Chapter 83 – Embers of Rina
The house in Rina was small, stone-boned and sun-faded, but it felt solid under Blake's hand when he pushed the door open.
It smelled like stew and toasted bread. Like spices and heat.
He stepped inside, shrugging off his light armor. Dust shook loose, glinting in the late-afternoon light pouring through the narrow windows. His twin swords thunked softly as he leaned them by the door.
Laughter drifted from the main room.
"—if he's late again, we're eating without him." Jake said
Blake grinned. "You wound me."
Ashley turned from the table, and for a second his world narrowed to just her.
She'd tied her hair back in a loose knot, damp strands clinging to her neck, skin warm from the kitchen. Light from the window framed her face and caught in her eyes—soft brown, a shade he'd known longer than he'd known his own reflection. There was flour on her cheekbone. Somehow, that made her look even more devastating.
"About time," she said, but her mouth curved.
Ashley brushed past Blake to set another bowl on the table. Her shoulder brushed his chest as she moved. It was a small touch, casual, but his heart still managed to stutter like he was a teenager again, hiding in a Rina alley with stolen bread.
They sat—three at a scarred wooden table that still felt like a luxury. Years ago they'd eaten on crates. Or floors. Or rooftops.
Now there was a roof over them.
"Orders?" Ashley asked once they'd taken a few bites. No flinching. No stalling. That was one of the things he loved about her—she walked into storms.
Blake unfolded the parchment. The wax seal bearing Rina's crest was already broken.
"We're heading to Harven Reach," he said. "Three days northeast. The town's gone silent. No scouts. No signals. Cory wants answers."
Jake's brow creased. "He's sending all of us?"
"Full platoon," Blake said. We observe first and report if there's dark masters or hostile activity."
Ashley set her spoon down, fingers lacing together. "You think it's the dark masters?"
"I don't know." Blake stared briefly at the parchment. "But if it wasn't serious, he'd have sent a smaller team."
Jake snickered. Ashley didn't.
She looked at Blake instead, searching his face. "Will it be bad?"
"It's us," he said. "It's always bad."
She exhaled through her nose, but one corner of her mouth twitched. Under the table, he found her hand. Her fingers slid easily between his, as natural as breathing.
"Then we do what we always do," she said.
Jake lifted his cup. "To poor life choices."
Blake snorted. "To poor life choices."
They clinked mismatched cups and ate. The stew was simple—root vegetables, tough meat that Ashley had bullied into tenderness—but it tasted like memory and warmth. Blake watched the two of them between spoonfuls: Jake laughing with his whole body, Ashley rolling her eyes but smiling. The lamplight painted gold along the line of her jaw when she turned.
He'd loved her long before he had words for it.
Back when they were kids barefoot in Rina's gutter-alleys, stealing oranges and sharing bruises. Back when Jake would drag him away when he got too close, muttering something about "not touching my sister unless you plan to marry her, idiot."
Now he did plan to marry her. They hadn't spoken the word out loud, but it hung in the space between them all the same.
After dinner, Ashley rose first, gathering bowls.
"I'm washing up I'll see you in a little bit ," she said.
Blake caught her waist as she passed and kissed her lightly. It was soft and familiar, but somehow still made his chest ache every time.
"Sounds good to me," he murmured.
She rolled her eyes in fond exasperation and disappeared toward the washroom, the sound of running water starting up a moment later.
Silence settled after she left. The warm kind. Shared and easy.
Jake leaned back, chair creaking, and studied Blake.
"You know," he said, "this is exactly how I pictured it."
Blake raised an eyebrow. "You pictured me covered in stew?"
Jake snorted. "I pictured you with her. House with all of us together.
Blake's mouth tugged. "You tried to throw me off a bridge when I told you I liked her."
"I was thirteen and dramatic," Jake said. "Also correct. You weren't ready."
"You weren't exactly a model of stability either."
"Still aren't," Jake said cheerfully. "But you… you did it. You dragged us out of the gutters. Got us into the regiment. Now you're leading an elite unit while I get to be the handsome backup."
Blake huffed a quiet laugh. The warmth in his chest didn't come from the stew.
"We did it," he corrected. "You, me, Ash. We will Always be together."
Jake's eyes softened, the kind of softness he let almost no one see.
"Brothers," he said quietly.
Blake reached out and clasped his forearm. Jake gripped back, firm and sure.
"Brothers," Blake agreed.
They both laughed, even as something cold moved under the moment like a shadow. War had taught them that warmth like this never lasted long.
Ashley returned eventually, hair damp, wearing a loose shirt that absolutely did not belong to her but looked better on her anyway. She kissed Jake on the top of his head, swatted his shoulder when he complained, then leaned down and kissed Blake properly—slow, lingering.
"Let's Get some sleep, lieutenant," she murmured against his lips.
He watched her cross the room, watched the lamplight follow her like it had a crush.
"I'm yours now," he said softly.
She heard anyway. Her shoulders relaxed just a fraction as she closed the bedroom door.
Jake cleared his throat. "If you start reciting poetry, I'm moving out."
"Go snore on your own bed," Blake muttered.
Jake laughed all the way down the hall.
Blake sat alone for a while after that, staring at the cooling stew pot, the maps on the wall, the two cups still sitting side by side.
He didn't know it was a memory.
To him, it was just life.
Morning broke crimson over Rina.
The fortress gates loomed black against the sky, and nine figures stood ready beneath them—armor tight, weapons oiled, expressions hard.
Blake walked the line once, checking straps and blades, calling each of them by name. When he reached the end, he turned and took his place at the front.
"All right," he said. "Try to keep up."
Groans answered him. He grinned.
"Hi-ho, here we go!" he shouted.
Eight voices picked it up, half mocking, half eager:
"Hi-ho, here we go!
Off to a mission, to and fro!"
Feet pounded the packed earth. Dust kicked up behind them, their chant echoing between stone and sky as they left the outer wall.
Ashley jogged at his right, Jake at his left. The rest of the squad fell in behind, two by two, the rhythm of their steps settling into something almost like a heartbeat.
They moved from stone roads to packed dirt, then to wild paths fringed with scrub and pale trees. Rina's sprawling capital shrank behind them, replaced by open plains and distant hills.
By the second day, trees grew closer together, tall and skeletal, their white trunks twisting up like old bone. The air cooled. The wind faded.
By the third, even the birds had gone quiet.
"Harven Reach should be close," Jake said, wiping sweat from his brow.
"Keep sharp," Blake replied. "Places that go quiet for no reason are never just 'lonely.'"
He didn't know why, but something gnawed at the back of his mind—a sense of wrongness just out of reach. He chalked it up to nerves. To responsibility.
To loving more people than he could afford to lose.
They found the village at dusk.
It lay in a shallow dip between low hills, wooden palisade half-rotten around the edges. The gates stood open. No guards. No lights.
The first thing that hit them was the silence.
Not the peaceful kind that settled in tired towns at night—but the hollow kind, the too-clean kind, where sound felt like it had been scraped away.
Blake lifted a hand. The squad stopped.
"Spread," he said. "Pairs. Check everything. If you see anything moving that's not us, shout."
They drifted through the gate, boots scuffing against dirt and old stone.
Houses circled a central square. The windows gaped open, empty. Doors hung from broken hinges or stood wide as if expecting someone to walk through.
No one did.
Ashley crouched near a wall, fingers tracing an etched mark half-hidden under soot.
"Sigils," she murmured.
Blake joined her.
The carving was sharp despite the wear—layered lines of power, circles within circles. Not Rina military script. Not anything he recognized from standard defensive wards.
"What kind?" he asked.
"Binding. Suppression." She hesitated. "Something else layered over it that I don't like."
He straightened and swept his gaze over the square. More sigils, carved into doorframes, into wells, even into the stones of the central fountain.
"Any idea what happened to the people?" Jake asked quietly.
"No bodies," Ashley said. "No blood."
"No signs of struggle," one of the squad added from the other side of the square.
"Too clean," Blake muttered.
They searched until the last of the daylight bled out of the sky. Every house was the same: dishes left on tables, clothes folded in chests, beds made. Lives paused mid-breath.
No people to fill them.
By the time the stars began to show, they were all back in the square.
"We camp here," Blake said. "Two on watch. We'll sweep the perimeter again at dawn and start looking for tracks beyond the village."
No one argued. They moved like they always did—with practiced efficiency, building structure inside chaos. Tents went up between houses. A fire pit was dug near the dried-out fountain.
Blake left them to it and slipped back out through the gate.
He needed something to hit.
Rina's forest wasn't dense, but there were enough trees to cast long shadows in starlight. He moved quiet, senses open. The further he got from the village, the more the wrongness faded, replaced by something close to normal—wind in branches, distant rustle of small animals.
Then a heavy snort, wet and guttural, rattled the shrubs ahead.
Blake smiled.
He stepped out into a small clearing and met the eyes of a hulking creature—a hipposaurus, gray hide marked with old scars, tusks jutting from its mouth. It blinked, offended by his existence.
"Yeah," Blake said, drawing his blades. "Same."
The fight was short and messy. Poison aura poured into metal, his swords leaving sickly green trails in the air as he moved. The beast roared once—loud enough to make the trees shiver—then crashed to the ground, twitching.
He dragged the carcass back, arms burning by the time he reentered the square.
"Dinner," he said.
The squad cheered, fatigue forgotten for a moment. Jake whistled. Ashley shook her head, disbelief and affection warring in her eyes.
"You really have no concept of 'take a smaller one,' do you?" she asked.
"Where's the fun in that?" Blake replied.
They skinned and dressed the beast, setting slabs of meat over the fire. Fat hissed and popped. The smell rolled out heavy and rich, banishing some of the chill that clung to the village.
They talked as they ate—about nothing important. About old training mishaps, about a sergeant who'd mispronounced half the unit's names, about the time Jake had fallen into a latrine pit and insisted it was "tactical cover."
Ashley laughed until she choked. Blake watched her, storing the sound somewhere deep.
"To Rina," he said after a while, lifting his mug.
"To Rina," they echoed.
"And to family."
"Family," Jake repeated, softer.
They drank.
The fire burned bright.
None of them saw the eyes.
Beyond the edge of the firelight, crouched low among the black trees, something watched.
Many somethings.
Eyes glowed in the dark—dozens of them. Red, faint and patient. They never blinked.
The shapes attached to them were hunched and wrong, all bone angles and coiled muscle. Clawed hands anchored into the dirt. Breath misted in slow, synchronized huffs.
They didn't growl.
They didn't move.
They just stared at the gathered soldiers, motionless as carved idols, while the flames flickered and the squad laughed around their meal.
The stars disappeared behind drifting cloud.