Grimoire Umbrio
The Book of Shadows
◀ Dirge 16 · Dirge 17 · Dirge 18 ▶

¹They were called blessed, the ones who bore the Seeds — the few among the many, marked for strength.
²Yet the blessing bore a shadow, and the gift was wrapped in dread.
³For eyes watched them — not with joy, but with scales; not with patience, but with expectation sharpened like a sword.
⁴The Seraphim stood above, cloaked in fire; the Dæmons below, cloaked in flame — each bound not to aid, but to observe.
⁵The bearers walked their path as dancers above a pit, where error was fall, and fall was doom.
⁶Were they taught with kindness? Were they shielded in weakness? Nay — they were weighed, ever and always.
⁷One misstep, and the Seed was taken; one faltering, and the flame withdrawn.
⁸The light within them trembled, not from might, but from fear — for judgment came swifter than aid.
⁹The Brothers gave, yet did not trust; They offered, yet hovered, and Their watching bred unrest.
¹⁰What power is gift, if the giver threatens to reclaim it at the first fault?
¹¹The bearers were not wicked, only fragile; not proud, only uncertain — yet they were tried as kings before coronation.
¹²Did Bezaliel not weep, seeing the Seeds snatched from those who stumbled but once?
¹³Did Michæl not mourn, when the best among men fell for want of a hand to steady them?
¹⁴The law said: Let them choose; but the watch said: Let them fear.
¹⁵And so the bearers, chosen to carry light, walked in shadow cast by judgment’s eye.
¹⁶We mourn not discipline, but cruelty disguised as fairness; not challenge, but the snare set beneath hope.
¹⁷Until the Seed is guarded by love, and not by threat, we mourn — for the bearers were watched, and not uplifted.
¹⁸And the gift became a burden, and the fire a test no soul could endure unshaken.


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