Chapter 30- How had it come to this?

  All across Solvara, corpses littered the streets. Buildings toppled one after another, their white stone facades breaking apart under the ceaseless rain of Blessed fire. Explosions rolled through the city, scattering embers and screams alike.

  Civilians tried to flee but were cut down in droves, fathers shielding children only to be torn apart, mothers clutching lifeless infants as flames consumed them. The air reeked of burning flesh and shattered lives.

  Frill crawled through streets that used to smell of bread and morning rain. Now they stank of ash and blood. His leg was mangled, twisted beneath him from when his shop had collapsed, the bakery he had built with his own hands now nothing more than rubble and ash. Each movement was agony, his palms slick with blood and soot as he dragged himself forward.

  He shifted weakly to avoid the bodies, the trader across the street, the tailor’s boy, nameless strangers he’d passed a hundred times without a word. Now they all looked the same: broken, still, swallowed by the firestorm.

  How had it come to this? The thought flickered through him with the dull weight of despair.

  Frill knew he wasn’t going to survive. That much was obvious. But still, he crawled.

  His breath came ragged, every wheeze a fight against the smoke clawing at his lungs. He dragged himself past the blackened remains of his bread cart, the same one he had wheeled to the square every morning. How many times had children run laughing beside him, begging for sweetrolls? How many mornings had he nodded politely to passing guards, to merchants setting up their stalls?

  Now the cart was ash, and the guards were dead at his side.

  Frill’s fingers trembled as they brushed the cobblestones, nails breaking as he pulled himself forward inch by inch. His blood smeared over the street he had walked a thousand times before, a crimson trail across the heart of Solvara’s market.

  He looked up once, through blurred vision, and thought he saw the spire of the palace still standing, haloed in fire and smoke. It felt impossibly distant, like a dream that had already ended.

  Tears mingled with the soot on his face. Not for himself, he already knew his story ended here, but for the city, for the neighbors he would never greet again, for the simple life that had been torn away.

  He tried to push forward one last time, arms shaking, breath hitching. His body refused.

  “I… I wish I were able to serve Her Highness and her friends one last time,” he muttered, voice broken, more breath than sound.

  The words hung in the burning air, swallowed quickly by the roar of collapsing timbers and the endless chorus of screams.

  With a final, shuddering exhale, Frill slumped to the stones.

  When he stilled, the city seemed to quiet with him.

  ***

  Ryn ran, his boots hammering the blood-slick stones, Lilia’s limp weight dragging at his shoulders, Ariel stumbling at his side. The battlefield of Solvara’s final stand stretched before him.

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  Everywhere he looked, knights fought and fell. Their shields splintered, their blades dulled, their bodies crumpling beneath blows they could never hope to match. For every enemy struck down, three more emerged from the cracks in the sky.

  Civilians screamed as they were cut down, their cries twisting into the clash of steel and the roar of fire. A woman knelt over a fallen child, only to be struck through herself. An unarmed guard threw himself at a Blessed knight, his courage ending in a single strike.

  The wall loomed ahead, but it was no sanctuary; its battlements were already overrun. Solvara’s defenders bled and broke beneath the weight of a world united against them.

  Ryn’s chest burned with every breath. He kept his eyes forward. He couldn’t falter. Not now.

  He pushed forward, weaving through the carnage. A knight reached out toward him, blood pooling from a wound that split his side. “Help—” The voice cracked with pain.

  He didn’t slow. His grip only tightened around Ariel’s arm as he dragged her through the smoke.

  Another soldier fell to his knees in front of him, clutching a shattered spear, trying to rise against the tide. An enemy blade split him open before Ryn could even register his face. He stepped over the corpse without a word.

  The clang of steel, the screams, the collapsing towers, it all pressed in from every side. His brothers-in-arms were being cut down, begging for aid, but all he saw was the girl beside him, her golden hair catching what little firelight broke through the smoke.

  Every step was a betrayal. Every heartbeat was a reminder. He was leaving them, leaving them to die.

  But he didn’t look back. He couldn’t….Yes, His duty was clear, and in that clarity there was no room for anything else.

  And still, the hopelessness thickened. For every alley he crossed, another knight fell. For every scream he ignored, the weight on his back grew heavier.

  Smoke filled his throat. For a heartbeat, he thought the world had gone silent—then hands seized him. A violent pull yanked Ryn sideways, dragging Ariel and Lilia with him into the cover of a half-collapsed wall. His boots scraped stone as he fought the motion.

  For a moment, Ryn thought it was an enemy.

  Then he felt two familiar scarred hands clamp down on his shoulders.

  “You’re alive,” came the voice of Captain Sylvas.

  Ryn froze, blade still raised. His heart lurched. His vision blurred for a second, smoke, exhaustion, disbelief tangling into one.

  Around him, through smoke and ruin, eleven knights took form — battered but standing. Familiar faces. Brann. Sara. Kael. The sight struck Ryn, a wave of relief hit him, one he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding back.

  Brann broke formation first, striding up and gripping Ryn’s shoulders with a rough shake, a crooked grin plastered across his soot-streaked face. “I knew you’d survive!”

  Kael gave a quick nod from behind him, lips pressed tight, but his shoulders sagging as though a weight had lifted. Sara, quieter still, only exhaled sharply.

  He glanced at Ariel, then back at Ryn, eyes alight despite the ruin. “Eldric swore he’d find you and the royals. But… we never heard back.”

  Ryn’s throat felt raw, but he managed a nod. “Eldric’s alive. I saw him. He’s still fighting.”

  The captain's eyes flickered, the weight of that name settling heavy. He gave a short nod back, grim but resolute. “Then Solvara still stands, for now.”

  Lilia’s head lolled against his shoulder, her breath shallow and uneven. For a moment, he thought she’d stopped, then a faint tremor passed her lips. Barely breathing, but alive.

  Two of the knights moved in quickly, easing Lilia’s limp body from Ryn’s back. Her dress was dark with blood, her face pale. They lowered her onto a strip of cloak torn for a stretcher, one of them already pressing cloth to the wound.

  “Don’t let her slip,” Sylvas ordered. His tone cut through the fire and screams like steel.

  Ryn felt Ariel’s shaking lessen—reduced now, only faint, but enough to jolt him back into reality.

  Sylvas’s scarred face turned to him, voice iron despite the chaos.

  There was a few seconds of an odd silence

  “Now, Ryn.”

  His grip tightened on the younger knight’s shoulder. “Take the princess.”

  “And get her out of Solvara.”