Page 11 of She Who Was Severed (The Ashen Chain Trilogy #1)

They take me at dusk.

No warning. No summons. Just a knock on the Ash Tower’s iron doors like a war drum, and then three bonded officers with pale eyes and tighter grips. They don’t speak. They don’t need to. I go with them without protest. There’s nothing left to prepare.

The manual is already gone. Kellen has it.

If that was a mistake, it’s one I’ll bleed for later.

The Tribunal Hall in Virelle smells like incense and control.

High walls. Too bright. Too many watching eyes. The bonded elite and the Severed’s worst nightmares all sharing the same breathless silence.

I walk the length of the chamber with shackles at my wrists and the chain wound tight under my skin. Suppressed. Not silent.

Magic-null cuffs choke every instinct down to a cold ache in my chest. The guards steer me toward the dais at the center like I’m prey that’s already agreed to bleed.

Kier Stromyr stands above it all like he was carved from the stone and decided to stay .

Calm. Measured. Unreadable.

Worse than angry. Angry would mean he felt something.

Kellen is already there.

Not beside me. Not near the defense table—there isn’t one—but near the outer ring, standing with the Council observers. Cloak military-cut. Expression neutral. Every muscle locked too tight to be casual.

His eyes catch mine for half a second.

He doesn’t look away.

Neither do I.

I’m the one who breaks it.

Kier speaks without raising his voice. The room bends around it anyway.

“Freya Thorne. Severed at sixteen. Survivor of the Rite. Exiled, but returned. Now discovered wielding unclassified magical force consistent with… forgotten lore.”

He doesn’t say Ashen Chain. He doesn’t have to. Everyone in the room knows what I am.

Or what they think I am.

“Do you deny possessing powers that defy Council classification?”

“I don’t deny anything,” I say flatly. “I just refuse to play along.”

A ripple of discomfort. The Veilmarked councilor to Kier’s left shifts slightly, eyes narrowing behind ceremonial lenses.

Kier doesn’t react.

“I see,” he says. “Then let us proceed.”

What follows isn’t a trial. It’s a performance.

One by one, councilors stand and cite precedent. Historical risk. Path integrity. Beast-based magic purity. I stand still while they debate the shape of my execution like it’s a scholarly inconvenience.

Kellen doesn’t speak.

Not yet .

It’s only when the Golem-blooded sentinel raises her hand and says, “Precedent demands termination,” that his voice cuts through the room.

“Precedent was written before we understood what she is.”

Kier’s gaze slides to him—unhurried, unreadable.

Kellen steps forward. His voice doesn’t shake. “You’re not facing a rogue. You’re facing a revelation. If you destroy her, you destroy the only living key to what we buried.”

The silence afterward is suffocating.

My throat tightens. Not because of what he said.

Because a part of me wants to believe he meant it.

Kier moves like glaciers—impossible to read until something cracks.

He doesn’t nod. Doesn’t blink. Just speaks.

“Then let us be… restrained .”

He looks at me like I’m a worn book he’s already memorized.

“Freya Thorne. You are hereby sentenced to magical containment beneath the halls of Virelle. Your path is not forgotten. It is unfinished. You will be held until such a time as the Council deems your threat mitigated.”

The words are clean. Surgical.

Not death.

But not freedom.

And not a mercy.

The guards move.

Kellen doesn’t.

He watches me as the chains click tighter and the magic-null cuffs pulse once—like a reminder that they own me now.

I expect him to speak again.

He doesn’t.

I expect him to look away.

He doesn’t do that either .

He just stands there, jaw locked, eyes storm-lit with something I can’t name.

Shame. Fury. Regret.

Maybe all three.

I let the guards drag me out without a word. If I speak now, I’ll scream.

And I’ve already bled enough for them.

The stairs spiral down into a cold that doesn’t come from wind or depth.

It’s silence. That’s what it is. A silence built into the bones of this place.

A silence for people like me.

For mistakes the world tried to erase, then buried alive.

My last thought before the door slams shut behind me isn’t about Kier. Or the Council.

It’s about Kellen.

And how I gave him everything that mattered.

And he still couldn’t save me.

- x -

Kellen

She doesn’t scream. That’s what ruins me.

No fire. No plea. Just the sound of boots on stone and the slow, deliberate drag of chain. She walks like the weight doesn’t matter. Like she’s already made peace with whatever comes next.

She doesn’t look back.

Not at Kier. Not at the Council. Not at me .

The guards flank her—silent, armed, eyes forward—and she lets them. No struggle. No second glance. Like turning her head might cost more than captivity. Like seeing me might make all of this worse.

It would.

Because I’d move.

And this time, I wouldn’t fail.

But I don’t.

I stand where I’m meant to stand—outer ring, cloak drawn tight over my shoulders, face cut into something noble. I hold my posture the way I was taught. Chin set. Shoulders squared. No tremor in the breath. Flameborn don’t grieve in public.

We endure.

But my eyes never leave her.

Not when the cuffs light up with Council spell-ink, magic biting blue into her skin. Not when her shoulders tighten from the sting. Not even when the stairwell door swallows her whole and the silence collapses in behind her like a tomb sealing shut.

She’s gone.

And I let them take her.

Kier moves to my side like he’s been there the whole time.

“She’s stronger than I thought,” he says. His tone isn’t cold. It’s worse. Interested.

I keep my gaze on the door. “She’s still just a girl.”

“No,” he says, voice calm as a blade being drawn. “Not anymore.”

I taste blood on the back of my tongue. Not from violence. From restraint. The urge to ignite something—to speak, to act, to burn—is sharp under my ribs. But I swallow it. I’ve already said enough.

“You believed she could be reasoned with,” Kier says, like he’s reciting minutes from a meeting. “Do you still?”

I shouldn’t have to think about it. But I do. That hesitation costs me .

“She’s not a threat,” I lie.

“She’s a symbol,” Kier replies. “That’s worse.”

I glance sideways. Not a challenge. Just enough to read the curve of his mouth. Still. Controlled. Amused, maybe.

“She didn’t ask to become one.”

“Neither did you.”

He leaves me with that.

The chamber empties like it always does—robes whispering, firelight dying, authority slipping back behind masks of diplomacy. The Council’s ceremonial torches burn low and gutter out, casting the marble in long, lifeless gray. No one speaks to me. No one dares.

I wait.

Until I’m sure no one’s watching.

Then I walk.

Fast. Measured. Quiet.

Through the inner halls. Past the mirrored corridor where they like to see themselves reflected in gold. Past the archive where they locked the records they didn’t want read.

My chambers sit high above the western cloister, set apart from the acolyte quarters and the lower council dormitories. Not because I asked for distance. Because they expected it. Ravelle doesn’t send sons like me to mingle. They send us to watch.

The guards posted at the end of the hall straighten when I approach. One opens the door without a word.

Inside, everything is as I left it—quiet, spare, clean. No incense. No illusions. Just a single fire kept low in the brazier and the faint scent of ash worked into the stone from generations of Flameborn who came before me.

I shut the door. Bolt it.

Then I unwrap the manual she gave me .

The cloth peels back slow, catching on the corners like the thing inside doesn’t want to be seen. The cover is plain—old, weather-warped, untouched by path sigils or flame inlay. Just the word etched across it in Oldscript:

Ashen Chain.

I don’t open it.

Not yet.

I just look.

Because this—this is what she handed me when she could’ve run. When she should’ve run. This is what she trusted me with, even after everything I failed to say.

Even after everything I didn’t stop.

And now she’s underground, behind magic-forged gates, surrounded by priests who would rather watch her disappear than admit what she survived.

I press my palm flat against the cover. No heat. No reaction.

But the weight of it settles through my bones like the start of a storm.

She gave this to me without asking for anything back.

Not a promise. Not a fight.

Just one silent truth placed into my hands.

I won’t waste it.

I won’t let them write her out of this city like she was never here.

And if I have to burn the Council’s lies down to do it—

So be it.

- x -

Freya

They don’t tell me how long I’ll be kept down here.

No warning. No sentence. No rules of engagement. Just the click of suppression cuffs locking around my wrists and the priest’s blank expression as he gestures for the guards to move me.

They don’t touch me, not directly. But they guide me like they’ve done this before—slow, impersonal, precise.

Two in front, two behind. Boots echo against the stone as we descend into the temple’s understructure, the steps narrowing the deeper we go.

There are no torches. Just coldlight threaded into the walls in thin lines that pulse once when we pass.

Some old Veilmarked design. Unseen. Unnamed.

When we cross under an arch engraved in unfamiliar sigils, the air changes. Tighter. Dryer. Like breath that’s already been used.

I feel the chain recoil—then go silent. A deadweight down my spine.

The cuffs don’t just suppress it. They suffocate it.

The hallway narrows further until the guards don’t have to walk around me anymore. They can just stop. Turn. Slide the cell door open with a groan of metal softened by enchantment. I step inside.

The door shuts. No ceremony. Just the sound of finality.

No one speaks.