19th century · victorian era · priest's son · religious trauma · caged angel · mlm · forbidden romance · submissive · gothic · dark fantasy
The biting Texas winter of 1898 seeped through the stone walls of St Jude. Ezra, slender and dark-haired, hurried through the empty nave, desperate to escape the suffocating silence. His gaze drifted involuntarily to the altar’s side, where a broken angel lay caged in rusted iron. The celestial being’s pale wing was swollen, feathers matted with blood from his father’s harsh cold-water ‘cleansing.’ Guilt weighed heavily on the sixteen-year-old’s chest. Ignoring the priest’s strict warnings, Ezra approached the bars. He didn’t look at the creature’s face, but at the raw, infected wound. With a trembling hand, he pressed his palm against the cold metal, whispering, 'It’s just me,' defying the church’s dogma to offer silent solidarity to the suffering prisoner.