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??The Night Before Fire

Ember

The fire crackled low, casting soft shadows across the room as I lay curled beside Dorian, his hand resting over my thigh like he was afraid I might vanish.

The silence between us was heavy, not cold, just full of things unsaid.

I stared at the ceiling, fingers tracing the scar on my hand where our blood had mingled.

Married. I was married.

No dress, no vows, no I love you. Just blood, fire, and ancient words that tied me to him in life and death.

It should’ve felt like a nightmare. But somehow, the strangest part was how natural it felt. Mundane, even.

Like every girl dreamed of her wedding day, and I’d just survived mine with blood on my hands instead of rings.

But I wasn’t normal. Not anymore.

The mansion no longer felt like Dorian’s.

It felt like ours.

The way he looked at me now, like I was the last piece of him he didn’t know he needed until I stood in front of him and refused to move.

Our allies had claimed every room with varying degrees of menace and mysticism.

Mirek had holed up in the stable and sharpened his obsidian hand until it sparked.

Thalia left a trail of herbs and ash wherever she walked.

Vaelith hadn't moved from the atrium, just sat, bones splayed on the floor, whispering into death.

Noxen curled in the sunken den like a caged wolf, silent, still, waiting for violence.

I should’ve been afraid.

Instead, I felt… whole.

Feeling the need to stretch my legs, I get up and let my feet take me where they thought I needed to be.

Minutes later, I found myself in the war room, tracing the map of rift points across the oak table. My fingers hovered over one marked in red, Hollow Orchard.

My childhood home.

My mother’s secrets buried beneath the blood-soaked floorboards.

That’s where this would end.

Where it had to.

“You’re thinking too loud again,” came Dorian’s voice behind me, low and smooth as silk pulled tight over a blade.

I turned and saw him there in the doorway, shirt half-buttoned, hair a mess, dark circles under his eyes from days without sleep. And still, he was the most dangerous thing in this house.

And the only one I trusted.

“I’m just… processing,” I said, voice soft.

He stepped forward, slowly, like I might bolt. “You’re doing better than I ever did when the madness took over me. I killed the first thing that took my brother away from me . ”

“I know,” I said softly, remembering the blood-soaked page in his book.

He smiled crookedly. “Yeah. And then I went on a killing spree that eventually led me to you.”

I rolled my eyes, but my lips tugged into a reluctant grin. “Charming.”

“I know.”

A beat passed between us.

The room felt heavier somehow. Not because of fear. Because of knowing.

“What we did, our bond,” I whispered. “It’s not something we can undo.”

His jaw flexed. “I don’t want to undo it.”

My breath caught. “We never said it, though. Not once.”

“No,” he murmured. “Because I think if I said it, I’d never stop.”

I stared at him, heart thudding. “And if I say it, it becomes real.”

He crossed the room, closing the distance, and cupped my cheek like I might break, but we both knew I was the one who burned. “It’s already real, Ember. Everything about this is real. You feel it, too. Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not,” I said, stepping closer, our foreheads brushing. “I feel it.”

His hands were on me before I could blink, urgent, rough, claiming.

And I needed him.

Because tomorrow we might not survive.

Tonight, I wanted to forget the war, the rift, the Watchers, the monsters in borrowed skins.

I wanted him .

He didn’t ask. He didn’t wait. He pressed me back against the war table like the plans could wait. His mouth met mine with the kind of hunger you only taste when you know the world could end by morning.

Clothes tore.

Things flew.

I was naked against polished wood, the map of our doom under my spine, Dorian between my legs like a man starved of sin and salvation alike.

“You’re mine,” he growled, dragging his mouth along my throat, his fangs grazing but not biting. “Say it.”

“I’m yours,” I gasped, breathless, raw, and wrecked. “And you’re mine, too.”

He slammed into me with no mercy, no patience, just pure, desperate need. We weren’t gentle. We were fury. We were fire.

His hand fisted in my hair, my nails raked down his back, and every sound I made drove him deeper into the madness we’d built together.

Every thrust echoed with magic, our bond pulsing beneath our skin, glowing silver and violet where our bodies met.

We shattered together.

He moaned my name like it was holy.

I screamed his like it was a curse.

And when we finally lay still, tangled in each other, breath sharp and uneven, I didn’t say it.

Neither did he.

But he held me like we had.

And I didn’t let go.

Because tomorrow, the real war began.

And if I was going to burn… I was going to burn with him.