Chapter 38

Chapter 38
Lyra’s POV

The forest pressed in like a living wall. Shadows swayed, thick with damp breath and rustling teeth. I clutched the cloak Mira had pushed at me, though it barely covered my shaking hands.

Then the rogues stepped out.

Three at first, their eyes catching what little moonlight broke through the canopy. Another followed..leaner, meaner, with scars like cracked earth across his jaw. His lips pulled into something that wasn’t a smile.

“Seraphina,” he rasped, and the name cut straight through me.

My throat locked. “I’m not—”

“You are,” he interrupted, his gaze sharp as a blade. “You carry her fire. You carry her scent. You are the key. She never finished what she began—but you will.”

His words slid over me like chains. I shook my head, forcing air into my lungs. “My name is Lyra. I’m not whoever you think I am.”

Another rogue chuckled, low and mocking. “Funny. You deny her name, but your blood doesn’t lie. We smell it. We feel it.” He tapped his chest. “The flame sings in you, girl.”

Behind me, Mira moved like a ghost, her hand brushing my elbow. “Don’t fight them,” she whispered. “Not yet.”

I turned on her, desperate. “You said this was safe. You said this was the way out.”

Her face was pale in the torchlight, caught between shadows and something that looked almost like guilt. “I brought you here to show them,” she murmured. “To prove what you are. So they can’t deny you anymore. So Draven can’t deny you.”

My stomach twisted. “Prove?” I repeated. “To rogues?”

“They believe,” she said softly, eyes shining. “The pack must see it too. The prophecy wasn’t just Seraphina’s—it’s yours now.”

“I don’t care about a prophecy!” My voice cracked, raw and shaking. “I didn’t ask for fire. I didn’t ask to be anyone’s key.”

The scarred rogue circled closer, his eyes never leaving me. “That’s what she said too,” he growled. “But destiny doesn’t ask permission.”

“She comes with us,” he snarled, flicking his chin at me. “The moon chose her. The fire is ours.”

“No,” Mira said, her voice ringing sharper than I’d ever heard it in the infirmary. She stepped in front of me, healer’s hands clenched into fists. “She isn’t yours.”

The rogue laughed, rough and cruel. “You think you can keep her? You’ve been hiding her from your Alpha already. Or do you think we don’t know? She doesn’t belong to him. She belongs to prophecy.”

The word made my blood ice. Prophecy. Always prophecy. Never Lyra. Never me.

“I belong to myself,” I snapped, though my voice shook.

The scarred rogue tilted his head, grin widening. “Do you, little flame? Or do you burn for whoever claims you first?”

When they lunged, everything shattered.

The first one grabbed for my arm, claws raking. Pain slashed fire across my skin and fear detonated inside me, hot and wild. Before I could stop it..before I could even breathe.. my power surged.

Flame burst from my palms.

It wasn’t clean or controlled. It screamed, licking across bark and leaf, catching the edges of cloaks. The rogue who touched me shrieked and staggered back, his sleeve a torch. Another cursed and slashed at me, but the fire leapt higher, spinning out of my skin as if it had been waiting for this.

I couldn’t stop it.

“Lyra!” Mira shouted. Her hands clamped over mine, steadying, shaping. “Breathe—control it!” She whispered words I couldn’t understand, and the flames bent—not gone, never gone, but funneled, drawn into a narrow stream instead of a storm.

She was protecting me. Or maybe protecting them from me. I couldn’t tell.

The rogues reeled but didn’t break. The scarred one bared his teeth. “Yes,” he hissed, eyes gleaming in the firelight. “It’s her. The flame reborn.”

One of the others laughed, wild-eyed. “Seraphina’s blood returns to finish what she started!”

They surged again. One caught Mira by the shoulder, shoving her back, while another tried to seize my wrist. His breath stank of iron and rot.

“Don’t touch me!” I screamed, kicking, clawing, my fire sparking bright again. The rogue yelped as flames licked his skin, but his grip didn’t loosen.

Mira shoved her attacker off with surprising strength, snarling like a wolf though she wasn’t one. “She’s not yours! She is under my protection!”

“Protection?” the scarred one mocked, eyes flashing. “From what? From him?” His sneer dripped contempt. “Or from herself?”

I thrashed harder, power surging wild and raw. The ground itself seemed to burn with me, roots glowing ember-red. Mira tried to steady me again, but even she staggered under the heat.

“You see?” the rogue shouted, laughing madly. “She cannot hide it! She is fire, and fire cannot be chained.”

I didn’t know if he was taunting me or worshiping me. Maybe both.

Then the forest itself seemed to snarl.

A growl rolled through the clearing, so deep it rattled the ground. The rogues froze. My fire guttered against my will, as if some greater force pressed it down.

The sound came again—closer now, darker, filling every hollow in my chest.

Then he stepped into the clearing.

Massive, silver-black fur bristling. Eyes like molten gold fixed on the rogues, on me. Draven. His wolf, larger than memory, larger than myth.

The rogues hissed and stumbled back, their bravado splintering under the weight of that growl.

Mira’s hand slipped from mine. For a heartbeat, her mask cracked..fear, grief, something tangled and sharp. Then she stepped aside, as if yielding to the storm she’d called down.

And me?

I stood in the glow of my own fire, chest heaving, hands scorched red, staring at the Alpha’s wolf as he placed himself between me and the rogues