Aftermath In The Ashes
375 Words
Ash sat with his back against a half-melted lamp post, ice still steaming off his arms. Luna curled beside him, her fingers brushing against his — burned and raw, but still reaching for something solid. Something real.
“You good?” he asked quietly.
Luna didn’t answer at first.
She watched a scorched feather — hers — float down onto the frost-covered street. It hissed where it landed, curled in on itself like a dying flame.
“No,” she said finally. “But I’m not broken either.”
He looked at her, really looked. Hair wild, skin smeared with soot and blood, but eyes bright. Fierce. Alive.
“Then we’re doing something right.”
Vexa approached, limping. “We need to disappear. The press is coming. Hunters too.”
Ash stood, offered Luna his hand. “Together?”
She took it.
“Always.”
As they moved into the shadows again, the sound of helicopters began to echo overhead.
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Far from earth, in a realm untouched by time or mortal perception, a circle of gods gathered. Cloaked in storm, shadow, stone, and flame.
A silver basin shimmered at the center, showing scenes from the city. The battle. The blaze. The frost.
A voice like thunder broke the silence.
“She awakens.”
Another, colder: “And the Ice God walks again. The prophecy is alive.”
A figure draped in moonlight leaned forward. “We were wrong to wait. The rogue stirs. Ozriel moves.”
Whispers flitted like birds around the council:
“She will burn the world.”
“He will freeze time.”
“Together, they are balance—or destruction.”
An ancient god, older than language, raised a withered hand. “Send the emissaries. Watch them. Judge them.”
A younger deity, fire-eyed and sharp, scoffed. “Or end them before the end finds us.”
Lightning cracked across the marble floor, silencing all.
“They were born for this,” the oldest said. “But we chose silence. Now we must choose war.”
The basin flared — Luna’s phoenix form flashing across it, followed by Ash’s blade of frozen light.
The council fell still.
A storm was coming. And its gods had only just begun to wake.
- Writer
