THE THRONE HE LEFT ME TO BURN IN

--- *SEASON 1 EPISODE 1: The Valley That Burned* The order was simple. Hold the valley until the Ash Guard arrived. Three hundred men. That's what Rhys promised me. I am Captain Sera Ashford, and I do not break. I held the valley for three days with fifty soldiers against a thousand. We bled. We burned our own cloaks for warmth. But we held. Because he said he would come. On the third night, I saw the banners on the ridge. Black. The Throne's black. Rhys. I lifted my sword, my voice raw. "He's here! The Commander is here!" My men cheered. We thought we were saved. Then I saw the archers. Not aiming at the enemy. Aiming at us. At the valley. Rhys Thorne, Lord of the Black Throne, my fiancé, stood on that ridge. The wind took his black cloak. He looked down at me. I could see his eyes even from that far. Cold. Empty. He raised his hand. "Fire," I heard him say. The wind carried it. I thought he meant fire the arrows at the enemy. He meant burn the valley. The first oil barrel fell. Then the second. The sky turned orange. The enemy screamed, but so did my men. The fire didn't care whose side you were on. I screamed his name. "RHYS!" He didn't move. He just watched. A burning beam fell and crushed my lieutenant. I tried to lift it. My hands burned. My armor melted into my skin. The smoke filled my lungs and I couldn't breathe, but I could still see him. He turned his horse. And rode away. He left me to burn. He left all of us to burn. That was how Captain Sera Ashford, the strongest sword of the Ash Guard, died. For duty. For a man who called it strategy. They told the capital I died a hero. They lied. I didn't die. I woke up three days later under ash. Everything was black. My men were black. The valley was black. My hands — I lifted my hands. The skin was gone. Underneath, something glowed like embers. Black fire, crawling up my arms. When I touched a fallen sword, it melted. I crawled out of that valley. No one saw me. No one looked for me. Why would they? Heroes don't crawl. I walked for a week until I reached the edge of the capital. I stole a veil. I stole gloves. I found an abandoned forge where the old smith died in the war. I became Ash. For three years, I made swords. Not normal swords. Swords that burn cold. Swords that never break. Every noble wanted one. They paid in gold and they never asked who made them, because I never spoke and I never showed my face. I heard stories. Rhys Thorne took the Black Throne made of a thousand swords. He married Lady Elara of the North for alliance. He became the most feared man in the empire. And every night, the servants say, he wakes up screaming about hands reaching for him in fire. Good. Today, a messenger came with a royal seal. "The Lord of the Black Throne requires one thousand swords for the northern war. He will come personally to commission them. Gold is no object." I looked at the seal. His seal. He is coming to my forge. Three years I waited. Rhys Thorne is going to walk into my forge, and he is going to beg me for swords. And he has no idea that the smith he needs is the woman he burned alive. --- *END OF EPISODE 1*