WHEN FIRE FORGETS

Into the forgotten city

The tunnels beneath the eastern cliffs of Kinmoor hadn’t been walked in over sixty years.

Or so the Kin Council claimed.

But Liora could feel it in her bones — the heat, the hum, the undeniable memory of fire licking at the edge of her consciousness as they descended into stone.

Their party was small: Rowan on point, silent and alert; Kaen and Mira moving like shadows, whispering only to each other in a twin-born tongue no one else knew. Severin brought up the rear, torchlight dancing along the hollows of his face.

Liora walked in the middle, fingers trailing against the walls.

"These stones remember," she whispered.

Rowan glanced over his shoulder. "You sure it’s memory? Not your power reacting?"

She didn’t answer.

Because it felt like both.

---

They reached it by midday — or what they assumed was midday. Time bent in the tunnels.

A stone door twenty feet tall, blackened from some ancient blast. Sigils were carved in a language none of them could read except Severin, who knelt and traced them.

"It's locked to Emberborn blood," he said. "Only fire can open it."

Liora stepped forward. The crescent on her collarbone pulsed.

"Do I burn it?" she asked.

Severin shook his head. "You speak to it."

She frowned. "I don’t know how."

Rowan put a hand on her shoulder. "You don’t need to. Just let it feel you."

She inhaled.

Placed her palm flat against the door.

Closed her eyes.

I am not what you were. But I remember.

The stone flared with heat — not destructive, but warm, welcoming. Lines of molten red flowed outward, like veins, pulsing once… twice…

Then the door split open with a sound like a sigh.

And they stepped into the Forgotten City.

---

The city was buried but not broken.

Stone bridges arched over dry canals, buildings half-sunk in dust but still whole. Mosaics decorated walls — wolves, moons, a crown of flame passed from hand to hand.

Liora walked beside Rowan in silence, taking it in.

"It’s like they meant to return," Rowan murmured.

Kaen crouched near an old statue. "They left too fast to take anything."

Mira stood at a collapsed market stall, fingers brushing broken glass. "Or they didn’t leave at all."

Liora’s heart pounded. "We need to find the Archive Hall."

Severin pointed toward the central tower.

"That way."

---

The Archive Hall was half collapsed, vines and ash choking the entry. Rowan cut through with a shortblade, while Severin held the torch steady.

Inside, scrolls floated in glass cylinders, some intact, others blackened with age. A large dais stood at the center, etched with the crescent flame.

Liora stepped forward. The air thrummed.

A voice whispered — not aloud, but in her mind.

The truth burns only those who fear it.

She placed her hand on the dais.

Light erupted.

Scrolls uncurled in midair. Dozens. Hundreds. A cyclone of history.

Kaen yelped and ducked.

Mira stepped back, shielding her eyes.

Rowan reached for Liora — but she was rooted in place.

The flames formed into scenes — visions of Averie Flameborn, of battles fought in red-soaked snow, of wolves with no scent executed by their kin.

And then — her.

Liora.

As a child.

But not in the Sanctuary.

In a Kin lab.

Surrounded by monitors.

Screaming.

---

The scroll dropped to the dais.

Liora fell to her knees.

Rowan caught her. "Liora—?"

She looked at him, tears tracking soot down her cheeks.

"They made me."

Severin picked up the scroll. "No. They awakened you. You weren’t born from them — you were found by them. You came before."

Rowan's voice was a rasp. "What are you saying?"

Severin met their eyes. "She’s not the heir. She’s the source. The first Flameborn. Reborn."

The air in the hall dropped ten degrees.

Kaen and Mira exchanged a glance.

"And if that’s true?" Mira asked.

Severin turned.

"Then the Council doesn’t just fear her. They need her. To seal the gate. Or to open it forever."

----

They made camp in the central courtyard that night.

Liora curled beside a broken mosaic, her shoulders trembling. Kaen and Mira kept watch.

Rowan stood by himself.

Staring up at the hollow sky.

Severin approached quietly.

"You saw the same things I did."

"I saw lies."

"You saw her birth. Her pain. Her power."

Rowan clenched his fists. "She’s still Liora."

"Yes," Severin said. "But you need to ask yourself what part of her you’ve been in love with — the girl, or the fire."

Rowan turned to him, eyes glowing faintly gold.

"I’ve bled for her. Stood in front of blades for her. I don’t care where she came from."

"You should," Severin said softly. "Because the ones who created her… are the ones hunting her. And you can’t protect her from a past she hasn’t remembered yet."

---

Mira found the vault by accident.

A broken step in the archive tower revealed a hollow space. Inside it: a black blade, humming with heat.

Liora reached for it.

Rowan caught her hand. "It could be a trap."

"Or a test," she said.

The moment her fingers touched the hilt — the blade flared red.

Molten.

Alive.

It whispered her name.

Not Liora.

Ashra.

She fell back, gasping.

Rowan held her close. "What did it say?"

She looked at him, eyes wide. "My name. My first name."

Severin knelt beside them. "Then it’s true. The weapon was left for you. Flameborn before the Fall."

The city groaned.

Dust fell from the ceiling.

Kaen’s voice echoed from above. "Someone’s coming!"

Not wolves.

Not scentless.

Not Council.

But something old.

And it remembered her.

They came as whispers first.

Low, breathy hums slithering between the broken stones of the Forgotten City. The scentless air shifted. Cold, then colder still.

Rowan had his blade out before anyone spoke.

Liora felt the change in her bones—like something ancient was crawling up through the bones of the city, peeling back memory.

“Under the dais,” Mira muttered. “Something’s moving.”

Kaen hissed. “Not Council. Not wolves.”

“Spirits,” Severin said, voice tight. “The old kind. Kinmoor didn’t fall by war. It fell because they tried to seal them here. They failed.”

A column of ash surged up from the dais.

Then another.

Then eyes appeared—burning gold inside the dust.

Three forms. Human-shaped. But wrong.

“Who dares wake us?” the center figure asked. Its voice echoed in their minds, not ears.

Liora stepped forward. “I am Flameborn. You remember me.”

“You are not the one who left us. You are reborn. Unfinished.”

Rowan moved to her side. “She is whole enough to burn you.”

The left spirit hissed, “Then let her prove it.”

---

The world shifted.

Stone peeled away. Shadows collapsed into red light.

Liora found herself alone in a place of no edges—just smoke and mirrors.

Then she wasn’t alone.

A younger Averie stood before her. Not the matriarch. The warrior. Scars on her hands. Fire in her eyes.

“You think you understand legacy?” Averie asked.

Liora’s voice was hoarse. “I don’t want legacy. I want truth.”

“Then take it.”

Flame burst from Averie’s hand—straight at her.

Liora raised hers too late.

The fire hit her chest—and vanished.

Because she absorbed it.

Averie smiled. “You don’t carry our power. You are its source.”

Then the mirror broke—and she was back.

---

He stood before the second spirit.

It didn’t speak. It showed.

Rowan, age ten, locked in a scent-testing chamber.

Rowan, age twelve, throwing punches to protect a younger boy with golden eyes—killed a week later.

Rowan, fifteen, burning with rage he didn’t understand.

Then—Liora.

Her laugh. Her eyes. Her fire.

“She makes you forget what you are,” the spirit said.

“No,” Rowan whispered. “She makes me choose who I want to be.”

The vision faded.

---

The last spirit turned on Severin.

And he fell to his knees.

Because it showed him not visions.

But memory.

Of him handing over a child—Liora—as part of a Kin experiment.

Of him watching from behind a wall as she screamed under tests.

Of him doing nothing.

Liora watched in horror.

“You let them take me,” she said.

“I protected you in the only way I could,” Severin said, voice shaking. “I was supposed to destroy you. I lied. I forged your death report. I made them believe you were a failed vessel.”

Rowan had his blade drawn.

“Let me kill him,” he said.

Liora raised a hand. “No. He will answer to me.”

The spirit turned to ash.

Trial complete.

----

They stood again in the Archive Hall.

The air lighter. The heat—calm.

The blade Liora carried flared once, then dimmed.

Rowan sat with her beneath a broken mosaic of the first moon.

“You knew,” she said.

He nodded. “You weren’t like the others. But I didn’t care.”

“You should’ve.”

He turned to her. “No. Because if I had… I would’ve been too scared to stay.”

She rested her head on his shoulder.

“You always stay.”

“Always.”

Mira and Kaen returned with supplies. Severin remained distant.

Liora rose. Looked to the city around them.

“We rebuild it,” she said.

“Here?” Kaen asked.

“Not the stone. The truth. The records. The memory. The fire that was never meant to go out.”