Cynder woke up to her heavy coughing wracking her body. Her body ached and her throat burned. She tried to open her eyes, and squinted as bright candlelight assaulted her vision. In front of her was a nurse who had spots of blood all over her paws. As Cynder looked over herself, she noticed she had several bandages around her limbs, some of them stained red with small spots of blood.

As her vision cleared up, she saw the interior of a large cave with several torches illuminating it with a warm orange light. Looking around, there were five other nurses walking around, with about thirty wounded dragons lying throughout the cave. Each of the nurses were also wounded, bandages wrapping around their upper legs and shoulders, one of them even with one wrapped around the left side of her face, covering her eye.

"Oh, thank the ancestors. You're finally awake," the nurse tending to Cynder exclaimed, relief washing over her.

"What happened? How long was I out for?" Cynder croaked.

"It's been two days since Typhaar was reduced to rubble. Just over thirty of us were able to get out of Typhaar alive."

"Reduced to rubble? What…?"

Cynder stopped herself, as the memories washed over her, her mind replaying the moment the Typhaarian guards pulled her and Aerus out of the palace, before the entire city was destroyed due to the 'excavation' that D'varin and Trogon had done. The moment Aerus' name entered her mind, she immediately jolted up, looking around her frantically, ignoring the pain shooting through her legs.

It took a few seconds, but she finally found him, lying beside her, curled up and bandaged like her. Relief briefly washed over her, but a small bit of fear still gripped at her heart. "Is he okay?" Cynder pleaded.

"He's fine; he woke up early yesterday morning, and he was up for all of today as well. He went back to sleep about two hours ago," the nurse said.

"Oh, thank the ancestors. Um… do you know how we got here?"

"Some guards found some other survivors and followed them over here to the hideout. They were also pretty roughed up from the destruction of the city. One of them succumbed to his wounds about an hour after they walked in with you. We did the best we could to help him, but we were unable to. The other three are still alive and being cared for."

Cynder just nodded. "How are we?" Cynder asked, gesturing to herself and Aerus' sleeping form. "We kinda need to get all the way back to Warfang, sooner than later would be preferred. How long will it be before you think we're healthy enough to make the flight back?"

"Well, your bodies need a lot of rest, and they were very badly wounded; there's only so much red gems can do. Your brother's head wound worried us quite a lot; it looked like a very heavy blow from an earth dragon's clubbed tail, due to the shape of the wound, but it was very big and had been bleeding quite a lot. Luckily, he woke up with just a concussion, but don't think he'll be able to do long flights for the next few days due to how concussed he was. He had other very deep cuts and claw wounds over his body, as do you, but the red gems did a pretty good job at dealing with them for the most part.

"As for you, your worst wounds were the deep punctures in your neck and limbs, as well as many severe grazes to your head, those of which I'm assuming came from the falling rubble that almost buried you and the guards, according to their recount, where you had been knocked out instantly from the impact. Your right wing was also broken from it."

"So you're saying we'll be stuck in here for the next few days…" Cynder murmured.

"Unfortunately, yes."

"Do you have any other red gems you can give us to speed up the process? Please? I'm the leader of the Warfang Army, they need me over there!"

"We've already given you two the amount you need; extra red gems won't speed up the process. Your brother's head wound has been mended, and your wing has been fixed, but with your wing still tender and healing, and your brother concussed, it is not safe to go on that long a flight yet."

"Just try! Please!"

"Do not beg any further, you're not getting any!" the nurse snapped, causing Cynder to recoil; Cynder felt anger build up inside her and was about to retaliate, before she realised she didn't know much about anything medical and that it was probably a good idea to listen to the nurse. "They won't help you. Even if red gems were able to help you, we don't have the amount to spare on a concussion and a healing wing, now that your major wounds have been treated by them. There are others that need them more."

The nurse gestured over to a spot a few metres away. Cynder followed her gesture to a young wind dragon, about thirteen years old, lying in agony as he lay flat on his back, his limbs splayed out around him, each one of them awfully mangled and twisted, with dark, crusted blood covering his limbs. His face was also disfigured, his jaw hanging crooked and the left side of his head seemingly caved in. Cynder realised with horror that this poor dragon must have been completely crushed by large amounts of rubble, and only just survived, having been pulled out in time.

A mother looked on with concern, sitting back a few metres as she watched two nurses working around the teenager, cleaning his wounds and breaking red gems over them, before wrapping them up in clean bandages. The old bandages lay rolled up beside the nurses, stained red with blood that had dried into the fabric.

Focusing on the mother, Cynder noticed her right eye was bandaged up, and she was missing a paw, the stump at the end of her arm also bandaged up. Her body was covered in partially healed grazes and scabs, and some other wounds had turned into scars.

Guilt washed over Cynder as she realised how selfish she was being. This poor kid definitely needed the red gems way more than she and Aerus did. As she looked around, there were a few other dragons scattered throughout the cave that were also in awful, bloody conditions.

As she looked over them, she realised that for the first time in a very long time, she was starting to feel sick at the sight of these wounds. She'd been in so many gory fights for so many years that she'd become desensitised to the immense wounds that she had dealt and seen dealt. She, as well as her soldiers, had come to expect seeing so much gore in these fights. These were regular dragons, just living their lives, unaccustomed to anything so brutal, and now they were thrown into such immense pain and awful disfigurements, wounds, and losses of body parts.

Cynder didn't know what that was like. She'd been around this type of stuff since she was born, being raised under Malefor's control. But after she had been rescued and started to life a normal life, she grew a heart. She knew she'd lost that heart after Spyro turned and started yet another war, but had it really changed her that much? Was she really that heartless?

Warfang had also been abundant with red gems, even to cater to the insane amount of heavy wounds that each attack on the city saw; there were many scouting parties that searched for them, and recently there had been a few farms for red gems that had been made, trying to make more and more to help cater for Warfang's needs. The aftermath of big fights also only seemed so severe when there were actual deaths or wounds that red gems couldn't heal completely, but everything else was almost completely dealt with red gems. Cynder had never thought of what might happen when there was a shortage of them. She never thought of how many awful wounds would be left untreated, and that a priority system would have to be put in place to help cater for dragons in conditions like that.

The agonised cries of the thirteen-year-old dragon finally registered in her ears, and her stomach twisted at how awful they were to listen to. No dragon, no child, deserved to go through that much pain. She hated watching and listening to him, but at the same time, she couldn't tear her eyes and ears away. Her eyes kept flicking between the teenage boy and his distraught mother, who was forced to watch her son scream and cry in complete agony as his nurses dabbed at his awfully raw wounds with wet towels to try and clean them of the dried, crusted blood. The mother's exposed eye was red with emotion, but it was completely dry; she had no more tears to give.

It was only when the nurse started speaking again that her attention went back to the nurse standing beside her. "Dragons like that… they need the red gems more than anyone else here," the nurse explained sadly. "We've managed to see all thirty of the dragons in our care, and done our best to make sure everyone's at least been cared for, but right now, these ones are our priority and seek all of our care."

"I understand. I… I'm sorry about insisting about the red gems," Cynder apologised.

"It's alright. I just… needed to make sure you understood why we couldn't give you two any, regardless of if they would even help or not."

"I know. So… with a natural recovery rate, do you know how long it'll take before my brother and I are able to make the flight back to Warfang?"

"I'd like to keep watch over your brother for another day or two since he had such a heavy concussion. You on the other hand, I want to keep you here resting that wing for three days," the nurse said, and Cynder's heart dropped at the time frames she was given, even though she knew the nurse was right. "The last thing I want you to do is to overexert and put too much pressure on that wing while it's still coming out of being broken; we mended it for the most part, but the bone isn't fully healed yet. So for now, I want you here for three days."

"Oh. Okay… I understand."

"Great. Feel free to get up and have a walk around if you need to stretch your legs or have some time to yourself. I know it can be quite overwhelming in here, particularly with the smell of so many wounds and the sounds of agony. Just… no flying, got it?"

"Got it. Thank you."

The nurse said nothing more. She nodded with a smile, before turning and walking off in the other direction towards another patient, leaving Cynder alone in her thoughts. The first thing that came to her mind was the end of that night in Typhaar when the queen had been killed, the Ring of Spirits stolen, and Typhaar destroyed.

She had failed.

It wasn't a new concept to her; they had lost many battles over the course of the war, more than they had won, unfortunately. But this was the worst failure she had ever had. It wasn't just a large amount of deaths or captures, or just an ancient artifact stolen, or the destruction of a large amount of infrastructure. An entire city was gone. Erased from existence. Only thirty made it out alive. She didn't know how big Typhaar was, but there were easily several thousand dragons living in the city.

Thousands of dragons, completely erased from existence, crushed by their own home.

It was one of the biggest tragedies she had seen since the war started. As she thought of all the tragedies she'd seen, she almost put it higher than Armageddon. She knew Armageddon was many hundreds or even thousands of times worse than this, but the difference was they had won against Armageddon. This was far from a victory. She hadn't been able to stop this, and it was tearing her apart as she thought of this.

It was purely irrational and made no sense to rank this higher than Armageddon on the 'tragedy severity list' that she was internalising, but that was what it felt like to her. She hadn't had a failure this big in years.

Her mind started to get loud, combining with the sounds of agony around her, particularly from the poor teenage boy with awfully mangled limbs. It was getting way too much for her. Her head began to hurt as it started churning with the screams, the thoughts, the guilt and hatred, the sights…

She felt her breath quicken, her chest tighten, sweat start pouring down her face. From that moment, Cynder knew that she was getting way too overwhelmed, as the reality of everything hit her all at once.

I need to get out of here.

Leaping up to her paws, she speed-walked over towards the mouth of the cave and left, stepping out into the forest. She sighed as the ambient noise around her quietened down, and she began to take a small walk in the forest to gain her sanity after her near breakdown. It was nice to be surrounded by quiet for a time, and to take in the soft white moonlight from Adrano that shone down on the serene forest below the sky.

However, the serene forest didn't last for very long, as she stepped out of the edge of the forest to a large plain that stretched down a large hill. At the bottom of the hill lay what was left of Typhaar. It was nothing but rubble, every building destroyed, as a large gaping hole stretched across where Queen Lehftin's palace had once been.

Seeing the state of the city made the realisation of how much she had failed even worse. She felt her breath catch in her throat as her heart ached for the many thousands of lives lost, but she couldn't bring herself to cry. She almost felt unable to.

A few brief moments passed, before the sorrow gave way to pure anger, at herself for failing, and at Spyro for corrupting those poor kids and forcing them to commit these atrocities. A raw scream tore from her throat before she turned and started attacking a thick tree, tearing into it with her claws and tailblade, eventually chopping it down. Feeling the rage still burning inside her, she moved to another tree and tore at it as well, knocking it down just like the first. As the second tree fell, it collapsed into another tree, causing both trees to explode into tiny splinters as it threw pieces of wood everywhere.

Cynder watched her carnage, but it still wasn't enough for her. She reared her head and cursed Spyro at the top of the lungs. She then started to curse the ancestors. She screamed and howled until her throat hurt. Her head spun from her screaming, and she sat herself down to the ground. Rage still seethed inside her, but she'd let enough of it out where she was able to just sit in silent anger. Her breath was heavy and quivering, and she tried to slow it down to calm her anger.

She didn't know how long she sat there under Adrano's soft light, trying to calm her rage, but eventually she finally felt it dissipate, taking on the form of a shadow in her heart, the way it usually had for the past twelve years. It was a constant shadow that had lingered in her heart for so long, she didn't know what it felt like to live without it anymore. She didn't know what calmness felt like. There was always some form of anger, fear, or horror lying dormant inside her, ready to break out.

Suddenly, she became aware of a soft green light before her. She jumped, before whirling around to look at the large green spectre standing behind her. It was the spirit of a very familiar bulky earth dragon who had been a very large part of her teenage years when growing up in Warfang. Terrador looked upon her with sorrow in his eyes as he watched her suffer. However, at the sight of him, her face twisted with disgust.

"Go away," Cynder spat.

"Cynder, I just want to make sure you're all right," Terrador said softly, his deep, gravelly voice sending chills down her spine.

"You said this when you last visited me four years ago. I'm. Fine. Now leave me alone."

"You also said that four years ago. Cynder, you've just gotten worse since then, same with the world around you. You've… you've been shutting all of us out since then… since before then even; last time I visited was a struggle to get through to you."

"I don't need ghosts of the past haunting me any more than they already are. I just need to move on with life and keep fighting, keep trying to win this damn war. Getting caught up talking with apparitions won't help that."

"Apparitions? Ghosts of the past? Is that all you see us as now? Not old friends and family? Ancestors?"

"If the ancestors really cared, they'd get rid of Spyro for us! They wouldn't keep us suffering down here! You say you all care, but every time you visit just brings more pain! You remind me of my past failures. I couldn't protect you. I couldn't protect my parents. I couldn't protect my comrades. Every time you try to visit me to make sure I'm okay, to try and 'help' me, you only make things worse! I hate it every time you visit me!"

"Cynder…" Terrador muttered, shaking his head sadly.

"Don't you dare!" Cynder scowled, taking a threatening step forward.

Terrador stepped backwards, trying to keep the space between him and Cynder. He knew he was a spirit and she couldn't harm him, but she'd grown so intimidating over the years that she scared even him, even in a spirit form. Terrador would hate to be alive and subject to the full force of Cynder's uncontrollable anger.

"You don't get to speak. It's my turn to speak. You want to know how I'm doing? Fine. I'm doing awful!" Cynder screamed, her voice raw. "Twelve years this war has raged on and I have had to lead Warfang in it and try and protect everyone! Twelve years I've had to fight for my life, fight for the life of my comrades, my superiors, my fellow citizens! Twelve years I've been forced to kill or be killed! Twelve years I've had to watch families, friends, and couples suffer as they lose people they love, or watch their loved ones become crippled or disabled from their wounds! I could go on and on about how horrible these last twelve years have been, and that's not even including the first twelve years of my life when I was forced to do atrocity after atrocity, killing and torturing and maiming because I loved it!

"Twenty-four years of my life has been drowned in blood, trapped in an endless loop of violence and darkness and self-hatred, and these last twelve years in particular has been failure after failure after failure! Do you know what that does to someone Terrador?! I am so close to just giving up! It feels like there's no point continuing to fight because we fail more than we win, and every time we fail, people lose loved ones! We lost thousands of lives that night in Typhaar! I can't keep watching as we continue to lose lives at our own hands because we can't protect them!

"I've gotten to the point where I want to just give everything up to Spyro and tell him 'they're your subjects now, not mine, so you do what you want with them and if they get themselves killed it's their own fault'! I'm this close to giving myself over to him because I know that even if he corrupts me and I return to the hellish trap I was raised in, he will take care of me! I can feel Spyro's victory on the horizon! I don't want him taking any more lives than he has to! If I just give everything over to him, we wouldn't have to lose any more families from pointless sieges as Spyro tries to take away everyone's freedom!

"And now after all this, my son is back! That cursed purple devil who I brought into the world! I don't know what his true intentions are! What if after all this time, he's on Spyro's side, trying to act all innocent just to get on our good side, just to kill us from the inside?! What if he was Spyro's great plan after all this time?! I helped Spyro make that weapon! I let his little devil form inside me, feed off me to create his egg! He's just as much my failure as Typhaar is! If anyone dies by his claws, it will be my fault, because I MADE HIM! He carries my blood as well as Spyro's! THE BLOOD OF THE TERROR OF THE SKIES IS INSIDE THAT MONSTER! MY SON WILL BE TWICE THE MURDERER THAT I EVER WAS AFTER BEING RAISED BY MY TWISTED, DEVILISH HUSBAND!"

As Cynder finished screaming, she was only just aware that she was now inches away from Terrador's face as she howled in his face, spittle spraying from her mouth and tears streaming down her face. She felt her entire body trembling with self-hatred and fear. Her throat burned and her heart raced. Her heart ached even more as she suddenly realised that for the first time, she had actually admitted Forzen's blood ties with her, that he was actually her son. As much as she had disowned him, nothing could remove the truth that he was, biologically, her child.

Cynder became acutely aware of Terrador's face, watching as it became full of terror and anguish as he simply watched her outburst, letting her scream at him to her heart's content. She took in a hoarse, ragged breath as she stepped back a few steps and sat down, looking down at her paws. Her trembling got worse, and her tears began to spill down her face faster, flooding out of her eyes.

Before she knew it, she found herself continuing to ramble, words spilling from her lips in a hoarse croak. "If my son kills anyone… I will never forgive myself. That I could bring such an awful creature into this world, and let him run around and do what he wants… that I would let Muras teach that monster how to use his elements and how to kill things. My responsibility as a mother is to make sure he never learns his elements. Even if the guardians force me to teach him wind, I will beat the will to learn out of him, so much so that he will never want to take lessons from me again. I will not comply with teaching my son how to kill."

"So… why continue doing everything that you're doing? Leading the army, protecting Warfang, silently allowing Forzen to stay in Warfang?" Terrador challenged. "If all this is what you really think, why don't you just leave?"

"Because… at the same time, I can't bring myself to do that to my friends… my brother, the only family I have left… my comrades. I can't just… leave them; they need me," Cynder explained. "And they will never understand my point of view. They're too blind to see the truth. They will never see Spyro's victory coming. As much as I can, and as much as I just want to give him the victory at this point, I can't throw everyone else under like that. They don't deserve that awful reality, especially if they don't know it's coming. I only exist to delay the future because I also care about them. Besides, if I gave Warfang up to Spyro, I'd be no better than Apata's father, who gave their home up to Malefor out of the same fear I'm feeling. I can't do that to my friend. I can't put her through that again."

"Have… have you ever thought that maybe you're wrong?" Terrador asked. "What if you could be the victor over Spyro?"

"It's impossible. It'll never happen. Spyro was always meant to be the hero. This world… it's all his. It's his story, his world. He brought it back together. He recreated it. He owns this world; there's no way he could ever lose it. He is the hero of his own story, and his story will continue to see him win," Cynder murmured. "Me on the other hand? I'm the villain. Always have been, since the moment we first met in Concurrent Skies. I only exist to get in the way of his plans and his goals."

"You can't seriously think that."

"And what if I do?"

"Please rethink all this, Cynder. Your worldview, after so many years of trauma and horror and darkness, is twisted beyond belief. It's broken. It's only got this strong of a grip on you because you've let it, and you've refused to see any other worldview. You've let it consume you from the inside, from bottling up all these thoughts and never telling anyone, pretending to look like you're on the same mindset as everyone else and trying your hardest to win a war that you think is lost before it's even over."

"There is nothing you can do to make me see another view. Not now anyway."

"Cynder…"

"JUST GO AWAY ALREADY!"

The floodgates crashed down, and Cynder broke. She turned into a sobbing, wailing wreck, her cries shaking her body as tears, snot and saliva ran down her face as she sniffed, cried, choked, and gagged on her heavy emotions. She almost felt like throwing up.

Terrador just watched as Cynder broke in a way she never had before, his heart aching as he watched the awful display before him. There was nothing he could do or say to bring her back from this. She was beyond repair. Only a victory against Spyro, a permanent victory, would bring her back, but she didn't think it was possible.

He watched as Cynder eventually looked back up at him, and her features twisted into rage once more. "GO AWAY, TERRADOR! NEVER COME BACK!" she howled, before a heavy beam of convexity tore from her throat towards him.

The blinding purple beam went straight through his spirit form, before slamming into a tree that was standing strong behind him, before going up in flames as the convexity beam burned a large hole through the trunk, the wood being set alight.

"Okay. I'm sorry," Terrador whispered sadly, before his spirit form dissipated from the physical world, taking the soft green light with it.

With the darkness of night her only friend, Adrano now covered by thick cloud cover, and the eerie warm light of the burning tree in front of her, Cynder gave way to her emotions, feeling the crushing weight of everything finally hit her as she had finally verbalised her every haunting thought that had plagued her over the past decade. She had let it all out for the very first time.

Hearing those words finally leave her head and come out of her mouth… hearing herself say those words… it broke her more than she thought it would.

She didn't know how long she sat there crying for. All she knew was that it had easily been several hours that she had spent crying at the edge of the forest, looking over the wreckage of Typhaar from a distance. The sky was starting to brighten, sunrise close to coming. All through this, Cynder hadn't slept a wink; she'd spent the entire night doing nothing but crying. It was an unfamiliar feeling to her, after so many years of not crying. Even when she was a crier, she didn't think she'd ever cried this hard before.

Everything hurt.

By the time the sun was peeking over the horizon, the endless wells in her eyes finally dried up, and she could produce no more tears. She sat there in silence watching the sun rise, before she finally got up, wiped her face free of her tears and snot, before she made the trek back to the large cave that all the survivors had been in.

She stumbled back into the cave, carefully stepping around the many other injured dragons. She found her spot by Aerus, who was still sleeping, and sat down a few metres away from him. As she looked around, she noticed just how quiet it was. Most of the dragons in agony who had contributed to the overwhelming cacophony last night were all asleep, including the thirteen-year-old dragon a few metres on the other side of her.

Cynder turned to look at him, and gave a sad sigh when she saw him sleeping on the ground, his face still painted with a pained frown, his bandaged legs held out in front of him, the bandages slightly stained red with fresh blood that seeped from the raw wounds. There was no doubt the blood would dry and harden up around the wounds again by the time the bandages would need to be changed.

"You doing okay?" a soft feminine voice asked her.

Cynder looked over slightly, to see the mother of the young dragon staring at her with wide, caring eyes. "I… I'm fine. It's just been… a rough night for me. I needed to get out for a bit and… I've never felt so many emotions before," she murmured, trying to keep the details vague.

"At least you're still feeling. That's the important part," the mother said, her thin lips pulling up into a smile. "It shows you still have a heart."

"It… doesn't feel like it most of the time. I don't know what having a heart feels like anymore."

"It feels like that," the wind dragoness said, gesturing to Cynder. "I can tell you've been crying while you were gone. I also saw the way you looked at my son last night. You worried for him, even though you don't even know him."

Cynder glanced down at the young dragon, watching his chest rise and fall softly with each unconscious breath he took. "Will… will he be okay?" Cynder asked.

"The nurses believe so, but they're not sure how his paws will recover. He may be able to use them again, or they could end up deformed after how badly they were mangled from being crushed under so much rubble. He ended up completely crushed under three stories; it's a miracle he's even still alive to be honest. It's a miracle that his wings were only broken; they'll make a full recovery. His face will also recover, but it'll scar pretty badly, and his jaw will remain slightly crooked from the break it had."

"I'm… I'm sorry to hear that."

"Again, I'm just thankful he's alive. I'm thankful I still have one of my four babies still alive after that collapse."

"One of four?"

"His three sisters died. His father also died. Us two are the only ones who survived."

An uncomfortable silence washed over them. Cynder had no idea what to say to the grieving mother. The dragoness was aware of this, and stood up, limping over to Cynder on three paws, before placing her remaining front paw on her shoulder.

"You don't need to say anything. We'll be fine. Petrius is… he's a strong dragon. Always has been. He and I will get through this, I'm sure of it," the mother said with a smile.

"How are you so strong? How are you so hopeful? In a time like this, how can you smile?" Cynder asked, her voice wobbling.

"Because I know the rest of our family is looking over us and praying for our safety. And I know that wars don't last forever. This will pass eventually, and I'm hopeful that we can win this."

"How? How can you believe that given all the tragedy that's just happened?"

"You're from Warfang, aren't you?"

"I… Yes. I am."

"I believe that because Warfang is strong. Warfang is powerful. Warfang won against Malefor. Warfang has come out victorious over many, many wars that it has been part of. I trust that there are many in Warfang who are doing their very best to make sure that they are doing everything they can to protect their home, as well as try and bring an end to this war, and return peace to the entire world. That includes you, Cynder."

"You… you know who I am?"

"Word spread pretty quickly that the Queen had called for you, Cynder. Many people in Typhaar knew who you are, particularly since you are also a Typhaarian by blood. I know you haven't had an easy life, but your childhood experiences have helped build you up for this. You know warfare. You know how to fight, and now, you can put that into a much better use. Instead of fighting to destroy, you're fighting to protect. And many look up to you for that, both in Warfang and in Typhaar, and I'm sure across the rest of the world too."

Cynder swallowed awkwardly. She wasn't that special. She was just a broken dragoness who was in over her head, thrown into a situation too big for her. There was no way people saw her like that… right?

There was a soft moan from the young dragon as he woke from his sleep, his pain pulling him back to the waking world. "Mum?" he whimpered, his eyes slowly opening.

"I'd better go to him," the mother said to Cynder. "Go to your brother. And do your very best when you get back home. We believe in you."

I wish I could believe that, Cynder thought.

The dragonesses turned and made their way to their respective families. Cynder sat down beside Aerus, looking over his bandages and wounded body sadly. It didn't take long before he too woke up, letting out a small groan as he rolled over. He sat up, yawning widely, before he noticed Cynder sitting beside him.

"Oh, Cynder! You're… you're awake!" Aerus exclaimed with relief. "How… how do you feel?"

Cynder didn't feel like going on a big spiel about how physically she felt fine but was a wreck mentally. At least… not now, anyway. Right now, only one thing mattered, and that was the fact that they were both alive.

Without even thinking, Cynder reached out and for the first time in twelve years, initiated a hug.

Aerus gasped with shock, at first thinking Cynder was trying to attack him, but when he felt her embrace him and hold onto him firmly, he felt his own eyes tearing up. She was hugging him. What had brought her to finally initiate a hug with him? He felt the way she held onto him, never wanting to let him go. He felt the way her breath trembled against his neck, and the way her arms shook.

Something had seriously messed with her to make her want to hug him.

He would ask later; he was just happy that his sister was finally hugging him.

Aerus gently returned the hug, and Cynder just held him tighter. They sat there, hugging in silence for what felt like ages, before Cynder finally spoke. "I thought I lost you. I saw you go down, your head covered in blood. I saw the way everyone else died: Ta'torol, Forlorӓr, Queen Lehftin, Uncle Prafȗr… I thought you had gone too."

"Uncle Prafȗr… he died too?" Aerus asked.

"Yeah…"

"How did he die?"

"Tailblade to the chest. He was trying to help save a family from being murdered… only the mother of the family made it out."

"At least someone made it out. He'll be happy to know he sacrificed himself to keep another life alive. That was the way he always wanted to go; he always talked about it ever since joining the guards. Either naturally or in battle, protecting others. I… I guess it does make it just us left now."

"What do you mean?"

"Our family. Only we remain alive now. Mum and Dad are dead, so is Uncle Prafȗr, and his other two sisters are also dead; one died a few days after hatching, and the other passed from sickness in her early twenties. Dad didn't have any siblings. Uncle Prafȗr and Aunt Mimala didn't have any kids either; Mum was the only one out of the three to get married and have children."

"So… we're alone now? It's just us?"

"I guess so."

"I won't let anything happen to you, you hear me? I can't let anything happen to the only family I have left."

Aerus felt Cynder squeeze him even tighter, her hold becoming almost protective now.

"Thanks, Cynder. Let's promise to look out for each other, okay?"

"I promise. I love you, brother… even though I do an awful job at showing it."

"I know. I know you do, even though you don't know how to say or show it. You don't have to worry about that."

If Cynder had the tears to give, she would've broken down into tears again in that moment. Right now, she was no longer General Cynder. For the next few days, she just wanted to be plain old Cynder. She wanted to be Aerus' sister. She wanted to make the most of their time together, even if it was in recovery, before she was thrown back into her tough line of work.

Warfang could wait. The nurse gave her three days before it was safe for her body to make the flight to Warfang. She could spend those three days just being here, resting, and being with Aerus.

At least that was something she could look forward to in these dark times.

That felt good to write lol. Cynder's breakdown to Terrador ended up way more intense than I had originally planned but honestly I prefer it this way. It truly shows just how much the last twelve years has absolutely destroyed her. Hope you guys enjoyed reading this chapter, it felt good to come back to Outcast, and to return to Cynder again.

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Dragon of Mystery: Yeah, Muras' life was one thing after another. He skimmed over most of the details, mainly just to give Forzen the important bits and to give him the closure without drawing it out too long. There was a lot more that went into it as shown back in Chapter 31 of Demonised when he told everything to Cynder. Not to mention all the events in Demonised and afterwards being thrown onto his life after barely a few years on his own in peace, he hasn't really had a break.

And it was good to have Almai call Krygour out like that; that was quite a fun sequence to write. It was another scene that really made me like writing Almai honestly XD

Also sorry to hear that about the last four years, hoping things start looking up for you soon :)

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It felt good to get another chapter of Outcast up again, particularly after writing The Time Wardens (give it a read if you're interested, I'm really proud of that fic lol). Let me know what you guys thought, and I'll see you all later with another chapter soon!