Chapter 5: Ashes and Oaths
The dawn after the raid broke gray and bitter, the sky still bruised with smoke that clung to Frosthold's towers. The keep stood, but its yard was a graveyard of scars—splintered gates, blackened beams, weapons scattered like bones, and bodies that would never rise again.
The air stank of blood and ash. Men moved slowly among the fallen, covering faces with torn cloaks, dragging corpses aside. Some wore the raiders' garb. Too many wore ours.
I stood on the edge of it all, exhaustion pressing heavier than any sword. My tunic was stiff with dried blood, my body aching with every breath, but I couldn't look away from the dead. Boys I had eaten beside, trained beside, mocked or ignored—gone in a single night.
Cedric groaned nearby as healers bound his leg, his face pale but alive. Two younger boys hadn't been as fortunate. Their cots lay empty now, their names already slipping toward silence.
I clenched my fists until nails cut my palms. The storm I had feared was no longer some far-off shadow. It had broken against us already, and we had barely held.
Joran found me staring at the yard. His tunic was torn, his cheek marked by a shallow cut, but his eyes were steady as ever.
"You're still breathing," he said simply.
"Barely."
"That's more than can be said for them." His gaze flicked toward the covered bodies. "This was only the beginning."
I swallowed hard, throat tight. He didn't know how right he was.
---
Later, Master Hale gathered us in the hall. His presence filled the chamber, his one good eye hard as flint, his voice raw but unyielding.
"You bled last night. Some of you killed for the first time. Some of you lost brothers." He scanned the room, voice cutting through the smoke that still lingered in the rafters. "Remember this—steel does not care for your name, your birth, or your pride. Only your strength. Only your will. Lacking either, you'll join the dead outside."
No one spoke. Silence pressed in like a weight.
Hale slammed his fist against the table, the sound sharp as a blade. "You are not men yet. But last night, some of you took your first step. Hold to it—or the wolves will eat you whole."
His gaze lingered on Joran. Then, briefly, on me. My stomach knotted. He had seen something.
---
The days that followed bled with mourning and repair. Fresh timber patched the gate, the walls bristled with watchmen, and the keep buzzed with rumors: more ships on the horizon, raiders gathering strength, Frosthold marked for ruin.
I drowned myself in pain and silence—tending wounds, swinging my sword until blisters tore, collapsing into restless sleep. Joran trained with me still, but his patience thinned, his corrections sharper.
"You hesitate," he snapped one night, knocking my blade aside with ease. "In battle, hesitation kills."
"I'm trying," I muttered, sweat stinging my eyes.
"Not enough. You think too much. You need instinct. Fire. Because next time, they won't give you room to think."
I raised my blade again, jaw tight. He was right. The boy I had been was already dead.
---
Yet no wound hurt as deep as the ones within. Every night, when I closed my eyes, I saw the man I had killed—his eyes wide, his blood hot on my hands. I heard the screams, the horn's call, the fire's crackle.
And beneath it all, visions from my other life gnawed at me. This storm was more than raiders. Armies would march. Kings would fall. Winter itself would rise, hungrier than flame, colder than death.
The weight of it threatened to crush me.
---
On the fourth night, I climbed to the wall. The sea stretched black beneath the moon, endless and watching. Somewhere out there, more ships waited. I felt it in my bones.
Joran joined me in silence, resting his arms on the stone. For a time, neither of us spoke.
At last, I whispered, "Do you ever wonder if we're meant for more than this? More than being bastards, more than bleeding in the yard?"
Joran's jaw tightened. "All I wonder is how to survive the next fight. Dreams won't keep your throat from being cut."
"Maybe not," I murmured. "But if survival is all we ever reach for… what's the point?"
His gaze lingered on me, as though he searched for a truth I hadn't spoken aloud. "You carry something," he said quietly. "I don't know what. But I see it."
My chest tightened. Had he guessed? Did he sense the truth—that I was not wholly of this world, that I bore knowledge none here could?
Before I could answer, a horn echoed from the yard. Not alarm this time, but summons.
We looked down to see Lord Carrow riding in, his furs heavy, his face carved with lines, his eyes as cold as the sea. Men bowed as he dismounted. His voice carried, sharp and final.
"The raiders test us," he declared. "They will not stop. We must answer. And every sword will be needed."
The hall erupted in murmurs. His meaning was clear: we were no longer training for war. We were already at war.
Joran's hand clenched into a fist beside me. Mine did the same.
The storm had come.
And I swore, as the wind tore across the wall, that I would not be swept aside by it. Not this time.
[End of Chapter]
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