The air around Shadelake cracked and shimmered with heat.
Kaelin stood frozen at the edge of the basin, her breath caught in her throat. The fiery apparition above the lake—so vividly resembling her daughter—burned into her memory like a brand.
Theron stepped closer, his sword drawn, eyes fixed on the flaming child. "That’s not Seren."
"No," Kaelin whispered. "But they made it look like her for a reason."
The child’s cries echoed like war drums, rising into the moonlit sky. Tendrils of flame wrapped around its limbs, and beneath the fire, its skin shifted, cracked, and reformed—never staying whole.
Myrra approached, eyes wide with horror. "This isn’t natural. That child is being possessed."
"By what?" Kaelin demanded.
"A fragment," Myrra said. "A soul caught in flame. Something anci
