We drink to forget (Ashe)

a s h e She wasn’t sure what she had expected from Kaladin with her admission. Perhaps disbelief that the tiny little messenger girl from Northaven with a penchant for violence was, in fact, the Assassin in Blue. Maybe she expected hatred. He had been a royal guard, charged with protecting the royal family from threats like her. One of the most notorious murderers in all of Northwind’s history. She glanced up from the flames and quirked a brow at him with a small, half smile. There was a time when a comment like that would have her grinning, leave a thrill rippling down her back - now there was perhaps only a ghost of that. Ashe pursed her lips tilted her head back to the fire, and some small part of her reached for those flames, and inner magic she hadn’t spoken to in some time. It had been her most vicious magic back in Northaven - her fire. Her blood was sparks and lightning now, everything in her a vicious storm. Even still, some of that fire leaned towards her, as if an old friend reaching out. She didn’t reach back. ”No, I didn’t just become her,” Ashe echoed, shaking her head. ”I’ve been an assassin since I was seven, started my training two years before that.” The word seemed to tilt, and she cast a glare at the former royal guard with a near pout; it was halfhearted and felt hollow. She knew he was right. She was sure she did look like shit, the wolf having slept in the woods for weeks now. Didn’t mean she didn’t want to bite him for pointing it out. ”You didn’t hear about the Assassin in Blue selling out the entirety of Northwind’s Guild of Assassins?” She made a tsking sound as she lurched forward and folded her legs beneath her, bracing her elbows against her knees as she looked at Kaladin. ”Your King granted me clemency and sanctuary in Northaven.” She stared at him for another long moment before she cast her eyes away. She had spent weeks in the castle dungeons, never once tried to escape. Hadn’t wanted to. She had expected a public execution, not freedom. ”Sanctuary,” she spat bitterly. ”More like a fish in a fucking barrel.” It had taken all of about two months of being in Northaven for Master to track her down and begin her torment anew, and she’d had nowhere to run. Ashe sighed heavily, still staring into the flames. Why did she bother telling him? What did it matter? ”I told you because it’s meaningless now,” she finally said quietly. ”The Assassin in Blue is fucking meaningless.” Now that her Master was dead, now that she’d finally stood against him alone and survived... she wasn’t supposed to survive it. She had never planned to make it this far, to live this long. She should have been dead a thousand times over, deserved to be dead. Ashe turned her head to look at Kaladin again, and she smirked ruefully. ”You tell me what you’re doing out here looking like shit and slumming it in the woods, and maybe I’ll tell you why I am.”