Page 46 of She Who Was Severed (The Ashen Chain Trilogy #1)

Freya

The room was never meant for this.

Not for war, not for unity. Certainly not for me.

The chamber sits buried beneath the western cliffs of Ashmere, carved into old stone and memory.

Once a council chamber, maybe. Now it’s a war room.

Cracked benches rise in tiers along the walls, scorched from old fires.

Rusted sconces gutter against the damp, and a slab of collapsed reliquary stone has been dragged into the center to serve as a war table.

It still bears a half-engraved name—something sanctified long ago, now blackened and meaningless.

They’re already here when I arrive.

The Ash-Banners gang to the left. Scarred, broad-shouldered, thick-knuckled. They sit like they never stopped guarding something, even if they can’t agree on what. Their eyes flick over me without judgment, without welcome. Just readiness .

The Bone Line gang opposite—their coats are bloodstained and patched with too many repairs. The way they lean back in their seats tells me they want us to think they’re calm. But their hands rest on blade hilts or hidden pockets. Soldiers turned mercenaries. Mercenaries turned survivors.

And at the back, barely illuminated by the low, pulsing glow of the sconces: the Siltborn.

They don’t speak. They don’t move. They’re watching. Like they’ve always been watching.

I don’t say anything when I enter.

Vale walks beside me, silent, loose-limbed, but I can feel the tension in her gait — not fear. Violence on a leash. Her gaze skips across the benches like she’s checking for ghosts. Or debts.

No one stands. No one welcomes.

That’s fine.

“I won’t waste your time,” I say, stepping toward the slab in the center. “We don’t have long.”

No one challenges. That, at least, is different.

I unroll a scroll across the surface of the stone — hand-drawn maps of Ashmere and the surrounding areas, chokepoints, breach lines. They’re smudged from heat, stained with blood in the top corner. No one reaches in. But they do look.

“We’ve had reports that Virelle’s forces are three days out. Two if they push,” I say. “We’re not going to match them blade for blade.”

A grunt from the Ash-Banners. Not disagreement—recognition.

Vale steps to the side, arms folded, hovering near the Bone Line with deliberate carelessness. One of them—tall, narrow-faced, jaw stitched from a healing break—mutters something I don’t catch. Vale does. She tilts her head, just enough.

“Say it louder, Vark,” she says. “So everyone can hear how you begged me for rations last winter.”

It shuts him up.

I press my fingers against the map.

“We’re holding three outer chokepoints. Here, here, and here.” I mark them with broken shards of polished bone. “They’ll come hard on the western front first. The Ash-Banners will lead resistance at that gate.”

The Banner captain—broad, jaw square, head shaved—grunts. “We’ve held worse.”

One of the Bone Line snorts. “Not beside us, you haven’t.”

A chair screeches. The Banner closest to him rises halfway to his feet.

Vale doesn’t blink. She steps between them, palm flat on the table, eyes bright and empty.

“Do it,” she says softly. “I’d love to explain to Kier that you gutted each other before the siege started.”

The silence drags for just a breath too long.

Then the Ash-Banner captain nods, sharp, to his man—a silent sit down. The Bone Line fighter shifts back, arms crossed, scowling into the flame.

I don’t thank them.

“There are three fallback points built into the old smugglers tunnels,” I continue. “One beneath the old forge district, one behind the aquifer vaults, and one leading into the abandoned priest tunnels. Bone Line scouts will rotate through all three.”

That gets their attention. A younger one—no older than me—raises a brow.

“You want us to cover retreat?”

“I want you to watch the exits,” I reply. “No one gets cut off. If someone does—we lose them. And if we lose enough, we lose the city.”

Another silence. Not hostile. Just… weighing.

The youngest Bone Line nods once. “ Fine.”

I move on. “The cliffwatch will rotate every six hours. No crews are doubled up. No mixed patrols.”

Someone chuckles—I think it’s the Siltborn, but I can’t be sure.

“We’re not asking you to be friends,” Vale says. “Just not idiots.”

Now, finally, one of the Siltborn speaks.

A woman, old but ageless. Her voice is thin, soft as worn silk. “We’ll hold the east wall. That’s where it breaks.”

It’s not a question.

The others don’t argue.

I lean my hands on the table, Chain humming faintly beneath my shoulder blades.

“You don’t have to like each other,” I say. “But if we fall before they even reach the gates, then the ones who come after us won’t remember who you hated. Just who failed.”

The Chain tightens—not flaring, not commanding. Just present.

Like it agrees.

The Ash-Banner captain nods. “We’ll man the lower tunnels. No contact with Bone Line. They can have the upper exits.”

“Done,” I say.

Bone Line shrugs. “As long as we’re not cleaning up their corpses.”

“Wouldn’t leave you the honor,” the captain snaps back.

Vale grins. “Flirting? Or blood feud?”

The Bone Line woman scowls. The Banner man rolls his eyes.

The tension thins, just barely.

The room doesn’t feel united.

But it feels aligned.

I roll the map back. The Chain slips back beneath my cloak like a thing that’s heard enough.

One by one, they begin to file out—not quickly, not loudly. Some nod. Some don’t look at me at all. But no one speaks against what’s been said .

The Siltborn woman is last to move. She lingers near the door, voice trailing like a shadow.

“You’re not what they expected,” she murmurs. “That might be the only reason this works.”

Then she’s gone.

I stand alone by the table.

Vale walks up behind me, leans a hip against the stone.

“You did it,” she says. “Kind of.”

“It’ll fall apart,” I say. “The second someone bleeds, it’ll splinter again.”

The Chain thrums. Not loud. Just there.

Waiting.

I close my eyes. Just for a moment.

Then I breathe out—once, slow—and step toward the war ahead.

- x -

Owen

Some ruins scream.

This one purrs.

I don’t mean that as metaphor. I mean actual vibrations—bone-low, tooth-deep, the kind of sound that changes how your breath fits in your ribs. It’s been humming since the moment I carved the first anchor six weeks ago. And now it wants to know if I’m serious.

I step into the ruin like I own it.

Because I do .

No one’s claimed it in years. Long enough that the stone gave up waiting. And I’m not one to turn down free real estate, even if it hums like it’s haunted.

The dais is gone. Weather, collapse, maybe judgment with nowhere left to go. But the foundation’s still here. Cracked, sunken, and stubborn. That’s the thing about old sanctums—you can clean up blood, but not memory. Not the kind etched into stone.

I kneel, robes flaring just so. Dust blooms. Dramatic, but tasteful. It’s important to maintain standards, even while committing theological heresy.

“Oh, darling,” I whisper to the foundation stone, “still humming after all these years? I’m flattered.”

My blade’s not sharp. Not for stabbing. It’s tuned for carving—edges dulled to avoid slipping too deep. The grooves come easy now. My hands know the motion. Doesn’t matter if the glyphs light up. They just need to hold.

Five anchors are already set—tucked under rubble, slipped beneath broken prayerstones, one wedged under a rusted priests relic I’ve been using as a urinal for the last week.

Each one’s drawn to hold the Chain’s pressure, not release it.

Like sockets waiting for something to plug in.

But this one here—this is different. This is the throat.

Not a spark point. A channel.

The Chain isn’t like other paths. It doesn’t flare like Flameborn, doesn’t crack the ground open like Stoneborn. It doesn’t announce itself. It instructs. It moves through systems—through history—like it’s making corrections.

And this anchor sigil?

It doesn’t explode. It directs. Quiet and focused, like a blade sliding between ribs .

If the Chain ever wants to speak judgment loud enough to change the world—this is where it’ll start.

I finish the outer ring. Brush moss from my palms like I just rearranged the furniture of fate and called it interior design. The ruin hums louder. Not eager. Not warning. Just… aware.

“Yes, yes,” I murmur, “very impressive. Very sacred. Very ‘ we judged sinners here and now our ghosts file paperwork .’” I drag a clean spiral through the core glyph.

The stone answers with a subtle pulse—like something ancient rolled over and decided to keep one eye open.

I smile. The kind that doesn’t show teeth. Just intent.

Then I draw the match from my sleeve.

I don’t light it. Of course not. That would be premature. And vulgar.

Instead, I press it into the center groove. Tip outward. Alignment perfect. Angle precise.

A match is not a weapon. It’s a reminder.

This one says: I’m ready.

Not for war.

For choice.

Which, let’s be honest, means her.

Freya will find this place. Might stumble across it chasing Kier or chasing herself. Doesn’t matter. The moment her fingers brush this stone, the pressure will crack wide. Not with fire. With memory. With consequence.

They’ll call it prophecy.

They always do. Easier than admitting I left the door unlocked and dared history to walk through it.

I glance up. Ceiling fractured to sky. Light slants through broken stone like someone forgot to turn off the gods.

“If this works,” I say to the ruin, to the Chain, to no one and everyone, “they’ll blame fate. ”

I shrug. Brush my sleeves like I’m leaving a disappointing supper.

“If it doesn’t… well. I’ve always looked good in ruins.”

The wind moves. Not fast. Just intentional.

I stand. Stretch. Roll my wrists like a man who definitely didn’t just lace a sacred ruin with path-reactive chain logic designed to override magical barriers and maybe, possibly, rewrite judgment protocol with a single breath from the right girl.

The match stays.