The basin is cold. The water is a spring that does not care if it is holy; people brought the holiness with their feet.

You drink. Hop, if he made it, gets a badge too big for his chest. Aelric checks the list as if the list might smile. Jennet sits. No bone jumps. No comb sings. A shrine is a well plus walking plus witness.

You can stay in that proof.

You can turn back to Osric, whose fever is a crossing, whose pole is a relic that actually works.

A pewter badge is a cheap circle with a well and a stick. It means feet. Relics in the story may be a comb or a bone; the water is the part you can test. You drink. It tastes like stone and cold. Witness is the rest of the holiness.