Page 93 of The Last Rose of Ashwood

How irritating, to discover that survival had not killed every useless thing inside her.

She had thought that by sunrise, Seren Veyr would discover an empty lean-to and another lie to add to the growing collection between them. Briar Hollow would continue unraveling. The Council would return with cleaner weapons and better excuses. The roots would call, the old seal would strain, and Aelira Ashwood would remain what history had made her. Dead, and therefore untouchable. Untouchable to the world. Safe because she was gone. The word nearly made her laugh.

Nothing about her had been safe in ten years. Not her name. Not her blood. Not the grief she carried like a second spine. Still, there were degrees of danger, and staying here meant choosing the worst of them. Staying meant old magic that knew her too intimately. Staying meant villagers looking at her with dawning horror. Staying meant the Council learning that the last Ashwood heir still breathed.

Staying, unfortunately, meant Seren.

The name should have belonged with the other dangers.

Roots. Council. Blood. Recognition. Exposure.

Instead, it stood apart. Seren was not the oldest danger, nor the most powerful, nor even the most immediate. That distinction still belonged to whatever waited beneath Briar Hollow with its patient green hunger. But Seren had become dangerous in a more intimate way. She had begun making Aelira explain herself inside her own mind, which was intolerable. She had begun appearing in Aelira’s thoughts not as the sword of the revolution, not as the woman history had dressed in victory, but as a figure by firelight with mud on her boots and tired eyes that saw too much.

Aelira had spent ten years surviving by leaving before attachment could learn her name. Now her horse remained ready. The road waited below. And still, the thought of Seren waking to find her gone felt less like triumph than cowardice dressed in sensible clothing. How unbearably humiliating that was—how painfully revealing as well.

Aelira closed her gloved hand around the reins. There it was at last. Not the noblest reason. Not the strongest. Not the one she would ever admit if interrogated by gods, councils, or inconveniently observant generals. But it stood among the others all the same, sharp, and unwelcome.

Seren Veyr, who had been easier to hate before she became tired, wounded, suspicious, brave, infuriatingly competent, and cruelly human.

Seren Veyr, who had looked at Wren as if one frightened child were reason enough to defy every old law beneath the earth.

Seren Veyr, who had persisted between Aelira and a chain before either of them had earned the right to such foolishness.

Aelira hated that most. She hated more that hatred had begun needing company.

The horse shifted, breath steaming in the cold. The southern road waited beyond the trees, dark and open, a clean line cut through the snow. Aelira could still choose it. She looked through the cabin window. Wren’s drawing lay on the table beside Seren’s sleeping hand, the charcoal lines protected from the damp by oilcloth, the old listening symbol dark against the page. The child herself was miles behind them, tucked somewhere inside a village that did not understand what called to it, and still the drawing seemed to watch Aelira as though distance meant nothing to old things.

Her father’s voice came from memory, low beneath the Worldroot.

"Pretty songs are for children who inherit peace."

Aelira had inherited no peace. Neither had Wren.

Slowly, she removed her hand from the reins. The choice did not feel like redemption. She did not trust redemptions. They were stories people told after consequences had been paid by someone else. This felt colder than that. Harder. Less beautiful. It felt like placing one more chain around her own wrist and deciding, for reasons she did not yet understand, not to call it captivity.

Aelira unsaddled the horse before dawn. When Seren found her later near the lean-to, Aelira was already dressed for the road north. The general’s eyes moved over her cloak, her boots, the blade at her side, the faint trace of hay clinging to one sleeve. Too perceptive by half.

Seren’s mouth tightened. “You were in the stable.”

Aelira looked toward the northern road. “How observant.”

“You were leaving.”

She paused before realizing that Seren observed far too much already for her answer to be a lie this time. “I considered it.”

Seren went very still. Aelira hated that she noticed the hurt before Seren buried it. “And?” Seren asked.

Aelira did not look at her. “I reconsidered.”

“Why?”

Because the roots were calling. Because the Council knew too much. Because Wren had drawn the door before any of them knew its name. Because you would follow the wrong truth into the dark and call it duty.

Aelira chose the least dangerous answer. “Because I dislike unfinished business.”

Seren watched her for a long moment. Then, softly, “Liar.”

Aelira’s mouth curved faintly. “Yes,” she said.