All Chapters of THE ALTAR WE BURNED : Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

The days following the harrowing discovery of the blood-stained journal in the cathedral cellar were anything but ordinary. Isabella barely slept. Arthur, though calm on the surface, carried tension in his shoulders that hadn’t been there before. The unearthed secrets hinted at forces far more sinister than they’d ever imagined. But it was the silence that followed—a haunting stillness across the church leadership and clergy—that chilled Isabella the most."No one has asked about the journal," she whispered one morning as they met in the library before first light. "It’s as though it never existed."Arthur glanced toward the heavy doors and lowered his voice. "Or they knew it was there all along."The church's upper ranks remained cryptically aloof. Arthur had discreetly reached out to Michael's old contacts within the order—contacts once trusted in their youth. All replies were the same: silence. Even letters Arthur sent to supposed allies in Rome came ba

The air around the church thickened with a tension that only a few could sense, like an unseen web tightening with every whispered word and suspicious glance. Arthur had grown familiar with the silence of deception, but even he couldn’t deny the shift in atmosphere. Something had changed. Something big was coming.Despite the warmth of Isabella's growing influence and Arthur’s expanding ministry, an undercurrent of danger lingered. Catherine had not made another public move, yet the sense of her presence loomed like a shadow behind every door Arthur opened.The church council had suddenly become more active, asking Arthur to take up more responsibilities beyond the library—preparing sermons, leading youth conferences, and assisting the presiding elder in special anointing services. Outwardly, it looked like a promotion. Inwardly, Arthur sensed it was surveillance. They were drawing him closer not to elevate him, but to monitor him.Isabella, meanwhile, had

The following morning, the sky bore a hazy gray shroud. Rain tapped gently against the cathedral’s stained-glass windows as the air hung with a chill that seeped into the bones. Isabella stood in the hallway of the church’s eastern wing, her gaze fixed on the statue of Saint Lucia—protector of vision and light. There was something poetic about it, something that echoed her current torment: clarity through affliction.A week had passed since the Archbishop’s visit and the unveiling of the altar’s connections to her bloodline. Since then, her life had transformed. Every breath she took felt heavier. Every eye that lingered on her was riddled with suspicion—or reverence. The lines between the sacred and the hunted had blurred, and Isabella, once a servant of God, now felt like both a key and a threat.The church had imposed tighter restrictions around her. No more nightly wanderings, no more unguarded meditations in the woods. Wherever she went, two women from the Hol

The first hints of dawn bled into the sky like the slow healing of a wound. Ember Hollow was unusually still, as if the land itself was bracing for what came next. The birds did not sing. The air was thick, scented faintly with incense and something older—something buried beneath time and sanctity.Arthur stood at the edge of the chapel ruins, the place where the old sanctuary once stood before it was devoured by flame and memory. He had come alone, guided by instinct and the whisper of scripture that played on a loop in his mind: "The fire shall test every man’s work of what sort it is."His boots crunched over charred soil, the remnants of sacred ground scorched in a battle the public never knew had occurred. And yet, this earth remembered. He could feel it under his skin, in the beat of his heart, and in the low hum of the wind that moved through the ashes.Behind him, hidden in shadow, two figures watched."He returns to the ruins too often,"

The firelight danced along the cathedral’s stained-glass windows, throwing fractured colors over the marble floor like shattered hope. Outside, the wind howled like an omen. Inside, Isabella sat in the vestry alone, her trembling fingers cradling the ancient relic she'd retrieved from the altar’s hidden chamber—a vial sealed with crimson wax, pulsing faintly as though it contained something still alive.Her heart raced. She knew she had trespassed into a place not meant to be disturbed—not by the living, at least. Her visions had drawn her there, compelled her to pry the stones loose beneath the sanctuary until she found the hidden vault her mother once spoke of in whispers. The vial had been waiting.And so had something else.Arthur stood in the shadows by the vestry door, watching her. He had followed her that night, not out of suspicion, but because the voice in his spirit had grown too loud to ignore. A warning. A nudge. Something sacred had shifted t