Beneath that comfort was something hungry. It watched from the dark. Waiting. Patient. Ready to devour.
The air thickened. Smoke slipped into my lungs, sour and bitter, curling inside my throat like it belonged there.
I knew I should’ve been fighting. Screaming. Thrashing. Doing anything.
But I was so tired.
The flames blurred in and out of focus. I didn’t know if I was standing or falling. I couldn’t tell where my body ended and the heat began. Everything felt far away.
Screams ripped out of Will, raw and earth-shaking. He sobbed. Pleaded. Begged them to be merciful. But I knew it didn’t matter.
They enjoyed it.
Every second of it.
The fire got closer. Close enough to dry the tears from my eyes before they could fall.
A hand closed around my neck, yanking me forward.
“What are you doing? Stop—please, don’t—” Will’s voice kept tearing through the night.
The heat crawled over my skin. Slow and sweet. Like poison ivy’s gentle touch before the blistering sting.
“Kera. Do something!”
But I didn’t move. I couldn’t. My body didn’t feel like mine anymore. It moved, but I wasn’t inside it.
I tilted my head up and found the moon. Pale and distant, just watching. I thought of the riverbank.
Of wind in the fields.
Of my mother’s voice.
The flames reached the edge of my vision.
I could have done something. I could have burned them. But I didn’t.
My captor leaned in.
“What a waste,” he rasped, his voice low and ugly against my ear. “You’re a pretty thing,”
I didn’t have time to process the words.
He shoved me.
Hard.
I didn’t hit the ground.
I didn’t land.
I vanished.
The moment I touched the fire, I stopped being Kera.
I became pain.
The heat sank its teeth into me. It tore and gnawed and peeled me apart. My skin split open. My clothes dissolved into ash. Flames curled around my arms, poured down my legs, seeped into my chest and lit my ribs from the inside.
