Cassia had never heard a sound like that before.
It wasn’t a scream. Not a wail. It was the guttural release of years, no, decades of stolen life spilling from a single breath.
Her twin sister knelt in the ashes of Flamevale’s ruined square, her shoulders trembling, the fire that once obeyed her now retreating into the soot.
Cassia didn’t speak. She didn’t move.
She let the girl cry.
Let her body shake, fists pound into gravel, teeth grit so hard they bled.
This wasn’t the enemy. This was her.
Another her.
“I don’t even know my name,” the girl finally whispered. “He calls me Flameborne. Or Daughter. Or Weapon. But never… never anything soft.”
Cassia’s heart broke in a way she didn’t know was possible.
She reached out, hesitant. Her hand hovered over the girl’s ash-coated shoulder
