An Ember in the Ashes (An Ember in the Ashes #1)

Overall Content
Severity
5.6

Language

10.0/10

Alcohol, Drugs, Smoking

1.0/10

Intimacy, Sex, Immodesty

5.0/10

Violence, Weapons, Crime, Blood

10.0/10

Potentially Intense Themes

2.2/10

An Ember in the Ashes (An Ember in the Ashes #1)

Sabaa Tahir

I will tell you the same thing I tell every slave. The resistance has tried to penetrate this school countless times. I have discovered it every time. If you are working with the resistance, if you contact them, if you think of contacting them, I will know and I will destroy you.
Excerpt taken from back of book.

Language

H***- 42

S***-

A**- 6

B****- 2

F***-

D***- 45

Bas****- 17

Religious Cursing-

J****-

Chr***-

G**-

Derogatory terms etc-

Curses unique to the book-

Ten hells

Son of a whore

Burning/bleeding skies

Son of a whore

Skies

Alcohol, Drugs, Smoking

After graduation, it’s common to drink a lot.

A resistance group gives people a neem leaf, which is an opiate, to forget the last few hours.

A friend is drunk, “loosening up.”

A friend advises s friend to not get too drunk.

A cook tried to poison someone.

A group of men want to smuggle in a keg.

A man takes an herb that dilates his eyes wider to pass as a common man.

A man pretends he’s drunk, slurs his words and is clumsy.

Intimacy, Sex, Immodesty

A soldier grabs a girl by her hair and implies he’s going to rape her. Very vague. Later she verifies in her thoughts that she knows he will, then kill her.

One man suggests to another to go to a brothel.  This man jokes and tells stories about his ventures to the brothels.

If a band of lowly soldiers catches a girl alone, rape is implied.

“You look like your favorite whore’s caught the pox.”

A woman walks in on a man undressing. He imagines what it would be like to kiss her, push her up against the wall and run his fingers through her hair.

A man jokes with another man that he spent the night with prostitutes.

A man’s eyes, “creep down her body, leaving no doubt as to what he’s thinking.” “I’d prefer you in nothing at all.”

A man grabs a woman’s face and kisses her.

A man wants to buy a girl to sell her to the brothels.

A young woman is told she will get a disfigured face but that it will keep others from raping her too much.

For students at the soldier school, raping a slave or paying a prostitute is common.

A friend jokes that a guy shouts her names every time he visits a prostitute.

“Will raping you be like fighting you?” Used as a threat.

“The ladies of the night beckon to anyone passing, their eyes like fading coals.”

A woman, takes a man to dance and runs her finger from his chest to his waist.

A man and young woman pretend he’s taking advantage of her.

A man tells another man he will have a certain woman. He will find her alone and make her his. Rape implied.

A woman bests a man at a scim fight and has a dagger to his throat when they lean together for a kiss.

A man tells his brother to leave a girl alone unless he wants to be a eunuch.

A man is beating a girl so he can rape her. He claims he would’ve gone easy on her but that he likes a little spirit. He says he practicing on her to prepare for someone else.

A girl rips her dress while being taken to a cell. It is very revealing (but no details.) She is given to a man as a reward. He’s wearing scims and a dagger and he gives the dagger to her as a peace offering.

A young woman kisses a man. Her cloak falls off revealing skin under a ripped dress (no details) while they passionately kiss and pull each other closer, with his hands roaming her thigh and back.

A man presses a young woman against the wall, kissing her passionately.


Violence, Weapons, Crime, Blood

Soldiers carry a special steel sword that is stronger than most anything else. They can shatter knives.

Prepping for a raid, a man hands a younger man their largest kitchen knife. A brother and sister sneak away but are found and the brother holds up the knife in defense. The soldier throws him to the ground, and holds him with his knee. His face is bloodied. When the sister screams, the soldier has a sword at her throat. She is grabbed by the hair, threatened. A soldier grabs their grandma by her neck and slams her against the wall. A soldier then caresses her cheek with a shard of glass. He asks if he should carve out her eyes. He pushes harder, causing blood. If the brother ends goes to prison, he will end up as a slave or dead. A soldier strikes the grandpa, killing him. The grandma tears her hair and screams in horror. She lashes out at the soldier and he sliced her throat. Both grandkids have watched. Their house is then burned. The brother lashes out, attacking a soldier, knocking him down and punching. He is taken as a prisoner.

A man swears to himself he will shove a blade through another man.

Rebels assassinate upper class merchants.

At a school for soldiers, the students (ages 6+) wear scims for weapons.

At age 11, the soldier school sends their students out in the wild to survive for four years.

A man looks at a woman with “predatory gaze” and another man wants to strangle him for it.

A young boy (about 10), is charged with deserting the soldier school. He is bloody and limp from his capture. He is tied to a post while he writhes and bucks but students roar in approval. He is whipped in front of the crowd. This is not abnormal, whipping is the action for any rule broken. The boy screams, students cheer. The boy starts to seize from the multiple whips and pain. A pool of blood surrounds him. He is whipped to death, then taken to the desert to be fed to the animals. A man relives his death over and over again.

A man carries a knife, others carry bows trained on a girl. A woman carries a knife.

A leader of the soldiers tortures first and asks questions later.

A man has his knife held to another’s throat.

A man is threatened with strangling by sheep gut.

A mother wanted to leave her three young children fight for the resistance. The oldest would sing to the younger while the parents fought.

At graduation, the students are gifted full armor and weapons that they wear.

A man is held back from attacking another man, another man elbows one who is holding the man, and someone kicks at a man’s back. A woman then holds one blade to the man’s throat, another to his groin. She says she will relieve him of his manhood. He insults her and a man attacks him, hitting his face over and over. Others are punching each other and shoving each other to the ground. One man decides if the woman is whipped for this infraction that he will kill the man who started it.

Two youth were taken prisoner. The boy was hog-tied, the girl’s hands were tied. She escaped and used the twine to garrote three jailers then broke the necks of three more with her bare hands.

The penalty for breaking an oath is death. Their hands are sliced to get blood for this oath.

Three female slaves have died, one threw herself off a cliff.

At one prison, it is the goal to make slaves suffer before they die.

A man grabs a girl by her hair, holding a knife to her throat and threatens to cut her eyes out.

A woman slaps a girl for speaking. Later she is whipped for tardiness. Four lashes and blood is dripping off her.  It is said the woman would rather put a scim in her than see tears. Later she is backhanded enough to spit blood. A student grabs her by the neck. She’s given ten lashes for being late, three lashes for a stain, four lashes for not finishing mending, a black eye from a student. She is held down while the woman heats a blade in fire then she slowly slices her skin as the girl screams.  Later s man dreams of doing it to the woman that hurt her.

A grandfather kicks his grandson with steel toed boots.

If participants fail a trial they will be executed.

A man comes upon a battlefield of fallen men and families. He hears a voice and hold a knife to its throat. The boy is his first kill. A gaping wound in his gut is visible. He slices his hand to see if he’s dreaming. He walks through the field and realizes he’s killed them all. They tell him their stories. He sees their wounds and blood.  A woman was attacked by giant birds and shows the gouges in her stomach from them. A man attacks another man, forcing him to swing his dagger while he punches and eventually he sinks his dagger in his side, blood sprays. The woman is attacked by another man, she stabs his thigh but he injured her enough that she’s bleeding profusely and can’t move her arm. She falls unconscious. The men were sent to kill the two. He carries her in a back sling and her blood coats his back.

A boy broke his wrist and had the bone hurting out. His sister screams and almost faints.

A woman takes a fire poker to a young girl’s eye, making another watch.

A man reaches for his blade to throw at another man.

A woman carved up another woman’s face, made her swallow hot coals to ruin her voice, she then made her a slave and killed everyone she lived. This same woman tortured a boy for days, his screams could be heard throughout. She then killed three more for suspecting they were friends of his.

A surprise attack of throwing stars is hurtled at a man. Three attackers come next, one holding a scim to his throat, he is able to thrust his scim in one, a throwing star nicks his arm, poison is in the air, two are against three and the man slices off an attackers head, then another. A woman does the same. Then a blade is thrown at them, barely missing the man. The woman fights with the attacker and he throws vile insults at her. She then kicks him, knocks him down, blood pouring out of his mouth, she stamps on his sword arm and presses her scim to his throat. An arrow comes toward her.  They run, find a tower but are attacked from above and below with arrows. Guts, throats, kidneys and hearts are butchered. The man is punched, and smashed against the wall. The attacker lifts him and holds him over the edge of the tower by his throat. He is let go but is tethered to the woman, when he catches footing, she falls. They are hit with arrows, one attacker grabs the one in the man’s thigh and drags it. Their weapons are forced from them, and an attacker saws at the rope they’re hanging from. One of them falls.

A man is found gruesomely killed in his house. No details.

Soldier raid a festival. They shoot out lights with arrows, and cut down people with swords as they run.

If caught at a festival, a son will be “flayed” but the slaves will have worse.

A man holds a dagger to another man’s stomach. That man threatens to slit his throat. The dagger pierced his skin, bleeding and he knows he can’t move. When released, he finds a mace and pretends smashing the man’s head.

A girl dreams of someone carving on her face and her brother hanging from the gallows.

There’s is a lot of scim and sword training throughout. Some playful, some not. Most is done with training weapons which are blunt.

A man grabs a girl by the throat, pulls her off her feet. She tries to bite him but he spins her around and pushes her against a wall. He punches her face, smacks her head against the wall. . Then punches her stomach, and knees her face. She tackles his legs but he backhands her and kicks her. When she’s calm he straddles her and pins her arms. Another man yanks him off her, punching him, hearing crack of bone and watching blood spray. His scim is placed on his rib cage. When they check the girl she is barely conscious. Her wrist is broken, bone hurting out of the skin. Bruises cover her body and her eyes are black and swollen shut.

A student at the school has killed slaves.

A dagger is thrown at a man’s chest, he deflects. Knocks him down. Another man’s eyes bulge, his weapon falls, he turns blue- men are dying by some form of magic when they don’t kill others. A man thrusts a sword into his friends back. He dies. A mace is thrown at a man’s head, the battle continues. The order is given to kill. A man’s armor is covered in blood, his weapons drip with it. A man snaps another’s neck, then cuts off another’s head. A woman is covered in blood also. She goes to cut off his head but he deflects. He throws his knee to her chest, hearing a crack, then pins her to the ground. She knees him and grabs her weapon but he’s faster.  A man kills his brother. Many are killed in this battle of friends. One of the men wants to shove his blade in a leader’s chest.

An older woman shoves a girl.

A woman grabs a young woman by the neck, her vision starts to spot before she is let go.

Three people are taken, gagged, blindfolded and tied. One is put in front of others and the others are to try to kill this person.  One knocks another person out, there’s is the sound of steel in flesh, one falls to ground with a pool of blood. A man is sentenced to death.

News comes of a leader and his children being killed.

A man tells another man to get rid of a girl and to hide her body far away. She fights and hold a knife to a throat. She digs it in, drawing blood. She is knocked out before she can do more.

A woman poisons another woman, killing her. She says if her newborn would’ve cried she’d have broken it’s neck.

A man grabs another man and slams his head into the wall. Guards punch his stomach, so he falls to his knees only to grab the man, his knife and hold it to his throat.

A man kneels down to be beheaded. He feels the steel bite his neck.

An explosion goes off, people run and scream and a few are unconscious on the ground.

A girl holds a knife to a man’s neck.

Potentially Intense Themes

A family worries about starving this winter.

The Empire raids, jails and kills for crimes such as hoarding grain, selling books, or teaching kids to read.

Two siblings have had their parents and sister killed by the Empire, in a prison.

Two siblings have neighbors that were raided, imprisoned then sold into slavery for selling books. An elderly man had his throat cut for supposedly collaborating with the resistance.

A girl’s friend disappeared in a raid.

After receiving a certain tier of achievements at the soldier school, the students are given a silver mask that melds to their skin. Some say it’s for intimidation.

A man watched his younger brother be whipped to death years before.

A woman abandons her baby, hours after birth and gives him to tribesmen.

A group of people believe some leaders are immortal and are possessed by spirits of the dead.

A young boy is taken from his bed, his foster mother screaming.  He is put in a pen outside and given only scraps of food. After 7 days, the ones who survived were given opportunities.

A man dreams of a bloody battlefield and feels he killed them.

A boy was beaten by his grandfather.

A small creature, beloved to be a hallucination, visits a girl many times, it gives her a creepy feeling and scares her. It shows her things such as her family dying.

Jinn are made of smokeless fire, they can read minds.

Efrits and Wraiths are spirit-like creatures that can harm people.

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