Ashes of Fate
1040 Words
Chapter Two
Smoke still breathed from the forest long after the fire had died.
It curled around the treetops like a living thing, refusing to lift, clinging to blackened branches and the hollowed ribs of the valley. Dawn arrived without warmth. Its pale light revealed what remained trees split open, earth scorched to bone, ash settling in soft drifts where moss once grew.
Wolves moved through the ruin without sound.
Their noses skimmed the ground. Their tails hung stiff. Each step left dark prints in the soot. When one paused, the others froze with it. When one lifted its head, ears pricked, the rest mirrored the motion like a single body breathing. One wolf scratched at the ground until his claws bled. Another circled the same fallen trunk three times, confused, frustrated. A third lifted his muzzle and tasted the air again and again, lips pulling back as if the smoke itself mocked him.
There was nothing.
At the edge of the valley, Alpha Ulric stood apart.
Ash dusted his boots. His cloak hung untouched by wind. He did not pace. He did not speak. He simply watched as the search unraveled before him.
A scout approached and dropped to one knee, shoulders trembling.
“The trail…” His voice cracked. He swallowed and tried again. “It stops here.”
Ulric did not look at him.
The scout waited. The silence pressed so heavily that his ears flattened of their own will.
“The fire erased it,” the scout whispered.
Ulric’s fingers tightened slowly at his side. Ash sifted through them.
“The fire does not erase,” Ulric said at last. His voice carried no heat. “It reveals.”
Another scout stepped forward, bolder or more foolish.“There was no body found.”
Ulric turned.
The movement was unhurried but the effect was immediate. The wolf stiffened, breath hitching as silver eyes fixed on him.
“No,” Ulric said. “There wasn’t.”
The Alpha looked back toward the ruined forest. Toward the place where the flames had burned hottest. Toward the absence that screamed louder than any howl.“She knew these woods better than any of you,” he continued quietly. “She ran them as a child. She mapped them in her blood.” His jaw tightened. “If she fell, it was not here.”
A low murmur rippled through the pack laced with unease and doubt.
Ulric lifted one hand.
The sound died instantly.
“Beta.”
A tall wolf stepped forward. Scarred but steady. She bowed her head.
“Speak.”
She hesitated, then said, “The Seer said the child would be born under a broken moon. That his life would...”
Ulric’s hand closed into a fist. “Enough.” The word struck like a blade.
His gaze hardened, sweeping across the pack. “I will not have my rule undone by whispers and stars.”
He turned sharply.“Search the borders. Human lands, rivers, roads, stone walls. If a breath has sheltered him, I want it found.”
The wolves shifted, restless.
“And if he is found,” Ulric added, voice dropping, “cut down whatever dares to call him theirs.”
“Yes, Alpha.”
“And send word to the Iron Fangs.”
A pause.
“They do not stop or they fall dead.”
The pack scattered, bodies blurring as they shifted and ran, ash exploding beneath their paws.
Ulric remained. He inhaled smoke. And beneath it, faint, stubborn was hope. Hers. His lip curled.
“You always were difficult,” he murmured. “Even when running.”
Miles away, morning arrived softly.
Mother Loveth stepped outside the orphanage with a cup of tea warming her hands. The sky was washed clean by rain, pale blue and harmless. Birds dared to sing.
A blackened leaf drifted down and landed near her feet.
She stared at it.
The nearest forest lay far beyond the river. Fires had never crossed that distance.
Her gaze lifted slowly to the concrete slab by the doorway. It was empty. Her chest tightened, though she couldn’t say why.
Inside, the baby stirred.
Loveth turned back indoors, shutting the door behind her.
She moved through the orphanage with practiced care, straightening blankets, folding clothes, checking bowls. Her hands never stopped, but her thoughts wandered.
The river outside murmured steadily.
She had grown up hearing stories about it. How it swallowed secrets. How some nights the fog moved against the current. How voices carried farther than they should.
She had learned to work louder than fear. But when she knelt beside the woven blanket and looked at the child, the room felt… thinner.
Moses lay still, eyes open, tracking something she could not see.
She smiled despite herself.“You’re watching the ceiling again.”
He did not blink.
As she lifted him, her fingers brushed the skin at his upper arm.
It was Warm, not fevered, Alive.
There, a faint crescent, pale as moonlight, resting beneath the skin. When her thumb passed over it, the warmth deepened, spreading into her palm.
Loveth pulled her hand back.
The baby made a small sound not a cry. A breath. As if settling.
Her heart pounded.
She looked toward the door. Toward the river beyond the walls.Then she drew the child closer to her chest and exhaled slowly.
“No one is taking you,” she whispered, unsure who she was speaking to.
High above, where clouds thinned into nothing, two presences watched.
“He is hidden,” one said, its form wavering like heat above stone.
The other did not answer immediately.
Below them, the river curved like a silver scar. The forest breathed. Somewhere, wolves ran.
“The Alpha hunts,” the lesser being pressed. “And the child carries too much.”
“He carries exactly enough,” the higher voice replied.
“And if it breaks him?”
A pause.
“Then the world will break with him.”
Below, Moses slept against Loveth’s shoulder. She rocked gently, humming an old tune that trembled at the edges.
Outside, the wind shifted.The river changed its sound.
And somewhere beyond human sight, the hunt found its direction again.
- Writer
