Morning broke like a bruised eye, bleeding light across Ravenhold's wreckage. Smoke still curled from splintered beams, but the scent of rot and charred flesh was slowly giving way to something cleaner, fresher — the sharp, green tang of new growth.
Seraphina had barely slept. Her mind refused to quiet, replaying the battle in savage detail. Every scream. Every spark of her magic. Every drop of blood.
Yet as dawn crawled across the ruined courtyard, something stirred in her chest — a fragile, cautious hope.
She stepped out into the courtyard, where survivors had already begun clearing debris. The once-great banners of Ravenhold, shredded and burned, lay in piles waiting to be mended or replaced. Children darted among the workers, giggling in a way that made Seraphina's heart squeeze painfully.
How could there be laughter, even now?
Valen approached from the training yard, sleeves rolled up, sweat already darkening the fresh bandages around his side. He had been helping to lift the massive fallen gates back into place, refusing to stand idle while others rebuilt.
He looked so alive in the pale gold morning, and Seraphina felt a surge of grateful, almost savage love.
"Morning, my lady," he teased, voice rough with exhaustion but warm with tenderness.
"Valen," she replied, brushing ash from his cheek. "You should rest."
His grin was a thin cut of defiance. "Not a chance."
They shared a look — one that spoke of battles won, wounds carried, and a future that refused to die.
---
Work continued throughout the day.
Seraphina joined the masons, using a spark of her power to lift stones too heavy for mortal arms. Each time she did, she felt the strain deep in her bones — a reminder that magic had a price, no matter how noble the cause.
She helped a young apprentice named Jorric, whose hands shook every time he tried to set a new keystone. The boy's eyes still carried the glassy fear of siege.
"Steady," Seraphina told him gently, guiding his hands with her own. "The wall will stand because you make it stand."
Jorric nodded, tears brimming, then forced a smile. "Yes, milady."
---
By evening, the courtyard looked less like a battlefield and more like a worksite. Fires had been doused, bodies buried with whispered prayers, and even the fountain — shattered during the attack — was being repaired stone by stone.
Seraphina stepped away for a moment, catching her breath beneath a newly mended archway.
She could hear singing — soft, broken, but achingly beautiful. A lullaby.
She followed the sound and found an old woman rocking a toddler in her arms, crooning over the child with a voice worn by decades. The lullaby was older than Seraphina's memory, something carried through generations, and it made her eyes sting.
They're still singing, she thought, heart twisting. We're still here.
---
Night fell, and a sense of uneasy peace settled over the fortress.
Valen joined Seraphina on the western wall, where the view stretched out to endless rolling hills stained silver by moonlight.
"Look," he said, pointing.
Far off, campfires glimmered in the valley — refugees who had fled during the Dread King's reign, returning cautiously to their homeland.
"They're coming home," Valen said, voice rough with wonder. "They're actually coming back."
Seraphina smiled, leaning against the stone parapet. The world felt impossibly wide again, full of roads they might still walk together.
"I want to help them rebuild," she told him. "Not just Ravenhold, but all the lands that suffered."
Valen nodded. "We'll do it. Brick by brick. Day by day."
A breeze caught Seraphina's hair, carrying the scent of woodsmoke and damp earth.
She drew a deep breath, willing herself to believe — to truly believe — that the darkness had broken, and something gentler waited on the other side.
---