Chapter 56: Embers in the Ashes
The battlefield was silent at last.
Not the silence of peace, but the silence of exhaustion—the kind that followed when screams had burned themselves out, when swords had nothing left to cut. Smoke drifted in thin ribbons across the ridge, carrying with it the bitter stench of blood, charred flesh, and earth torn apart.
Le Wai stood at the center of it all, his sword still buried in the cracked soil. His body trembled, his bandages soaked through, every breath scraping like glass. The ember within him pulsed faintly, steady now, no longer raging.
The fire had quieted.
Kael was gone.
And yet, Le Wai felt no victory in his chest—only the weight of what remained.
---
Around him, the survivors gathered. Their faces were pale, streaked with ash and blood, their armor broken, weapons notched. Captain Seris limped toward him, one arm bound in cloth, her jaw tight with the pain she refused to show.
"It's done," she said, voice low but resolute. "Kael's shadows are broken. The ridge is ours."
Le Wai lifted his gaze. The battlefield stretched before him—hundreds of corpses, some wreathed in black dust where Kael's spawn had fallen, others flesh and bone, men and women who would never rise again.
"Is it?" His voice was hoarse, raw. "Look at them, Seris. Look at the cost."
She did not flinch. "Every battle has a price. But without you, there would be no one left to mourn them."
He wanted to argue, but the words caught in his throat. She was right, and yet the ember's whisper lingered in his ears—burn… burn… burn—as if mocking him for pretending he had a choice in this.
---
A small hand tugged at his sleeve.
Le Wai turned, finding Ryn standing beside him. The boy's armor hung in tatters, his face streaked with grime, but his eyes still burned with that same faith. He held out Le Wai's scabbard, cracked but intact.
"You dropped this," Ryn said softly.
Le Wai took it with trembling hands. For a long moment, he simply stared at the boy. Of all the soldiers who could have survived, it was this one—young, untested, yet unbroken.
"Why are you still here?" Le Wai asked, the question spilling out before he could stop it.
Ryn blinked. "Because you are."
The answer struck deeper than any blade.
---
As the wounded were gathered and the dead laid in rows, Le Wai walked among them. Some reached out to touch his arm, whispering thanks. Others averted their eyes, fearful of the golden cracks that still flickered faintly across his veins.
To them, he was not simply a man anymore. He was fire. Salvation. Curse. Both.
Each look was a reminder: they followed him not only because they believed in him, but because they feared what would happen if they didn't.
That truth burned worse than any wound.
---
By dusk, the fires of the battlefield had dimmed. A funeral pyre was built from shattered shields and broken spears. The bodies of fallen comrades were laid atop it, draped in what banners still remained.
When the flames rose, golden against the bleeding horizon, the soldiers bowed their heads. Some wept, some prayed, others stood in silence.
Le Wai did not bow. He stood at the pyre's edge, the ember within him resonating with the fire before him. Each crackle, each flare, felt like an echo of the voices he had heard in his dreams—the countless souls who had carried the ember before him.
They burned. They resisted. And in the end, they were nothing but fuel.
The words returned unbidden, and he clenched his fists. Would he one day join them? Would his name too be whispered only in ash?
The pyre's heat licked at his skin, yet it was the ember's quiet, patient thrum that made him shiver.
---
Later, in the remnants of a half-burned tent, Seris laid out a map on a cracked table. The ink had smudged from smoke and blood, but the lines of the land were still visible.
"The ridge is secure," she said, tracing with her good hand. "But scouts report movement beyond the river. Kael may have fallen, but not all his allies. Shadows don't die easily."
Le Wai leaned over the map, his reflection flickering faintly in the golden sheen of his blade. "Then they'll come again."
"Yes," Seris said simply. "And when they do, the men will look to you."
He looked at her sharply. "I'm not a king. Not a savior."
Her gaze did not waver. "That doesn't matter. To them, you are fire made flesh. You can either guide it—or let it consume us all."
The ember pulsed within him, as if agreeing with her words.
---
That night, Le Wai could not sleep. He lay beneath the torn canvas of the tent, staring at the fractured stars. His body ached, but it was the silence inside him that unsettled him most. The ember had grown quiet, no longer demanding, no longer clawing for dominance.
It waited.
Like a predator watching from the dark.
He closed his eyes and saw again the faces in the flames—hosts before him, warriors who had burned until nothing remained. Their voices echoed faintly, not taunts this time, but something softer. Warnings. Pleas.
And through them, the ember spoke once more.
You resisted today. But how long can you resist tomorrow?
Le Wai clenched his fists. He thought of Ryn's unwavering eyes, of Seris's grim faith, of the soldiers who had stood when they should have fallen.
"As long as I must," he whispered into the dark.
The ember pulsed, steady, patient.
The war was not over. Not against the shadows beyond the river, not against the fire within his chest.
But for the first time, Le Wai did not feel like prey caught in the flame.
He felt like a man carrying it forward—burning not to consume, but to endure.
And that, perhaps, was enough.