Chapter 4 The Memory of Fire
The forest was quieter than it had any right to be. Not the peaceful kind of quiet this one trembled with the unsettling weight of listening, as if the trees themselves leaned closer each time Nyra exhaled. She walked between Aric and Liora with a stiffness she couldn’t shake, her mind replaying the vision from the seer’s pool. Flames eating through time. A crown of molten gold. A voice her own whispering Run before he wakes.
Nyra still wasn’t sure what terrified her more: the prophecy or the fact that she had recognized the presence inside that burning vision. Something ancient. Something that waited for her.
“The Hollow King is stirring,” Liora said gently, twirling her staff as she guided them deeper through the glowing underbrush. “The fire inside you called to him. You felt it, didn’t you?”
Nyra swallowed. “I don’t know what I felt.”
Aric scoffed softly behind her. “You screamed.”
She shot him a sharp glare over her shoulder. “I didn’t scream.”
“You absolutely screamed,” he replied, unbothered. “It echoed.”
Liora hid a smile. “Regardless of volume, what matters is why. The prophecy is only beginning to unravel. Nyra, you carry a power that has been dormant for centuries. Its return is… disruptive.”
“That’s one word for it,” Nyra muttered.
They stepped over a fallen trunk veined with faint blue fire scars evidence of the Hollow King’s sweeping influence. Nyra’s stomach tightened. “Why does he want me?”
Liora hesitated. “Because Phoenixborn are the only ones who can destroy him. Or free him. The line between the two is finer than you think.”
Nyra slowed her steps, turning fully to face the seer. “Free him? Why would I ever ”
“Destiny is complicated,” Liora said quietly. “And bonds of fire are deeper than blood.”
Aric stepped forward before Nyra could respond, positioning himself between her and Liora with a protective edge that surprised them both. “You’re not helping. She doesn’t need riddles. She needs answers.”
“I’m giving her the ones she’s ready for,” Liora replied calmly.
Nyra studied Aric really studied him. His stance was defensive, tense, like a blade forged from instinct rather than training. He wasn’t doing it consciously, which made it worse. Or better. She wasn’t sure.
“You don’t have to shield me,” she said softly.
His jaw tightened. “Someone has to.”
The quiet that followed wasn’t awkward. It hummed with something she wasn’t ready to name. She kept walking before it clung too tightly.
\---
The forest soon opened into a clearing lit by floating amber lanterns another relic of old magic. Liora lifted her staff, and the lights spiraled downward, forming a ring around them.
“We rest here,” she said. “And I’ll teach you the first lesson every Phoenix Queen must know: how to control the fire that remembers.”
Nyra sat reluctantly on a smooth stone. “What does that mean?”
“It means your flames are not just power they’re memory. They carry echoes of the Phoenix Queens who came before you. Their victories, their mistakes, their lives. Your magic is a living archive.”
Nyra froze. “You’re saying their memories are inside me?”
“Yes,” Liora said. “And they will surface whether you want them to or not.”
A soft wind brushed Nyra’s cheek. It smelled faintly of smoke and something older embers buried beneath centuries of ash. She closed her eyes as Liora instructed.
“Focus on the warmth inside you,” the seer murmured. “Don’t summon it. Simply acknowledge it.”
Nyra breathed slowly. Warmth curled in her belly, flickering like a timid creature. She touched it gently, and the world shifted.
Suddenly, she wasn’t in the clearing. She stood in a grand hall of fire-lit stone, feathers of molten gold drifting from the ceiling. Warrior women moved across the floor, their eyes glowing with the same light that burned in Nyra’s veins. A throne of charred obsidian towered above them.
And seated upon it was a woman with Nyra’s face older, fiercer, crowned in flame.
Nyra stumbled back. The woman rose.
Remember us, the queen whispered. Or you will lose yourself.
Nyra’s breath caught as the scene dissolved. She gasped, falling to her knees in the clearing, sweat dripping down her temples.
Aric grabbed her shoulders instantly. “Nyra? Hey look at me.”
Her vision steadied long enough to meet his eyes. Dark, determined, grounding. “I… saw them,” she whispered. “The ones who came before me.”
Liora nodded knowingly. “The fire remembers. It always has.”
Nyra pushed a shaky hand through her hair. “I didn’t ask for this.”
“Destiny rarely waits for consent,” Liora said.
Aric shot the seer another glare but helped Nyra sit upright. His hands lingered longer than necessary before he pulled them away. “You don’t have to face this alone,” he said, voice low.
She blinked. “I thought you didn’t care.”
His eyes flickered. “I never said that.”
Something tightened in her chest not uncomfortable, but startlingly warm. The moment stretched between them until Liora cleared her throat obscenely loud.
“As lovely as this budding attachment is,” the seer said with a smirk, “we have more pressing matters.”
Nyra flushed. Aric pretended not to. Neither succeeded.
\---
Liora lifted her staff again. “Nyra, we must strengthen your control. The Hollow King will sense your awakening soon if he hasn’t already.”
“What happens when he finds me?” Nyra asked.
“Destruction,” Liora said simply. “His flames devour everything. You must be ready.”
Nyra stood. “Then teach me.”
Liora nodded, drawing a circle of light around them. The amber lanterns flared, casting sweeping shadows. “We begin with flame-call. Draw the fire without letting it overtake you.”
Nyra inhaled, reaching for the warmth again. It pulsed alive, eager, waiting. She called it gently, and fire curled across her palms like golden water.
Aric watched with awe he tried to hide.
“Good,” Liora said. “Now shape it.”
Nyra exhaled, guiding the flame into a small sphere. It trembled, resisting, then settled soft, warm, obedient.
A surge of pride lit her chest. “I did it.”
Aric stepped closer, captivated. “You”
The flame suddenly flared, reacting to the intensity of his gaze, bursting upward in a sharp streak.
Nyra gasped, nearly losing control. Aric moved instantly, grabbing her wrists to steady her. His touch grounded her, drawing the wild fire back into a gentle glow.
Their faces were close too close. Heat, not from the magic, spread between them.
“Focus,” he whispered.
“I’m trying,” she whispered back.
“You’re doing fine.”
His hands were still wrapped around hers. Neither pulled away.
Liora sighed dramatically. “If the two of you are done flirting with combustion, we should continue.”
Nyra yanked her hands back, flustered. Aric cleared his throat and stepped away, ears slightly red. Liora’s grin was merciless.
But Nyra couldn’t ignore the truth that settled heavily in her chest:
Aric’s touch calmed her fire.
And the fire wasn’t just power.
It was memory, destiny, and danger intertwined.
If it responded to him…
What did that mean for her future?
\---
By the time the moon rose, Nyra had mastered three flame forms and learned how to suppress the Phoenix fire beneath her skin. But exhaustion clung to her bones, and the weight of prophecy sat like a stone in her chest.
When they finally settled to rest, Aric sat close but not touching. Close enough that his presence felt like protection rather than intrusion.
“Get some sleep,” he murmured.
Nyra hesitated. “Aric… why are you helping me?”
He stared into the distance for a long moment before answering. “Because someone has to make sure you survive what’s coming. And for some reason, fate chose me.”
She felt warmth that had nothing to do with magic. “Thank you.”
He didn’t look at her, but the corner of his mouth lifted. “Don’t thank me yet.”
Nyra lay down beneath the glowing lanterns, the night humming with unseen magic. Her last thought before sleep claimed her was simple and terrifying:
She wasn’t just awakening power.
She was awakening something else entirely.
And she wasn’t sure she could control either.