The forest outside the village had turned unrecognizable.
Twisted branches clawed at the sky, and fog rolled low and thick, curling around Asha's ankles like silent fingers trying to pull her back. The road to West Ridge was more myth than path — lined with graves of those who never returned. Still, she walked. Alone. Ahead of the others. Always ahead. As if by reaching the battlefield faster, the pain would sting less.
But it didn't.
Each step reminded her of him.
Each breath tasted like the air she'd left behind — filled with the quiet sound of his sleeping breath, the scent of warm cloth and cinnamon bark tea. She had packed his favorite tea blend before she left. She didn't know why. Maybe because it felt like a goodbye she hadn't been brave enough to say out loud.
She touched the red thread on her wrist. He had tied it during a village festival, pretending it was some grand ritual, but she had smiled and let him — even though she knew his hands shook every time he touched her.
"For protection," he had whispered then.
She kissed his fingers and whispered back, "I'll protect you."
And now, she would. Even if it meant dying alone.
Back in the Village — That Morning
He had spent the night curled against the gate.
The guards had begged him to move. A healer had tried to bring him in. But he refused. His eyes never left the fog beyond the boundary — as if sheer will could part it, as if love could bring her back before it was too late.
By morning, the fever had returned. His illness — the one Asha had spent months treating, nursing, fighting — was clawing at his lungs again. But he didn't care.
He saw her in every gust of wind.
In every bird that took flight.
In the petals that scattered from the trees like blessings.
Flashback — Two Months Ago
They had lain beneath a mango tree, her head on his chest, listening to the village children scream and run with kites in the sky.
"Marry me," he had said suddenly.
She had laughed, thinking he was teasing. "You're serious?"
"More serious than I've ever been."
She had propped herself up on her elbows, her eyes searching his. "You'd really want me forever?"
"I want nothing but you," he had said, pulling a small wooden ring from his tunic. "Made it from the spine of that book you love — the one with the warrior woman who survives everything."
She had slipped it onto her finger, eyes wide, heart thudding like a drum. "You're insane."
"For you," he grinned. "Always for you."
Now
He pulled that wooden ring from a pouch tied to his waist. She didn't know he still had it. She had lost hers a week after the festival, crying for days. He never told her he had carved another.
It was still warm from his hand.
"She left me to save me," he whispered to no one. "And I'll find her. I will."
He turned from the fence, walking back toward the village square — slower this time, but with purpose. If they wouldn't let him through the gates, he would find another way. There were smugglers, hunters, old escape paths used by children in wars long past. He would search every one.
Meanwhile — Asha
Nightfall came too fast. The fens were silent, but the air tasted wrong. Thick. Like the quiet before a scream.
The centipedes hadn't arrived, but they would.
Asha sat beside a makeshift torch, sharpening her blade. The others tried to sleep, but none of them truly could. Not after seeing what the beasts had done to the other battalions.
She whispered a lullaby under her breath — one she used to sing to him when his illness was at its worst. The same one his mother had once hummed when he was a child. The words cracked halfway through.
She leaned back against a rock, eyes on the stars.
"Live for me," she whispered into the wind. "Don't you dare come after me."
Because deep down, she feared the same thing he once said under the mango tree would come true:
"If you leave, I'll follow. Even into the fire."
(Her heart ached not only for him but for the engagement they had been betrothed under: the promise of protection, of staying alive together. But here, she had to break the promise temporarily—to let him live.)