Page 11 of Ashfall (Firebound #1)

CHAPTER 10

DAX

S he walks into camp like nothing happened. Like she didn’t just dangle over splintered death. Like she didn’t scream into smoke and flame and fall straight into my arms, trembling and defiant and branded into my memory like fire on stone. Ember Vale. Impossible woman. She walks past without a glance, all straight spine and biting pride, like she didn’t just rattle the very bones of me. Like she didn’t make me burn in ways I haven’t in centuries.

But I can smell it on her. Shock, adrenaline—raw and acrid like scorched pine—and the sharp curl of her fear laced with something hotter: fury. And beneath that? Her scent, unmistakable. Wild and ripe with the kind of need she refuses to acknowledge. She can pretend all she wants, throw walls and sarcasm and distance between us, but her body speaks truths she won’t say out loud. And my dragon hears every damn word of it.

My dragon is still pacing under my skin. Still seething that I let her walk away. He wants her—wants to claim, to mark, to protect. And I do too. But I can’t. Not yet. She needs space, and if I push her now, she might bolt—not from the fire and her job, but from me. Or worse, she’d stop trusting me. And I need her trust more than I need her body right now. Barely.

It used to be easier.Back when humans offered what they didn’t understand—when villagers lit pyres and left trembling girls at the edge of caves, praying for rain or harvest or mercy. I took what was given, yes. But I never hurt them. I’d let them cry in my arms until the fear ebbed and both maiden and I could enjoy one another for a time. Then I moved them—somewhere safe. Somewhere clean. I made sure they had gold, anonymity, and lives untouched by what they’d seen. It was transactional. Controlled.

But Ember? She’s not an offering. She’s not trembling or grateful or afraid. She is my mate. She is fire wrapped in skin, sharp-edged and untouchable, a force that answers to no one. She doesn’t yield—she commands. And that command, that will of hers, it unnerves me more than any sword or flame ever could.

I can seduce her—I know I can. I see the way she looks at me when she thinks I’m not watching, feel the tension in the air whenever I’m near. But I don’t want her because I claimed her. I want her to come to me. Willingly. Completely. Because that’s the only way the bond holds.

She wasn’t left in my care—she walked into the inferno on her own terms, eyes open, spine straight. And pretending I have any control over the pull between us is the biggest lie I’ve ever told myself. She wasn’t left at my feet. I chased her into the flames—and I don’t know if I’ll survive what happens next. Not because she might reject me—but because if she doesn’t… I’ll never be able to stop wanting more.

She disappears into her tent, her silhouette swallowed by the canvas flap, and I don’t move until I hear the quiet sigh of fabric settling back into place. My feet itch to follow. My dragon snarls at me to go after her. But I force myself to hold the line. Just for now.

I roll the tension from my shoulders, blow out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding, and finally turn toward the tree line. The shadows are deeper there, thick with the scent of ash and cooling earth. I pull out the secure satellite phone clipped to my belt and duck behind a cluster of trees. It takes a moment to patch the connection; the signal flickering with static before it locks.

Kade picks up first. Rafe clicks in seconds later. Neither says a word, but I can feel the tension pulsing through the line. They know I wouldn’t call unless it mattered.

I now know for certain, and it settles in my bones like molten stone: someone set this fire not to destroy land or resources, but to lure her in. This is personal. Deliberate. And Malek isn’t just playing with fire. He’s aiming for her, and that changes everything.

“She’s lucky you got there in time,” Kade says, his voice low.

“She shouldn’t have been there alone,” I mutter in the ancient language of dragons—I can't risk anyone overhearing what I have to say.

“Command cleared her,” Rafe adds, switching to our language.

“Doesn’t matter,” I growl. “The trap wasn’t random. It wasn’t faulty infrastructure or some unlucky collapse. Someone lured her there and rigged that floor—timed it to fail when she was on it. That wasn’t carelessness. That was precision. It was intended for her.”

Kade’s voice drops through the line, the static barely dulling the weight of his words. "You think it was him?"

"I know it was him."

Malek. The name rips through me like ash through lung—scalding, bitter, and impossible to ignore. It settles in my chest like something unfinished, something that should’ve burned out long ago. But now I know better. Now I know the fire never went out. It just waited.

I tell them what I saw at the tower—the spiral burned into the wall, the melted casing of the drone that had no business being there. Someone changed the ignition code, calibrating it for maximum delay and directional flame—sophisticated, malicious, and deliberate. And then the signature: D. Price.

I hear the silence stretch through the line as the name settles over all of us like a shadow. Not just a signature—this was a provocation. A breadcrumb left with purpose. He wants us to follow. Wants us to see what he’s building in the flames. It was a message. And maybe a warning. Or a challenge.

Rafe’s voice is tight across the line. “So you're sure—Dennis Price is Malek.”

I exhale slowly. “He shed the name, but not the fire. Reinvented himself right under our noses. And now he’s baiting us. Testing how close he can get.”

We fall quiet. The kind of silence that isn’t empty—it’s heavy, coiled tight with shared memory and dread. Across the line, I can almost hear Kade exhale, can imagine Rafe scrubbing a hand over his face like he does when the past gets too close. We’ve hunted Malek before. We failed. And now he’s back, dragging Ember into the middle of a war she doesn’t even know she’s fighting.

Kade’s voice cuts through the static, calm and dark. “Malek believed he could make fire sentient. That if you fed it right—fear, pain, chaos—it would start to answer back.”

“And he wanted to be its voice,” Rafe mutters. “Freak wanted to become the fire.”

“He’s not just playing with flame anymore,” I say. “He’s marking territory. Using symbols. Drawing Ember into it.”

“She’s the bait?” Kade asks.

I shake my head even though I know they can't see me. “She’s the spark.”

Rafe curses softly. “Then we don’t take our eyes off her.”

I nod once. “Double tail rotation. One of us is on her at all times. She can’t know—not yet.”

They don’t respond right away. Just a click from Kade, a quick breath from Rafe—confirmation that they’ve heard me, that the order’s understood. Then the line goes dead. Clean. Final. They’re out there, scattered across different sectors, but I know they’ll fall in line. They always do.

But before I can disappear into the night, I feel it... her eyes on me. A prickle between my shoulder blades, the subtle change in the air that only comes when she’s near. It’s not just awareness—it’s a tether, one I feel tighten every time she looks my way. She sees more than I want her to. More than I’m ready for. And even from across the distance, that look sets my instincts clawing at the surface again.

I turn and find her across the camp, standing just outside the shadows, watching. The wind kicks through the trees, lifting her hair, and for a moment, I wonder—did she hear? Did she misinterpret a word, a tone, or something else she shouldn’t have?

I don’t wait to find out. I slip deeper into the woods, every step taking me further from her tent, from the tether of her gaze that threatens to unravel what little control I have left. The trees swallow me whole, shadows thick and familiar, until I’m sure I’m alone. Only then do I let go.

My body ignites from the inside out—heat crackling down my spine, fire washing over my limbs in a tide that consumes, then remakes. No bone-cracking. No grotesque morphing. Just a roar of flame and the rush of old magic rising from the core of me. The fire isn't just a transition—it's a memory of what I am, what I’ve always been beneath the skin. The fire consumes my human shape like parchment, revealing what was never truly hidden. Wings unfurl with a whisper of scorched air, talons stretch and dig into the earth, and my eyes—no longer mortal—pierce the sky ahead. This is my truth. This is my form. This is my power unleashed.

I take to the sky alone, wings beating hard against the updraft, rising fast until the treetops vanish beneath a layer of smoke and cloud. The air thins and cools, sharp against my scales. Then I feel them—two more pulses of ancient power slicing through the dark.

Kade and Rafe join me above the clouds, their dragons flanking mine in perfect formation—fluent in the kind of wordless coordination only centuries together can create. We don’t speak. We don’t have to. The rhythm of war settles over us like an old, familiar cloak as we sweep the ridgeline below. Smoke spirals from fresh burns, dim embers glowing against the dark, flickering like war paint across our scales.

We fly in silence, wings slicing the wind, until we see them—charred spirals etched into the scorched earth. They aren’t random. They’re measured. Precise. Not just markings—runes. Burned into the land with purpose. The lines are too exact, the heat still lingering. This isn’t just a sigil of intent. It’s a ritual. A summoning in a language the world buried, but our kind never forgot. Malek’s signature. His challenge. His war drum.

Ahead, more smoke coils skyward—too thick, too controlled to be natural. It moves like it knows we’re watching. A figure takes shape in the haze: massive wings stretched wide, eyes burning like coals, a jagged smile cutting through the gloom. The air warps around him, humming with threat and memory.

Malek.

He doesn’t speak. Just grins—that slow, taunting curl of teeth and smoke that twists rage through my gut. His wings stretch wider, casting a shadow that swallows the ridge. His eyes lock onto mine. Time fractures. Past and present collide. I feel everything I lost, everything he took.

He tips his head. A dare. A reminder.

Then he vanishes, dissolving into the smoke like he was never there.

Kade’s voice cuts through the silence, sharp and low. “We’ll circle east. See if he’s baiting us.”

Rafe nods, already banking his dragon. “We’ll signal if we find a trail.”

Without waiting for my reply, they peel away—leaving me alone in the darkening sky, Malek’s ghost still burning in my vision.

I don’t land. I don’t stop. I burn my way back to camp, wings shearing through the air like knives, panic dragging hard against the rage still curling in my gut. The image of Malek’s grin flashes in my mind—taunting, certain—and all I can see is Ember, alone, unguarded, wrapped in danger she doesn’t even understand. My wings beat faster, harder, slicing through cloud and smoke as if speed could erase the risk. The memory of her falling through that floor—it guts me. If I’m too late, if she’s hurt…

No. I won’t let that happen.

The sky howls around me, and still I push faster. Because I need to see her. Need to know she’s still safe. Still whole. Still mine—even if she doesn’t know it yet.

When I shift back, the air is still thick with the echo of his grin, with the burn of flight and the weight of panic that hasn’t quite left my chest. I don’t bother dressing. I don’t even slow down. I’m fixated on her. I stalk across camp like a storm barely held in check, the gravel hissing beneath my feet, the scent of smoke still clinging to my skin. Her tent glows dimly in the moonlight, and I know I shouldn’t. I know she needs rest. Space. Time.

But I need to see her more. I need proof she’s here. Breathing. Alive. I walk straight to her tent, every step tight with restraint, and I don’t knock. I ease the flap open and slip inside, the canvas whispering against my shoulder.

She’s curled in the low cot, the lantern left dim on purpose, casting a soft amber glow across her skin. One arm flung over her head, lips parted, lashes dark against her cheek. Vulnerable in a way I’ve never seen her, and it pulls at something deep, something old. The part of me that remembers cave walls and hoarded gold and the vow I once made never to lose another to fear.

I stand at the edge of the shadows, the restraint it takes to keep my distance stretched razor-thin. Every breath she takes tugs at me, her scent curling around my senses like a chain of smoke and longing. I ache to move closer, to kneel at her side and press my forehead to the warm, bare skin of her shoulder. To breathe her in and brand the moment into my memory like I’ve done with every fire I’ve ever flown through. But I know what comes next if I do. My dragon wants to wrap around her, protect her, claim her. And I—I want to. But that isn’t the way. Not with her. Not yet. So I stay where I am, frozen in place, gripping my own will like it’s the only thing keeping me human.

I should leave. I need to leave, but I don’t. I stand there like a sentinel forged in fire, my pulse thrumming with something ancient, something dangerous. Because I’m already hers—even if she doesn’t know it yet.