The Godsworn Trials

When Calistra shut her eyes, her eyelids burnt with memories of her destroyed home. Flames of orange and red had painted the Vanderhael Estate, its sandstone walls now permanently scorched with swathes of black ash. Embers had flown like fireflies above, drifting in a macabre dance against the heavy grey sky, and smoke rose in choking columns out of the collapsed roof. Objects adorned with the Vanderhael sigil, the golden griffin symbolising honour and resilience, had been engulfed in the same pyre where the bodies of the loyal Vanderhael soldiers now cremated. She closed her eyes and tried to summon the estate as it once was: the grand halls, the quiet gardens, and the steady strength of its walls. But even in her mind, they crumbled into ash.

She knelt now, far from her destroyed home, on a raised platform at the heart of the Praethyian capital. Her body trembled as her back, flayed raw by repeated lashes, bled freely under the merciless sun. The square was filled with a crowd so dense it seemed endless, their voices merging into a cacophony of jeers, laughter, and shouted insults. Her chains clinked as she shifted, the cold metal biting into her wrists and anchoring her between two sturdy poles. Her back faced one half of the crowd, offering them a view of her brutalised flesh—a spectacle of pain they’d watched and consumed with grotesque delight.

On the other side of the platform knelt her parents, both bound and battered. They were on their knees, faces streaked with blood and dirt, positioned as if to offer penance before the general who presided over the scene: General Halvard Grimsall, Godsworn to the god of justice, who stood tall, a figure as commanding as he was cruel. His needle sharp gaze pressed down upon Calistra’s parents. The general stood with his back to them, facing the crowd; the figurehead of justice.

The crowd pressed close to the platform, their faces alight with savage anticipation. Merchants in dusty cloaks, labourers with calloused hands, noblewomen draped in silks—every strata of Praethyian society had gathered for the spectacle. Children perched on their fathers’ shoulders to get a clearer view. Young men shouted crude jokes about the “evil child of war,” and older women whispered prayers to Esther, the god of justice, their lips curling in disdain.

Above it all, the scent of blood from her parents’ wounds mingled with sweat and the faint traces of incense burned at the edges of the square, a futile attempt to mask the stench of death.

Calistra tilted her head around slightly, desperate to relieve the tension in her neck, and wincing as the motion pulled the torn flesh of her back. Her parents knelt facing the other half of the crowd, their amber eyes—symbols of their bond with Imallia, the god of war—fixed not on the jeering masses but on each other. Their silence was heavy, a testament to their defiance even now, when death loomed over them.

Procreation between Godsworn brethren was forbidden in the Praethyian Empire. People feared the type of power that could come from a child of two people sworn to the same god, even though true power could only be earned through the Trials. In any other union, no child had ever been born with inherited abilities, other than exceptional strength, and Calistra was no different. But it didn’t matter to the powerless mortals, who squirmed with displeasure and discontent under the rule of Godsworn. The child of two Imallian Godsworn may not be bound to the mortal limits, to only have increased strength. To appease the commons, who believed that everyone was equal under the gods, the law would remain. So Calistra was forbidden.

Her life was the death of her parents’.

The general’s voice rose, commanding attention. “Two Godsworn of Imallia in a single Trial had been a welcome miracle,” Halvard said, pacing before the crowd. “Praethys’s pride. Heroes to the people. And yet here we are, betrayed by the very strength we once revered. Nialus and Pietra Vanderhael have committed such a great sin against our gods!” He gestured toward Calistra with a sharp motion of his sword. “Their crime? Concealing this abomination for two decades!”

The crowd erupted, their voices a tempest of hatred and fear. “Monster!” one man bellowed, shaking his fist. “Burn her!” shrieked a woman, her face twisted with fervor. Calistra’s stomach churned as she met their eyes. These people, citizens of the kingdom her parents had sworn to protect, looked at her as though she were a mere beast unworthy of life, as though she’d done something truly wrong other than existing.

She clenched her fists, her nails biting into her palms. She refused to give them the satisfaction of seeing her cry, though the tears stung at her eyes.

Halvard turned to her parents, his voice dripping with mockery. “Pietra, Nialus, what say you? Do you regret your betrayal? Do you regrether?” The word sounded like poison from his tongue.

Pietra lifted her head, blood dripping from a split in her brow. “We regret nothing,” she roared, her voice hoarse but strong. She spat at Halvard, the saliva landing just a hair from his boot.

The crowd howled in response, a wall of sound that reverberated through Calistra’s chest. From her position, she could see the faces of those closest to the stage. Some were red with anger, others pale with fear. A priest in white robes clutched a golden talisman, muttering prayers as he stared at her with wide, unblinking eyes. A merchant laughed cruelly, tossing a rotten fruit at her feet.

High above and behind Calistra, the bells of the cathedral tolled, a slow, deliberate sound that marked the hour. To Calistra, it sounded like a death knell.

The general raised his hand, silencing the crowd. “The people demand justice,” he declared, his voice booming across the square. “And so, justice shall be delivered, as I am Godsworn to cast the judgement.”

He turned to the guards flanking her parents. “Unbind them,” he ordered. Her parents had each one Godsworn guard to them, none other needed. The rest—the ones guarding her and holding the crowd at bay—were mortal.

The Godsworn guards obeyed, pulling Pietra and Nialus to their feet. The crowd surged forward as if drawn by the promise of violence, but a ring of soldiers held them back. Calistra’s breath quickened as her parents were forced to kneel again, this time facing each other.

Halvard unsheathed his broadsword, the Great Rectifier, and held it aloft. The weapon gleamed in the sunlight, its golden carvings of Esther catching the light in a way that seemed almost holy. The crowd roared its approval, their cries blending into a single, bloodthirsty chant: “End them! End them! End them!”

Calistra strained against her chains, her muscles burning with the effort. The wood of the poles creaked, but it held firm. Tears streamed down her face as she screamed, her voice lost in the chaos.

Halvard turned to her parents, his expression one of cruel satisfaction. “Which of you will die first?” he asked, his tone almost casual.

Pietra spoke without hesitation. “It will be Nialus.”

Calistra’s father jerked his head toward her, his eyes blazing. “No!” he shouted. “Pietra, I—”

She silenced him with a look, her expression softening. “We will meet again,” she said, her voice breaking. “In this life or the next, I will always find you. I love you.”

The crowd fell silent for a moment, as if caught off guard by the tenderness of her words. It was like they’d believed her parents to be heartless, inhuman animals, obsessed only with power. Then the jeering began anew, louder and more vicious than before.

Calistra pulled harder at the chains, her body trembling with effort. The wood began to splinter under the strain. She screamed her father’s name, her voice raw with desperation. She screamed, horrible grieving screams, that tore her throat apart.

A man in a soldier’s cloak hurled a stone toward the stage. It struck Calistra on the shoulder, but she barely flinched. Others began following his lead, their hatred manifesting in the sharp edges of broken bricks, fruit, and bits of debris that rained down upon her. Pain set her ablaze as things she couldn’t see fell upon her wounds and the air was thick with dust and the metallic tang of blood.

Halvard stepped forward, his blade raising high. The crowd surged again, their excitement reaching a fever pitch. Calistra’s father turned to her, his amber eyes meeting hers one last time. “You are the light of the world,” he said. “Fight like hell. You are a Vanderhael and you will not falter because Imallia will not allow it. I love you.” And his words triggered an impossible silence in her head. The silence dispelled and her head was filled with screaming rage and unending wrath.

Calistra’s scream echoed across the square, carrying with it the agony of a soul ripped in two. The sound seemed to pierce the crowd, silencing them momentarily. Even the wind stilled, as though the world itself held its breath. Her chains rattled as she pulled again, her fingers bleeding against the iron bindings. The splintered wood beneath her hands groaned, straining under the force of her rage. She had never felt strength like this before. Painfully, she compared it to the strength of a mother protecting a child, that strength fuelled by panic and a rejection of fate.

Halvard began, “Nialus Vanderhael, you are found guilty for the crime of treason against the crown and the gods. For your crimes, you are sentenced to death.”

Calistra’s chains creaked again, louder this time. She gritted her teeth, her vision blurring with a mixture of tears and fury. Her muscles screamed in protest, but she poured every ounce of strength into the effort. Her mother’s words rang in her ears, spoken in the quiet of the Vanderhael Estate long ago: You are not just our daughter. You are our legacy. You carry our fire in your veins, our strength. You are our greatest achievement. Pietra snapped her attention to her, as if she could tell what was about to happen.

Calistra’s chains snapped out of the poles.

The crowd collectively gasped, and when Calistra charged forth from where she’d hung, Nialus watched her with only pride and love.

Calistra’s scream pierced the air, a sound so raw and primal it silenced even the most raucous jeers. She found grim satisfaction in the realisation that the crowd would not be able to cheer her father, her wonderful father, to his death. Pietra’s eyes were fixed on Nialus once more.

The Great Rectifier fell and her father’s head followed a heartbeat after.

As Calistra’s mother cried out in such heartbreaking despair, the crowd found their voices once more.

“Witch!” someone shouted at Calistra, the word carrying above the noise. “Demon!” cried another, a woman clutching her child tightly to her chest. The crowd erupted with fear and anger. But despite the putrid words that they threw like spears at her, most ran from the stage at the sight of Calistra unleashed.

In her infinite rage, she flung the chain at an approaching soldier, the heavy and nailed end of it finding his head with a lethal precision Calistra had never known herself to possess. The fastener slammed into the guard’s head with an impossible force enough to kill him on impact.

And it did.

The crowd began backing away from the stage. Hysterical screaming and gasps replaced what had been jeering just minutes ago.

Halvard turned, his eyes glinting with satisfaction and mild horror as he raised the Great Rectifier, the blade still slick with her father’s blood. Calistra was too far away, the stage too broad, too many soldiers between them. Halvard held the sword high, letting the crowd, that lingered further away, see the crimson that dripped from its edge. The roar of approval that followed was deafening, a wave of noise that crashed against Calistra like a physical blow, even as the mortal cowards pulled back from her.

Her mother knelt in silence, her head bowed. Pietra’s hands trembled where they rested against her thighs, the once-iron strength of Imallia’s Godsworn betrayed by grief. And when she looked up, her mortal blue eyes locked onto Calistra with unwavering intensity.

In that gaze, there was no defeat—only unyielding love.

Another two guards approached and Calistra hurried to retrieve the sword that had been fastened at the hip of the dead guard. The moment she armed herself, the mortal guards eased backward. Only two Godsworn guards, aside from Halvard, were on the stage. One was occupied restraining Pietra, and the other...hadbeen restraining her father. Now, he moved toward her hastily at Halvard's command.

“Mother!” Calistra screamed. And for the first time, she noticed her mother’s lip quiver, her face giving her away.

Ahead, Halvard gestured for Pietra to be moved. Two guards — one Godsworn, one mortal — stepped forward, their movements deliberate as they dragged her to the center of the stage, closer to the blossoming pool of her father’s blood. The crowd surged forward again, the front row pressing against the line of soldiers holding them back, fear mostly gone. Children wept at their mothers’ skirts, some burying their faces to avoid the sight of what was to come. Others—those too young to understand or too hardened by years of war—cheered with glee, their small fists punching the air.

Pietra knelt before the Great Rectifier, her head held high. The wind tugged at her blood-matted hair, and the sunlight caught on the scars that crisscrossed her face—marks of battles won and sacrifices made. To Calistra, she looked like a warrior queen, regal even in defeat.

“No, spare her!Please!” Calistra roared, like it might sway the sinister hearts of those around her.

Halvard stepped forward, his voice ringing out above the din. “Pietra Vanderhael, you are found guilty for the crime of treason against the crown and the gods. For your crimes, you are sentenced to death.”

The crowd cheered again, their voices swelling in a chaotic symphony of bloodlust. Calistra could hear individual cries now, snippets of words that cut through the noise like jagged glass.

“End her!”

“Send her to Hell!”

“Kill her!”

The cries blended into a singular demand for violence. The collective hunger of the masses bore down on Calistra, suffocating her. She wanted to scream at them, to ask how they could revel in this barbarity, but no words came. Her body was consumed with one singular goal: Get to her.

Her mother’s voice broke through the noise. “Calistra.”

The word was soft, barely audible, but it carried across the square like a whisper from the divine. Calistra froze, her breath catching in her throat, and two guards — one the Godsworn, the other mortal —ambushed and disarmed her in her shock. They each restrained an arm, and their grips were like iron vices. Pietra turned her head slightly, her immortal amber eyes meeting Calistra’s once more.

“You are stronger than this, my girl. Will be. You’re the daughter of Love and War,” she said, her voice steady despite the tears that streaked her face. “I love you.” Flaring amber eyes and more tears.

Calistra choked on a sob. “Mama, no.” Suddenly she was just a little girl begging her parents to let her out, let her meet people. Waiting in the sunroom by the door for her parents to return from war. Being tucked in at night by her father, who read her history over fiction.

The broadsword rose once more. Calistra struggled then, against the guards. She tried to open her mouth again, to say it back, to sayI love you too, but her throat closed and her tears drowned her. So she mouthed it, and her mother smiled as if she’d read her lips.

Pietra’s eyes hardened with iron will, and she screamed her last words, her final act of defiance.

"KILL THEM ALL CALISTRA!”

The crowd fell into a hush at the unexpected order, the silence broken only by the distant cry of a gull and the low murmur of wind through the streets. Halvard began the arc of the Great Rectifier from high above his head. The sunlight caught the blade, casting a blinding reflection across the square.

When the sword finished its downward arc, her mother’s head fell. It thudded dully to the ground, and rolled next to her father’s until their dead mortal eyes faced each other’s. Calistra thought it might’ve been Imallia’s final gift to her Godsworn. To die only seeing each other, and she wondered if maybe that meant they’d be together in the afterworld.

The thought was a final breaking. Calistra mustered up every ounce of strength she could and swung the Godsworn guard off of her, sending him stumbling away with shock. Then she wrenched her arm from the other, and reached her hands up to the woman’s face where eyes of mortal blue widened in fear, and snapped her neck.

The crowd ran in all sorts of directions, but not closer. Many swore filthy words at her as they ran, most just screaming in fear. They dispersed and Halvard turned to her, from where he stood with the Great Rectifier, coated in the blood of the only family she’d ever know. Between watching her soldiers, who’d remained loyal unto death, and her parents lose their lives...

She knew Halvard read it in her face. The hatred she felt.

She yanked the dead guard’s sword from her sheath, like she’d done before, and advanced on the Godsworn guard still standing there in shock. She swung at him with all the might her strange body might contain. He dodged, unsheathing his own sword. As if it were easy as breathing, the Godsworn guard seemed to phase into battle-readiness. He parried her attack with painful ease, no longer humbled with surprise.

Fury and despair guided her limbs as she attacked with every set of moves her parents had trained her in. She was the daughter of Love and War and they’d taught her as such. She roared and screamed as she attacked over and over, slamming the stolen blade into the guard’s to no effect. The sharp ringing of blades ricocheting was like water to her, and she drank it in like it would save her, save the voice that was growing hoarser and meeker with each bellow. The song of swords ran in her blood, and it might’ve been the very first time she felt truly free. Unleashed.

But to the guard... she could tell, even with her blind wrath, that he was amused. Her anger and grief was a game to him, and she knew he was just waiting for her to sputter out like a candle at the bottom of its wick. And when her foot slipped the first time, she realised that even though her father had told her otherwise, she could falter. Imallia did not guide her. She was hopelessly mortal, and she had always been. If she had been Godsworn, her parents never would have died. Her enhanced strength meant nothing against a man blessed.

Noting her fault, the man began his offensive, brutally assaulting her with perfect swipes of his blade that were too fast and too strong. All she could do was block and dodge, and still, in all his Godsworn glory, he managed to cut into her all over. She noticed, with no small sense of infuriation, that he attacked all of her soft and stretching spots, that made movement exceptionally painful, like the insides of her joints, her sides, and her hands. Just like her parents had taught her to.

He sliced into her left thigh, the one that dominated most of her movements, in one swift and calculated swipe. Though she didn’t buckle, the attack did its job, giving the Godsworn guard the opening he had meticulously built up to. He slashed upward at the hilt of Calistra’s sword, knocking it from her hand and well out of her reach, the blade spinning across the stage. And it was so easy for him. Godsworn strength was truly unparalleled, and when paired with obvious training... she’d stood no chance. That devilish voice whispered again,Maybe the mortals’ fear isn’t unfounded. How strong would you be as a Godsworn when you already surpass mortals?

The Godsworn guard pulled away, satisfied with his performance, and looked to Halvard. Calistra swiveled her head around, waiting for an attack at her back, and found none. The mortal guards now surrounded the stage with the rest of the guards who had held the crowd back. Only Halvard and the other Godsworn—a woman and the one who had been responsible for Calistra’s mother—remained. They had both presided over Calistra’s futile match with the male Godsworn, also surveying it like it were a performance match. Halvard stared at her with morbid curiosity. “So strong,” he purred maliciously. His lips pulled away from his lips in a grin of conniving cruelty. “Don’t you think, Amala?”

To his right, the woman tilted her head at Calistra, dark eyes assessing and contemplative. “Indeed, General.”

He let out a deep throaty hum of approval. “I have other plans for the girl. Take her down,” he ordered the female Godsworn.

And all it took to do so was the woman unsheathing and slinging a dagger at Calistra with lethal precision and immortal strength, the hilt hitting her in the temple. She landed heavily, just a few feet away from the bodies of her parents.

She crawled towards them languidly and dazed, stretching out her arm towards her father.

She had only managed to close his mortal hazel eyes before she absorbed another blow to the head, and her world went black.