Page 1 of A City of Flames

“What a great day to shit oneself to death, don’t you think?” My second oldest brother whispers beside me.

I roll my eyes and turn to face him. “Careful Illias, your sarcasm could get you killed, and then you’ll be shitting yourself postmortem.”

His thick dark brows bunch together as he huffs, cutting a gaze towards the woods in front of us. A broken tree has blocked our pathway. Making it merely impossible to jump over the height of it, yet excellent when it comes to hiding from whatever creatures lie ahead of us.

“Why is it that you drag me out on every hunting escapade of yours?” He groans quietly as the spring morning sunlight streams through branches and high trees. “Why can’t you ask Iker to do this instead?”

“Iker...” Being two years older than me and cannot tell whether it is night or day most of the time. “Iker is dreadful when it comes to moral support, unlike you. Besides, you’re my favorite out of the three.” I smile. Illias is known as the lenient one out of the four of us. He can never say no to my offers on purchasing him cans of paint for his canvases if he tags along.

He scoffs, brown doe eyes find my light blue ones. “Now you are outright lying—”

I lift a hand to silence him and listen carefully as the bushes to my right rustle in the distance.

“What? What is it? Should I start running?” Illias asks. The lining of his dusted tunic frays at the edges.

My eyes search every thicket surrounding us. “Where did you set the trap?”

“Trap? I was supposed to set a trap?”

I turn my head slowly and grit my teeth. “I asked you yesterday!”

He gulps, short chestnut curls fall across his forehead, just about touching his brows. “Oh, we really are going to die, aren’t we?”

It’s a possibility, yes, but am I telling him that? No, I am not. “I’ll just have to catch it a different way,” I say and rise to my feet. Birds scatter towards the skies, and the wind blows wisps of my hair across in a dark and eerie ambience.

I pull the cloak down from my head and draw two daggers out of the leather sheath strapped around my corset. I wait five short seconds before a crack of a branch comes from my side, and I whisper, “Now... you can run.”

On cue, Illias takes off in the opposite direction as a rümen catapults out of the bushes, heading to the main forest. I waste no time leaping over the tree. One of the blades warms against my non-gloved hand as my boots sink into the crusted grass. I pass darker branches, lichens, and shrubs as the rümen screeches in the distance.

Rümens rely on scent and hearing for everything. Where eyes should be, slits can be observed on either side of their head, rendering them blind. With the grimy slim body of a long snake and the wings of a bat, they look intimidating enough, but their screech? That is a deathly sound no one should experience at proximity.

I don’t intend to kill one. My primary purpose is trapping, even if rümens are one of the hardest species to catch due to their speed and agility. Yet, a simple nick to the scales on their back renders them weak.

Pausing in the middle of a clearing when it’s no longer in sight, I keep my grip steady and bring the dagger to the side of my head.

More birds flee from their nests, and I wait... I wait for any movement, any noise to show the rümen is still lurking within the depths of the woods.

Turning in a slow circle, my breath wavers. And just as I spot a glimmer of sun bounce off the scales of the rümen hidden between bushes, a snap of a twig behind triggers the creature, causing it to fly out, fangs at the ready as it sends me to lie flat onto the ground. Both knives fall from my hands, and I bring my forearm out to its neck, stopping the horrid creature from biting me.

Everyone knows the bite of one is lethal—a death unimaginable.

I wince, trying to reach for the blade that has fallen on the far left of my body while the rümen’s head comes down, snapping its razor teeth and bellowing out its cries which only remind me of something far feared in our land.

Dragons.

Suddenly, flashes of that day when I was twelve years old echo in my mind. How my mother’s screams resonated in our cottage as I stood there paralyzed with fear, helplessly watching a dragon kill my father in broad daylight.

I grunt out a cry as the rümen’s talons sink into the side of my leg, the same way the dragon had sunk his in my flesh, slicing down from my palm to my forearm. I had raised it as a shield at the same moment my oldest brother Idris shot an arrow to its back, projecting the dragon forward.

The memory comes back to me so vividly it all but blends with the present, the blurred images fogging over the reality of the moment. I had raised my arm as a shield back then, yet the blunt force of the arrow made the dragon’s claw slice down into my palm.

As my mind finally allows me to focus on the present, the rümen stops, looking into my eyes as if it can see me—as if it’s analyzing me, just the way the dragon had done, right before taking Idris’s arrow. I take that as my chance, and once my hand latches onto the handle of the blade, I bare my strength and ram it into the side of the creature’s neck, deepening it until blood, warm and thick like lava, erupts down my hand.

The rümen screams out its agony one last time before slumping. Membranous wings fall limp, and I push its body off of mine, scrambling to my feet while catching my breath.

So much for not wanting to kill.

Picking up the other blade, I half turn to try and find Illias when a sense of darkness up ahead draws my attention. I stare at the thorns encasing the path, leading to the territory known as the Screaming Forests. A section that separates the land of Emberwell from Terranos and a place where rulers of earthly immortals reside. No human on our side ever dares pass it. Not after the settlement was forged for all of Zerathion and its four lands, three hundred years ago. Each to their own land except for rulers.

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