The Silence Before Dawn

The nights were the worst. Every night the soldiers would drag another prisoner from the cells and exit the dungeon. That prisoner would then never return.

Darkness thickened inside the cell like tar, broken only by the flicker of torches mounted along the corridor. Their smoke pressed against the ceiling, staining the stone black, while the flames snapped and spat as though they too wanted out. The air still reeked of damp moss, rust, and the faint copper tang of blood – old blood, dried into the cracks of the floor.

Luke had stopped asking whose it was.

They always waited until the prisoners grew quiet, until breathing slowed into uneasy sleep. Then the guards started – mocking chants, sharp words that thundered down the hall, like stones grinding in a river. Their syllables barked against the silence punctuated by laughter that made his skin crawl. Every sound was designed to crawl into the mind and gnaw.

Luke sighed. Its like being the punchline of a joke in a language you don’t speak, he thought. And you just know it’s about you.

He struggled to decide whether to ally himself with the others or try to escape himself again. He was concerned that he might be killed for even associating with the rest of the group. However, the fact that he might be disappointing Sera, after all he learnt from her, bothered him.

Then Uriel broke the silence.
“You’re breathings too loud. You’re trying not to think, aren’t you?”

Luke’s head lifted, frowning. “What?”

“You’re clenching your teeth. Holding in the panic. I know the sound.” Uriel tilted his head. “That’s how I used to sleep. Back when I still wore the Black Maw’s colours.”

Luke’s brow creased. “You? A soldier?”

“Once.” Uriel gave a short laugh, low and bitter. “That’s why I can tell you something you don’t want to hear: If you keep clutching at your own pain like it’s some prize, you’ll end up like him.”

“Like who?”

“Commander Cassian Veyne.” Uriel’s eyes hardened, dark with memory. “He thinks suffering is currency. That screaming is the same as letting go. That people’s pain doesn’t belong to them. I served him long enough to watch it hollow men out. I mutinied because I saw where it was leading – and because I didn’t want to wake up one day sounding like him.”

Luke swallowed, voice unsteady. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you’re too close to it already,” Uriel said. “You keep your pain to yourself. You think it makes you stronger. But selfishness – thinking your wounds are only yours – it rots you from the inside.”

Luke’s jaw tightened. “It’s my pain. Who else’s is it supposed to be?”

“Everyone’s,” Uriel said simply. “Or no one’s. That’s the part people never want to accept. The commander twisted it into cruelty, but the seed of the lie is the same: pain belongs to the world, not you. If you hoard it, it will eat you alive.”

Luke looked away, shame tightening his chest. “So, what am I supposed to do? Just let go? Pretend none of it matters?”

“No. You let go by giving it away. Sharing it. Not screaming into the void like the commander. Not burying it in silence like you. But trusting others to carry some of it with you. That’s the only way not to end like him.”

The silence stretched, heavier now. The torchlight flickered along the walls.

Luke’s voice finally broke through. “So, what brought you back to this prison… back to the commander?”

“The Enchiridion,” he said with an ominous tone. “The resistance hid the map to it deep in a Morzbeast nest. We tried to delay the Vicar and his Black Maw Order, to weaken their pursuit for the Enchiridion. But we failed. Someone betrayed the routes, and the convoys moved before we struck.”

Luke’s shoulders sagged. “So all of this – “

“– was for nothing? No.” Uriel shook his head. “Failure is never nothing. It teaches. But the Order still has their supplies, and they’ll hunt the book all the harder for it. That’s the truth we need to face.”

Luke’s throat tightened. He wanted to argue, but the words stuck.

For the first time, Uriel’s eyes softened. “Listen. Whatever comes next, don’t forget what I told you. Don’t die clutching what isn’t yours. Don’t die screaming in the dirt, thinking the world owed you. You’ll be more than the man in the next cell, or the man with the scar on his lip.”

“And if I can’t?”

Uriel studied him for a long moment, then smiled faintly, tiredly.
“Then you’ll end up like me.”

Luke looked at him, confused. “Like you?”

Uriel turned his palm upward, as though waiting for something to be placed in it. “Already knowing when my time comes.”

A distant sound echoed through the halls – boots striking stone, deliberate, unhurried. Luke stiffened. Michael and Seraphina, awake now in the neighbouring cells, pressed against their bars.

Uriel exhaled, almost in relief. “My time has come.”

The cell door screeched open. A figure emerged flanked by soldiers and Luke recognized his familiar face – armour etched with curling patterns that caught every flicker of firelight, as if mocking the chaos he’d wrought. A scar ran through his cheek, splitting his lip. His dark brown eyes didn’t burn with rage; they calculated, dissected, consumed. The Commander

He stopped before the prisoners. With a deliberate motion, he drew a small leather patch from his breastplate – a crude pouch of dried herbs wrapped in rolling paper. He lit it without ceremony, inhaling deep, the smoke curling from his nose like some ancient beast at rest.

“Take him,” he ordered.

“Uriel?” Michael’s voice cracked, confusion giving way to dread.

Two soldiers hauled Uriel to his feet. He didn’t resist. He only turned once, meeting Michael’s and Seraphina’s wide eyes from the neighbouring cell.

“Farewell, my friends,” Uriel said, voice steady. “Hold fast.”

“No,” Michael choked, gripping the iron bars so hard his knuckles whitened. “No, you don’t— you can’t—” His voice broke into something desperate, wild. He turned toward Commander Veyne, his composure shattering. “Wait—take me instead! Please! I’ll give you anything. Just don’t take him.”

The commander paused at the threshold, regarding Michael with cold amusement. “Begging doesn’t suit you boy.” Then he turned, and the soldiers dragged Uriel into the dark. Michael’s voice shifted into rage, “I’m going to kill you, Cassian… you’re dead! You hear me! You’re dead!”

The footsteps faded while Michael’s rantings continued, until only silence remained.

No one spoke the rest of the night.

Everyone already knew what morning would bring.