Weaves of Ashes

Chapter 95: Chapter 90: A Mother’s Grief

Location: Tardide Village - Ryunzo Home

Time: 19 Voidmarch, 9938 AZI | Day 510/208

Realm: Dimension 137 (Telia)

The dinner table had been cleared, but the house hadn’t emptied.

More villagers had arrived as word spread—”the mage” was here, the one who’d promised to help with the direwolves. They filled the Ryunzo home until people stood along the walls, sat on the floor, crowded in doorways. The air grew thick with body heat and hope and fear all tangled together.

Jayde found herself at the center of it, surrounded by faces that wanted—needed—to believe she could fix this.

Operational pressure building. Civilian morale dependent on perceived capability. Cannot show uncertainty.

(So many of them. All looking at me like I’m the answer.)

”Tell her about the Harmon boy,” someone said from the back. An older man, grey-bearded, voice rough with grief.

Elder Ryunzo’s expression tightened. ”The first attack. Three months ago.”

”Seven years old,” the grey-bearded man continued. His hands shook slightly. ”Playing near the forest edge with his sister. We heard screaming. By the time we got there...” He swallowed hard. ”Found his sister hiding in a tree. She wouldn’t come down for two days. Still doesn’t talk much.”

The room was silent except for the crackle of the fire in the hearth.

”How many attacks have there been?” Jayde asked quietly.

”Twelve deaths,” Behro said, his voice flat in the way of someone who’d learned to report horror without feeling it. ”Eight children. Four adults who tried to protect them or hunt the pack.”

Casualty assessment: 4% of estimated population. Disproportionately young. Psychological impact severe.

”The children were...” Jayde couldn’t quite finish the question.

”Between four and ten years old,” Mrs. Ryunzo said softly. Her hands twisted in her apron. ”The direwolves prefer smaller prey. Easier to drag away.”

(Drag away. Gods.)

A woman near the window spoke up, her voice thick. ”My nephew. Six years old. We found his shoe. Just his shoe, half a kilometer from where he’d been playing.”

”The Chen twins,” another voice added. ”Playing by the stream. We heard the howling. Recovered...” The speaker’s voice broke. ”Parts. We recovered parts.”

Strategic assessment: Pack exhibiting coordinated hunting behavior. Targeting vulnerable population segments. Classic predator pattern—remove threats by destabilizing community.

The stories kept coming, each one worse than the last. Each one adding weight to the air until it felt hard to breathe.

”We tried to fight back,” Jinko said. ”Three months ago. Gathered every able-bodied man—all seventeen of us. Tracked the pack to their territory.”

”Lost three good men,” Master Whitestone added, his voice hollow. ”Tomek, Derrin, and young Carso. The pack separated us. Picked us off. We barely made it back.”

”After that, we stopped hunting beyond the village perimeter,” Elder Ryunzo said. ”Can’t risk more men. Can’t risk the children. So we stay close to the walls. Watch our children like hawks. And pray the direwolves don’t grow bold enough to attack the village directly.”

”But they’re getting bolder,” Behro said quietly. ”Last week, they took a goat from just outside the east gate. Dragged it away in broad daylight.”

The room fell silent again.

Jayde looked around at these faces—exhausted, afraid, desperate. Three months of living under siege by predators they couldn’t fight. Three months of children who couldn’t play freely. Three months of parents who couldn’t sleep, terrified they’d hear that howl in the darkness.

Mission parameters crystallizing: High-priority threat. Significant civilian impact. Success critical for community survival.

(I can help them. I have the power to end this. Why does that feel like both a burden and a purpose?)

Before she could speak, the door opened.

***

The room didn’t go silent all at once.

It was more gradual—conversations dying mid-sentence, people turning, voices trailing off into shocked quiet. The kind of silence that happened when something terrible walked into a room, and everyone knew it.

The woman in the doorway looked like death had tried to claim her and settled for close enough.

Physical assessment: Severe malnutrition. Dehydration. Possible trauma-induced catatonia. Medical intervention required.

But Jayde’s medical analysis couldn’t capture the full horror of what she was seeing.

Three weeks. Elder Ryunzo had said Milta lost her children three weeks ago.

The woman standing in the doorway looked like she’d aged thirty years in that time.

Her skin hung loose on a frame that had lost too much weight too quickly, the kind of rapid wasting that happened when someone simply stopped eating. Her face was skeletal—cheekbones sharp enough to cut, eye sockets deep and shadowed. Her hair, which might once have been thick and healthy, hung in lank, unwashed strands.

But it was her eyes that made something twist in Jayde’s chest.

Empty. Completely, utterly empty. The kind of emptiness that came when every tear had been cried, every scream had been screamed, and all that remained was a hollow shell that still, somehow, continued breathing.

(She looks like the ghosts we’d find in bombed-out colonies. The ones who survived but couldn’t remember why.)

Mrs. Ryunzo moved immediately, but carefully—the way you’d approach someone made of glass. ”Milta, dear. You shouldn’t be out. You should be resting.”

Milta’s voice, when she spoke, was barely recognizable as human. Hoarse. Raw. Like she’d spent days screaming, and her throat had never recovered.

”I heard... heard there was a mage. Here to... help.”

Each word seemed to cost her something.

Elder Ryunzo stood. ”Milta, please. Sit. Have some water at least—”

”No.” The single word was final. ”No water. No food. Not until...”

She didn’t finish. Didn’t need to.

(Not until she has her vengeance. Not until someone pays for what happened to her children.)

Milta’s gaze swept the room, searching, until it landed on Jayde. For just a moment, something flickered in those dead eyes. Something that might have been hope, or rage, or desperate prayer.

She crossed the room with the unsteady gait of someone whose body was failing but whose will refused to let it stop.

And then she knelt.

***

”Don’t—” Jayde started, reaching out instinctively. ”You don’t need to—”

”Please.” Milta’s voice cracked. ”Please. My children. My babies.”

The room held its collective breath.

”Their names were...” Milta’s hands were shaking so badly she had to clasp them together. ”Tomas. My boy. He was six. So smart. Learning to read. Wanted to... wanted to be a scholar like the ones in the big cities.”

Her voice broke. She forced herself to continue.

”And Lira. My baby girl. Four years old. She loved... she loved flowers. Picked them every day. Made crowns for...” Milta’s eyes squeezed shut. ”Made flower crowns for me and her brother.”

(Don’t cry. Don’t you dare cry. She needs you to be strong, not to fall apart with her.)

Maintain professional composure. Emotional display counterproductive.

But the child voice in Jayde’s head—the one that remembered being powerless, being hurt, being left with nothing—wouldn’t be silent.

(She’s hurting like we hurt. Exactly like we hurt.)

”Three weeks ago,” Milta continued, each word coming slower, heavier. ”They were playing. Just... just playing. Near the garden. I told them to stay close. I told them.” Her voice rose slightly, desperate. ”I told them to stay close.”

”You couldn’t have known,” Mrs. Ryunzo said softly, but Milta didn’t seem to hear her.

”The howling started. I ran. I ran so fast. But I was too late. Too late. They...” Her breath hitched. ”They were gone. The direwolves had... had taken them.”

Someone in the room made a small, wounded sound.

”We searched for two days. Found...” Milta’s voice dropped to barely a whisper. ”Found scraps. Of clothing. Tomas’s shirt. Lira’s little dress. The one with... with the yellow flowers she loved so much.”

(Yellow flowers. She was four years old, and she loved yellow flowers.)

”Nothing else. Just... just scraps.”

Milta’s eyes opened, fixing on Jayde with an intensity that was almost physical.

”I can’t eat. Can’t sleep. Can’t... can’t do anything except see their faces. Hear them calling for me. Mama. Mama, help us.” Her voice broke completely. ”But I couldn’t. I couldn’t help them.”

Tears tracked down her hollow cheeks—silent, unstoppable.

”So I’m begging you.” Milta’s hands reached out, grasping at Jayde’s. Her grip was weak, trembling. ”Please. Give my children vengeance. Give me... give me something. Anything. Because I can’t... I can’t keep going like this. I can’t.”

The silence in the room was absolute.

Jayde stared at this broken woman kneeling before her, and felt something shift inside her chest. Something that had been forming since she watched the refugee family hide in the woods, since she walked through Tardide’s poor-but-dignified streets, since she saw children playing with cloth balls and mothers nursing infants while tending cooking pots.

Why do we feel this compulsion? the Federation officer in her asked coldly. These aren’t our people. This isn’t our mission. We have no strategic interest in village politics.

But for once, the tactical voice didn’t dominate.

(Because she’s hurting the way we hurt,) the child answered. (Because someone has to help. Because if we don’t, who will?)

And beneath both voices, something deeper. Something that had been forged through sixty years of military service, tempered in slave pits, refined in brutal training, and was still somehow learning what it actually meant.

Because this is what power is supposed to be for. Not for conquest. Not for domination. For protection.

”Milta,” Jayde said softly, gently pulling the woman’s hands into hers. ”Look at me.”

Those hollow eyes focused.

”I swear to you.” The words came with a weight Jayde hadn’t expected. A binding quality that felt almost physical. ”I will hunt down every direwolf in that pack. I will end the threat they pose to this village. And I will bring you the Alpha’s head personally. Your children will have their vengeance.”

Something broke in Milta’s expression.

She crumpled—not slowly, but all at once, like her strings had been cut. The sound that came from her throat was inhuman. A keening wail of grief so raw, so profound, that it seemed to tear the air itself.

Mrs. Ryunzo was there immediately, arms around the sobbing woman, murmuring soft words that couldn’t possibly help but were offered anyway.

”Come, dear. Come. Let’s get you home. Let’s get you to bed.”

She helped Milta to her feet—the woman was so light it seemed she might blow away—and guided her toward the door. Other women moved to help, creating a protective circle around the grieving mother.

As they left, Milta’s wails continued, echoing through the village streets. The sound of a mother who’d lost everything and had finally been given permission to break completely.

The door closed.

The room remained silent.

***

People left quietly after that.

What else was there to say? The promise had been made. The weight of it hung in the air like smoke.

Eventually, only Jayde and Reiko remained in the now-empty living room. The fire had burned low. Outside, Tardide had gone quiet—or as quiet as it could be with Milta’s distant wailing still occasionally audible on the wind.

Jayde sat on the floor, back against the wall, staring at nothing.

Post-operation analysis: Made significant commitment without full tactical assessment. High-risk promise to civilian population. Failure would result in severe morale damage and loss of contractor credibility.

(I told her I’d bring her the Alpha’s head. I looked into her eyes and promised.)

[You’re upset,] Reiko observed, his mental voice gentle. He was curled beside her, head resting on her lap. [But not surprised. You knew you’d help even before she asked.]

”Did I?”

[Of course.] His certainty was absolute. [You helped the refugee family even though we could barely spare the food. You promised to eliminate the direwolves the moment you heard children died. You always help. That’s who you are.]

”The Federation officer in me says that’s tactically unsound.” Jayde’s voice was quiet. ”Emotional decisions lead to strategic errors. You can’t save everyone. Trying to will get you killed.”

[What does the rest of you say?]

Jayde was quiet for a long moment.

(The rest of me remembers what it felt like to need help and have no one come. To be powerless. To watch bad things happen and be unable to stop them.)

”The rest of me says... maybe the Federation officer is wrong about some things.”

Recalibrating operational parameters. Perhaps power without compassion is just another form of oppression.

(Or maybe it’s simpler than that. Maybe I help because I can. Because these people can’t help themselves. Because a four-year-old girl who loved yellow flowers deserved better than to die screaming in the woods.)

”Milta’s children were six and four,” Jayde said aloud. ”Tomas wanted to be a scholar. Lira loved flowers.”

[And now they’re gone,] Reiko finished gently. [But you can make sure no more children die like that. You can give them safety. Give Milta her vengeance. Give the village their peace.]

”What if I fail?”

The question hung in the air.

[You won’t,] Reiko said simply. [Because you can’t. Not when you’ve looked someone in the eye and promised. That’s not who you are either.]

Jayde let her head fall back against the wall, eyes closed.

The weight of the promise settled into her bones like iron. Heavy. Binding. Inescapable.

Tomorrow she’d start gathering intelligence. She’d track the pack, assess their patterns, and develop a tactical approach. She had the skills, the training, the power to eliminate a direwolf pack—even one led by an alpha.

But tonight, she just sat with the weight of it.

With the memory of Milta’s hollow eyes. With the sound of a mother’s grief echoing through quiet streets. With the knowledge that somewhere out there, a pack of direwolves was hunting, and somewhere here, children were trying to sleep despite their fear.

Mission parameters finalized: Eliminate direwolf pack. Restore village security. Fulfill promise to Milta. Failure is not an option.

(Because a little girl who loved yellow flowers deserved to live long enough to learn whether she’d follow her brother into scholarship or find her own path.)

(Because promises mean something.)

(Because this is what we’re supposed to do with power.)

”Tomorrow,” Jayde said quietly, opening her eyes. ”Tomorrow we start the hunt.”

[Tomorrow,] Reiko agreed. [But tonight, you should rest. You can’t help anyone if you’re exhausted.]

He was right, of course.

Jayde stood slowly, muscles protesting. The day had been long—dimensional transfer, meeting the village, dinner, stories, Milta’s devastating grief. Her body wanted sleep.

But as she climbed the stairs to her small guest room, she knew sleep wouldn’t come easily.

Not with Milta’s voice echoing in her mind. Mama. Mama, help us.

Not with the weight of a promise that couldn’t be broken.

Not with the knowledge that tomorrow, she’d begin a hunt that would end with either vengeance delivered or everything she’d promised revealed as lies.

Failure is not an option, she told herself again as she lay down in the dark.

And for once, both voices—Federation officer and traumatized child—agreed completely.