Page 8 of She Who Was Severed (The Ashen Chain Trilogy #1)

The priests don’t escort me. That would suggest I need help finding the place.

Instead, one of them walks ten steps behind, just far enough to make it clear I’m being watched, not guided.

The others disappear like smoke into side alleys and temple halls.

This isn’t about enforcement. It’s about visibility.

Word spreads fast in Virelle. By the time I cross into the lower tier near Tidewatch Spire, the streets have already started to tilt around me. Voices hush. Lanterns flicker where there’s no wind. I pass a fruit stall and the vendor turns her back, slow and deliberate, pretending not to see me.

The city’s spine curves here, following the old cliffline where the spire marks the boundary between Veilmarked ground and the training fields. I know the way—every Severed does. We’re not supposed to enter, but we all learn where not to step.

The field isn’t empty.

Figures wait near the far wall—priests, observers, a scribe already seated with his inkboard balanced on one knee.

Daxira’s already pacing near the ring, her ashmaw drake crouched behind her like it never left the battlefield.

The ground smells of scorched salt and sweat-thick iron.

No illusions here. No silk. Just stone, blood, and fire.

Kellen isn’t beside me when I arrive. But I feel him watching. Somewhere behind the crowd. Somewhere quiet.

I stop at the edge of the practice circle. My boots slide once in loose sand. The wind shifts—smoke and something else. Like the moment before a bone breaks.

A priest raises his voice without ceremony. “Standard conditions. No fatalities. No permanent injury. ”

Which means they’re aiming for the kind of pain that lingers.

I glance at the ring. The watching priests. The sidelong glances. The silence pretending not to be anticipation.

It’s a trial in all but name.

A witchhunt with a finer robe. The kind where the only way to prove you aren’t cursed is to drown clean. If I lose, I’m a threat. If I win, I’m a monster. Either way, they get to say they were right.

Daxira catches my eye and grins like she’s already bored. “You made it. Good. I hate wasting heat.”

I say nothing.

The chain doesn’t move. Not yet. But it’s awake.

Daxira’s ashmaw drake crouches behind her, massive and too quiet. Its molten eyes track every breath I take, like it’s tallying how many I have left. Daxira doesn’t bother to stretch. She just cracks her neck and smiles, like the outcome isn’t even a question.

“You know,” she calls, “I’ve had worse opponents. But they were at least bonded.”

I don’t answer. She wants me to bite. To slip.

She rolls her shoulders, flame flickering in the shallow space between her open palms. The ashmaw’s spine lights, ember by ember, a silent call-and-response of fire and obedience.

The bond between them is visible now—a tether of sigils glowing along her forearm, a mirrored pulse in the beast’s throat.

I hear the chime.

She doesn’t wait.

Daxira surges forward, a wave of flame lancing from her right hand as she pivots low.

I sidestep, barely, the heat dragging a sting across my cheek.

She follows with a hard hook, but I’m already moving, ducking under, striking out at her ribs.

She may have her magic, but I’ve always been the better fighter .

Contact. She grunts. Steps back. But her smile never fades.

The drake screams.

Flame cascades in a wide arc. I dive, roll hard, gravel tearing at my back. The chain pulses once, then again. Not uncontrolled. Responsive. Like it knows what I need before I ask.

I shift stance. Inhale. Anchor at the collarbone. Exhale. The Rootform Grip slips into my fingers as naturally as breath. My stance adjusts. Low. Grounded. Going to the glade was worth it. Every failed attempt. Every page I wasn’t meant to read.

Daxira sees it. Her smile falters.

“You’ve been practicing,” she says, circling.

I don’t reply.

She lunges again. This time she brings the heat close, her palm flaring red. I lift my wrapped wrist and meet her head-on.

The chain hums.

Energy flares outward. Not visible. Not elemental. But real. Pressure explodes between us, like air collapsing in on itself. Daxira stumbles two steps back.

The drake hisses, wings flaring. Its fire doesn’t launch. It flickers. Then dies.

She charges. I brace.

Her fist connects with my shoulder. Pain lances through me. But I use the momentum to pivot, catching her off-guard with an elbow to the jaw.

She reels. Her beast screeches.

And then she’s on me.

We hit the ground together. I’m under her, weight crushing my ribs. She lifts her hand, flame coalescing in her palm.

The chain tightens.

There’s a sound I can’t explain. Like iron pulled across stone.

The fire vanishes .

Her beast cries out. The sigils between them dim, like ash smothered by water. Her hand trembles.

She backs off, breathing hard. Confused.

The priests stand now.

“Enough,” one says.

Daxira glares at me. I push to my feet, slow and careful, my body screaming with bruises. The chain eases back to a dull hum.

Her voice is quieter now. Bitter. “What are you?”

I don’t answer.

Because I don’t know.

Not yet.

As I walk from the ring, heads turn. Not with respect. Not yet. But they’re watching. Trying to figure out what they just saw.

Kellen stands by the far gate.

He doesn’t speak.

But his eyes don’t leave me.

And for once, I don’t look away.

The priests converge again, and this time I know—they mean to take me.

Hands twitch toward cuffs. One lifts a coil of threadburn rope.

I brace.

But Kellen steps in, voice sharper than fire:

“You lay a hand on her and I will ensure that Ravelle starts asking why Virelle skipped due process for a Severed girl they already failed.”

They hesitate. Not because he’s wrong. Because he’s right. Because someone’s watching. Because they always are.

The lead priest lowers his hand. “Then she’ll appear before the Council. One week. At dusk.”

A pause.

“We’ll see if she walks away then.”

I don’t thank Kellen.

But I don’t look away, either.

The crowd begins to scatter.

And for the first time since the chain took hold, I don’t feel spared.

I feel postponed.

- x -

They didn’t kill me. Not yet. But they left their mark in fire and silence—and I’m supposed to be grateful for that.

I sit in the old healing chamber beneath the east transept, tucked between the empty apothecary shelves and the prayer-bed no one uses anymore.

A cracked basin sits in the corner, its glaze flaking like old paint.

The room smells like bitterroot and faded antiseptic, but at least it’s quiet.

No priest-healers came. They don’t treat the Severed. Wouldn’t want to catch whatever I am.

So I bandage my own ribs.

The bruises are blooming deep violet, tracing where Daxira’s flame hit hardest. My knuckles are split.

My palm still glows faintly where the chain hummed too loud, too long.

I soak a strip of linen in water that smells faintly of iron and dab around the edge of a burn.

I don’t flinch. It’s not the pain that bothers me.

It’s how easily I let them see I could still bleed.

They didn’t break me.

But they’ve scheduled it.

The chain lies dormant now, curled like a silver-black vine beneath the wrap at my wrist. I haven’t unwrapped it yet. Not since the fight. Not since it flared against Daxira like it knew what she was before I did. It didn’t protect me. It warned her.

The door doesn’t creak when it opens. It exhales. I know the shape in the doorway before he speaks.

Kellen steps inside, eyes darker than I’ve seen them. No ceremonial wrap this time. No Ravellan silks. Just a black shirt, unbuttoned at the collar, his hair loose and damp like he just washed off the fire. He looks at me like he doesn’t know where to begin.

He starts with silence.

Then: “You could’ve died.”

“So could she.”

He closes the door behind him. Doesn’t move closer. Not yet.

“They’re escalating this, Freya. There’s talk of summoning observers. From Solenn. Maybe even Raleth-Kai and Branneth Hold.”

I laugh, bitter and hoarse. “Why not invite the whole continent? Maybe they’ll sell tickets.”

“It’s not a joke.”

“No,” I say. “It’s a message. Let them watch. I’ll give them something to remember.”

He crosses the room then. Not fast. Just enough. His hand hovers near my bandaged side. “You’re bleeding.”

“You should see the other girl.”

He doesn’t smile.

His fingers brush the wrap at my wrist.

The chain surges.

A pulse bursts through my veins—sharp, electric, furious. The glow beneath the wrap flashes. Symbols I haven’t seen before spark and vanish like struck flint. I gasp. He jerks his hand back.

We both stare.

“It knows me now,” I whisper .

Kellen shakes his head. “Not just knows you. It’s chosen you.”

The silence stretches.

“Why did you help me?” I ask.

Kellen’s brow creases. “Because you needed it.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“And you think yours are?” he snaps, too fast.

My voice goes colder. “You still think I’m yours to protect.”

“No,” he says. “I think you still don’t know what it means to fight with someone instead of always fighting alone.”

I stand, too quickly. The pain flares in my side. I bite it down.

“You think I haven’t been fighting? You think what I did out there wasn’t a fight?”

He watches me carefully, like he’s measuring the weight behind my words.

“I know,” he says. “But every time I reach, you pull away. You don’t have to be alone in this, Freya.”

I step forward. He doesn’t move. “You helped. I know that. But help doesn’t make this easier, Kellen. It doesn’t make it less mine to carry.”

Kellen breathes out hard through his nose. Looks away.

“They gave you a week.”

“Yeah.” I exhale. “Tick tock.”

He doesn’t smile.

“To be judged,” he says quietly.

I already knew that. But hearing it from him makes it worse. Makes it real.

“And there was me thinking the fight was judgment enough.”

“That was the test.”

“So what’s this?”

“The public execution,” he says. “Just drawn out. ”

I sit again. Slower this time. My limbs feel stretched, wired with too much heat.

“They want to make a show of my fall,” I say.

Kellen nods once.

“And if I don’t fall?”

He hesitates. “You will.”

We don’t look at each other after that. The silence between us is sharp-edged. Not empty. Just overfull.

He leaves without touching me again. No apology. No comfort. Just the click of the door.

When he’s gone, I unwrap the chain.

It’s warm.

Alive.

Symbols shimmer along the metal like breath on glass. One mark I haven’t seen before glows faint gold—not red like pain, not silver like presence. Gold. Like a countdown. Like a warning.

The whisper doesn’t come in words.

Just a pressure in the back of my skull.

Link Two. Nearing.

I close my eyes.

Then I open them.

“Then I need to be ready.”