All Chapters of Ashes of the Sky: Chapter 1 - Chapter 6

The doors open. Not with a scream like the cell. Not with resistance. Just a heavy, final shift of iron that echoes deeper than anything else I've heard in five years. Then blinding light. I stop. It hits all at once. Too bright. Too open. Too much. I raise a hand, squinting against it, but I don't look away. Not after five years of being prisoner in Skyless Keep. No windows, no sunshine. I refuse to allow myself to look away. After my eyes adjust, I look around at my surroundings. The sky stretches endlessly above me, gray-blue and streaked with slow-moving clouds. I stare at it like it might disappear if I blink too long. I forgot how big it was. Forgot how... exposed it feels. Like standing under something that sees everything. "Move," the guard snaps behind me. This time, I do. The path curves away from the prison, winding along the mountainside until it opens into a wide clearing carved into the rock. And that's where I see them. Not one. Not two. A full escort. Guards

I wake before the sun. For a second, I don't remember where I am. Then I do. And I wish I didn't.The ceiling above me isn't stone. No cracks. No damp. No flickering torchlight. Just smooth, unfamiliar quiet.My body is already tense, already awake, already waiting for something to go wrong. Old habits don't fade. They settle in your bones.I sit up slowly, scanning the room out of instinct. One door. One window. No immediate threats. Good enough. The silence presses in around me.I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand, rolling my shoulders once before moving toward the washroom.The water is warm. Hot even. Skyless Keep either had freezing water or no water. I stand under it longer than I mean to, letting it run over my skin, over scars I don't look at too closely. Clean doesn't feel like mine yet. Neither does this place.When I step out, I dry off quickly, pulling on the cadet uniform piece by piece. It fits. Too well. Like I belong here. Like I was always meant to end

By the time I make it back to my room, everything hurts. Not in a dramatic way or in a way anyone would notice.Just—everywhere. I shut the door behind me and lean against it for a second, letting the quiet settle in. I slowly slide down the door until I am sitting on the cool floor. I drop my head into my hands.How am I going to survive this? If I don’t find a way to escape, I am certain I will die. And I will be damned if my entrance into Eryndor is caused by this Gods forsaken school.I stand up shakily and move toward the washroom, grabbing a cloth and rinsing it under cold water before pressing it to my lip. It stings. But in a way, it’s grounding. I need to know I’m still here. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and cringe. I look away before I start hating what I'm looking at. I clean the worst of the blood, ignoring the dull ache spreading through my ribs and shoulder. I've had worse. I've had a lot worse.Still, this is different. Not the pain, but the rest of it. T