Alaric lands heavily nearby, his dragon form rippling smaller as he forces himself toward a more humanoid shape, blue fire still simmering off his scales.
“Fire power is tricky,” he grits out, eyes silver-bright. “It seduces. It corrupts. It overwhelms. When the tether snaps, he can lose himself to it. We are doing everything we can to contain?—”
“No.” The word rips out of me.
They all look stunned.
“You’re wrong,” I say, fists curling, heart pounding so hard my chest hurts. “Fire doesn’t just corrupt and destroy. It purges. It cleans. It remakes things.”
Alaric stares at me like I’ve grown an extra head. “That may be, but right now you cannot reach him?—”
“Yes,” I cut in, voice shaking. “I can. You can’t. But I can. Because I’m not afraid of him. I love him. And whether he’s admitted it or not, he loves me too.”
The moment I say it, something inside me settles.
The bond hums.
Thorne turns.
The massive skull swivels toward me, fire flaring higher in his sockets. For a heartbeat, there is no recognition.
Just rage and raw power and a kind of agony that tears at my chest.
He roars.
The sound slams into me like a physical blow, driving me to my knees. Heat slashes over my skin, fierce and wild, and the hem of my cloak flares with sudden sparks.
Behind me, Kael swears. Alaric shouts my name. Dagan’s rumble rises in panic.
“Delia!” Alaric bellows. “Get back! You will burn?—”
“No.” My voice is barely more than a rasp, but I force myself upright. One step forward. Then another. “He won’t hurt me.”
I don’t know how I know.
I just do.
Everything in me is certain.
Thorne stomps closer, each step sending tremors through the ground. The air around him shimmers and warps, so hot that the edges of the world seem to waver.
He swipes his hand—another row of abandoned tents disintegrates into cinders.
“Thorne, stop!” I shout, throat raw. “This is your camp! Your people! You don’t mean to do this!”
There is no sign he hears me.
No sign he understands.
Flame boils inside his ribcage, churning like a living thing. The light is almost too bright to look at.
I swallow hard.
“Please,” I whisper. My legs threaten to give out, but I keep walking. “Please remember who you are.”
The other Lords are screaming behind me.
Someone tries to grab me—Alaric or Kael, I’m not sure—but a sudden wall of heat rises between us, pushing them back.
