He kisses me again. Softer this time. A benediction instead of a claim.
“We should leave before the Council realizes we’re planning to disappear.” He tucks Torval’s dog tags into a pocket close to his heart. “Varn will buy us time, but she won’t lie to the Arbiters. Her loyalty has limits.”
“Where will we go first?”
“East. There’s a mining town called Ironreach that’s been having trouble with their catacombs. The dead there are restless—have been for decades. The local death wardens have been burning without rites, and the situation is getting worse.” He moves to the weapons rack. Selects his curved blade and beginsstrapping it to his belt. “They sent a request to the Guild three days ago. Requested assistance.”
“And you think a death warden and a mourning witch showing up uninvited will be welcome?”
“I think we’ll be useful. That’s usually enough.” He offers me a set of clothes from his chest—a shirt that will hang loose on my smaller frame, trousers that will need to be rolled at the ankles. “It’s not much, but it’s better than a bloodstained rag.”
I take the clothes. Dress quickly while he finishes his preparations. The fabric smells like him—smoke and iron and the clean scent beneath that I’ve come to associate with safety.
Safety isn’t a location anymore. It’s a person. This impossible orc who burns the dead I speak for, and we’ve found a way to do both.
A knock at the door makes us both freeze.
Drokhar’s hand goes to his blade. I step back, positioning myself behind him without needing to be told. Old instincts. The survival mechanisms of a mourning witch who has spent her life dodging death wardens and Council enforcers.
“Commander?” Varn’s voice, muffled by the door. “The Council has sent word. They’re demanding a report within the hour.”
Drokhar and I exchange a glance. In his eyes I see the same calculation I’m running—how long we have, how far we can get, whether it’s worth trying to negotiate or better to simply disappear.
“Tell them I’m indisposed.” Drokhar’s voice carries the flat authority he uses with subordinates. “The assault took more out of me than expected.”
A pause. Then: “Commander, they’re not going to accept?—”
“Tell them the Gravetide King is dead. The revenants have returned to their graves. The crisis is over.” He moves toward thewindow, checking the angle of the sun. “They can wait one more hour for the details.”
Another pause. Longer this time. I can almost hear Varn weighing her options—loyalty to her commander against fear of the Council, duty against whatever conclusion she’s drawn about what’s happening in this room.
“Understood.” Her footsteps retreat down the corridor.
Drokhar turns back to me. “We have an hour. Maybe less.”
“Is that enough time?”
“It’s enough to get outside the walls.” He crosses to the door, cracks it open, checks the corridor. “After that, we improvise.”
I gather the last of our supplies—waterskins, dried food, the medical kit I found in the corner of his room. The work is familiar. I’ve fled before. Hidden in the Undercroft while the Council’s enforcers searched for the mourning witch who gave grief a voice.
But this time is different. This time I’m not running alone.
Drokhar takes my hand as we slip out of the compound. His grip is solid. Reassuring. The hand of a man who has navigated worse situations than a political escape.
The Ash Pits stretch around us, still and hazy in the morning light, the pyre-smoke thinned but never gone. Death wardens are already at work—burning the corpses from last night’s battle, tending the pyres that have been the city’s defense for generations. They don’t look up as we pass. Don’t notice their commander walking away from everything he’s built.
Or maybe they do notice. Maybe they’re pretending not to see.
We reach the edge of the compound. Beyond lies the road that leads out of Blackreach—past the lower districts, through the main gates, into the countryside that stretches toward the horizon.
Drokhar pauses at the threshold. Looks back at the pyres one last time.
“Twenty years.” His voice is quiet. “I built my entire life on those fires.”
“You can build a different life.” I squeeze his hand. “One that doesn’t require you to silence things that deserve to speak.”
He turns back to me. In the early light, his gray eyes carry unexpected warmth—the cold ash thinning to reveal the man beneath.