Page 23 of Ashfall

I don’t wait to find out. I slip deeper into the woods, every step taking me further from her tent, from the tether of her gaze that threatens to unravel what little control I have left. The trees swallow me whole, shadows thick and familiar, until I’m sure I’m alone. Only then do I let go.

My body ignites from the inside out—heat crackling down my spine, fire washing over my limbs in a tide that consumes, then remakes. No bone-cracking. No grotesque morphing. Just a roar of flame and the rush of old magic rising from the core of me. The fire isn't just a transition—it's a memory of what I am, what I’ve always been beneath the skin. The fire consumes my humanshape like parchment, revealing what was never truly hidden. Wings unfurl with a whisper of scorched air, talons stretch and dig into the earth, and my eyes—no longer mortal—pierce the sky ahead. This is my truth. This is my form. This is my power unleashed.

I take to the sky alone, wings beating hard against the updraft, rising fast until the treetops vanish beneath a layer of smoke and cloud. The air thins and cools, sharp against my scales. Then I feel them—two more pulses of ancient power slicing through the dark.

Kade and Rafe join me above the clouds, their dragons flanking mine in perfect formation—fluent in the kind of wordless coordination only centuries together can create. We don’t speak. We don’t have to. The rhythm of war settles over us like an old, familiar cloak as we sweep the ridgeline below. Smoke spirals from fresh burns, dim embers glowing against the dark, flickering like war paint across our scales.

We fly in silence, wings slicing the wind, until we see them—charred spirals etched into the scorched earth. They aren’t random. They’re measured. Precise. Not just markings—runes. Burned into the land with purpose. The lines are too exact, the heat still lingering. This isn’t just a sigil of intent. It’s a ritual. A summoning in a language the world buried, but our kind never forgot. Malek’s signature. His challenge. His war drum.

Ahead, more smoke coils skyward—too thick, too controlled to be natural. It moves like it knows we’re watching. A figure takes shape in the haze: massive wings stretched wide, eyes burning like coals, a jagged smile cutting through the gloom. The air warps around him, humming with threat and memory.

Malek.

He doesn’t speak. Just grins—that slow, taunting curl of teeth and smoke that twists rage through my gut. His wings stretch wider, casting a shadow that swallows the ridge. His eyeslock onto mine. Time fractures. Past and present collide. I feel everything I lost, everything he took.

He tips his head. A dare. A reminder.

Then he vanishes, dissolving into the smoke like he was never there.

Kade’s voice cuts through the silence, sharp and low. “We’ll circle east. See if he’s baiting us.”

Rafe nods, already banking his dragon. “We’ll signal if we find a trail.”

Without waiting for my reply, they peel away—leaving me alone in the darkening sky, Malek’s ghost still burning in my vision.

I don’t land. I don’t stop. I burn my way back to camp, wings shearing through the air like knives, panic dragging hard against the rage still curling in my gut. The image of Malek’s grin flashes in my mind—taunting, certain—and all I can see is Ember, alone, unguarded, wrapped in danger she doesn’t even understand. My wings beat faster, harder, slicing through cloud and smoke as if speed could erase the risk. The memory of her falling through that floor—it guts me. If I’m too late, if she’s hurt…

No. I won’t let that happen.

The sky howls around me, and still I push faster. Because I need to see her. Need to know she’s still safe. Still whole. Still mine—even if she doesn’t know it yet.

When I shift back, the air is still thick with the echo of his grin, with the burn of flight and the weight of panic that hasn’t quite left my chest. I don’t bother dressing. I don’t even slow down. I’m fixated on her. I stalk across camp like a storm barely held in check, the gravel hissing beneath my feet, the scent of smoke still clinging to my skin. Her tent glows dimly in the moonlight, and I know I shouldn’t. I know she needs rest. Space. Time.

But I need to see her more. I need proof she’s here. Breathing. Alive. I walk straight to her tent, every step tight with restraint, and I don’t knock. I ease the flap open and slip inside, the canvas whispering against my shoulder.

She’s curled in the low cot, the lantern left dim on purpose, casting a soft amber glow across her skin. One arm flung over her head, lips parted, lashes dark against her cheek. Vulnerable in a way I’ve never seen her, and it pulls at something deep, something old. The part of me that remembers cave walls and hoarded gold and the vow I once made never to lose another to fear.

I stand at the edge of the shadows, the restraint it takes to keep my distance stretched razor-thin. Every breath she takes tugs at me, her scent curling around my senses like a chain of smoke and longing. I ache to move closer, to kneel at her side and press my forehead to the warm, bare skin of her shoulder. To breathe her in and brand the moment into my memory like I’ve done with every fire I’ve ever flown through. But I know what comes next if I do. My dragon wants to wrap around her, protect her, claim her. And I—I want to. But that isn’t the way. Not with her. Not yet. So I stay where I am, frozen in place, gripping my own will like it’s the only thing keeping me human.

I should leave. I need to leave, but I don’t. I stand there like a sentinel forged in fire, my pulse thrumming with something ancient, something dangerous. Because I’m already hers—even if she doesn’t know it yet.

CHAPTER 11

EMBER

The light coming through the tent canvas is barely gray when I wake, my skin damp with sweat and a chill clinging to my spine. My breath catches, a tight flutter in my chest like something inside me knew to brace for something I hadn’t seen coming. My body’s tense, strung tight like a wire stretched to its limit, and it takes effort to pry my hands from the blanket. I sit up slowly; the cot creaking beneath me, muscles aching in strange places, like I’d been fighting something in my sleep. I glance toward the tent flap.

It looks... wrong. Not open. Not obviously disturbed. Just different. A few inches misaligned from how I closed it last night. A subtle wrinkle in the fabric. A crease where there shouldn’t be. And something else—almost like the air inside the tent is heavier, still holding a breath that doesn’t belong to me. I stare at it for a second too long, that quiet tickle at the base of my spine refusing to go away. Like someone was here. Like I wasn’t alone.

I frown, but the unease keeps buzzing beneath my skin. Tell myself I’m being paranoid, that it’s just sleep fog and overwork playing tricks on my perception. But that doesn’t stop the icyknot forming in my gut—or the way I keep glancing over my shoulder like someone might still be here, just out of sight.

Still, I check my bag, moving slower than usual, as if expecting something to leap out at me. My laptop’s untouched. My notes and laptop are exactly where I left them, even the pen I dropped last night resting at the same odd angle. Nothing looks out of place—but the feeling lingers. Like someone slipped in and out without leaving a mark. I see nothing missing, but that doesn’t mean someone didn’t take something. Maybe someone was looking for something I haven’t even found yet.

But the sense of being watched, of something lingering, won’t go away. It threads through the air like smoke, curling into my lungs, heavy and invisible. I keep looking over my shoulder, half-expecting the flap to rustle again, to catch a whisper of breath that isn’t mine. Like something came and stayed—just out of sight, just out of reach—but not gone. It’s the kind of sensation that sticks to your skin, that whispers through your hair even after you’ve checked every corner and turned on every light. A low hum in my bones that doesn’t fade with reason. It’s not just a feeling anymore. It’s a warning.

At breakfast, the sense only deepens. The mess tent buzzes with low conversation and the scrape of metal against tin plates, but it all seems to go still the moment I step in. The firefighters are unusually quiet this morning—too quiet. Nods are stiff, eyes slide past me too quickly, and whatever energy was in the room before seems to thin out around me. I try twice to spark a discussion—bring up the cluster patterns, the irregular wind anomalies, ask questions I know demand answers—but both times I’m met with polite non-answers. Shrugs. Deflections. As if they’re following a script that tells them to keep their mouths shut. It’s not indifference. It’s avoidance. Like they’re afraid of saying too much.

The third time, I don’t waste my breath on subtlety. I cross the space between us and plant myself squarely in front of the base commander, arms crossed, jaw set. His crew might look the other way, but I won’t let him. Not today. Not when I’m this close to something and he’s acting like I’m the one lighting matches.

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