Chapter - 2
The journey to the fortress passed in flickering silence.
No one spoke. No one needed to.
Evelyn rode behind Kael on a strange beast — part horse, part shadow, muscles rippling beneath its coal-dark hide. The creature didn't breathe steam, but smoke, like the very air of this world was laced with embers. And Kael's hand — steady on the reins, inches from her own — radiated heat.
Not like a man.
Like something born of a forge.
She didn't dare speak.
Not because she was afraid of him.
But because she wasn't sure what would happen if she did.
Her back still burned.
A sigil. She hadn't seen it, but she felt it — etched between her shoulder blades like living ink, pulsing slowly beneath her skin.
When they arrived, she saw it for the first time.
The fortress was a mountain wrapped in armor.
Blackstone towers pierced the sky, crowned with flames that burned without fuel. Bridges of glowing lava flowed between peaks like veins of a sleeping god. The gates alone were the height of city buildings — carved with dragons whose eyes wept smoke.
They opened without sound.
Inside: stillness.
The kind of silence that said, You are being watched.
Kael led her through long stone halls lit by hovering orbs of fire.
No torches. No guards.
Only that sense of being carried deeper into something sacred… or sacrificial.
Finally, he stopped before a door of volcanic glass.
"This is yours," he said.
His voice was quiet now. No less commanding, but no longer a thunderclap.
"You are not a prisoner. But you are not safe."
She frowned. "From what?"
He looked at her then — really looked. And for a moment, his eyes didn't burn.
They ached.
"From yourself."
And then he left.
The room was dark, vast, and filled with heat.
Not oppressive. Not suffocating. But alive. The walls pulsed faintly, as if the whole fortress had a heartbeat. Soft silks lay across the bed. A tub of steaming water glowed in the corner, already drawn. Someone had prepared for her.
Too well.
She sat on the edge of the bed, trying not to shake.
That's when she noticed it in the mirror.
Her back.
She turned slowly, pulling her shirt away — and gasped.
The sigil burned between her shoulder blades: a dragon in flight, its wings stretched wide, tail curling into flame. Not ink. Not scar.
Fire made flesh.
It pulsed in time with her heart.
And every time it beat… the air in the room shifted.
Her skin flushed.
She heard a sound.
Not from the hall. Not from the walls.
From inside her.
A low, deep hum.
That night, sleep did not come.
Not in dreams.
Not in peace.
The heat in her spine grew stronger. Her bones ached. Her breath shortened.
She threw the silk covers off, padded to the balcony overlooking the lava rivers below. The sky above was black velvet — pierced by stars and glowing constellations that moved like drifting ash.
And there he was.
Kael.
On a terrace far below, standing alone in nothing but shadow and that long black cloak.
She should have looked away.
Instead, she watched him.
Not his body — though it was carved from heat and war.
But his stillness.
The way he stood like he'd been carved into this world.
Evelyn didn't realize she'd stepped to the edge of the balcony until the wind rose and a spark from below drifted toward her — and caught.
It landed softly against her chest.
And the sigil flared.
She gasped.
Down below, Kael's head snapped up.
Their eyes met across the divide.
His gaze burned through her — not cruel, not hungry.
But like he recognized her.
And hated that he did.
She turned and fled back inside.
The mark didn't stop pulsing.
Not for hours.
Not even when she finally slept — face buried in silk, breath short, hands clenched in the sheets.
Somewhere deep beneath the fortress…
In a chamber no one had entered in years…
The same sigil glowed to life across the surface of a sealed stone door.
And something ancient stirred.