LUNA OF ASHES

CHAPTER 5 — Marked by Moonfire

Myra’s cottage had always smelled of dried herbs and woodsmoke, a comfort Aria had clung to since arriving. Tonight, that familiar warmth felt wrong. The air inside the small room shimmered as if summer had slipped indoors, then—without warning—fell sharp and biting. Aria stood near the hearth, hands clenched at her sides, breath shallow. The flames in the fireplace bent toward her, bowing like grass in a strong wind.

“Aria,” Myra said softly from across the room. “Breathe.”

“I am breathing,” Aria snapped, then flinched at her own tone. The heat spiked again, the iron kettle rattling on its hook. She squeezed her eyes shut, fighting the rush inside her chest. When she opened them, the floorboards beneath her bare feet were rimmed with white, frost creeping outward in delicate veins.

Myra didn’t move. Fear had flickered across her face days ago when this had first happened, but now it was something else—awed, cautious, almost reverent. She had watched the patterns repeat themselves: anger brought heat, grief brought cold. Joy did strange things too, bending light, humming faintly in the walls.

“This isn’t normal,” Aria whispered. “Even for… people like us.”

Myra nodded slowly. “No. It isn’t.”

The kettle dropped. Not fell—dropped, as if an unseen hand had simply released it. It struck the hearth with a clang that echoed through the cottage. The fire guttered, then flared blue-white, casting shadows that stretched too long across the walls.

Myra took a careful step forward. “I’ve read about this,” she said. “Old texts. Stories my grandmother swore were only meant to scare children into behaving.”

Aria laughed weakly. “You’re not helping.”

“I think you’re marked,” Myra continued. “Marked by Moonfire.”

The words landed heavily between them.

“That’s a myth,” Aria said at once. “Moonfire doesn’t exist. Dual-element magic doesn’t exist. Not anymore.”

“Extinct,” Myra agreed. “That’s what everyone says.”

Aria shook her head. She had grown up hearing the same legends—warriors blessed by the moon, wielding fire and frost in equal measure. Kings and queens. Monsters. The kind of power packs used as excuses to start wars or justify s*******r.

“That’s not me,” she said. “I’m not a weapon. I’m not royalty. I can barely control my temper, let alone magic that belongs in songs.”

Myra reached out, stopping just short of touching her. “You don’t have to be those things to carry power,” she said gently. “But you do have to decide what to do with it.”

A sharp knock sounded at the door, and both of them froze.

“Who would be out this late?” Aria whispered.

Myra glanced toward the window, peering through the curtain. After a tense moment, she exhaled. “Just the wind. Or an animal.”

Aria wasn’t convinced. Since leaving the pack, she had felt watched—not constantly, but enough to keep her on edge. She didn’t know whether it was fear or instinct, but the feeling crawled along her spine all the same.

Miles away, Kaden stood at the edge of the training grounds, arms crossed as he stared into the trees. The night was quiet, too quiet. The pack slept, believing his words—that Aria was gone, that he wanted nothing more to do with her.

It was a lie.

“She shouldn’t have been able to disappear,” he muttered.

A scout knelt before him, head bowed. “We’re searching the outer forest. No scent yet.”

“Keep looking,” Kaden said. “Quietly.”

He told himself it was duty that drove him, nothing more. The pack was fragile, still reeling from betrayal they hadn’t fully uncovered. If the traitor had survived—and Kaden believed they had—then Aria was a liability. A symbol. A weakness that could be twisted into a weapon.

And if the rumors he’d heard as a child were even half true…

He clenched his jaw. “Do not bring her back unless I say so.”

Back at the cottage, the surge came without warning.

It began as pressure behind Aria’s eyes, a tightening in her chest that stole her breath. She gasped, stumbling backward as the air thickened around her. Frost exploded outward from her feet, racing up the walls. The fire in the hearth roared, flames stretching unnaturally high.

“Aria!” Myra cried.

Aria screamed—not in pain exactly, but in terror—as something inside her tore loose. She staggered out the door, desperate for space, for air, for anything that might stop the feeling that she was about to shatter.

The forest answered her fear.

The ground beneath her feet split with a deafening c***k. Heat and cold collided, a blinding flash erupting from her body. Trees were thrown back as if struck by a giant’s fist. When the light faded, a crater smoked in the earth, its edges rimmed with ice, its center glowing faintly like embers beneath ash.

Aria collapsed to her knees at its edge, shaking. Her hands trembled as she stared at the destruction she had caused. The forest—Myra’s forest—scarred because of her.

“No,” she whispered. “No, no, no…”

Myra reached her moments later, breathless, horror plain on her face. “Aria…”

“I can’t stay,” Aria said, scrambling to her feet. “I’ll kill you. Or someone else. I don’t know how to stop this.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Myra insisted, though her voice wavered. “You’re not alone.”

“I am,” Aria said quietly. “And I have to be.”

She backed away, tears freezing on her lashes before melting down her cheeks. The moon hung low above the trees, bright and unforgiving.

“I won’t bring this to your door,” she said. “You’ve done enough.”

Before Myra could stop her, Aria turned and ran, disappearing into the darkness.

From the ridge beyond the clearing, a lone figure watched the smoking crater with satisfaction. The surge had been stronger than expected. Faster.

“Good,” the traitor murmured. “Just as foretold.”

Moonfire had awakened.

And the world would soon remember why it had been buried.