The days that followed folded into one another like the pages of a half-burnt tome—charred at the edges, full of stories that refused to be told clearly. The wilderness swallowed time, and Caedren walked its green depths without complaint. The trees whispered overhead, thick-limbed and ancient, bearing witness in silence. Every step forward deepened the weight in his chest. The path had not begun at Aerlan's ruin. That was merely where it became visible.
They were not alone. Neris, the scarred woman, traveled beside him, though never quite with him. Her gait was fluid, but there was tension behind it—like a bow drawn halfway and never loosed. The others trailed close behind, bound to her more by memory than by faith. They did not speak to Caedren. Not yet. But their eyes followed him, questioning, measuring.
They reached the edge of the forest under a sky brimming with stars. A half-moon cast silver light upon the clearing where makeshift tents formed a rough crescent around a fire pit. These were no soldiers' tents—no banners, no sigils. Just worn canvas, soot-stained, patched with years of hardship. The people here bore the same marks. Scarred hands. Hollowed cheeks. Eyes that had watched cities fall.
Neris led him to the heart of the camp. A large tent, held together with fraying rope and the stubbornness of the living, stood like a relic. Within it, a gathering of voices quieted as he entered. Firelight carved shadows into the corners, revealing a circle of rough-hewn faces, all turned toward him.
"There," Neris said, nodding toward Caedren. "The one who walked out of Aerlan. The one who speaks of choices."
At the table sat a man whose presence filled the space like stone fills a grave—weighty, immovable. His beard was streaked with iron-gray, and his eyes held the sheen of a man who had buried too many comrades to count.
He didn't rise. He didn't need to. Authority draped him like a cloak.
"What makes you think we've any room left for choices?" he asked, voice slow as thunder over mountains.
"I don't think you do," Caedren said, stepping into the circle. "But I'm offering one anyway."
The man studied him. "Another preacher," he said at last, with a grunt that might've been a laugh or the beginning of a cough. "We've buried more than one who came through here with words."
"I don't preach," Caedren said. "I remember. That's different."
Silence. The fire popped. One of the younger men glanced at Neris. She nodded, almost imperceptibly.
"Speak, then," the old man said.
Caedren's voice did not rise. It did not need to.
"You think you fight for freedom," he said, sweeping his eyes across the room. "But you are only resisting death. Not shaping life. You cling to the bones of old kingdoms and forgotten gods. You fight shadows and call it justice."
A younger woman near the fire bristled. "And what would you have us do? Lay down and die?"
"No," Caedren said. "Not die. But live differently. The world that made your suffering is gone. You need not inherit its rot."
Neris stepped forward. "You speak like a man who's never had to choose between vengeance and starvation."
"I have," Caedren replied. "Many times. But vengeance is hunger without end. Starvation of the soul."
The fire danced in her eyes, catching the deep scar that split her cheek. Her jaw tightened, but she did not answer.
The old man folded his arms. "You want an oath."
"Yes."
"And what would it bind us to?" he asked, tone sharp. "To you?"
Caedren shook his head. "To the future. To the idea that power does not make right. That kings are not sacred. That no blade should be raised in the name of thrones already crumbled into dust."
A long silence stretched. Even the fire seemed to hold its breath.
"And if we refuse?" the old man asked.
"Then you remain as you are. Wandering. Bleeding. Dying," Caedren said. "I will walk on, and you will bury another generation in the ruins of the last."
The tent grew colder, despite the fire. The wind picked up outside, tugging at the canvas.
At last, Neris spoke—not to Caedren, but to the circle.
"He walked into the ashes of Aerlan without a sword drawn. Carried a broken child. Faced a killer without hate." Her voice faltered, only for a moment. "I've followed worse men."
The old man grunted again. He reached beneath the table and withdrew a small iron coin—weathered, bent, almost useless. He tossed it onto the wood.
"We've no kings here," he said. "No gods either. Only the oath we make tonight."
Caedren stepped forward. He laid his hand upon the coin. "Then let this be the beginning."
And so the oath was forged—not in blood or battle, but in firelight and silence. It was not signed. It was remembered. Spoken not aloud, but inward, into the marrow. A promise not to rebuild what had already failed, but to imagine what might rise in its place.
The Ashen Oath was not an army. Not yet. But it was a beginning. A crack in the old stone.
And from that crack, the fire would come.