Chapter Forty
Craize sets us down just beyond the blazing ring.
The heat hits like a physical blow. Sweat beads instantly form along my hairline, my cheeks flushing as the air buckles into rippling waves of molten gold. Every breath burns—thick, heavy, andhostile—as if the fire itself has teeth and my lungs are caught between them.
At the edge of the inferno stands Ryder, one hand braced on the hilt of his sword. A thin line of blood slips down his cheek, stark against firelit skin. Nala stands at his side, her eyes greeting me with relief and panic all at once.
“You okay?” I ask, stepping into the heat. I cup Ryder’s cheek and release a careful pulse of warmth. The cut seals beneath my fingers, skin knitting cleanly back together.
He exhales, slow and controlled, tension easing from his shoulders. “I’m fine.” His eyes stay on mine, searching, measuring. “Are you?”
“I’m okay,” I say, though the lie tastes thin. My gaze slides past him to the fire. “And Versivius?”
“He’s nearby.” Ryder tilts his head, eyes tracking the sky. I follow—past smoke spiralling upward, past treetops trembling under the pressure—to the towering wall of flames. It roars like a living thing, furious and hungry, straining against whatever elixir cages it.
“Is it in there?” My hand lifts, unsteady, toward the inferno.
“For now.” Ryder’s jaw tightens with a stiff nod.
The fire surges, swallowing his words in its crackling snarl. Shapes writhe within the blaze, and for a heartbeat, I swear I see something pacing, its silhouette bending in ways nothing living should. My pulse stutters, and even though the heat grows quick around me, my hairs stand on end as if it were deathly cold.
Nala steps forward, voice calm and absolute. “We don’t have long. Lina said the fire won’t hold for more than an hour, and even then, she doesn’t know for sure.”
River rolls his shoulders, fingers tightening around the hilts of his knives, blue powder catching the light. “Then we’d best move quickly,” he says, a muscle jumping in his jaw.
A gust of wind sweeps low overhead—Versivius, unseen but unmistakable. A reminder. A comfort.
I draw in a steadying breath. “Okay,” I say. “This is it.”
Silence falls—not the absence of sound, but the kind that coils tight and waits.
Ryder draws his sword.
The soft metallic whisper cuts clean through the roar of the flames. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t look at us. The firelight dances along the blade, catching in the hard line of his jaw, in the quiet fury etched into his face. His stillness is lethal—the kind that comes just before something shatters.
Even the air seems to brace.
River steps up beside us, spinning one of his lightning-dusted knives between his fingers, grin sharp as broken glass.
“All right,” he says lightly. “Let’s destroy this son of a bitch.”
The fire hisses, as if answering the challenge.
And together, we step forward—inches from the flames.
I whistle for Craize. “Take them over,” I instruct, and he swoops low, wings slicing through smoke-heavy air as he collects his passengers. Nala swings onto Kareem’s back in one fluidmotion. I’m about to climb behind her when a hand clamps around my wrist—cold and vice-tight.
“Asha, watch out!” Nala shouts.
My head snaps back.
Everything in me freezes.
It’s—
It’s my dad.
Leon stands before me, his hand wrapped tightly around my wrist.
