Kingdom of Ash

Great Hall, aiming for the north tower.
It was a lonely, cold walk to the room he
sought. As if the entire castle were a tomb.
He knocked lightly on the wooden door
near the top of the tower, and it immediately
opened and shut, Lysandra slipping into the
hall before Evangeline could stir in her bed.
In the flickering light of Aedion’s candle,
the shadows etched on Lysandra’s face from a
week of fighting from sunup to sundown were
starker, deeper. “Ready?” he asked softly,
turning back down the stairs.
It had become their tradition—for him to
see Lysandra upstairs at night, then come to
meet her in the morning. The only bright point
in their long, horrible days. Sometimes,
Evangeline accompanied them, narrating her
time running messages and errands for
Darrow. Sometimes, it was only the two of
them trudging along.