It had been a week since the battlefield.
Seven days since Kara had lost... him.
A week of waking to the same reality. It hadn’t improved. It hadn’t gotten easier.
The first morning had been the worst. Because she’d forgotten. She’d woken reaching for him, thinking, for one heartbeat, that he’d been beside her. Choking fresh grief had torn through her when she’d realised he wasn’t there.
That he had died.
The flood of pain was so violent that Alys and Sienna had pressed trembling hands to her temples, pouring magic into her until sleep dragged her under again. But sleep was no mercy. She dreamed of him still. And then she woke again. And again. And every time she woke, he was still gone. Now, a week later, the pain was no less. The numbness people promised never came. Only a hollow ache. An empty space where he should have been.
This is no way to live.
It was not the first time she’d thought it. But it was true. And she wasn’t sure how long she could endure it. She would stay breathing, at least long enough to say goodbye – he deserved that. After that... she couldn’t see. Didn’t want to.
Today, she stood in Thorne. Today, she was expected to watch him be put in the ground. Plans had been made, mostly by Rowan – Tobias couldn’t bring himself to choose the details – for a hero’s funeral. Kara pulled nervously at the sleeves of the black gown she wore. Alys hadpicked it for her, laid it out. She’d had to. Kara hadn’t been able to make one single decision.
She wasn’t ready for this. But the bells of Thorne tolled, low and heavy, carrying across the Keep.
It was time.
Kara walked down the steps towards the main hall, Alys and Sienna at her side, pale-faced and silent. They’d hardly left her side since it happened. She didn’t have the words to tell them what it meant to her. Tobias, Rowan, and Saffra were waiting, tears already running down Saffra’s cheeks. His sisters were a comfort she hadn’t expected. They reminded her of him in little ways. Helped her pretend he hadn’t really gone.
But when she saw the coffin laid before her draped in crimson, the black Thorne sigil stark against the cloth, her knees buckled.
He’s in there.
Tobias was at her side in an instant, his strong arm around her. “You are Thorne now. You are my family. And I will not let you fall.”
The words steadied her, but the sight of that coffin threw her mind back to the journey home. To the carriage. How she’d stumbled through the soldiers that guarded his body when they’d stopped to rest, mad with grief, clawing at the carriage doors. She’d needed to see him. Needed proof this wasn’t some nightmare.
“He’s not dead – open it, please, he’s not–”
They’d tried to hold her back, but she’d fought them wildly. Shrieking. Sobbing. In the end they’d let her go, let the madness take her as she pounded and raked at the doors until her hands were bloody. But they still would not open it. It had been sealed – Tobias’s orders – to preserve what dignity remained.
It had taken Tobias himself to catch her wrists, his face lined with his own grief, and whisper: “Kara, he’s gone. I know it hurts, but it’s not really him in there. Not anymore.”
She’d known then. She knew now. But his coffin still made her want to scream. It just lay before her. Final. Unmoving. The oak doors opened and weak autumn sunlight shone into the hall. The coffin was lifted, held by Thorne’s strongest captains, those who knew him best, and the people gathered fell into a hush. Together, she and the Thorne line followed as it began the slow descent through the Keep towards the temple. So many had come. All of Thorne lined the streets, banners lowered, heads bowed. And not just Thorne – members from every House stood in sombre silence, a sea of black. They’d come to honourthe Hero of Vallenna. To thank Sebastian Thorne for giving his life for them.
He would have hated this. The gratitude, the speeches.
He’d have smirked, muttered something cutting under his breath, and slipped out halfway through.
Every step towards the temple felt like a step towards her own execution. Death would have been kinder. At least if she’d fallen on the battlefield beside him, they’d be together. But she knew – deep in her ruined soul – that he would never have allowed it. She heard his voice still, from the cell where he’d saved her life, cruel in its clarity:
You’re not dying here.
But he wasn’t here anymore.
He can’t stop me.
The thought came unbidden – with terrifying focus. It almost gave her... relief. To never again wake to find nothing, to have an end to this pain–
No.
She shoved it down. She owed him more than that. So she kept moving, one foot in front of the other, following the coffin into the temple. It was full. Every bench taken. The air thick with the scent of burning candlewax. Hands reached out as she walked past, attempting comfort. Soldiers who’d fought beside him, strangers who’d doubted and now grieved. She hardly felt it. But they passed murmurs of sympathy anyway. Whispers of thanks to the woman who had saved Vallenna.
Like that matters now.
