Page 83 of Three Scorched Kingdoms

“Is that what you thought the first time you—whoa. What the hell happened here?” He stares at the ashen walls surrounding us.

“A fire,” I say quietly.

He looks at me sharply. “Your fire?”

The others have fanned out, wandering among the debris still smoldering.

“Yes,” I say.

“How? I mean, it looks like it just happened. But it’s been days since…”

“Time works differently here,” I explain. “It’s probably only been minutes or hours since everything burned.”

Leo opens his mouth, undoubtedly to fire off more questions but Ned’s voice interrupts.

“What did you do to it?” he suddenly wails. “Everything is gone.”

Paige winces, and we share a look. In the chaos of the orc war, we never told the gnomes everything that happened here.

I step forward. “I did it,” I tell them.

“You cooked it,” Ned accuses.

“With your dragon fire,” Zed adds.

“Yes,” I answer.

“Why would you do that?” Ned demands, marching up to me with a glare.

I kneel so that we’re a bit closer to eye level. “Because Constantine was going to kill Paige if I didn’t.”

Ned stops, frowning. The anger goes out of his eyes, and he says, “In that case, thank you for stepping in. Paige always thinks she can save herself, but we’ve been doing it this whole time.”

“And it’s exhausting,” Zed says solemnly, icing covering the lower half of his face.

Behind me, Paige snorts.

I bite back a smile, nodding as seriously as I can. “Now, she has me, so you don’t have to worry.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” Zed says. “We would much rather eat cookies all day and let Kitty chase mice in the stables.”

“You like it in Astronia then?” I ask.

“We love it,” Ted chimes in, all of them nodding happily. “We live like kings!” he adds then ducks his head sheepishly. “No offense.”

“None taken.”

“Hey, what is this?” Blossom asks from across the space.

Paige and I join her along with Mag and the others. She gestures to something lying among the debris and ashes.

An ancient-looking tome, its edges burnt and flaking. But the cover itself and the faded lettering, though tattered, is readable enough.

“Book of Origins,” Blossom reads. She glances up at Paige. “I’ve never seen this book before. Have you?”

“No,” Paige says, brows crinkling in confusion.

The others join us, Mag and the gnomes each taking turns examining the book, but no one remembers it.

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