Emberfall Eve
1062 Words
Serina:
I was already crying when I woke up.
My hands clawed at empty air, my chest burning as if something had been torn out of me mid-breath. For a moment I didn’t know where I was, only that I had lost him again.
Like always.
The dream clung to me, hot and aching.
He stood before me in firelight, tall and solid and unbearably real. A man with eyes like molten gold, looking at me as if I were the only thing anchoring him to the world.
He never spoke my name.
I never knew his.
But the way he looked at me; the adoration, devotion, and grief braided so tightly it hurt. It made my throat close every time.
His hands had been warm when they framed my face. His forehead resting against mine. A kiss that felt like a promise and a goodbye all at once.
Then the fire came.
Flames swallowed him from the inside out, his body breaking into light, his expression shattering into agony…
And I screamed.
I sat upright now, gasping, tears sliding unchecked down my cheeks.
Not the same dream as last year.
The same dream as last week.
As two nights ago.
As yesterday.
Emberfall Eve just made it worse.
The room was still dark, the kind of dark that pressed down on your ribs. Cold air pooled near the floor, carrying the scent of soot and old stone. Somewhere outside, a temple bell chimed once and went silent.
I dragged a shaking hand over my face and forced myself to breathe.
“Still alive,” I muttered hoarsely. “That’s something.”
The thin floorboard creaked behind me.
“Bad one?” Leyah whispered.
I turned. She stood in the doorway, hair loose over one shoulder, a blanket wrapped around herself. She looked exhausted, like she always did when I had those dreams.
“Yeah,” I said. “Sorry.”
She crossed the room anyway and sat beside me, bumping her shoulder lightly into mine. “Don’t be. You cry quieter now. That’s improvement.”
I huffed weakly.
Leyah wasn’t my sister by blood. She’d come to us three years ago, half-starved, bruised, running from a man who’d thought no one would notice a girl disappearing in Emberfall District.
I noticed.
Reon had noticed too.
Family, it turned out, was sometimes a choice.
Reon slept through everything, curled on his mattress near the wall. Eleven years old and too small for it, dark lashes resting against hollowed cheeks. Leyah glanced at him and softened.
“I’ll wake him later,” she said. “You should wash up before the incense makes you nauseous again.”
As if summoned by the words, the smell crept in through the shutters, thick, cloying incense from the temples uphill.
Priests loved to burn it on Emberfall Eve, as if smoke could make the day holy instead of monstrous.
“Thank you,” I said quietly.
Leyah hesitated. “The dreams are happening more.”
I nodded.
“They always do before today,” she said gently. “Whatever it is… it’s not trying to hurt you.”
I didn’t answer. Because in the dream, it hurt worse than anything I’d ever known.
After she left to start the fire, I washed my face in the chipped bowl by the door. My reflection stared back, eyes red, skin warm to the touch despite the cold. When I pressed my palm flat against my chest, a strange heat pulsed beneath my ribs.
I pulled my hand away quickly.
Not today.
The heat lingered anyway, a low throb beneath my ribs that didn’t fade no matter how slowly I breathed. It always did this on Emberfall Eve, like my body knew something my mind refused to name.
I pressed my fingers to my sternum and waited for the sensation to settle, counting heartbeats the way Maa had taught me when fear grew teeth.
One. Two. Three.
It dulled, but it didn’t disappear. It never did. Somewhere deep inside me, something was awake: watching, waiting, restless in a way that felt older than this life.
Outside, Emberfall District was waking reluctantly. Narrow streets glistened with last night’s ash. Vendors moved quietly, stalls half-assembled. Red cloth hung from doorways, blessings, they said. Warnings, more like.
The air smelled of bread, smoke, sweat, and fear.
People called this day different things.
The nobles called it The Choosing Day.
The priests called it holy.
The slums called it The Day of Offering.
I called it what it was.
Cruel.
As I walked uphill toward the upper district, the world changed around me. Stone roads widened. Water ran cleaner in the gutters. Guards stood straighter, armor polished bright enough to reflect the lie of celebration.
Tomorrow, there would be feasts.
Music.
Laughter.
As if tonight’s death didn’t matter.
The Lionhart manor loomed pale and elegant against the darkening sky. I knocked at the servants’ door and was let in without a word.
Inside, the house hummed with preparation, maids rushing, cooks arguing, priests murmuring in corners.
I felt it again as I passed them, a strange prickle under my skin whenever I moved too close to the runes etched into the walls.
My chest burned.
I hurried on.
Upstairs, everything felt heavier.
I knocked softly.
“It’s Serina,” I said.
The door opened a c***k.
Lady Izabeth Lionhart stood there, composed and brittle, eyes rimmed red beneath her flawless posture.
“You’re late,” she said.
“I apologize, my lady.”
She stepped aside.
Eloise sat on the edge of her bed, hands trembling in her lap. When she looked at me, relief and terror warred across her face.
“I don’t want to die,” she whispered.
“I know,” I said.
And meant it.
The horns sounded outside.
Three long blasts.
The signal.
A moment later, fists pounded on the manor doors below.
“Prepare the Offering,” a voice called. “You have one hour.”
Lady Izabeth’s gaze snapped to mine.
And beneath her grief, beneath her composure, I saw something colder.
Fear.
Not for her daughter.
For something else entirely.
“Serina,” she said quietly. “Come with me.”
My chest tightened, heat flaring beneath my skin as if something deep inside me had just recognized the moment.
This was where everything broke.
- Writer
