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Ash-Child and River-Blood
Last Updated:
2025-06-24 09:42:31
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River witch The Drowning Crown
The Drowning CrownThe crown lay where it had fallen—in the trench, beneath miles of black water, on a throne of stone and spine.It had once pulsed with will, bound to tides, pulling souls into the deep like a whisper behind their ribs. But now it was dormant. Waiting.The river above no longer listened to it.Because she had said no.The girl it called Salt-Blooded had broken the pact. Not out of rebellion. Not out of war. But out of something far more dangerous:Love.The sea does not understand love. It understands hunger. Pull. Obedience. Currents.But Mireya had remembered the warmth of land. The ache of laughter. The grief of memory. The strength of holding someone’s hand instead of drowning alone.She had remembered herself.And that, above all else, had changed the tide.—It had been three weeks since they returned to the village on the hill.News of the returned “drowned” spread like stormfire. Some ran in fear. Others wept and kissed the salt-crusted cheeks of children the
River witch Tideborn
TidebornThe sun rose slow and low over the water, like it wasn’t sure it was welcome.Mireya stood at the river’s edge, barefoot, salt-washed, arms crossed as she stared across the endless current. The river looked different now—brighter, clearer. But it also watched her. She could feel it—not as a threat anymore, but as a twin.It knew her now.Behind her, the freed drowned—now fully breathing, speaking, and blinking in the morning light—slept in a makeshift camp. They had begun calling each other by old names, trading memories like seashells: “I used to work at the ferry,” “My mother lived on the hill,” “There was a girl—I think I loved her once.”She had done that.Not with magic.But with memory.With blood that remembered the sea but chose the land.Bastian sat on a log nearby, half-dozing, still watching her like he couldn’t believe she was real.She was quiet when she spoke. “I still hear them. In the current.”He stood and came to her side. “The drowned?”“No,” she said. “The
River witch The Blood-Flood Pact
The Blood-Flood PactMireya stood in the center of the collapse, breathless.Where the Tide-Heart had been was now only mist—glowing, pulsing, laced with the scent of rain and blood. The chamber that once felt eternal now cracked at the edges. Water ran upward. The walls flickered like torn canvas.But she was still there.Alive.Somehow.Bastian knelt nearby, covering his face as a final wave of saltwind ripped through the space. His hair dripped, his hands burned faintly from the light that had poured out of Mireya. “Are we dead?” he asked, coughing.“No,” Mireya whispered. “But the sea will never be the same.”Then came the voice—not from around them, but from within her.The drowned queen.Fainter now.“You have severed the Heart,” it rasped. “You have broken the pact.”“I didn’t break it,” Mireya replied, eyes glowing faintly green. “I rewrote it.”Her skin shimmered—part salt, part shadow. Her veins still pulsed with water, but it no longer drowned her. It obeyed her.A pact ha
River witch : The Sea Within Her
: The Sea Within HerThe figure that stepped from the vision wasn’t made of flesh. It shimmered, translucent, like a body formed of memory and tide.But its face was hers.Not exactly. The cheekbones were sharper, the eyes older, the mouth crueler. It looked like what Mireya might become if she surrendered everything—her will, her name, her heart—to the deep.The drowned around them were gone. The salt gate behind them had vanished. They were inside something vast, ageless—a chamber that pulsed like the heart of the ocean.The figure stared at Mireya with something close to affection.“Do you know what you are yet?” it asked, voice like water slipping over bones.Mireya’s hand closed into a fist. “I’m not your vessel.”“No,” the reflection said. “You’re not just a vessel. You’re the anchor. The tether. The mouth of the river and the teeth of the sea.”Bastian stepped in front of Mireya, but she touched his shoulder, gently easing him back.“I’ve seen you before,” she said. “In dreams.
River witch The Salt Gate Opens
The Salt Gate OpensThe farther north they traveled, the less the world obeyed itself.Trees grew in twisted spirals, like they were writhing to escape the soil. The sun no longer rose or set—it hovered behind clouds, a dim eye watching them. Even the animals had vanished. No birds. No insects. Just silence and the soft, endless squelch of barefoot drowned following Mireya like tidewater drawn to the moon.Bastian had stopped asking questions. The answers never made him feel better. His only job now was keeping Mireya alive—or what was left of her.She didn’t sleep anymore. Didn’t eat. Yet her body kept moving, steady as a tide. The coral crown was fused deeper into her brow, bone threads spreading like veins beneath her skin. Her voice, when she spoke, sometimes echoed.And her eyes… they weren’t hers.They were the river’s now.“We’re close,” she murmured that morning, kneeling beside a cracked stone slab half-swallowed by vine and salt.Bastian wiped sweat from his brow. “Close to
River witch Where Rivers Remember
Where Rivers RememberWater surged from the broken statue like a living thing—rushing, swirling, climbing the banks without touching the trees. It swept through the clearing in a spiral, circling Mireya without soaking her feet. The drowned dropped their heads to the ground, whispering in tongues older than land.Bastian grabbed Mireya’s hand, trying to pull her back.“You’re not doing this,” he said. “This is them. This is their flood, not yours!”But her fingers were ice-cold, stiff, unyielding.“I don’t know where I end,” Mireya whispered, “and they begin.”The river sang louder now. Not water, not wind—something deeper. A chorus of old voices. She couldn’t block them anymore. They filled her head with memories that weren’t hers: women drowning with smiles on their faces, cities sunken beneath coral towers, kings kneeling in the tide begging forgiveness. It wasn’t just history.It was prophecy.“The flood doesn’t destroy,” Mireya said suddenly. “It restores. It remembers what the w
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