Death Bound (The Soulsworn Chronicles #1)

Chapter 4

Chapter Four

My world ended quietly, not with screams or fury, but with the soft hiss of ashes falling like snow. The crypt—her crypt—burnt, broken, and stripped of its silence, crumbled to nothing around me. Stones that had stood for centuries lay shattered at my feet, but it wasn’t the ruin that gutted me. It was her absence, vast and unbearable, like a wound I couldn’t stop bleeding.

Her ashes drifted through the air, carried by a cruel wind, as if the world dared to call her death beautiful. But there was nothing beautiful about this. Nothing beautiful about the way she slipped away, piece by piece, until all that remained was smoke and the ghost of her name on my lips.

I staggered, my breaths ragged, as if the very act of living in a world without her was too much to bear. She was gone, and the fire stayed—inside me, in the hollow space where her laughter used to live, in the spaces her arms used to hold me. The flames didn’t burn me, but her absence did.

I couldn’t stay here. Not where her death hung in the air, clinging to me like soot I couldn’t wash away. Not where every breath felt like inhaling grief, sharp and choking.

I turned, stumbling over the ruin beneath me, her ashes still catching in my throat. The crypt had burned. She was gone. And whatever was left of me—broken, furious, alive—would have to find a way to carry her absence, even as it threatened to swallow me whole.

My boots slipped on the frozen ground, but I pushed through, arms swinging as I fought against the dragging weight. War drums pounded in the distance, low and ominous, like the heartbeat of the world. The storm brewed overhead. The Dragon King was gone, and yet the rage still burned inside, fueling every stumbling step.

I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t care. All I knew was that I had to keep moving. If I stopped, I’d drown in grief. If I stopped, I’d have to face the truth?—

that she was gone.

I barely saw the soldier until I tripped over him, falling to my knees. He lay sprawled on the blood-soaked ground, his legs mangled—one gone entirely, the other twisted and blackened, hanging by nothing but torn skin and muscle. He groaned, his face a mask of agony. His armor was half-melted, fused to his charred skin, and the stench of burning flesh assaulted me.

I gagged, recoiling from the horror of it. His hands twitched, fingers stained red with his own blood as he clawed weakly at the snow, trying to drag himself forward.

His eyes met mine, wild and desperate. “Please…” he rasped, his voice barely more than a whisper. “Help me…”

I stared at him, my chest tightening. Blood pooled beneath him, thick and dark, spreading like a grotesque stain. His leg—the one that was left—was torn apart, the bone shattered and exposed through the mangled flesh. Each inhale he took was a struggle, wet and gurgling. His eyes, wide and pleading, locked onto mine.

“I can’t…” I whispered, shaking my head.

But he wasn’t hearing me. His hands reached out, grasping at the air, at me. “Please… I don’t want to die like this.”

I froze. His words wrapped around me like chains, heavy and oppressive. I was no stranger to death, to the sight of broken bodies, lifeless faces. But this—this was different. He was begging, trapped in that space between life and death, with no escape except through my hands.

I thought of Aeliana. The death rites she had spoken of, honoring the fallen, giving them peace. I had seen too many dead, too many corpses in my thirteen years serving here.

Now I was the one holding mercy.

“Please.” His voice cracked, raw with pain, his eyes glassy. “End it…”

My throat closed around the words. I didn’t know how to move, how to act. The dagger at his side gleamed in the weak light, and my fingers, numb, closed around the hilt.

This is mercy. It’s what he wants.

I knelt beside him, my hands trembling as I whispered, “I’m sorry.”

With a swift motion, I pressed the blade to his throat and pulled.

His blood sprayed out in a violent gush, warm and thick as it splattered across my hands, my face. His body jerked, convulsing, the life draining out of him with each shuddering breath. The gurgling sound was wet, horrible, as he choked on his own blood, his hands twitching one last time before they fell limp.

I stumbled back. My hands were covered in it—his blood.

I had killed him.

My stomach twisted, nausea rising in my throat, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the sight. His blood was everywhere—on my hands, my clothes, splattered across my face. The air was thick with the stench of it, mixed with the sharp tang of sleet and the stench of burning flesh.

I stumbled back, my legs shaking, my chest tight. The war drums in the distance pounded louder, the rhythmic thrum vibrating through the ground beneath me.

I had to move. I had to keep going.

But my legs wouldn’t hold me. I collapsed, my hands still covered in his blood. The cold was everywhere, gnawing at my bones, creeping deeper, stealing the last of my strength. My body trembled, the world spinning around me, as the blood froze against my skin, turning to ice.

I was dying. I could feel it—my limbs too heavy to lift, my heart slowing, each beat fainter than the last. The world blurred, white and gray swirling together in a dizzying whirl of snowflakes and smoke.

I thought of Aeliana again. I wanted to cry, but even my tears had frozen in my eyes, tiny crystals clinging to my lashes.

I couldn’t even mourn her properly.

The ground felt like jagged glass, biting into my skin. My body was shutting down, my mind fraying at the edges, and in the thick, suffocating quiet of the storm, I heard her voice.

“ Elara .”

I froze, my heart leaping. It couldn’t be. But her voice—gentle, familiar—whispered my name again, closer this time, tender.

I blinked, and there she was, standing before me, untouched by death. Aeliana, just as I remembered—her blonde hair flowing in the wind, her eyes bright with life. She smiled at me, gentle and sad.

It couldn’t be real. I knew that. But my heart screamed for her, for the warmth she had once brought into this forsaken world.

I tried to reach for her, my fingers trembling, numb. “Aeliana?” My voice cracked, broken. “I—I couldn’t save you.”

She didn’t respond. Her smile stayed, frozen, unmoving. Something about it was wrong, but I couldn’t grasp what it was. My mind felt slow.

“Don’t leave me,” I whimpered, trying to lift my frozen arms, but they wouldn’t obey. The frost had turned my muscles to stone. “Please…”

Her image flickered, like a candle about to go out.

One moment she was there; the next, she was a shadow. I blinked. She wasn’t real. She wasn’t real.

But she was there again, her hands brushing my cheek, warm, tender. “ You’re safe ,” she said. “ I’m here, Elara .”

The chill gnawed deeper, numbing everything but the ache in my chest. My thoughts slipped away, like the world around me.

“Will you perform my death rites?” I asked, my tone brittle, choked with ice.

But she didn’t answer. She just stood there, smiling.

Suddenly, her face was inches from mine, her smile stretching wide, unnatural. Her eyes, once bright, darkened, black as pitch.

I blinked, and she was gone.

I was alone. The storm raged around me, burying me deeper. My body shut down, the cold creeping through my veins, turning my limbs to ice. I was dying, and I didn’t even care anymore.

A shadow passed over me, dark and looming. Through the haze, I heard a voice.

“I found one alive.”

Then, nothing.