Riven

The council filled the square, their voices worn from hunger and thirst. They spoke of one promise that could bring food, water, and medicine to our dying town. I try to stand tall, though my heart feels small and unsteady. My name waited on their lips until Riven stepped forward already burdened with the weight of our people. Riven was everything they said he was calm, distant, unyielding. His long black hair flowed like ink down his back, and the red and black of his robes glimmered with threads of silver. To the town, he was a blade forged from duty, a man who never faltered. But I knew better. Beneath the steel of his voice and the calm of his eyes, there was a warmth he hid from everyone else a quiet, aching kindness he showed only when no one was watching. We had grown up together on the same dusty paths, barefoot under the sun, sharing laughter and the little we had. My own robes were plain, gold-colored and worn, a reminder of where I belonged among the ordinary, not the powerful. My hair, lighter than his, always escaped its tie, and he’d brush it back gently when no one could see. To the world, I was fragile, unimportant. But to him, I was something worth protecting. That’s why he stepped forward not because they called his name, but because he wouldn’t let them speak mine. He was strong enough to endure what they would ask. I wasn’t. And though I wanted to prove my courage, he didn’t let me. When he volunteered, the square fell silent. They didn’t take him at once. Instead, they seated us at the long wooden table in the center of the square. That night, the table overflowed with stew, roasted roots, and fruit—a rare sight. But it wasn’t a feast. It was farewell I ate too fast, broth spilling down my chin. He looked at me then, and for the first time that night, his composure cracked. He smiled soft, fleeting, and so human. In that moment, I realized the truth: he thought he was saving me. But in doing so, he broke me.