For a breath, I stayed still, disoriented, my dream tangled with reality. My palms were sweaty, I had been too close to the fire, and I had been seconds away from being consumed by it.
The Lieutenant’s voice cut across the crackle, sharp and unshakable.
“Fire demon,” he barked. “It has to be. Stay alert, stay together!”
Carolyn’s eyes went wide. “Here? In the middle of nowhere?!”
“Exactly where they’d strike,” our leader snapped back, not leaving room for doubt.
Our squad scrambled tighter around him, their panic clinging to the explanation like a lifeline. I rose more slowly, my pulse still thrumming to that dream rhythm. While the others gagged on smoke, I felt… a sudden steadiness.
I tore my gaze away from the enchanting fire.
We stumbled clear of the burning trees at last, the morning air thick with smoke. Ash drifted in lazy flakes, clinging to sweat-slicked skin. Nate droppedto his knees, hauling Mey down with him, checking her for burns. Carolyn paced in tight, panicked circles, every crackle in the underbrush making her twitch. Ashley muttered curses at her satchel, shaking it to make sure nothing had ignited or was missing.
The Lieutenant stood tall despite the soot streaking his face, eyes sharp on the dark tree line. “No ordinary fire spreads like that. It was a demon’s work. Everyone stay sharp; fire demons don’t just ignite a forest fire and vanish. They watch. They wait.”
Carolyn made a strangled sound. “They wait for what? For us to… to-”
“To slip,” the Lieutenant cut her off. “So we don’t. Not today.Not ever.”
Mey clutched Nate’s arm, whispering, “I thought fire demons only lived near the desert and warm places?”
“Guess someone forgot to tell this one,” I said grimly, tugging my hair inside of my shirt, sheltering it from embers. “Question is, if it wanted us dead, why hasn’t it killed us yet?”
The squad fell quiet, the question hanging in the air.
I stayed still, eyes fixed on the glow fading behind the trees, as rain slowly smothered it. The fire was gone, but its warmth lingered on my skin, like a terrible reminder of what could’ve been.
We gathered further into the forest where the greenery once again took over, smoke curling like ghosts between the trees behind us. The fire’s glow was dimmer from here, only an angry stain on the horizon. Everyone was coughing, except for me, as I silently watched the sparks fade.
Nate broke the quiet first. “How the hell did it get that close without us hearing?”
“Wasn’t someone on watch?” I muttered, fiddling with the straps of my harness. “I’ve heard that they strike when you least expect it, is that true?”
“Yes, I was keeping guard,” Carolyn snapped, too fast, her eyes wide and wet. “It was quiet, there was nothing there… I—”
“You had the last watch before dawn, and you fell asleep?”
All heads turned. The Lieutenant’s gaze fixed on her like a hawk.
Carolyn stammered. “I-I didn’t fall asleep! I-I wasn’t supposed to—”
“You did,” he said flatly, with no room for debate. “Or the demon slipped past you because you weren’t sharp enough. Either way, it nearly cost us our lives.”
Carolyn’s fingers fidgeted, ripping against her nails, trembling. “I swear I didn’t—”
“Swearing won’t change what happened,” Nate cut in, sharp as flint. “If we’re lucky, next time we’ll get a warning before half the forest lights up.”
Mey pressed out of Nate’s embrace, wobbling on her legs before her eyes darted towards the smoldering smoke. “Will it come back?” she whispered.
“It will, if we’re careless again,” our leader said, his voice carrying over them all. “We can’t afford another mistake.”
Silence fell, heavy as the smoke in the distance.
I kept my gaze lowered. Right as I thought we were opening up, taking our first steps towards becoming a team.Thishappened and shredded apart the small trust we had built in a matter of seconds…
We continued walking, with Nate taking the lead again, silence eating the space between us. Was it because of therough start of the day, or was it simply our hope that had taken a beating? Surely our squad could figure this out and recover our confidence.
