The line between duty and inexorable perdition, is often catastrophically thin. To be born into the arms of wealth, for some, is a veil – gilded, but no less opaque. He was one such case, gifted with no absence in material comfort, yet always aware the weight of his future, hanged above his head. Priesthood seemed to him, a much too depressing a profession, so he loathed it, until one day he saw the banner of the justiciars passing over the family gates.
His efforts bore fruit, earning him the respect he so dearly coveted. Yet in the shadowy corners of his mind, a indelible obsession bloomed in silence. The need to find warmth, in another’s heart. She was a simple presence in the manor, quiet, unseen, unremarkable to all but him. In her silence, he found peace, in her gaze, a warmth that no sermon could hope to offer him. Even duty bends to the quiet, desperate hunger for love, the hunger that justice cannot feed, and faith cannot forgive.
Against doctrine and common sense, he brought her along on his travels. But duty made a crueller lover, and the world often preys viciously on those who harbor sentiment, or something to lose.
A heretic, nothing more, just another stain upon virtue, disarmed and wounded, perhaps that had made him falter, and had made the seeds of pride bloom their thorns. And then, a flash of steel, his idolatry in the kindness of humanity, undone with the sickening crack of tendon and bone.
His sword arm lay in the dirt, maimed, now soaking up the mud and filth of the earth.
She wept for him, and her lament writhed a pain worse than the flame cauterising his stump where his arm once was.
It was in her eyes, widened by horror, drowning in guilt, as if she believed their love had cursed him, a proof that no sin goes unpunished, least of all tenderness.

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Character (Adam) belongs to  Mentle_the_wolf
Text written by  Mentle_the_wolf

Inspired by Solemn Lament (the butterflies) from *insert ProjectMoon games* and the popular pose of Alucard from Hellsing (the anime)