Chapter 40 Seraphine
The fire was gone.
That was the first thing I noticed.
No smoke curling along the ceiling. No heat blistering the air. No crackling chaos threatening to swallow the room whole.
Just silence.
And Dante.
Standing in front of me like he hadn’t just watched the world bend around my emotions.
Like I hadn’t just set a room on fire without touching a single thing.
I backed away from him slowly, my heart slamming so hard it felt like it was trying to escape my chest.
“No,” I whispered. “No, no, no—this isn’t real.”
Dante lifted his hands, palms open, a placating gesture that didn’t calm me at all.
“Seraphine,” he said carefully, “listen to me.”
“I can’t,” I snapped, panic slicing through my voice. “I can’t listen to this. You’re telling me I did that?” I gestured wildly toward the ruined dining room. “That I’m—what—some kind of monster?”
“You’re not a monster,” he said firmly. “You’re dragonborn. And your first spark—”
“I don’t care what you call it!” My voice broke. “I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t want this. This isn’t possible.”
Amara stepped closer, her face pale but her voice steady. “Okay. Hey. Breathe. Just breathe, okay?”
I couldn’t.
My lungs felt too small. My skin felt wrong—too tight, too hot, too alive.
Dante spoke again, slower now, like he was trying not to spook a wild animal.
“A dragon’s first spark is always uncontrollable,” he said. “Always. It’s raw instinct finally waking up after years—sometimes centuries—of dormancy. It responds to stress. Fear. Desire. Connection.”
“That doesn’t make this okay,” I said, tears blurring my vision. “That doesn’t make this something I can just accept.”
“You won’t survive it alone,” he said quietly. “That’s why you need me.”
That did it.
The words hit something deep and fragile and terrified inside me—and it shattered.
“I can’t,” I sobbed. “I can’t do this. I can’t be this. I can’t belong to some world I didn’t even know existed.”
Before either of them could stop me, I turned and ran.
I didn’t remember crossing the hall. Didn’t remember fumbling with the door handle. I just knew I slammed it shut behind me, locked it, and pressed my back against the wood as if it could hold the entire universe out.
My room felt too big.
Too quiet.
Too normal for what had just happened.
I slid down the door and buried my face in my hands, my shoulders shaking as the reality crashed down on me all at once.
A soft knock followed almost immediately.
“Seraphine,” Dante’s voice came through the door, low and steady. “The dining room is fine. No one was hurt. I’ll have the entire floor fireproofed before nightfall. You don’t need to worry about that.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about!” I shouted back, my voice cracking.
There was a pause.
Then Amara’s voice—closer to the door, gentler.
“Dante… that’s not what she’s freaking out about.”
Silence.
Then his voice again, firmer this time. “She needs to hear this.”
“No,” Amara shot back. “She needs space. And right now? This is between women. Men need to leave.”
“I’m not leaving her,” Dante said flatly.
I could hear them now—voices overlapping, tension rising.
“You don’t get it,” Amara snapped. “You dropped destiny on her head like it was a weather report. She’s allowed to lose it.”
“And she’s allowed to be protected,” Dante shot back. “Her dragon has awakened. That makes her a target.”
“And right now,” Amara said sharply, “she’s a human woman having a panic attack in your penthouse.”
The argument pressed against the door like a storm.
Then another voice cut in—calm, controlled, unmistakably Lucian.
“Dante.”
A pause.
“You need to back away,” Lucian said. “You’re not wrong—but you’re not helping. Let Amara calm her down.”
Another beat of silence.
My heart pounded as I waited, unsure of what would happen next.
Finally, Dante spoke—closer to the door, softer than before.
“I’m not going far,” he said. “But I’m not abandoning her.”
“You’re not,” Lucian replied. “You’re trusting her.”
Footsteps moved away.
Amara knocked lightly.
“Hey,” she said. “It’s just me.”
I unlocked the door with shaking hands and opened it a crack.
She slipped inside and closed it behind her, immediately pulling me into her arms.
I broke.
“I didn’t ask for this,” I cried into her shoulder. “I didn’t ask to be special or dangerous or wanted by the wrong people.”
“I know,” she murmured, rubbing my back. “I know.”
“I just wanted to tell a story,” I said through tears. “I just wanted to help people.”
She pulled back slightly, holding my face so I had to look at her.
“You still can,” she said firmly. “Nothing about that changed.”
“What if it did?” I whispered. “What if I’m not me anymore?”
She shook her head. “You’re still Seraphine. You just found out the world is bigger than you thought.”
I sank onto the edge of the bed, exhaustion crashing into me.
Through the door, I could hear Dante’s footsteps pacing the hall.
Waiting.
Watching.
Not leaving.
And somehow… that scared me almost as much as it comforted me.
Because whether I liked it or not—
My life had just split into a before and an after.
And there was no going back.
I wiped my face with the back of my hand, breathing slowly until the shaking eased into something manageable.
Amara stayed with me, sitting close but not crowding me, her shoulder warm against mine.
After a moment, I whispered, “Can I ask you something?”
She glanced at me. “Anything.”
I hesitated. Then—quietly, because saying it out loud made it real—
“How are you handling this?”
She blinked.
I rushed on before she could deflect. “Because this isn’t just about me. You heard them. You’re… like me. This is going to happen to you too.”
Amara let out a breath that sounded like a laugh—but didn’t feel like one.
“Oh,” she said. “I’m not.”
I frowned. “Not… what?”
“Handling it,” she clarified. “At all.”
That surprised me more than everything else that had happened tonight.
She leaned back on her hands, staring at the ceiling. “I’m freaking out just as much as you are. I just cope by making jokes and ordering fries.”
I managed a weak smile.
She continued, more quietly now. “The idea that one day I might wake up and fill an entire room with water? That I could drown people without meaning to?”
Her jaw tightened.
“That scares the absolute shit out of me.”
My chest tightened in solidarity.
“I keep thinking about my shop,” she went on. “All that glass. All those people. What if I panic? What if I lose control?”
She looked at me then, really looked.
“Part of me wants to run. Just disappear before any of this happens.”
I swallowed hard. “Me too.”
She nudged my knee gently with hers. “But… we’re still here.”
I nodded.
Still terrified.