED CHAPTER 19 OF CAELESTIĀLIS

!!READ WITH CAUTION, THIS CONTAIN SPOILERS!!

Night settled thick and sour.

The sky above was shrouded in clouds, moonlight smeared like ash through a mist that clung low to the ruined town. At the edge of what had once been a grand square, they stood before the hollowed remains of the old cathedral—its spires now broken fingers clawing toward a starless sky.

Damir inhaled deeply, tasting the damp, metallic tang in the air. He felt it crawling on his skin, whispering something long buried. His posture was straight as a blade, his red eyes reflecting the cathedral's darkness with eerie clarity. "This is it," he said. "This place either has something was taken from it or buried within."

"Gonna guess both," Eli muttered. His hands were in his coat pockets, scarf twisted lazily around his neck. His sharp eyes scanned the remnants of old symbols carved into the moss-riddled stones. "Place smells like secrets and religious guilt."

Arty crouched near the threshold, tracing the faint outline of a sigil beneath layers of dust and moss. Her fingers trembled, "It looks like the same hand drew it. Maybe they are trying to replicate something."

Damir gave a quiet hum, stepping past her into the shadows of the cathedral. The darkness seemed to lean into him, rather than the other way around. He moved like he belonged there.

Eli followed at a slower pace. "Let me guess, now's the part where you start muttering about destiny and how it's all coming together."

Damir's smirk was sharp. "Must you always deny the romance of fate? Even once, could you not indulge its poetry?"

"More likely it would be the death of me," Eli returned dryly. "I've little tolerance for theatrics. A chronic affliction, I fear."

Arty stood and dusted off her hands. She looked between them, the usual spark in her eyes cutting through the gloom. "You two bicker like old men."

"We are older than we look," Damir said. "Some more gracefully than others."

"Wow," Eli said. "You're really pulling out all the classics today."

They ventured deeper. Cracked pews lay in scattered heaps. Old murals peeled like skin from the walls, their divine figures faded into ghosts. Yet amidst the decay, something pulsed. A vibration in the stone. A rhythm too ancient to name.

At the altar, a fragment of mural remained intact—barely visible under the soot and mold. Arty cleared it with her sleeve. A woman with hair of stars raised her hands toward a ring of twelve figures, their faces scratched out. At her feet, the land bloomed.

Arty whistled low. "That her? Astra?"

Eli nodded. "And those could be the Spiorads. Or the first gods. Depends which version of the tale you get."

Damir studied the mural with an expression unreadable. "This cathedral predates the current Church structure. This mural, too. They tried to erase it. They failed."

Arty leaned back against a broken column, arms folded. "Pretty, sure. But the Spiorads? Come on. That's bedtime story stuff. Folk songs and firelight whispers. Nobody actually believes they were real."

Eli turned toward her, brow furrowed. "They used to guide people, heal them even. And the stories—"

"Stories," Arty cut in, with a shrug. "There's a story that rain is God-tears and thunder is divine punishment. Doesn't make it true."

Damir didn't look away from the mural. "Just because a thing is told like a myth doesn't mean it didn't happen. The Church rewrote what it couldn't control."

Arty raised a brow. "And now a bunch of blood-drunk zealots are trying to bring back imaginary protectors?"

"Or what's left of them," Eli said quietly. "They said the stars are disappearing. Maybe because the Church is… consuming them."

Damir turned sharply. "Explain."

Eli squared his shoulders. "They used to be close, right? The stars and us. That's what the Spiorads protected. But now the Church claims to be the only voice of the divine. What if… they severed that bond? What if this heretical cult, seeks to mend what was broken?"

Arty's lips twisted into a half-smirk. "So, we face a sanctified empire devouring starfire, and a mad cult hellbent on restoring the gods through blood and ashes. Delightful."

"It all points west," Damir said. His voice was quiet but laced with resolve.

A long silence stretched between them.

Arty broke it. "Then we follow the thread."

Damir nodded once. "We leave by first light."

Eli sighed, rubbing his eyes. "I knew you were going to say that. Gods help me."

As they turned to leave, Arty lingered at the altar, hand pressed against the faint warmth of the mural. She didn't know what she expected to feel—just that something called to her. As though the stars themselves were watching.

~

Eli dropped his satchel onto the floor with the melodrama of a dying poet. "If my spine had a mouth, it would be screaming obscenities."

Damir stood by the window in absolute stillness. He hadn't spoken since they left the cathedral. Not unusual—he often lapsed into silence when his mind was spiraling. But there was something off-kilter in the quiet tonight. The way his red eyes tracked the street below, how his fingers twitched like he was measuring something invisible.

Eli didn't say anything. He knows better not to prod Damir when he was like this. You have to wait for the storm to surface—then tried not to drown in the wake.

The door creaked open before Eli could sigh again.

Arty entered, wind-tousled and grinning like she'd just robbed a god. Her braid was a mess, her coat soaked, but she strutted in like she owned the place.

"Your ghosts creak louder than you do," Eli said.

"And yet you didn't lock the door," Arty replied, throwing herself into the nearest chair. "It's almost like you wanted me to show up."

"You live in Araes," Eli said. "What are you still doing here?"

"Following the scent of conspiracy and the two most emotionally constipated men in the kingdom," she said, propping her boots on the table. "Obviously."

Damir finally turned, and there it was—that razor-smile. The one that meant he'd found a string worth pulling.

"I thought you had responsibilities," he said. "Family. Reputation. Suitors made of soggy bread and money."

Arty waved a hand. "They'll survive without me. Besides, I already told you why I am here."

"Why?"

"The fact that every time the world shifts, the Church starts singing louder."

That smile flickered across Damir's mouth again—thin, feral. "Has the world gone too dull for your liking, Artemisia?"

"Spare me your provocations." she snapped. "Keep prodding, and I'll show you just how lively things can get when I stop being polite, your highness."

Eli raised a brow. "So instead of returning home and letting us handle it, as we have all agreed, you decided to crash our investigation?"

Arty stretched. "Your little investigation lacked flair. I thought it's only proper someone arrived to breathe a bit of fire into the coals."

Damir crossed the room in precise steps, coat shifting like shadow. "You're here because you can't stand being irrelevant."

"Wrong," she said, not flinching. "I'm here because this matters. Because I'm not going to sit in Araes and pretend the sky isn't falling."

"You'll die." he said. There was no heat in it—just fact.

"Eventually," she replied. "But not before I make sure you lunatics don't burn the truth down with your obsessions."

Damir tilted his head. "Bold. Do you think you can stop me?"

"I think I can be really annoying about it."

Eli made a low noise. "Oh, that's true. She's remarkably consistent."

Arty grinned like a knife. "I'm chaos with a cause."

"Gods," Eli muttered. "She's what would happen if a scribe's stubborn conscience grew legs and took to kicking people in the shins."

With a mock salute and a glint in her eye, she said, "Precisely. I knew there was hope for you."

Damir exhaled slowly, the ghost of a laugh brushing his breath. "Hope is dangerous."

"Only to those who don't know what to do with it," Arty shot back, already digging through Eli's satchel like it belonged to her.

"Excuse you," Eli said, snatching it away before she could dig deeper. "That's private. And possibly cursed."

"I like to live on the edge." Arty kicked her boots off onto the floor with the flair of a disgraced noble and sprawled dramatically across the chaise like a bard begging for attention. "Besides, this is clearly a space in need of my genius."

"It's a miracle your ego fits in the room," Eli muttered, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

"I brought pastries," she added, completely unfazed.

Damir arched a brow. "From where?"

She held up a crumpled wax paper parcel. "A vendor. Somewhere between Torvaen and my very poor decisions."

Eli snorted. "So we're to die from cultists or food poisoning. Delightful."

"Oh hush," she said, tossing a small, slightly squashed tart at him. "It's apple. I made sure it wasn't cursed."

Damir, now seated in the windowsill like a cat watching the world unravel, finally leaned back and closed his eyes. "You two are exhausting."

"Your highness loves it" Arty said, already peeling off her soaked coat and draping it over the back of a chair. "Don't pretend you don't find our dysfunction endearing."

"I find it loud," he said without opening his eyes. "And inefficient."

"You say inefficient, I say character-building," Eli muttered, biting into the tart despite himself. "Hm. Not poisoned. Disappointing."

"Cowards, both of you," Arty sighed. "This is why I had to come."

Silence settled—not the uncomfortable kind, but the quiet that follows shared exhaustion. The wind pressed against the windows, whispering across the shutters. For a moment, no one spoke.

Arty yawned and curled tighter into the chaise, one arm draped over her eyes. "Wake me if someone starts stabbing the walls or speaking in tongues."

Eli had already dragged his coat over himself like a makeshift blanket, muttering, "If you snore, I'm throwing you out the window."

"Try it, and I'll haunt your dreams with off-key lullabies."

"I already live in a nightmare."

Damir didn't say a word. He remained still at the window, one hand resting over his knee, the other brushing the edge of the glass. His thoughts were far off—beyond Torvaen, beyond this moment—but something about the rhythm of their bickering seemed to anchor him. The smallest shift in his shoulders hinted at ease.

The storm inside him hadn't passed. But it had, for now, paused.

And in the cramped, dim room above a cursed town, three unlikely allies. One crowned prince, one reluctant mage, and one reckless noble found something resembling rest.

Even if it wouldn't last.

(ISTFG! I hated this chapter so much. The odd behavior and camaraderie they suddenly have is just pure shit. Something that my character Damir wouldn't do. So I had to revise everything. Idk why I made it this way, I was probably rushing the whole chapter to move forward from Torvaen.

I'm gonna show the deleted chapter 18 later on too, I had to find it first since I think I edited it in a different device.)