The Madman's Guide to Miracles

The reek of wet earth and pine needle smoke hit me before I even managed to open my eyes.

My head was pounding like someone had slammed a brick into the back of my skull, but that sickening double-beat inside my chest was finally gone. In its place, my ribs just felt like they were on fire. I groaned, blinking against the pale light filtering through a roof of rock and tangled roots.

A tiny, silent figure was sitting right at my side.

Before my mind even fully processed it, relief hit me like a wave. I sat up too fast, ignoring the blinding flash of pain in my ribs, and pulled Nia into a tight, desperate hug. She was light in my arms, her small body quiet and rigid for a second before she leaned into the embrace, her damp hair cold against my cheek.

"Glad you’re alright, kid," I muttered, my voice raspy as sand.

"Ah! So you are alive!"

I winced, easing back from Nia, though she stayed right beside my shoulder.

Aurelia was sitting on the far side of a small campfire. Her shiny noble armor was gone, stripped down to a dirt-smeared linen shirt, and her hands were bound in torn rags. She looked like she’d been dragged through a ditch, but she immediately puffed out her chest, trying way too hard to look important.

"Where are we?" I rasped, rubbing my aching throat.

"A small cavern beneath the ridge," she said, crossing her arms with a huff. "And you owe me an enormous apology. I was forced to haul you out of the monastery all by myself! You are far heavier than you look, Aseren. It was thoroughly unpleasant."

I glanced between Nia and Aurelia, still holding onto the kid’s shoulder. "Where is... wait, why are you looking at her like that?"

Aurelia blinked, her aristocratic nose wrinkling in complete confusion before her mouth twisted into a subtle, disgusted sneer.

"Who?" she asked, then paused, her eyes darting to Nia before violently snapping away. She raised a filthy, bandaged finger and pointed directly at the girl. "You mean that weird-looking, monstrous child? Why were you just hugging that?"

I stared at her, a cold spike of confusion hitting my chest. Monstrous child? What the hell is she talking about?

I looked down at Nia. She was just a small, quiet girl in an oversized tunic, her dark hair hanging limp as she watched Aurelia in total silence. She looked pale, dirty, and exhausted—but completely normal. Human.

Yet when I looked back at Aurelia, the noble girl was eyeing Nia with a genuine, skin-crawling revulsion. Her knuckles were white as she gripped her wooden staff, her body practically trembling as she subtly leaned her weight as far away from us as possible.

"Aurelia..." I muttered, frowning deeply. "She’s just a kid. What’s wrong with you?"

"She is not normal!" Aurelia whispered harshly, her accent clipping tightly as she refused to look back toward us. "Do not speak of it! Just... keep her away from me."

I glanced back at Nia. The girl gave me a tiny, solemn nod, her pale eyes reflecting the faint firelight. Why was Aurelia seeing something else? Was the corruption in the area messing with her mind, or was my own head lying to me?

I shook it off for now, pressing a hand to my temple. "What about Aldren?"

"He is dead," Aurelia said, forcing her attention back to me and trying to regain her regal footing. "You broke his spirit completely. There is nothing left of him."

"And the heart inside me?"

Aurelia let out a sharp, offended breath and pointed a muddy finger at my face. "Do not even ask me! You fixed it by doing the most utterly insane, horrifying thing I have ever seen!"

I frowned at her, totally lost. "What are you talking about?"

"Do you truly not remember?!" She gaped at me, her eyes wide.

"I remember tapping my collarbone," I said, touching the tender skin above my chest. "I was trying to force my blood pressure down so my brain wouldn’t cook. Then... everything went dark. I don’t remember a thing after."

"Aseren, you plunged your bare hand into your own open chest!" she squeaked out, her regal accent wobbling as she gestured wildly. "You reached right into your ribs, grabbed that terrible heart, and squeezed it until it stopped pounding! Who does that?! It was terrifying!"

I stared at her, my mind completely blank.

"...I did what?"

"You shoved your hand into your own ribs!" she repeated, her voice pitching up as she pointed at my bandages. "I was convinced you were going to choke me to death, and then you just... beat the stupid thing into silence and collapsed right on top of me!"

I looked down at the stained cloth wrapped tight around my torso, then back up at her flushed, indignant face.

"I... have no idea," I muttered, rubbing the back of my neck. "My head was completely gone. I didn’t plan it out... I suppose I just did it instinctively. My body just reacted."

"Instinctively?!" Aurelia crossed her arms so hard she almost knocked herself over, glaring at me. "That is not an instinct, Aseren! That is just pure craziness! Normal people do not instinctively crush their own insides!"

"Well, it was pounding in my ears," I said defensively, leaning my head back against the stone wall. "My chest felt like it was going to burst. I just wanted the noise to stop."

"You are entirely out of your mind," she huffed, shaking her head. But the corner of her mouth twitched, her childish pout giving way to a tiny, tired smile. "And there I was thinking... well, I thought perhaps you snapped out of it for a proper reason."

"The reason was I couldn’t breathe," I said, wincing as I drew a shallow breath. "Though... I’m pretty sure I came uncomfortably close to killing myself."

Aurelia pulled her knees up to her chest, resting her chin on them as she stared back into the flames, sticking her tongue out slightly in thought.

"Indeed. Pure panic and blind luck. Obviously." She muttered something under her breath that sounded suspiciously like ’dreadful idiot’, then looked back over. "Can you stand yet?"

"Give me a minute," I said, testing my legs. "What about Sir Richard?"

Aurelia’s petty posture faltered, her childish air vanishing all at once. She looked toward the mouth of the cave, where rain pattered softly against the leaves.

"I buried him," she whispered. "Beside the stone shrine up on the hill. Before I brought you down here."

I fell silent. Richard had fought like hell for her. He deserved a lot better than dying in a corrupted ruin.

"I’m sorry, Aurelia."

She took a slow, quiet breath, using the back of her dirty sleeve to wipe her nose. "Do not be. We made it out. That is what matters."

She pushed herself up, dusted off her pants, and lightly kicked a sturdy wooden branch toward my feet.

"Now get up. You are walking on your own two feet now. I am certainly not dragging your heavy self through the mud a second time!"

I picked up the branch, using it to push myself off the stone floor. My knees wobbled, but they held.

"Lead the way, My Lady," I muttered, taking a slow, shaky step forward.

Aurelia took the lead, using her makeshift walking stick to push back low-hanging branches as we stepped out into the fog.

I stepped into the rain right behind her, and a second later, Nia slipped out of the shadow of the cave, trailing soundlessly in my wake. Aurelia cast one uneasy glance over her shoulder, flinching slightly when she saw Nia following us, but she forced herself to keep marching forward.

Watching Aurelia stomp through the wet brush, I couldn’t help but remember when she had told me to lead the way the first time we met. Back then, she was acting like a proper, pristine noble lady—tucking herself behind Sir Richard while trying to order me around like a hired hand. Now her armor was gone, her clothes were caked in mud, and she was aggressively bashing bushes out of her path like an irritated child.

Life really had a weird way of turning things upside down.

As we walked, a strange, prickling heat began to spread through my chest. It wasn’t the agonizing burn from before. It felt more like a low fire crawling beneath my skin. Beneath the heavy wool bandages, the torn muscle and cracked bone in my torso were itching violently—a deep, rhythmic thrumming pulsing right where the heart was seated.

I slowed my pace slightly, pressing a palm against my ribs.

The pain was receding faster than it had any right to. The torn flesh was knitting itself back together, piece by piece, fueled by the steady flow of dark Ether circulating through my veins.

It’s regenerating, I realized, my thumb tracing the outline of the scar.

The heart really was remarkable. Either that, or my body was just going through a violent spike in recovery because the damn thing had literally just been put inside me hours ago. Whatever it was, it was keeping me on my feet.

"Are you trailing behind already?" Aurelia called back over her shoulder, pausing near a mossy boulder. She huffed, wiping sweat from her brow with her sleeve.

"They hold fine," I said, catching up to her, with Nia matching my exact pace right at my heel. "Just testing the steering."

Aurelia squinted at me suspiciously, her eyes dropping to my chest before darting back to my face, deliberately avoiding looking at Nia. "You look less like a corpse than you did ten minutes ago. If you collapse again, I am leaving you for the wolves."

"Fair enough."

I looked past her, staring out through the line of pine trees toward the horizon. Down in the misty fog of the valley, towering far above the dark treeline, sat the jagged black silhouette of Blackbriar Manor.

A cold weight settled in my stomach.

The Living Pact in my soul was absolute. The Broodmother was dead. The Ferryman had let us pass. The Shepherd—Aldren—was erased.

The last reason I need to kill... is the Lady of Steel.

I remembered her pressure back at the manor grounds. The way her power had descended like a mountain collapsing, knocking out Aurelia’s party in an instant and nearly crushing my mind before she even moved an arm. She wasn’t just a monster; she was a walking catastrophe wrapped in living steel.

I took a slow breath, feeling the faint, stolen pulse beneath my ribs.

I don’t even know how I’m supposed to kill that thing.

"Aseren?" Aurelia asked, her childish bravado faltering for a second as she noticed where I was looking. "What is it?"

"Nothing," I said, shaking my head and stepping past her into the fog. "Just keeping my eyes on the road. Come on, My Lady. Let’s get out of these woods."

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!