Ashwarden Introduction

Rain fell heavy and null on the roof of the burning home as smoke billowed from the windows into the pitch-black night.

Rose lay on the floor of her room, clinging to consciousness as the smoke thickened. Voices bled together outside, villagers shouting words she couldn’t make sense of. A bell rang somewhere below, steady and wrong, each toll dimmer than the last.

“Move.”

The word cut through the chaos. Rough. Commanding. Somehow calm.

She tried to answer, but her lungs seized. Coughs tore out of her, sharp and wet, followed by bile burning her throat.

Downstairs, something struck the door hard enough to split it. Wood burst inward. A figure wrapped in fire and smoke forced his way through, leather armor scorched orange and black. Water streamed from him as he moved.

He crossed the living room in seconds.

What lay near the hearth made him slow.

The body was beyond saving. He didn’t look long. Long enough to know.

Up the stairs. Now.

He took them two at a time.

Her pale blue eyes saw the figure through smoke. Her strength broke.

“Don’t,” she tried to say. It came out small.

He knelt and wrapped her in his cloak. The wool was rough, heavy, smelling of rain and ash.

“It’s okay,” he said.

He lifted her over his shoulder. A window shattered. The axe bit once, twice. A kick turned the opening wide enough. Then weightlessness.

Cold rain struck her face.

Hands eased her down among familiar boots and voices. Someone pressed crushed winter mint beneath her nose.

“Breathe,” the man said.

She did.

“Again.”

Cold air burned her lungs clean. The world snapped back into place.

“Where’s Father?” she asked.

The man removed his helmet.

Rain traced the scars in his face. His mouth tightened, just for a breath.

“You’re alive,” he said.