Page 61 of Embers of Midnight
Home felt like dry socks and water that tasted like water instead of pipes. I sat and let the tremor finish in my hands. Ronan set a glass down and waited until I drank and set it back. The corner of his mouth shifted half a centimeter. For him, that was a whole grin.
Ash dropped into the chair opposite and slid something across the table. A thin flake of black stone, dull now that the heat had gone. A tiny rune sat etched on one edge in Caelum’s precise lines. “Souvenir,” Ash said. His grin had softened at the edges. “First careful fire.”
“It did not feel careful,” I said, hearing how rough my voice was. “It felt like wrestling with a door you do not want to slam.”
“Careful is harder than strong,” Darian said from the doorway. He had already taken off his jacket and rolled his sleeves. His gaze skimmed my hands and moved on when the shake had stopped. He did not mark it out loud like a flaw. He let it be part of the picture.
Caelum leaned back against the counter, palms on the wood, eyes on me like he was listening to a note I could not hear. “You led without taking. That matters.”
“I did not break a single screw,” I said, and I let the pride through because it felt new and clean.
Ash stretched his feet under the table and bumped my boot. “You just taught a stone worm to heel. Top ten.”
“Name the other nine,” I said.
“Later,” he said, and it stayed as a promise instead of a tease.
Morrowpushed his head under my hand. I scratched along his jaw until his eyes went soft. Vex hopped into the fruit bowl and settled like a badly shaped pear because boundaries were not his hobby. Silks peeked from Ash’s cuff and flicked her tongue at the back of my knuckles. The cool touch grounded me more than any speech.
Ronan’s fingers pressed the nape of my neck for one long second. Warm. Steady. Permission to breathe. “Good work,” he said again, and the second time felt bigger.
“What about the Hunters?” I asked, turning the basalt chip in my palm. The etched rune caught light and then hid.
“Chased a shadow into a dead room,” Darian said, dry as paper. “By the time they realized nothing in there had a pulse, we were already boring.”
“Tragic for them,” Ash said. “Perfect for us.”
I set the chip flat and covered it with my hand. The stone was cool. My skin was warm. The balance felt like a lesson I wanted to remember.
“Thank you for letting me lead,” I said, not just to be polite. “I have spent a lot of years being told to get small. Tonight felt like the opposite.”
Ash’s grin thinned into something simple. “You’re ours, Little Flame. We do not bench family.”
The line hit low and stayed. I would probably make fun of it later to survive the feeling. Not tonight.
Vex let out a quiet caw and spat something onto the table. A strip of fabric with an embroidered mark scuffed at the edges. It took me a second to place it. Hunter insignia. Old style, not from auniform, from a bag. He rolled his head like he had delivered a trophy.
“Where did you get that?” Darian asked, already reaching for a cloth to pick it up. Vex clicked his beak, pointed at his own chest, then at the air, then made a walking motion with both claws like a silent film of theft. Ash coughed into his fist to hide a laugh and failed.
Ronan’s eyes narrowed in thought instead of worry. “They were closer than the van,” he said. “Someone cut through the side yard on foot.”
Caelum’s mouth went to a thin line. “Ironbridge will not stay quiet.”
The warmth under my skin stayed steady instead of spiking. I folded the cloth and slid it across the table so Darian could bag it. The stone in my other hand felt heavier in a way I did not hate.
“Then we practice again tomorrow,” I said. “I want more control, not less.”
Darian nodded once. “Eight. Training room.”
Ronan finished my water without asking and left the empty glass in front of me like a dare to hydrate more. Ash leaned back until his chair balanced on two legs and gave me a slow look that started at my face and did not go lower than my collarbone, which somehow felt more intimate than a once-over. Caelumslid a fresh mug across the counter like he had calculated my need two minutes ago and gotten the answer right.
I pocketed the basalt with the small rune because I am apparently sentimental now. The weight settled against my thigh in a way that felt like proof.
The day had started with a movie and the kind of contact that did not ask for anything but presence. It had turned into a field job and the first time my fire did what I asked without trying to make a point. I had not burned a thing I did not mean to. I had not been benched. I had been trusted with something delicate and did not break it.
Soft did not mean weak. It meant I finally had more than one way to burn.
“Bed,” Ronan said, not quite an order.
