THIRTY-FIVE
ASHEN RING
Into the fire she was cast, yet the fire claimed her not.
Beneath the waters she was held, yet the depths took her not.
From the high cliffs she was hurled, yet no descent befell her.
Beneath the earth she was laid, and there her strength awakened.
—VALEN’S JOURNAL
AMARA
The Ashen Ring is silent when we arrive.
No music or speeches. Just the wind brushing against black stone and the distant crackle of flame as the ceremonial pyre is lit.
I’ve never seen anything this beautiful.
Or this devastating.
The memorial is held at dusk in the Ashen Ring.
It’s vast and circular, open to the sky, with obsidian benches arcing around a wide central hearth.
The black stone drinks in the firelight, reflecting only what it cannot contain.
Above us, the sky opens into twilight, stars beginning to emerge as wind weaves through the silence of the massive crowd.
Earlier today, while we were getting ready, Thane told me how each clan honors the dead. But standing here now, surrounded by thousands of mourners and the weight of their grief, I realize understanding and witnessing are not the same thing.
The Flame Offering is the heart of the ceremony. At the center of the ring stands a long pyre, the fire already blazing. One by one, Fire Clan mourners step forward, bringing tokens of the fallen—armbands, shattered bits of armor, singed scraps of cloth—and cast them into the growing flame.
Each time a name is spoken, the fire briefly flares, as if answering the grief of those who are left behind.
The Water Clan’s Vessels of Mourning are placed in a wide circle around the benches, shallow bowls of clear water, one for every life lost. People step forward, releasing a single drop into each bowl, salted with tears, sweat, or magics, marking a life remembered.
The water ripples outward.
Water Clan mages stand silently nearby, their magics shaping the reflections of the Elements into rippling moons and shifting light. The air itself seems to glimmer.
Air Clan’s Whispers to the Sky comes next. Thin strips of cloth and paper are handed out at the entrance, already etched with names, prayers, fragments of memory. At a signal, Air Clan channelers lift them on the wind, sending them rising into the dusk.
As they climb higher, wind chimes strung throughout the cliffs begin to peal. The sound drifts across the Ring like a language I’ll never fully understand.
A language made of grief and breath and flight.
Earth Clan’s Stone Markers are laid at the base of the pyre in a quiet, continuous line. Some are pressed into the soil by Earth Clan mages, etched permanently into the land itself. Others remain above ground, waiting to be claimed by surviving loved ones.
A weight to carry forward. A reminder that remembrance is its own form of endurance.
Thousands of people fill the Ring: warriors, healers, families, children. The injured sit wrapped in bandages and healing cloths. Dragons line the surrounding ridges, their massive silhouettes dark against the fading sky.
No one speaks above a whisper. The grief is too large for that. And when the final name is spoken, when the last wind-carried prayer disappears into the stars, one final ritual begins.
The Ember Vigil.
Earlier, Thane told me about the final ritual. When the last name is spoken and the offerings are complete, a single flame will be taken from the pyre and carried to the Hall of Remembrance, where it will burn until the war ends.
A promise, flickering in the dark.
For now, the fire burns low, banked and waiting. It will not rise until the names are spoken.
Thane stands beside me, his hand brushing mine.
He asked me to stand with him tonight as the Spiritborn.
He said people needed to see me, just like when we walked through the infirmary.
My presence mattered. In the wake of so much death, they needed something to hold on to.
A symbol. A flicker of hope. A little light.
But I don’t feel like hope or light.
I feel like the reason we’re here.
Because this memorial wasn’t born from tradition.
It exists because people died. And they died because the Shadow Forces came for me.
Everyone at the ball. Everyone who bled, who burned, who didn’t make it home.
Collateral in a war I never asked for but can’t seem to escape.
A war that grows larger everywhere I go.
So I stand here with my back straight, my chin lifted, and my eyes dry. I do what’s expected of me.
I let them see what they need to see.
But inside, I feel like a fraud.
My shields remain firmly in place, held not out of fear, but by choice. If I let them down, even for a second, Thane would feel it. The weight pressing into my ribs. The guilt wound so tightly through me that some days it feels difficult to breathe.
I haven’t spoken it aloud since the night of the attack. And I won’t. Not now.
Thane already carries enough.
Every eye in the Ashen Ring turns toward him. They look to him not only as the Warlord of the Fire Clan, but as something more. Something they can count on.
Something that does not break.
He’s the one holding this ceremony together, giving grief a shape in a world that keeps threatening to fall apart.
I won’t add to what he’s already carrying. I won’t let my doubt become another burden he has to shoulder.
Because no matter how many people speak of me with reverence, no matter how many times they whisper Spiritborn as though it means hope, I cannot shake the truth lodged deep inside me.
This happened because of me.
And even if no one else will say it, I know it. I know it every time I close my eyes. I know it every time I hear another name spoken into the fire.
Still, I stand here, composed and present. I let them see strength. I let them see something they can believe in.
But the truth is, I feel like I don’t deserve to stand here at all.
And yet, I do it anyway. Because they need the symbol.
They need the Spiritborn.
Even if I don’t know how to be that title tonight. Even if part of me believes I never truly was.
Thane almost always wears black for formal occasions, but tonight he’s dressed in white.
A crisp tunic and fitted trousers, unadorned except for the silver clasp at his collar.
The color is stark against his skin, mourning transformed into something sacred.
A gesture of reverence. A symbol of peace.
Elira helped me get ready for the ceremony.
She pinned my hair to one side, soft waves cascading over my shoulder. Tiny clips were tucked throughout, slivers of silver and glass set with sparkling gems that catch the firelight. From a distance, it looks like starlight scattered across the night sky.
I wear white too, along with the other members of the court and council.
My dress is sleeveless, modest in the front but cut low across the back. The fabric falls in light, layered folds to my ankles, whispering with each step. The open back leaves my Elemental markings bare, each tattoo glowing faintly beneath the flickering firelight.
Fire.
Air.
Water.
Earth.
Tonight, I feel the weight of them more than ever.
But Elira did more than dress me. While she worked, she told me what would be expected of me. Not as the Spiritborn, but as the Warlord’s partner.
Thane had told me how the ceremony would unfold. He told me what I would need to do, how I would stand beside him, how I would be seen. But only as the Spiritborn.
He never told me what it means to stand beside him in front of all these people. He never told me that the court already sees us as partners. That the citizens do too.
That to them, I am already the woman who stands beside the Warlord.
That realization settles over me like a weight I hadn’t known I was expected to carry.
Rowena and Sera stand on Thane’s other side, their dresses nearly identical to mine, save for the covered backs. Rowena’s flame tattoo gleams along her upper right arm, a band of gold and crimson that pulses faintly whenever she moves.
Below the dais stand Garrick, Rian, and Jarek alongside members of the ruling council and several high-ranking figures from the court. Like us, they wear white. Even Garrick, who usually finds some way to bend the rules, wears the color without complaint.
Rian’s expression is calm, almost unreadable. Jarek stands like stone, his face somber.
Valen stands among them, robed in white linen, the carved lines of his staff catching the firelight. His gaze is distant, but his presence anchors the space.
I let my eyes drift beyond the dais, searching the sea of firelight and movement for a single bright thread.
And I find her.
Lyra’s red hair, pulled into a tight, elegant bun, catches the light even in shadow. She sits only a few rows back, close enough that I could almost call her name. She’s wearing a long dress of layered browns and greens in honor of Earth Clan. It suits her.
Strong. Steady. Rooted in something deep.
Beside her, Kieran sits with his arm still supported by a sling. The bruises shadow his face as he carries the quiet weight of recovery. He’s dressed in the blues and silvers of Air Clan, colors that remind me of the sky just before sunrise.
A quiet kind of strength.
Seeing them here, safe and together, grounds me in a way nothing else has tonight.
My gaze drifts farther through the crowd.
The stone benches carved into the volcanic cliffs are nearly full, warriors and citizens of every clan gathered beneath the same firelit sky. Some wear the colors of a single lineage. Others carry more than one heritage woven into their clothing.
Everywhere I look, people have come dressed to honor their heritage and remember.
Fire Clan mourners wear dark fabrics trimmed with copper and ember-red thread. Some have streaks of ash brushed across their cheeks, a visible mark of grief carried with pride.
Water Clan members wear deep blues and silvers, their fabrics light and flowing, layered like rippling tide. Many wear arm cuffs engraved with wave patterns or glass beads that shimmer faintly in the torchlight.