The first thing I remember is the heat.
Not just on my skin — but inside it.
Like my veins had been replaced with molten metal, and my heart was no longer a heart at all, but a forge hammering itself to pieces.
The night was quiet otherwise.
Too quiet. The kind of stillness that only existed before slaughter.
I stood at the edge of the valley, staring down at a cluster of lanterns below — a village built around a chapel of white stone and gold glass. The Lightborn, Seraphina had called them. Fanatics who worshiped the sun. Hunters of the night.
And my target.
"They burn our kind for prayers," Seraphina said beside me, her voice smooth, intoxicating. "Children, mothers, fledglings — they call it purification. You, my Fireblood, will show them what true fire means."
Her hand rested on my shoulder — cold, delicate, commanding.
I wanted to tell her that I didn't want to.
That I was tired of blood, tired of the screaming echo in my skull, tired of the thirst that never slept.
But then I remembered her eyes — the color of dusk and embers — and the way she smiled when she called me her creation.
And I realized I couldn't tell her anything.
The hunger had a voice now. And it spoke louder than mine.
...
We entered the village as shadows, her coven moving around me like predators through fog.
Neris, the poisoner — eyes black as oil, scent of sweet rot.
Valor, the enforcer — silent, massive, his armor etched with burn marks from a hundred battles.
Mira, the memory-singer — her hum could drown thoughts and plant others.
And Kade, the ritualist — pale as bone, whispering prayers to gods long dead.
They followed Seraphina like planets around a dying sun.
She stopped in the square. The villagers had already begun to gather, drawn by the sudden stillness — the way their torches flickered for no reason. A priest stepped forward, robes white, hands trembling but raised in defiance.
"Begone, demon," he said. "This place is consecrated."
Seraphina smiled. "Then let it burn brighter."
She turned to me.
The others stepped back.
"Show me," she said softly. "What the fire whispers when it dreams."
For a heartbeat, I couldn't move. My chest ached — not from fear, but from memory.
The fire, the light — it reminded me of home.
A farmhouse, once.
A boy staring out at a wheat field during sunset, his father's laughter echoing from the porch. The smell of bread. His mother's hands in his hair. The color of the sky before night came.
Then — a scream, a shadow, blood on wood.
And silence.
That boy died long before the fire.
But sometimes, when I closed my eyes, I could still hear him crying inside me.
...
Seraphina's whisper slid into my ear.
"Do you hesitate because they are human?"
I swallowed. "Because I was."
She chuckled. "Was. Such a fragile word."
Her hand pressed against my chest, over my heart. I felt something spark beneath her touch — an ember flaring awake. It hurt. Gods, it hurt.
"The Sun-seed," she murmured. "Your gift. Your curse. The gods burned it into your blood long ago. You were born to bring balance — fire to shadow, flame to night. But you were too soft."
She leaned closer, her lips at my ear.
"Let me make you strong."
Something broke.
Heat erupted outward — a roar that split the air. My body convulsed as light poured from my skin, molten and blinding. The villagers screamed as the ground beneath them began to glow.
Fire crawled up my arms, coiling like serpents. The torches extinguished in surrender.
And for the first time since my death… I felt alive.
...
They tried to fight.
The zealots raised their silver blades, their prayers thick on their tongues. "By the Sun, we purify thee!"
The irony almost made me laugh.
Because when the Sun answered, it wasn't mercy that came.
It was me.
I raised my hand — and the fire obeyed. It leapt from my skin like an animal freed from a cage, devouring air, flesh, and stone in one ravenous breath. Screams filled the square, echoing through the chapel.
The smell was unbearable — scorched linen, hair, the bitter tang of holy oil boiling.
I saw a man shielding his child, his face melting in the heat.
And suddenly, everything slowed.
The fire moved around them, bending, curling — as if waiting for my permission.
The boy looked up at me, eyes wide and wet.
He couldn't have been more than eight.
Just like I once was.
"Please," he whispered.
My hand trembled.
The fire snarled, hungry, demanding release. But the boy's face — that face — it cut through the haze like cold water.
I saw myself again.
The boy in the farmhouse.
The fire licking at the walls.
The shadow with red eyes that smiled as it burned.
Not again. Not him.
I clenched my fist — forcing the fire to retract, to crawl back under my skin. It screamed in my bones.
But then Seraphina's voice coiled through my skull like silk.
"Mercy is weakness."
She raised her own hand.
The boy's body ignited.
...
I screamed.
The sound tore through me, half-human, half-something else — a howl that split the sky.
Seraphina turned slowly, her eyes gleaming in the inferno. "You see?" she said. "Even mercy burns."
I fell to my knees, choking on smoke, on guilt, on rage. The fire within me pulsed, begging to be unleashed again, but I couldn't tell if it wanted to destroy her or myself.
"You did well," she said, kneeling beside me. "You let it speak."
"What did I say?" My voice cracked.
"That life is illusion. That pain is truth."
She traced a line down my jaw, her nails leaving trails of heat. "Every time you resist, you kill the boy you were. Every time you kill, you set him free."
I didn't understand. I didn't want to.
Behind her, Neris was gathering what remained of the bodies, whispering poisons to still the dying. Valor crushed the chapel doors with his bare hands. And Kade began his ritual — a circle of ashes, fire twisting in unnatural shapes.
This was no battle.
This was baptism.
And I was the altar.
...
Later, when the fires had died, Seraphina led me to the ruins of the chapel. The altar was cracked, the cross melted. The sun symbol carved into the marble glowed faintly with residual heat.
She placed her hand on it. The stone pulsed — a heartbeat of fire echoing through the ground.
"The Lightborn believed this was the Sun's blessing," she said. "They were right. It was a fragment — the seed of divine flame, trapped in mortal form."
Her gaze slid to me. "And now, it lives in you."
The light beneath the altar flared, racing through the cracks like veins of gold. It climbed my legs, seeping into my body. My vision blurred with heat. I felt the Sun-seed merge — a burning core deep in my chest, brighter than blood.
"Every god must burn to rise," she whispered. "You, my Fireblood, are no longer human. You are their vengeance."
The others watched in reverence. Even Valor bowed his head.
But all I could think of was that boy — the one who had screamed in the farmhouse, the one who had whispered please.
He was still in there, somewhere beneath the ash.
And now, he was screaming again.
...
When night returned, Seraphina left me to "rest."
I didn't. I walked to the edge of the ruins, where the flames had died but the air still shimmered with heat. There, I found a pool — shallow, murky, reflecting faint orange light.
I stared into it.
The man staring back wasn't me.
His eyes burned gold. His veins glowed faintly under his skin, like threads of magma. His face — mine — was beautiful and terrible in equal measure.
When I blinked, I saw her — Aria — for the first time in weeks.
Her silhouette, her eyes, her voice whispering my name.
The bond flared — faint but undeniable.
Then the fire inside me surged in response, devouring her image.
I fell backward, gasping.
The reflection warped. The water boiled. And in that boiling mirror, I saw something new — a figure made of flame and shadow, its shape almost human, almost divine.
"You are me," it said.
"No," I whispered. "I'm still—"
"—the boy in the farmhouse?" It laughed. "He burned first."
The reflection smiled with Seraphina's voice.
"Welcome home, Fireblood."
...
By dawn, the village was gone.
Only ashes remained — glowing faintly like embers under the gray sky.
Seraphina stood among the ruins, her cloak unburned, her beauty untouched. She looked at me — not with affection, not even triumph.
With possession.
"Do you understand now?" she asked.
I looked around — at the corpses, at the silent houses, at the scorched fields that would never grow again. I felt the fire still pulsing inside me, craving more.
"Yes," I said quietly.
She smiled. "And what do you understand?"
I met her gaze. "That the fire doesn't need gods to speak."
Her expression softened — approval, perhaps, or delight. "Then let it roar."
She turned away, her coven following her into the mist.
I stayed behind for a moment longer, kneeling in the ashes of the boy's family — the ones I'd burned and the ones she'd finished.
I touched the ground.
The heat answered me — loyal, eager, alive.
And for the first time since I'd awakened, I stopped fighting it.
The boy in the farmhouse was gone.
The man who loved Aria was dying.
What remained was something else entirely.
Fireblood.