The explosion arrived without warning
a single, violent pulse of light that split the dawn like a scream swallowed by heaven.
Lucas fell to his knees as the shockwave ripped through the street. Dust rained from the sky in slow, shimmering sheets. The world blurred into gray. The city his city seemed to hold its breath.
Then he heard it.
A voice.
Soft, trembling, impossibly steady in the middle of chaos.
A woman was singing.
Not loudly.
Not desperately.
Just… singing.
As if her voice alone could keep the ruins from collapsing.
Lucas staggered toward the sound, clutching the cracked violin against his chest like a relic. Smoke coiled around him. The air tasted of ash and blood. Every step felt like wading through a memory he wished he'd never lived.
He found her in what remained of a chapel
a young woman kneeling amid shattered pews, her white veil stained with soot.
Her hands clasped.
Her lips moving.
Her voice a thin thread of light cutting through the darkness.
She didn't even look afraid.
For a moment, Lucas forgot the war, the fire, the ruins around them.
He could only stare at her
this fragile flame refusing to die.
Then the ground trembled again.
The chapel walls groaned, stone cracking above her head.
"Move!" Lucas shouted as he lunged forward.
But she didn't.
She finished her last trembling note, exhaled slowly… only then did she open her eyes.
They were calm.
Too calm.
He grabbed her arm just as a beam collapsed behind them, sending up a cloud of white dust.
She gasped not in fear, but surprise.
"You saved me," she whispered.
"No," Lucas said, pulling her to her feet. "You were trying to save the world."
Their eyes met for the first time.
A moment sharp and fragile, like a shard of stained glass.
Then another explosion tore through the distance.
Closer this time.
She flinched.
Lucas tightened his grip.
"We need to go," he said.
"But the chapel.."
Her gaze darted back to the altar buried in rubble.
"Forget the chapel," Lucas snapped. "It's gone."
She shook her head.
"My prayers aren't."
There was a stubbornness in her voice gentle, but unmovable.
And something else beneath it.
Faith.
Or madness.
Lucas couldn't tell the difference anymore.
A fresh burst of fire lit the sky, painting her face gold for a heartbeat.
He realized she wasn't crying.
"Who are you?" he breathed.
The young woman lifted her chin, soot falling from her veil like snow.
"Elizabeth," she said softly. "And you?"
"Lucas."
"Lucas…" she repeated, as if trying the name on her tongue.
"Please. Help me light one more candle."
He stared at her.
At the trembling chapel.
At her soot-covered hands.
At the world collapsing around them.
And strangely
he nodded.
Elizabeth stepped back into the ruins, searching through broken pews. She found one small candle, bent and nearly melted, but still whole. She placed it at the foot of the fractured altar.
Her hands shook as she struck a match.
The flame flickered, struggling against the wind.
Lucas watched her with a strange ache in his chest.
"You really think that will change anything?" he asked.
Elizabeth cupped her hand around the flame until it steadied.
"It changes me," she whispered.
A moment later, the roof groaned again.
A shower of debris fell just inches away.
Lucas grabbed her wrist.
"We stay here, we die."
Elizabeth looked at the candle one last time her eyes shining with something too pure for a world like this.
Then she exhaled and nodded.
"Alright. Lead me."
They ran into the open street, the thunder of collapsing buildings behind them, the sky a roiling bruise of smoke and fire.
As they fled, Lucas glanced at her
this strange girl who prayed while the world burned.
And in the depths of the chaos, he heard her whisper:
"Even in ruins, the light can still choose where to fall."
The words lodged themselves in him like a promise.
He didn't know it then,
but it was the first whisper beneath the ashes
and it would follow him for the rest of the war.
The street outside was drowned in a thick gray haze. Buildings leaned like tired giants, their bones exposed to the cold morning light. The air tasted metallic, tinged with smoke and something older something like grief. Lucas covered his mouth with his sleeve and guided Elizabeth through the rubble-strewn path.
"Stay close," he murmured.
Elizabeth didn't answer, but her fingers tightened around the edge of his coat as they stepped over fallen bricks and shattered glass. Her breathing was soft, almost soundless. It unnerved him how calm she remained in the face of ruin.
A wounded man crawled from behind a collapsed cart, his arm bleeding freely. Elizabeth halted instantly.
"Wait" Lucas tried to stop her, but she knelt beside the man.
"Peace be with you," she whispered, touching his forehead with trembling fingers.
The man coughed, reaching for her hand. Lucas looked away. He had seen too many last breaths, too many bodies that still clung to warmth long after hope had left them. But Elizabeth stayed with the man until his eyes finally stilled.
She closed them gently, as if tucking a child into sleep.
"Why do you do that?" Lucas asked, voice sharp to hide the ache rising in his chest.
"Because someone should," she replied softly. "Even the dying deserve a witness."
Lucas had no response. He could only help her stand as they continued deeper into the ruined street where fire still smoldered in corners like forgotten warnings.
A sudden crack split the air.
"Down!" Lucas grabbed her shoulders and pulled her behind a toppled statue as debris crashed where she had been standing seconds earlier.
Her breath hitched for the first time.
"We shouldn't be out here," Lucas hissed. "There could be another strike."
Elizabeth steadied herself against the stone. "We can't hide forever."
"We can hide long enough to stay alive," Lucas countered.
She held his gaze. Those calm, luminous eyes again eyes that made him feel seen in a way that was almost unbearable. "And what use is living," she asked quietly, "if we don't become light for someone?"
He had no defense. The conviction in her voice disarmed him more than any explosion.
Before he could answer, the echo of boots sounded from the side street sharp, disciplined, approaching fast.
Lucas stiffened. Soldiers.
Not theirs.
"Move," he whispered urgently, grabbing Elizabeth's hand.
She didn't resist this time. They slipped between the ruins, hiding behind half-standing walls as shadows crawled into view. Three soldiers passed, rifles slung over their shoulders, faces masked in soot. Their voices were low and tense, each word clipped with exhaustion.
Elizabeth watched them with a strange sorrow. "Are they the enemy?" she whispered.
Lucas studied their uniforms. "They're survivors," he said. "Just like us. But desperate men can turn into anything."
The soldiers moved on, disappearing into the smoke.
Elizabeth exhaled shakily. "The war isn't over," she murmured.
"It never is," Lucas said.
They walked again, slower this time. Elizabeth's steps wavered from exhaustion, and Lucas adjusted his pace to match hers. The violin case on his back felt heavier with each passing minute not because of the wood, but the memories carved into it.
As they turned a corner, Lucas stopped abruptly.
The entire square lay open before them
a great expanse of gray, filled with the burnt remains of a marketplace. Stalls were overturned, smudged with soot. A charred tree stood in the center like a ghost.
Elizabeth released a small breath. "It was beautiful once."
Lucas nodded. "I used to play here."
The wind swept through the broken stalls, scattering ashes like snow. Elizabeth stepped forward, her fingers brushing the air as if touching invisible threads.
"The world remembers," she whispered.
Lucas looked at her. "What does that mean?"
She turned to him, her veil fluttering in the cold breeze. "Not all ruins are meant to be feared. Some are meant to be carried."
Before he could ask further, another distant explosion echoed across the city, turning the sky a deeper, angrier gray.
Elizabeth flinched.
Lucas took her hand again.
"We keep moving."
This time, she didn't argue.
As they crossed the square, Elizabeth looked back once toward the chapel they had left behind, toward the lone candle flickering in a sea of dust.
Her lips moved in a whisper only the wind could hear.
And though Lucas didn't hear the words, he felt them.
Soft.
Lingering.
Like a promise the ashes refused to keep.