And now I’m stuck. Can’t move. Can’t get out.
A cough rips out of me—once, twice—then nothing.
Breath won’t come right anymore, shallow and weak as the smoke and heat press in, until walls and doorways twist together in a blur I can’t trust as real. My mouth tastes sour.
Air. I need air.
Oh god, I'm going to... No, no, Bren knows where I am, right? But what if he can’t get in? What if he’s too late? The fire’s faster. Always faster.
Something shifts in the haze, a shadow moving. Charlie? My stomach lurches. Instinct screams to get up, but my body still won’t move. I claw at my Threads, begging them to answer, but nothing. They sputter out, choking like my lungs.
Too hot. Too dizzy.
I’m slipping.
This can’t be it. I didn’t save them. I didn’t save Ashvale.
The roar of the fire dulls, fading to a muffled hum, like I’ve sunk underwater. My lips part around a name—Rhiann, maybe it’s just in my head. My hand claws out anyway, reaching for her, for anything—but for a second, something else answers. A hum under my skin that doesn’t belong to me. A pull, magnetic and strange, like someone tugging on a thread I didn’t cast. It sharpens, cutting through the fire’s roar, before, finally, blackness. It curls in, slow and steady, until it’s all there is.
Then - Footsteps.
Heavy. Close.
“Get up.”
The order brushes the edge of my mind, so faint I can’t tell if they’re real, or just the last thought my brain conjures before everything fades.
Bren?
“Thorn, get up now.”
This time it slices clean through as a hand clamps around my arm and yanks me forward—abrupt, jarring—my lungs seize, choking on the sudden shift.
Not in my head, someone’s here.
But my legs won’t hold, I can’t feel my feet, and my chest won’t clear. I’m dead weight in their grip.Then arms scoopdown, one under my knees, one bracing my back as I'm lifted into solid strength—my chest pressed to warmth, my head falling sideways.
The scent of clean sweat and leather-warm heat cuts through the smoke as he pulls me close. I force my eyes open—just a fraction—long enough to catch the dark hazel of his gaze, rimmed with gold and steady on mine for a single heartbeat, before smoke folds between us again and he turns, carrying me toward the ruptured light. Each step jars. The heat presses harder. The fire’s roar closes in, until, all at once, it breaks.
Cold air hits my face like a slap.
The sound shifts, roaring replaced by the distant crackle of burning and the jumbled shouts of voices outside. The heat fades, smoke thins, and the arms around me stop in front of someone else.
“Take her and get her the fuck out of here.Now.” Not soft. Not a question. A command, low and raw with fury.
My weight shifts, the solid heat of one grip giving way to another—arms not as strong, not as steady, but known. Safe.
My head drops against a shoulder I could find blind, one I know better than my own reflection.Bren.
Bren lowersme on to the slope above Ashvale, propping me against the old chapel wall, the stone cold enough to bite through skin. My head lolls back. Can’t hold it up. Can’t hold anything up.
“Breathe,” he says, low and hoarse, but the way his hands tremble tells me he’s not sure I can. I’m not sure I can.
Pain claws up my throat as I cough, the sound raw and wet and awful. My ribs feel like cracked stone. But I’m not drowning anymore. Just burning.
“Just stay with me.” Not a command, it’s a plea. I try to open my eyes, but they close before I can focus.
Somewhere nearby, the fire’s still crackling. Distant. Or maybe just quieter now. I can’t tell. The air tastes like smoke and copper, and every inhale feels like I’m dragging down broken glass.
