She extended both hands. Fire roared free, incinerating the offending limb in a whoosh that filled the air with burning sugar and woodsmoke.
“Are you enjoying this?” Nythir panted.
She was.
Despite the fear and chaos, a wild exhilaration thrummed through her. She’d started the morning terrified—but somewhere between dodging killer vines and blasting rogue shrubbery, exhilaration had taken over. She felt alive. Freer than she had ever been within polished palace walls that smelled of roses, lemons, and expectations.
Then—light. Actual sunlight.
The oppressive trees parted, spilling them into a wide clearing. The air hit her sharply—cool, crisp, smelling of wet earth and something sweet, like flowering clover. Rolling green hills dipped away from the forest edge. Down in the valley, rooftops glittered as morning sun reflected off the river.
“Out,” Lyssara wheezed, bending over her knees. “Oh gods… we’re out.”
Vorrik slowed to a stop and finally—blessedly—lowered Esther to the ground. Her legs were jelly. She dropped to a knee, lungs burning, eyes watering from smoke and adrenaline.
Behind them, the sentient vines recoiled into the shadows, rustling like scolded pets. One leaf slapped irritably against a trunk.
“I think it’s mad at us,” Esther said.
“Good,” Vorrik grumbled, smacking dirt off his armor. “It started it.”
Nythir clapped her on the shoulder, grinning. “Look alive. Town ahead. And I smell bread. And beer.”
His braid was stuffed with twigs. His face was flushed. His hair a disaster. And somehow, he had the audacity to look even more attractive like that. Esther tore her gaze away quickly before her magic betrayed her.
Vorrik stretched. “Anyone else hungry?”
Lyssara nodded. “I could eat an entire chicken.”
Nythir smirked at Esther. “And you? Lost any pastries lately?”
She glared. “It was a strategic bun deployment.”
He tilted his head. “Is that what we’re calling catastrophic gravitational failure now?”
“Shut up,” she muttered, cheeks warm.
Down below, a small town nestled against a silver river, smoke curling lazily from chimneys. The faint sound of laughter and music floated up the hill.
No walls trapping her. No guards watching her. No carefully orchestrated lessons or suffocating expectations.
This was nothing like Valedara’s marble symmetry.
It was messy.
Lived in.
Human.
She loved it instantly.
Her heart hiccuped.
Then, she bolted.
“What the—Essie!” Nythir shouted, his voice lost to her laughter. Her hair whipped behind her as she tore downhill, bare soles pounding the dew-kissed grass. Every scent, every sound, every color rushed at her—bread baking, dogs barking, children shrieking with morning joy.
Freedom.
