The Reign of Ash and Blossom Ch. 2

Chapter 2 – Shadows at the Gate

Months passed. The scent of the shimmering garden no longer haunted Kael in the waking hours, but in dreams it lingered like a phantom. Some nights he woke with the memory of her voice in his ear, warm as breath, cold as a knife. Other nights, he saw her smile over a field of bodies.

He told no one.

It was early winter when the warning came. The scouts horse stumbled into the courtyard at dusk, its flanks foam-slick, its rider barely holding the saddle. Kael was there before the guards could speak. “Report.”

The man swallowed, his lips cracked from the cold. “An army, Captain. Thousands. Marching from the east under a black banner. At their head-“ He hesitated, as if the words themselves might bring doom. “A woman in silver. She walks beside a man in black armour, eyes white as flame.”

Kael’s chest tightened, though his voice was steady. “How long?”

“A day, maybe less.”

The gates of Eldoria had never fallen. Its walls were older than the crown itself, forged with the blessing of the First Kings. But Kael knew walls meant nothing when the enemy already stood inside you.

Night came, and with it, the sound – a slow, measured beat like a war drum, carrying through the snow. Torches bobbed in the distance, stretching into the horizon, a river of fire against the dark.

The king summoned his guard to the throne room; his daughter seated silently beside him. She was young – barely grown – but her eyes met Kael’s with a courage that reminded him of someone else. Someone he loved.

“Captain,” the king said, his voice heavy with years and knowledge of what was to come, “you will take my daughter from this city if the walls are breached. She is to live, no matter the cost.”

Kael bowed his head. “I will protect her with my life, your majesty”

Before dawn, the enemy was at the gates.

The black banner unfurled against the grey sky, its emblem a blossom of silver fire. Behind it the hordes stretched into the mist – soldiers clad with steel blackened by ash; their shields painted with petals. At their center, she stood.

Selvara.

Her gown was not the silken drift of the garden, but armour wrought like flowing glass, every curve and line a mirror to the blossoms at her feet. The white-eyed man beside her was taller than Kael remembered himself to be, his presence a shadow that clung to her like a loyal hound. And when her gaze found the walls of Eldoria, she smiled.

The siege broke with a sound like shattering bone. Arrows hissed through the air, ballista bolts screamed into the gates, and the streets filled with smoke of burning oil. Kael fought until his arms numbed, his blade a flicker of steel in the storm.

But the walls were breached.

The king fell in the throne room, his blood pooling at the base of the dais. His final command came not to Kael, but to his daughter – a wordless nod, a look that said live.

Kael took her hand and ran. Through the burning halls, past the screams and clash of steel, down to the hidden passages known only to the High Guard. His own kin waited there, ready to flee into forest and mountain.

At the final door, he placed the princess into his wife’s arms. “Go,” he said. “Don’t stop until you’re beyond the river.”

She tried to answer, but the roar of the battle swallowed her voice. He turned back before he could change his mind.

Selvara was in the courtyard.

The fighting still around her like waves pulling from the shore. She saw him, and the man at her side stepped away, as if this meeting had been promised.

“Kael Voss,” she said, her voice carrying even through the din. “You left me once.” Her eyes blazed, and in their light, he saw the garden – moonlit, eternal, waiting. Blossoms began to bloom at his feet, their glow casting ghostly petals across his armour.

Kael raised his sword. “And I will leave you again.”

But even as he spoke, he felt the garden’s pull – the scent rising from the flowers, the world narrowing her eyes. His grip faltered, his breath quickened and he knew the battle was already lost.

“You will be mine,” Selvara said, her voice a promise.

Selvara lifted her hand. Invisible threads wrapped around him, lifting him from the ground. He rose into the cold night air, weightless, helpless screams, but drawn towards her.

When his boots touched the earth again, he stood before her.

And when he stepped forward, it was not toward battle but toward the garden.