Ride For Me, Die For Me.

Chapter 27: Two Fires, One Flame

Justin P.O.V.

The dead don’t stay quiet forever.

The heat in New Orleans sat on my shoulders like a judgment. Thick, unmoving. Like the city remembered everything I’d tried to forget.

I sat on the back steps of the house Papa Toussaint was letting me stay in, a small shotgun-style place just off Claiborne. Real old bones. Cypress wood. Something always creaked when you breathed too loud. I didn’t mind. At least it was honest.

Dree hadn’t come back since the night she brought the blade.

That was weeks ago now.

I didn’t expect her to. Not really.

But when the knock came at the front door just before dawn, I already knew it was her. I didn’t move at first. Just let the quiet wrap around me, watching the mist roll across the street like breath from something buried deep.

She knocked again—harder this time.

I finally opened it.

Same defiant chin. Same tattooed fingers. Same guarded look in her eyes like everything in the world was a threat she’d already survived once.

“Hey,” she said.

I stepped back, wordless, letting her in.

She didn’t offer an apology. Not really her style. Just moved into the kitchen like muscle memory had brought her there before she could think.

She poured herself some of the coffee I’d made before dawn, even though it’d gone cold.

“You still take it black,” she said.

“Wasn’t much sweet left after you vanished.”

Her jaw tensed, but she didn’t flinch.

“I didn’t come to fight.”

“You didn’t come to stay, either. Not last time.”

“I wasn’t ready.”

“You left during the fire, Dree.” My voice came low, even. Controlled. “Not after. Not when the dust cleared. While it was still burning. While I was still bleeding.”

“I know.” She sat down at the little table, fingers trembling as she set the mug down. “That’s why I’m here now.”

Silence stretched out between us.

I stared at her for a long while. She looked older. Not in age—she was only two years above me—but in spirit. Like she’d been carrying too many things that didn’t belong to her. Or maybe, finally carrying the ones that did.

“You asked about me before,” I said. “The night you dropped the blade. Why?”

“Because… you were in my dreams,” she admitted. “You were younger. Crying. Not like scared-crying, but like… like the kind of crying when your heart don’t know where to go.”

I looked away, throat tight.

“I tried to ignore it. But it didn’t stop. Not until I came back.”

I leaned against the wall. “You think dreams are enough?”

“I don’t. That’s why I’m here.”

We sat like that—old wounds breathing between us, slow and cautious.

Finally, she asked, “What are you even doing here? After all that running?”

I looked out the window. “Training.”

“Training for what?”

“For whatever’s still coming.”

She nodded like she understood more than she was letting on.

“You still mad at me?” she asked, eyes soft.

“Yes,” I answered. “But I’m glad you’re here.”

That’s when I felt it shift.

Something in the air around us cracked open. Not in a loud way—but subtle, like a chain being loosened from inside my ribs. I didn’t forgive her—not fully—but maybe that wasn’t the point. Maybe facing her was part of my own unlocking.

Papa Toussaint stepped in through the back door just then, carrying two bundles of herbs wrapped in red cloth.

His eyes flicked between us, and he gave a knowing nod.

“Come,” he said. “It’s time.”

Dree and I exchanged a look.

“Time for what?” she asked.

Papa Toussaint’s voice was steady. “Time to face what chased you into the dark.”

Waiya’s P.O.V.

I wanted to understand.

That’s what I told myself when I stepped barefoot into the medicine room the next morning, the dawn light smudged across the horizon like a bruise. My feet were still dusty from the walk I took around the property before anyone else had woken up—if they even slept. I wasn’t sure Granny ever really did.

Smoke from the cedar she burned curled slow in the corners. Bundles of dried plants hung low from the rafters. Her work table was cluttered with carved bones, feathers, chipped bowls stained with time, and a half-burnt candle that hadn’t gone out since I got back.

I moved quietly, like the old floor knew me now, like the house had accepted I wasn’t just visiting this time.

Granny glanced at me from where she was grinding something in a molcajete. “You walkin’ lighter,” she said.

I didn’t answer right away. My eyes went to the altar—still glowing faintly from the night before, still carrying my father’s presence like warm breath against the skin.

“I saw him,” I said.

Granny didn’t stop grinding. “You ain’t the only one he’s speakin’ to.”

I looked over. “You too?”

She smiled, but it wasn’t soft. “That man got secrets older than pain. He’s tryin’ to guide you through one of ’em.”

I sat down across from her. “He said we don’t have much time. Something’s coming. But he didn’t say what.”

She let the silence settle before she spoke. “Your da was always one for riddles. But you saw what you needed. You came back clearer.”

My chest tightened. “It still hurts.”

“Shí yázhí,” she murmured, her words thick with breath and care. My little one. “T’áá shoodí éí bąąh dah nit’įįh—sometimes pain gotta be carried a little while longer.”

I nodded, even though I didn’t know if I believed it.

Later that day, I sat cross-legged outside in the shade of the cottonwood tree, sweat trickling down my spine as I tried to hold the stance Granny taught me. Hands palms-down, heart open, breath slow.

Nyla sat beside me, eyes closed but her presence steady.

“You’re too in your head again,” she said, voice barely above a whisper.

“Ch’ééh.” I sighed. “I know.”

“You’re not gonna open the way if you keep shutting the door with anger.”

I knew she was right. But hearing it from her made me flinch.

“It ain’t just anger,” I muttered. “It’s… all the things I wanted her to say and she never did. It’s everything I needed and never got.”

Nyla opened her eyes, studying me. “Then say it. Not to her. Say it to the wind. To the fire. To yourself.”

I stared at the red dirt. “It won’t change her.”

“No,” Nyla said gently. “But it might change you.”

That night, Mama found me sitting near the old ash pit, staring into the embers. She didn’t say nothing at first. Just sat nearby with her shawl pulled tight.

“You’re fighting ghosts and callin’ it growth,” she said finally.

I didn’t look at her. “You don’t get to say that.”

“I do,” she said. “I been where you are. Angry. Hollow. Lookin’ for someone to blame for the hole in my chest.”

I laughed bitter. “And what, you filled it up with silence?”

She flinched. That tiny thing. But I saw it.

“I filled it with survival,” she said. “And that’s what I gave you, even if it wasn’t what you wanted.”

We sat there for a long time. The stars opened wide above us.

I didn’t forgive her. Not yet. But I didn’t walk away either.

I dreamed that night.

But it didn’t feel like a dream.

The ground was cracked beneath my bare feet, steam rising from the fissures like the earth had just been reborn. The sky above shimmered purple, deep like bruises on spirit skin.

He stood at the edge of the broken land. My father. Not younger. Not older. Just him. Eyes sharp as they’d always been.

“This is the place,” he said.

“What place?” I asked.

“The place where it begins and ends.”

I stepped closer, but he raised a hand. “Listen, ashkii’ yazhi.”

My throat burned. “I don’t understand.”

“You will. When the earth splits and the dark calls your name—remember the tree.”

He pressed something into my hand.

I looked down.

It was a stone carved with our family symbol.

When I looked up, he was gone.

I woke with the stone clutched in my palm.

My breath caught in my throat.

I whispered, “Diyin shí maa’.”

Holy mother, guide me.

The journey wasn’t over.

Not even close.

But I was learning how to carry the fire.