Chapter 44 - Breath of the wild

  Outside Solvara’s Walls

  At the edge of the forest that bordered the Sol Garden Hills, where the ruins of Old Solvara bled into wild earth, a silver-haired girl stumbled forward.

  She was a mess of ash and blood and dirt, her once-white hair tangled with grass and grime. The remains of what had once been a maid’s uniform clung to her in tatters, ripped and torn from the flight through the woods. Scratches lined her arms and legs where thorns and stones had bitten deep, each step leaving faint smears of red in the grass.

  Slung over her shoulder was another girl, golden-haired. What had once been a princess’s gown hung in ragged strips, soaked through with blood and the green ichor of some creature she should never have faced. Her hair, though matted and dirty, still caught the fractured moonlight.

  Behind them, the cart creaked. A knight lay within it, his armor shattered, his skin a tapestry of wounds. One arm was gone entirely, the stump bound in bloodied cloth. His chest rose and fell, barely — too faint to promise life, too steady to mean death.

  Together, the three of them moved through the dark, stumbling, dragging, refusing to stop.

  And behind them, something followed.

  The creature.

  Half-ruined, half-mad, dragging itself through the underbrush.

  Its limbs scraped the ground, its breath rattled like broken glass.

  Still, it came, slow, relentless, the wet sound of pursuit haunting every step.

  Lilia couldn’t help but feel angry.

  Angry at the world for taking so much from them.

  Angry at Ariel — for fighting, for throwing herself into death…

  But most of all, she was angry at herself for not being able to do anything about it.

  She hauled herself deeper into the forest, roots catching underfoot

  The faint, uneven thud of the creature’s steps echoed somewhere behind them. Her teeth clenched. Every muscle screamed, every thought burned. Still, she pulled the cart forward, step after step.

  Her body ached. Her mind ached.

  A yet absurdly, she thought of books—of quiet rooms and ink-stained pages.

  Lilia had always loved reading. Outside her duties as a maid, it was her only escape.

  Due to the city's isolation, the library in Solvara was small, the selection limited, but she’d read those same few stories again and again until she knew them by heart.

  In those stories, adventure was something bright. Beautiful. Something that brought people together.

  When Lilia was younger, she used to whisper to Ariel about adventures beyond the city walls — childish stories spun from books and dreams she could barely put into words. Ariel would always laugh, bright and breathless, spinning around the room with her arms outstretched like she could already feel the wind from those faraway places.

  “Someday!” Ariel would say. “We’ll see all of it, Lilia!”

  Back then, it had all felt like an impossible dream: forests untouched by ash, rivers that shone like glass, skies that never dimmed.

  Maybe that was why Ryn had awed her once—a powerful knight, straight out of a fairy tale. But now, she knew better.

  Lilia smiled faintly at the memory.

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  There was nothing awe-inspiring about that quiet, awkward boy, and there was nothing romantic about the world beyond the walls.

  She pulled again, the cart creaking behind her.

  A breathless laugh escaped her lips.

  Because in the end, here she was.

  On an adventure…

  With her best friends.

  ***

  Ariel drifted in and out of consciousness.

  Her chest ached with every shallow breath. Nothing felt broken, but the pain was enough to drag her under again and again.

  Each time she woke, it was to the uneven rhythm of Lilia’s steps.

  The soft, strained breaths of the girl carrying her.

  The creak of the cart’s wheels bumping over roots and stone.

  And always, somewhere behind them, the faint, echoing weight of that thing.

  The aberration still following, still hunting.

  She wanted to speak.

  Tell Lilia to stop. To drop her. To run.

  To live.

  But her lungs burned too sharply to form words.

  So she did nothing.

  Only lay there, limp and useless, her head resting against Lilia’s trembling shoulder — just another burden to carry.

  Time blurred. The forest swayed around her like a dream.

  The next time she woke, it was to pain, a sharp jolt as her body hit the ground.

  For a heartbeat, she couldn’t breathe, the air punched clean from her lungs.

  Then she saw Lilia beside her, collapsed, her body slumped where she’d fallen.

  The cart had stopped inside another hollow, a shallow cut in the earth just wide enough to hide them.

  Ariel blinked slowly, trying to focus, realizing what had happened.

  Lilia had pushed the cart all the way here… and then, simply fallen.

  She hadn’t fainted. She’d given out.

  She stared at the faint outline of the girl’s shaking shoulders.

  Lilia’s breath came ragged, uneven, a sound that twisted something inside her.

  Ariel’s fingers curled weakly against the dirt.

  Why did they have to suffer for her?

  “Because you’re important.”

  That’s what they always told her.

  But who decided that? And what did it mean now — when the kingdom was ash and its people dead?

  The thought burned in her chest.

  Her throat tightened.

  She turned her face toward the cold ground, the chill of the night sinking into her skin.

  There was no crown now. No palace. No one left to call her “Your Highness.”

  Only this, the dirt and the dark.

  And yet there remained the sound of someone else breaking themselves just to keep her alive.

  She shivered and drew her knees closer to her chest.

  And it wasn’t the cold that made her tremble.

  At some point, exhaustion won. She drifted into uneasy sleep.

  She woke once to the sound of footsteps above, heavy, deliberate, too many to belong to one creature.

  She held her breath, frozen, until the sound faded into the forest beyond.

  Then she slept again.

  When she finally woke, it was to the faint crackle of fire and the pale light of morning filtering through the cracks in the hollow.

  The air smelled faintly of smoke and something warm, roasted roots, maybe, or dried fruit heating over the flame.

  Lilia sat nearby, hair tangled, eyes shadowed with fatigue, turning a small stick over the fire.

  When she heard Ariel stir, she looked up immediately.

  A tired smile tugged at her lips