The winds of Ravenhold howled like starving wolves.
Ash swirled over the broken parapets, caught in eddies of grief and fury. The castle—once a bastion of immortal arrogance and crimson banners—now stood cracked and blackened, its battlements glowing faintly from the fires that refused to die. Morning had no color here. Only smoke. Only shadow.
Mira stood at the edge of the citadel wall, fingers clutched around the hilt of her sword as if it alone tethered her to the world. Her armor was dented, bloodstained—most of it not hers. Her hair clung to her brow in wet strands, soaked in sweat and grief. Beneath her, the courtyard crawled with wounded men and women, the air ripe with the scent of healing salves and burnt flesh.
But her eyes were fixed not on the wounded, nor on the horizon where dawn refused to rise.
Her eyes were on Seraphina.
The Queen of Ashes walked across the battlefield, barehanded, her cloak torn and trailing behind her like the last scream of a dying star. Her hands were scorched at the fingertips. Blood—bright as rubies, thick as vengeance—dripped from her knuckles. She moved like a revenant. Like a creature born not of flesh but fury.
And behind her, a trail of bodies.
A dozen knights had tried to seize the gates during the night.
They were all dead.
Not from swords. From her.
Mira descended the stone steps two at a time, boots echoing against ancient rock until she reached the bottom, where Seraphina stood breathing hard, her chest heaving.
"They were our allies," Mira said.
Seraphina didn't look at her. Her voice came low and ragged: "They tried to bind me. They chanted the Old Tongue and raised the Circle."
Mira's jaw clenched. "That doesn't mean they deserved to die."
"They meant to silence me. Cage me. They brought binding runes, Mira. Chains."
"Then you should have shown mercy."
Seraphina turned. Her eyes were wild and golden-bright, rimmed in smoke and something unholy. "Mercy is what burned my mother alive."
Silence cracked between them. The kind that was heavier than war drums.
Mira took a step back. Not in fear. In mourning.
"You are changing," she said. "And I don't know if it's for better or worse."
Seraphina looked to the sky. "The gods made me a weapon. They don't get to mourn how I cut."
---
**Valen – The Forbidden Vale**
Valen collapsed beside a blackened spring, the water glowing faintly with buried starlight. His skin was torn, his arm split from shoulder to elbow where the entity had struck. It had no face. Only flame. It spoke in voices not meant for mortal ears.
He had bled on the altar. The deal was sealed. Not with words, but with silence. Eternal, binding silence.
He had given it his name. The last piece of his bloodline.
And in return, the being had given him fire.
Not the fire of kings. The fire of annihilation.
He lay on the stone now, watching the sky break into constellations that blinked like watching eyes. His bones hummed. His blood hissed.
And still, he whispered her name.
"Seraphina."
It burned to say it.
It burned more not to.
---
**Back in Ravenhold**
That night, Seraphina entered the old sanctum.
It was untouched by war. The stained glass windows still depicted the old gods, weeping over broken oaths and fallen heroes. Dust coated the floor in a thick velvet layer. The air smelled of forgotten prayers.
She approached the dais at the center. Her mother's crown rested there—iron and obsidian, forged from the bones of the first rebellion. No one had worn it since the fall.
Until now.
She took it in both hands, raised it over her head.
And placed it upon her brow.
The silence screamed.
Outside, the fires of Ravenhold roared to life again.
---