Page 7 of She Who Was Severed

I hate how much I want him to keep going.

“Freya…”

“Don’t say my name if it’s not to choose me.”

I turn. I walk.

But his voice follows.

“You felt it. When you touched the altar. Something answered.”

I don’t look back.

“Maybe. But it wasn’t you.”

And I’m gone before he can deny it.

Because he’s right. And I hate him for it.

Because I wanted it to be him. And I hate myself more for that.

I keep walking. The Ash Tower waits.

They forgot what waits in the dark. If they wanted a monster, they should’ve left me dead.

They don’t get to act surprised now.

- x -

The tower is half-collapsed, hollowed by fire and left to rot. They still call it the Ash Tower—because no one wants to name what came after. It squats just outside Virelle’s southern rise, beyond the last prayer gate—close enough to Virelle to see the spires, far enough to pretend it doesn’t count.

Gray stone, black ribs of once-sacred wood, iron braces eaten by rust and time. It leans like it’s tired of holding up all the history no one wants to remember.

I get why it was left alone. It feels like a wound the land decided not to close.

I wait until nightfall. No one follows. No one watches. The Severed don’t warrant surveillance. We’re ghosts with pulses.

The door doesn’t creak when I push it open. It just exhales.

Inside, it’s colder than outside, but not in a way that comes from wind or shade. It’s a bone-deep kind of cold, the kind you feel in the teeth behind your heart. The floor’s cracked tile, worn down to blunt nubs. There are scorch marks on the ceiling that don’t match any flame I know. And the air—it hums. Like something here remembers a song but can’t bear to sing it.

I don’t hesitate. I follow the spiral stair down until it ends in a wall of packed stone and dead roots. The instructions weren’t vague. Break the floor. Don’t wait for permission.

The bead the priestess gave me is still in my pocket. I press it to the stone and whisper nothing. Just let it happen.

The wall cracks. The floor splits.

Something sighs below.

I fall the last few feet into the vault.

The air is thicker here. Not just with dust or time. With intent. Like this place was built to be forgotten, not because it held nothing, but because it held too much.

Roots hang from the ceiling, dripping sap that smells wrong. Not rot. Not life. Something else. The walls are etched in clawed script, but none I recognize. The kind of marks made when someone needed to speak but didn’t have the right tools. Or throat.

There’s only one object in the room.

A pedestal. Stone. Cracked.