Chapter 1: Ashes and Echoes
The alarm screamed at 4:47 AM, but I was already awake. I'd been lying in the dark for three hours, staring at the ceiling of my sterile Chicago apartment, trying to forget the dream that had jolted me from sleep. Fire. Always fire.
My sheets were damp with sweat, and I could swear I smelled smoke, though the air was clean. I rolled over, reaching for the lamp, and froze. There, on my pristine white pillowcase, were scorch marks. Perfect circles of burnt fabric that shouldn't exist. I sat up slowly, my hands trembling as I touched the marks. They were real. The fabric crumbled under my fingers, leaving black residue that shouldn't be there. This was impossible. I was a trauma surgeon, trained in logic and facts. Things like this didn't happen. But the evidence was literally in my hands.
I threw the sheets in the trash and stood under a scalding shower until my skin turned red, trying to wash away the lingering smell of smoke and the memory of flames consuming everything I'd ever loved. The dream was always the same—a house burning, screams I couldn't place, and the sensation of being consumed by fire that felt more like coming home than dying. By 5:30 AM, I was dressed in my scrubs, hair pulled back in a severe bun, makeup minimal but flawless. Dr. Elena Vasquez, trauma surgeon at Chicago General, didn't have time for mysterious burn marks or recurring nightmares. She had lives to save.
The hospital was my sanctuary, the only place where the chaos in my head made sense. Blood, trauma, life and death—these were concrete things I could control. Unlike the gaping holes in my childhood memories or the way I flinched whenever someone got too close. "You're early again," said Dr. Martinez as I entered the trauma bay. "Elena, when's the last time you went home before midnight?" "Yesterday," I lied smoothly, checking the board for incoming cases. "I went home at 11:47 PM."
He laughed, but I caught the concern in his eyes. "That's not what I meant, and you know it. When's the last time you had a real conversation with someone? Went on a date? Had a life outside these walls?" I picked up the first chart, effectively ending the conversation. "We have a motorcycle accident coming in. Two minutes out." The day blurred together like they always did—broken bones, internal bleeding, the delicate dance of keeping people alive when their bodies wanted to give up. I lost myself in the work, in the precision of my hands as they repaired what was broken. Here, I was useful. Here, I made sense.
It was during my lunch break, while I was reviewing patient files in my office, that the fire alarm went off. At first, I thought it was just another drill. Chicago General ran them monthly, and the timing was about right. But then I smelled it—the acrid scent of real smoke, not the theatrical stuff they used for training. And something else, something that made my skin prickle and my heart race. The smell was familiar in a way that made my soul ache.
I stepped into the hallway and saw people running, real panic in their eyes. Through the windows, I could see flames engulfing the east wing—the trauma unit. My trauma unit. "Elena!" Dr. Martinez grabbed my arm as I started toward the stairwell. "We need to evacuate. The whole building could go up." But I was already moving, my feet carrying me toward the fire like I was magnetized. "There are patients in there. Mr. Henderson in 304, Mrs. Chen in 306—she just had surgery yesterday."
"The fire department will get them," he called after me, but I was already gone. The stairwell was filling with smoke, but I could breathe fine. More than fine, actually. The air that should have been choking me felt almost... nourishing. Like coming home after a long journey. I reached the third floor and the heat hit me like a physical force. The hallway was an inferno, but I could see through the flames to the trapped patients. Mrs. Chen was conscious, pressing herself against the window. Mr. Henderson was slumped in his bed, overcome by smoke.
I didn't think. I just moved. The fire parted around me as I walked through it, like it was welcoming an old friend. My scrubs should have been burning, my skin should have been blistering, but I felt nothing except a strange sense of rightness. This was where I belonged. I reached Mrs. Chen first, gathering her in my arms. She was barely conscious, but her eyes widened when she saw me walking through the flames unharmed. "Angel," she whispered, and I almost laughed. If she only knew how far from angelic I really was.
I carried her to the window where the fire ladder waited, then went back for Mr. Henderson. The ceiling was groaning above us, and I could hear the firefighters shouting warnings about structural collapse. But I knew, with absolute certainty, that I had time. I was lifting Mr. Henderson when the ceiling gave way. Three tons of burning concrete and steel crashed down on us, and I had just enough time to curl my body protectively around his before the world exploded in heat and light and crushing weight.
I should have died. We both should have died. But when the dust settled and the firefighters dug us out, I was unmarked. Not a burn, not a bruise, not even a scrape. Mr. Henderson was alive too, protected by my body in a way that defied physics. The photos in tomorrow's Tribune would show me emerging from the rubble, covered in ash but somehow glowing, carrying an unconscious man to safety. They'd call it a miracle. The media would speculate about divine intervention and impossible luck.
But I knew better. As I looked at my reflection in the hospital bathroom mirror later that night, I saw something that made my blood run cold. For just a moment, my eyes flickered with golden flames. And deep in my chest, something that had been sleeping for twenty years began to stir.
