⚠️ Warning: This chapter contains scenes of religious violence, including physical torture. Some readers may find it disturbing.
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Journal of Mylova – Day 2
They will not break me.
This morning, the Abbot returned — like a figure stepping out of a nightmare too real to ignore. He was not alone. Two other hooded figures walked at his sides. They said nothing. Their footsteps echoed like a threat down the stone corridor. From the ceiling, damp drops fell like tears I no longer had the strength to shed.
He stopped before me. Looked at me the way one might study a wild animal that must be tamed. Then he held out a small black book — a prayer book — with a gloved hand, cautious, almost disgusted, as if he were handing me something unclean.
— Recite.
His voice did not shake. It held no anger. Only that cold, absolute certainty that I would eventually bend.
I lifted my eyes. My heart pounded like a war drum — not from fear, but from refusal. My throat still ached from the day before, but I opened my lips slowly and spoke.
— Lord, protect sincere hearts from those who lie in Your name.
The silence lasted only a second. Just one. Then the slap came.
My head struck the stone wall. A white flash shot through my vision. My ear rang like a distant alarm. But I stayed upright. My tears stayed where they were — locked in, frozen.
They returned an hour later. Same order. Same book. Same threatening silence.
— Recite.
So I spoke again.
— Let the light never be dictated by the shadow of men.
This time, the slap sent me to the ground. My hands tried to break the fall, but stone has no mercy. It scraped my skin as if to remind me that every word had a price.
I don't know how long I lay there. Maybe half an hour. Maybe forever.
Then the afternoon came, heavy as a lead shroud. They returned. Again. Always with that book, that silence, that cruel patience.
I could have stayed quiet. I could have collapsed. But the words were already there, burning, sharp, too alive to be smothered.
— My faith is not an echo. It is a voice. It is mine.
This time, the slap was followed by a punch. Not to the face — to the ribs. A deep, dull pain settled in, like a knife left lodged inside. I fell to my knees. Blood from my split lips ran warm and metallic into my mouth. I swallowed it like a cursed offering.
Then they dragged me away. By the arms. My feet scraped the floor, my clothes soaked in sweat and dirt. They threw me into my cell like a useless sack. The door slammed. Darkness swallowed me.
I tried to get up. Once. Twice. My arms wouldn't hold me. So I stayed there, face against the cold stone. I listened to my shallow, uneven breath. Each inhale tore a faint moan from my chest. I hurt inside — not just in my bones, but in some deeper place I hadn't known existed.
Daylight had died, replaced by the clammy darkness that never sleeps here.
My swollen lips still bled. But they moved.
— Let silence never be a tomb for the living.
Simple words. Whispered. Just for me. Just to hold on.
The cold seeped into my bones. The floor beneath me was damp, sticky. A mouse ran past my hand, indifferent. Fear should have gripped me. But I no longer had the strength. Even it ignored me.
I don't know how much time passed. There are no clocks here. Nothing to mark the hours except pain and forgetting.
But I am still here.
And tomorrow, I will speak again.
Not their words.
Mine.