The Order of the Ashen Dawn

Mara,

I know it’s been a long time, and I don’t expect this letter to mean anything to you now. I don't know if you'll even read it, or if you’ll just burn it, as you have every thought of me for the past several years.

But I have to write it. I’ve been carrying this guilt with me for so long that I feel like it’s rotting me from the inside out. I don't think I can go another day without saying what I should have said back then. The truth.

You’ll probably remember the day it all fell apart. The day I made the choice to side with them — the Order of the Ashen Dawn.

You begged me not to, Mara. You told me they were dangerous, that they would use me, that they would use all of us. I saw the fear in your eyes when you tried to make me see reason, but I couldn't.

I was blinded by their promises. Their perfect, calm rhetoric. The idea of order, of rebuilding something — anything — after the fall. I thought they had a solution. I thought they had a way out of the mess the world had become. The chaos. The hunger. The endless fights for scraps. I thought maybe, just maybe, they had the answers we needed.

And in the end, they did. But not in the way I imagined.

I turned my back on everything we fought for, everything we’d survived together, because I believed in them. I believed in their idea of salvation. I thought they could save us all, but I was wrong. And you — you were right. I didn’t see it then, but I see it now. The Ashen Dawn was a lie, a trap. They took everything from me, from all of us. They used my trust to make me do things I’m too ashamed to even speak of.

I thought they would protect me, protect us, but they didn’t. When their power fell, when the crusade they started crumbled to dust — I was left with nothing but regret. The world didn’t get saved, Mara. It just got buried deeper under their lies. And when it all fell apart, I realized just how much I had lost.

But worst of all, I realized what I had lost because of you.

The last thing I ever heard you say to me was that I was no better than the people I was working for. I told you that you didn’t understand, that you were too emotional, too stuck in the past. You told me you couldn’t watch me do this anymore, that I was choosing the wrong side. Then you walked away.

I can’t even imagine how you felt, how angry you must have been. How much you must have hated me for what I’d done. You must have thought I was a fool, a traitor. And in a way, I was. I am.

But what’s worse, Mara, is that I never came back. I never apologized. I was too proud. Too caught up in their lies to even see how much I’d hurt you — my best friend in the world.

I know now that we were never supposed to be on different sides. That we were supposed to fight together, like we always had. But I chose them, and I lost you. And I’ve never forgiven myself for that.

I’ve been wandering alone ever since, picking through the ashes of what’s left. I’ve heard whispers of you — that you’re out there, still surviving. Still fighting. I hope you’re safe. I hope you’re okay. I pray every day that you’re still alive. But I also know you probably don’t want anything to do with me. I wouldn’t blame you.

The truth is, I’m not writing this letter to ask for forgiveness. I’m writing it because I need you to know that I see now. I see how wrong I was. How utterly blind I was to everything that truly mattered. And no matter what happens, I’ll carry that with me for the rest of my days.

If you ever read this, know that I’m sorry, Mara. So sorry. For the betrayal, for the silence, for abandoning you when you needed me the most.

If you can ever find it in yourself to forgive me — to even remember me without hatred — I’ll be forever grateful. But I understand if you can’t. I don’t deserve that.

Take care of yourself. You were always the stronger one, the smarter one, the one who knew the truth long before I did.

I hope the world is kinder to you than it ever was to us.

With love and regret,

Liv

I sat there, the screen in front of me fading to black as the words hung in the air like the silence that followed a gunshot. Liv.

The name had been missing in my life for so long that I had almost forgotten what it felt like to hear it. She’d been my closest friend. The person who had been by my side through the worst of it — the long days scavenging, the nights spent hiding from raiders, the weeks we’d spent lost, hungry, cold, and scared. We’d survived together when everything else fell apart.

And then, without warning, she had chosen them. The Ashen Dawn. She'd walked away from me, from everything we’d fought for. 

I hadn’t known what had happened to her. For years, I wondered whether she was alive or dead. The last words we exchanged were harsh. It felt like I had lost her that day — but I hadn’t known just how much of me she had lost, too.

Now, after all these years, after all the wreckage, she was writing to tell me she regretted it. She was apologizing.

I didn’t know what to do with it. Part of me wanted to scream at her, to curse her for what she had done. But another part of me remembered who she had been — the girl who had once made me laugh until I cried, the friend who had held me when I was sure we wouldn’t make it through another winter.

I remembered the hope we had once shared, the promise to never let the world break us.

But that had been before the Ashen Dawn.

The world wasn’t the same anymore. Nothing was.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I wasn’t sure what forgiveness looked like. I wasn’t sure I had it in me to give it, not after everything.

I didn’t reply. Not yet. I wasn’t ready.

But I kept the letter. And maybe, one day, I would.

Maybe.