He nudged her with the toe of his boot, just enough to make her shift, my breath hitched. Panic roared up my throat so fast it tasted like blood.
“Don’t,” I snapped. “This ends with you lettin’ her go.”
Jasper shook his head slow. “It doesn’t end till the fire says it does.”
I took a half step closer, measured, careful, my eyes never leavin’ the space between him and the flames. My heart was poundin’ so hard I was scared he could hear it.
“Listen to me,” I said, my voice low, rough. “She’s not your vessel. She’s not your flame. She’s a woman you hurt because you needed somethin’ to blame.”
His gaze flicked to me, hard now. “You don’t know anything about how the Flame cleanses and brings justice to the world.”
I swallowed hard, mind racin’. I needed a distraction. A second. Somethin’ he didn’t see comin’.
And then I saw it.
A shadow shifted behind him, just beyond the reach of the firelight. Slow. Deliberate. Familiar in a way that damn near broke me.
My daddy.
He’d circled wide, quiet as sin, movin’ through the place like he’d been born to this kind of night. His face was set, jawlocked, eyes fixed on Jasper’s back. No hesitation. No doubt. Just purpose.
Hope hit me so hard my knees threatened to give.
Jasper kept talkin’, still preachin’, still watchin’ me. “You ever notice how people fight hardest right before they’re set free?”
“No,” I said, steadyin’ my voice. “But I noticed how they shut up right before they die.”
Daddy moved.
One second Jasper was smilin’, sure of himself, and the next my old man was on him, arm locked around his throat, draggin’ him back away from the fire with a grunt of effort.
Jasper shouted, startled and furious. “What the—”
That was all the opening I needed.
I was movin’ before the sound finished leavin’ his mouth.
I dropped down from the ledge, lunged forward, hands goin’ straight to Lark. The heat was brutal up close, heating my skin, but I didn’t care. I got one arm under her shoulders, the other around her waist, and hauled her back hard, puttin’ my body between her and the flames.
“I got you,” I said, breath ragged. “I got you, darlin’.”
She stirred, a soft sound leavin’ her throat, and that was enough to keep me standin’.
Behind me, the fight exploded.
Jasper thrashed, elbows flyin’, boots diggin’ into the dirt as Daddy wrestled him away from the circle. They went down hard, rollin’ through ash and embers, Jasper screamin’ like a cornered animal.
“You don’t understand!” Jasper yelled. “She was chosen!”
Daddy growled somethin’ low and mean I’d heard my whole life when a man had gone too far. They struggled, hands slippin’, fists landin’ wet and solid.
I dragged Lark farther back, away from the heat, laid her down gentle as I could. My hands shook as I checked her bindings, workin’ fast, breath sawin’ in and out of my chest.
Then the shot rang out.
One sharp crack that tore through the night and echoed off the trees.
Everything froze.
