Chapter 125: Shadows Beneath the Ashes
The night was a black, dripping canvas.
Rain fell in heavy sheets, muffling footsteps, drowning whispers. In the charred ruins of what had once been Ashford's bustling market square, the world felt ancient, broken, and unbearably still.
Elias crouched beneath the skeletal frame of a half-burned stall, soaked to the skin. The torchlights of the mercenaries flickered faintly in the distance — like sickly fireflies. He could hear their coarse laughter even over the roar of the rain, their boots sloshing in the thick mud.
Beside him, Kaelen shifted restlessly, his sharp green eyes flashing in the gloom.
"They're getting drunk," Kaelen muttered under his breath, tapping the hilt of his dagger against his thigh. "Drunk and stupid."
"Good," Elias said quietly. "Stupid men are easy to guide."
Sophia, kneeling on Elias' other side, tightened her soaked cloak around her. Her dark hair clung to her cheeks, her gray eyes smoldered with anger barely contained.
"Still feels wrong," she said in a low voice. "Turning them against each other."
Elias glanced at her, rainwater dripping from his chin. The boy who once hesitated over small lies was long gone. What sat here, in the ruined skeleton of Ashford, was something harder — something forged in desperation and sorrow.
"They chose this," he said simply. "We're just helping them finish it."
---
Mira Valen emerged from the darkness like a ghost.
One moment, nothing.
The next, she was crouching beside Elias, barely a sound announcing her arrival.
He admired that about her — the way she moved, the way she adapted. A survivor, through and through.
"They're restless," Mira said, brushing rain from her face. "The big one, Garron, he's spoiling for a fight. Swears someone's been stealing from his stash."
Sophia and Kaelen exchanged a glance.
"That wasn't us?" Sophia asked dryly.
Mira smirked, teeth flashing. "Might've been me. Hard to keep track."
Elias didn't smile.
Instead, he leaned in closer. "Can you stir it up? Make him think it was one of their own?"
Mira tilted her head, studying him with shrewd, calculating eyes. Weighing him.
And, after a heartbeat, she nodded.
"Yeah," she said. "Easy."
She vanished again, slipping into the wet dark like smoke.
Kaelen whistled low. "Remind me never to trust a woman who moves that quiet."
Sophia shot him a sideways glance. "Good advice. You should start today."
Despite the heaviness in his chest, Elias found himself smiling.
Briefly.
Almost painfully.
It had been a long time since any of them had laughed without bitterness.
---
The first fight broke out an hour later.
Elias and his small band watched from the ruined bell tower as the mercenaries turned on each other, fueled by cheap ale, fear, and planted doubts.
Voices rose, hoarse and violent.
A shove.
A broken nose.
The shriek of metal as blades were drawn.
Lightning split the sky, momentarily painting the chaos in silver light.
Elias's heart hammered in his chest — not from fear, but from grim hope.
It was working.
Sophia leaned closer, her breath warm against his rain-chilled ear. "We need to move now. While they're distracted."
Elias nodded.
They'd planned it all: during the chaos, they would slip into the mercenaries' camp, sabotage the weapon stores, destroy the food supplies, and make it impossible for the remaining mercenaries to stay.
Ashford didn't need to win against the invaders.
Ashford needed to make itself not worth the trouble.
---
Slipping through the storm, Elias felt the pulse of adrenaline in his veins. Every step could mean death. Every breath, betrayal.
But this was his home.
These broken streets.
These crumbling walls.
These people.
He would not abandon them.
Sophia moved with quiet grace beside him, her face grim, focused. Kaelen followed behind, a short sword ready in one hand, a satchel of oil-soaked rags slung over his shoulder.
They reached the mercenaries' main storehouse — a hastily reinforced barn on the eastern edge of the village.
It was poorly guarded tonight.
Two sentries slumped by the doorway, hoods drawn against the rain, their hands clutching bottles instead of weapons.
Sophia moved first — a blur of motion — and before either man could react, she struck them both, swift and silent. They collapsed into the mud.
No alarms. No cries.
Just the endless drumming of rain.
Inside, the storehouse was packed with crates of food, weapons, armor.
Elias moved quickly, dousing the piles in oil. Kaelen trailed behind, setting small charges, black powder wrapped tightly in cloth.
Sophia kept watch at the door, every muscle taut.
Minutes later, the three slipped away, hearts pounding, rain disguising their retreat.
Behind them, the charges waited.
Sleeping embers in a nest of dry twigs.
---
They didn't have to wait long.
The explosion tore through the storm with the roar of a dragon, shaking the ground beneath Elias's boots.
A bloom of fire lit the night sky.
Screams split the air, high and ragged.
The mercenaries ran like startled cattle, confused, afraid, some half-dressed, others with blades drawn and no enemy to face but each other.
In the chaos, Mira appeared again, grinning fiercely.
"Beautiful," she said, her face gleaming in the firelight. "You might just pull this off, pretty boy."
Elias ignored the jibe.
He was already thinking ahead.
"More work to do," he said grimly. "We're not finished."
---
Far to the north, in the cold heart of Alendar Keep, King Aldred rose from his throne.
The Butcher of Baelen's Cross — real name unknown, face hidden beneath a cruel iron mask — knelt before him.
A messenger had arrived just minutes ago, soaked and trembling, to report Ashford's continued defiance.
The King's lips curved in a thin, cruel smile.
"Ashford believes itself clever," he said softly, almost admiringly. "Burning my supplies. Turning my dogs against each other."
He leaned down, his voice a whisper dripping with venom.
"Teach them the price of defiance."
The Butcher stood, towering, silent.
And with him, the shadow of true destruction began to move toward Ashford.
---
Back in Ashford, the fire raged until dawn.
Elias stood among the villagers in the square, smoke coiling around them, rain hissing as it met burning wood.
Sophia was bandaging a cut on her arm. Kaelen was barking orders to reinforce the barricades.
Mira leaned against a broken pillar, tossing a stolen coin between her fingers, watching it flash in the stormlight.
Ashford had won a battle tonight.
But not the war.
And as Elias looked out across the blackened ruins of his home, he knew — the real fight was still coming.
A fight not just for survival.
But for the soul of Ashford itself.
---