Page 25 of We Were Meant to Burn (Ashes and Ruin Saga #1)

The first thing I noticed was warmth.

It curled around me like a soft invitation, lulling me back toward sleep. Fir needles and spearmint wrapped around my senses, a scent both familiar and unfamiliar all at once.

I almost gave in. Almost buried myself deeper into the comfort of it—until I realized that the thing I was curled against was moving.

Breathing.

My entire body went stiff. A steady rhythm rose and fell against my back. An arm—lean and muscled—was draped around my waist.

Malakai.

My breath hitched, heat rushing to my face. I didn’t move, too stunned, too caught between the haze of sleep and the sharp awareness of where I was—of who I was pressed against.

Malakai stirred behind me. I felt it before he fully woke, the moment his body tensed, the sudden intake of breath as realization dawned on him.

He pulled away fast, like I’d burned him.

"The winds picked up last night and blew out the fire.”

His voice was rushed, awkward, almost apologetic.

"You were shivering half the night. I didn’t want to risk building another fire with the airships patrolling—”

I sat up and pushed a hand through my hair, willing my pulse to settle.

Outside, the storm still raged. Howling wind funneled through the mountainside, whipping leaves and loose branches across the landscape. Rain pelted the rocks in a relentless downpour.

Malakai shifted, clearing his throat, and for once, he wasn’t looking at me. I wasn’t looking at him, either.

“Thanks,”

I muttered, my voice clipped, trying to pretend like my face wasn’t burning. Maybe if I made my tone sharp enough, we could just pretend none of it had happened.

He exhaled, running a hand over his jaw, then gestured to the storm outside.

"Looks like we’re stuck here for a while.”

Wonderful. I’d just curl up right here and die from embarrassment then.

“I guess that means we should get to know each other a bit better,”

he added, a lazy grin sliding onto his face.

I narrowed my eyes.

"After we get out of here, I’m stuck with you for two more months. There’s plenty of time for you to get to know me.”

I plopped back down on the cold dirt floor, hugging my knees to my chest.

Malakai leaned back against the cave wall, tossing his hands behind his head as if settling in.

"Humor me,”

he said, eyes bright with amusement.

"Don’t make me beg you.”

I wrung my hands in my lap, feeling trapped in more ways than one. The last thing I wanted was to spend more time alone with him. I didn’t trust myself around him—not when my heart kept betraying me, kept twisting itself into knots every time he looked at me like that. Not when the easy confidence in his grin made something in my stomach flip.

I pressed a hand against the hollow in my stomach, desperate for a distraction.

"Do we have any more of that pig?”

Malakai arched a brow, his smirk deepening. “Yes,”

he drawled, tilting his chin toward a bundle of leaves in the corner.

"But you have to tell me one thing about yourself for every piece you wolf down.”

I hesitated, biting my bottom lip.

I was starving.

And Malakai had already seen the ugliest parts of me. What more could I possibly say?

“. . . Deal.”

Malakai tossed me a cut of meat, and I caught it without hesitation.

For the next few days, Malakai and I shared stories—our pasts, our missteps, the things we could laugh about, even the things we couldn’t.

He told me funny tales about the boys when they were younger, the kind of trouble they used to get into. How Lian once tried to fix a broken wagon wheel and ended up dismantling the entire cart. How Elías had a habit of collecting venomous creatures as pets—until one very angry serpent bit him, and Dom nearly strangled him for it.

I laughed more than I had in years.

And in turn, I told him about my own childhood—at least, the part before I’d been sent away for training. I always thought of my life in two halves. Before and after. Before, my world had been full of light, of laughter, of simple joys. After . . . well. I was still living in the after.

But I gave him the small things. The moments I wanted to hold on to. How I used to climb onto the palace rooftops just to watch the stars. How I’d steal sweets from the kitchens with Mistress Cryx. How I once tried to fly by leaping off a balcony with nothing but a sheet tied around my shoulders like a cape.

Mistress Cryx had scolded me for a week straight.

When we weren’t talking about ourselves, I told him the stories I’d grown up hearing from Mistress Cryx—the myths she used to whisper to me in the dark.

I told him about the boy who fell in love with the moon and chased her across the sky. About el mono y el conejo, the monkey and the rabbit, forever tangled in a trickster’s game. And my favorite—the girl made of glass, who shattered herself into a thousand pieces just to be free.

Though the storm outside made the cave bitterly cold, Malakai kept a healthy fire going, and the walls echoed with our laughter.

I had never known silence could feel so easy between two people.

By the time the storm finally died, four days had passed. The scent of wet earth clung to the air, rich and deep, filling my lungs as I stepped outside. The sun beat down hot on my neck, burning away the dampness that had settled in my bones.

“Looks like we can go find the others now,”

I said, stretching my arms above my head.

Malakai lifted his hands to his mouth and let out a strange, warbling whistle that carried through the forest. The sound rippled through the trees like a bird’s call.

Nothing.

He whistled again, this time sharper, more insistent.

Minutes stretched long and empty. My stomach twisted. What if something had happened?

Then—finally—an answering call came from the east.

Malakai’s entire face lit up.

"They’re okay! They survived the storm, and the patrol didn’t find them.”

He whistled back—a series of short notes mixed with high-pitched, longer ones. Another low note answered, but that was it.

No words needed. Just the certainty that they were alive.

We hiked for half the day, pushing through the dense jungle, following the sound of their signals.

When we found them, Dom looked like a mess. His hair was mussed from running his hands through it too many times, his face tight with something like worry. The second Malakai stepped into sight, Dom grabbed him and pulled him into a bone-crunching hug.

Dom’s voice was hoarse when he said, “Techies were scanning the ridge all night. I thought they’d find you for sure.”

Malakai nudged him with an elbow, flashing a sly smile.

"Give me a little credit, Dom. I’m smarter than a bunch of techies.”

But I saw the way his shoulders loosened, the way relief flickered through his eyes.

For all his bravado, Malakai had been just as worried as Dom.

The moment I stepped into camp, I was met with a furious, accusatory finger aimed squarely at my face.

“Finally,”

Elías huffed, his expression dark with betrayal.

"Keep that thing away from me.”

I barely had time to register what he meant before a blue-and-red blur shot out of the trees like a demon possessed. Xixi had grown. She was at least four times her original size, now resembling a small jaguar more than the mischievous little house cat I had left behind. Her fur was a wild blur as she leapt onto a nearby branch, launched herself into the air—soaring directly over Elías’s head—and landed on me in a full-body tackle.

With a strangled cry, Elías dove out of the way.

Xixi hit me like a boulder, knocking me clean off my feet and sending me sprawling into the dirt. She chirped excitedly, her tail wagging as her rough tongue rasped against my face in enthusiastic licks.

I wheezed out a laugh, struggling beneath her weight.

"Xixi, what the hell happened to you?”

I reached up and scratched behind her massive rabbit-like ears, trying to comprehend just how much she had changed.

"I’ve only been gone four days—how are you bigger?”

Xixi let out a series of chittering sounds, her ears twitching as if she was explaining something very important. I, of course, had no idea what she was saying.

Elías stormed over, his face red with outrage as he jabbed a finger toward Xixi.

"You need to control this monster! She’s been terrorizing me.”

Lian strolled up beside him, lacing their fingers together before pressing a kiss to Elías’s cheek. The amusement in his blue eyes was impossible to miss.

"He’s exaggerating,”

Lian said, the corner of his mouth twitching.

"Xixi has been very helpful. She’s an excellent ward against the real monsters of Endrina.”

He emphasized the word real, giving Elías a pointed look.

I looked between them, trying not to laugh. “Okay,”

I said, still pinned beneath Xixi.

"What exactly has she done?”

Elías threw his hands up.

"Apparently, that thing”—he shot Xixi a murderous glare—“likes to hunt. And instead of putting her kills somewhere logical, she likes to leave them next to me while I sleep. So when I wake up? Bam! Dead rabbit. Or a bird. Or a tapir. This morning, though?”

His voice rose to a dramatic pitch.

"She took it too far.”

I barely managed to stifle my grin behind my hand.

Lian leaned in conspiratorially and whispered behind his palm.

"She caught a deer and left it on top of Eli’s pack.”

I snorted.

Dom walked up then, casually ruffling Xixi’s fur as she preened like the little suck up she was.

"I told you they’re gifts,”

he said, shaking his head.

"It’s in her nature. You can’t blame her for that.”

Elías made an inhuman noise. “Gifts?”

He gaped.

"Well excuse me if I’d prefer a new revolver instead of waking up with a dead animal on my head!”

Dom, unbothered, just smirked.

"Just ignore him,”

he said to me.

"Your little beast has made my life infinitely easier. She’s a great hunting partner.”

Xixi let out a pleased trill, sitting higher on her haunches like the smug little menace she was.

I gave her a scratch under the chin.

"You are a good girl, aren’t you?” I cooed.

Elías groaned dramatically and turned to Lian.

"Look, Li-Li,”

he whined.

"She’s encouraging the little terror.”

Lian just laughed.

The group set out again after Elías had finally calmed down, though he kept a wary eye on Xixi, who trotted beside me with a proud sway of her tail.

Our pace was quicker than usual, the urgency in Malakai’s stride forcing the rest of us to push ourselves harder to keep up.

He moved like a man on a mission, his long legs covering ground with ease, while I had to jog every few steps just to match his pace.

“I’m taking us closer to El Valle de los Sue?os,”

Malakai announced over his shoulder, his tone clipped with purpose.

I blew out a breath and quickened my steps to draw level with him.

"Why are you in such a damn hurry?”

I asked, my words coming out in between gulps of air.

His gaze remained fixed ahead, his expression unreadable.

"The Aguatitlan patrols got too close to our position last night,”

he said.

"Their radar systems shouldn’t be able to track us here—Endrina’s magic scrambles human tech. But either they were flying blind and got lucky,”

he grimaced, “or they’ve figured out a way to calibrate their tech to counteract the interference.”

A chill slithered down my spine, lodging itself in my gut like a stone. I refused to go back. I refused to be locked away. To be a prisoner. To be King Rafael’s bride. The thought of chains around my wrists, of a collar burning my throat, of my body being nothing but a pawn on a chessboard—it made my vision go sharp with panic.

I swallowed hard.

"So, what do we do?”

Malakai’s jaw flexed.

"We stick to the border of El Valle de los Sue?os,”

he said.

"It’s Hada territory, and its boundaries are powerful. No human has ever discovered it, and no human map records its location. If we skirt the edge, the Aguatitlan patrols won’t be able to find us.”

A muscle in my jaw twitched. Magic so strong that even human technology couldn’t touch it? That was a level of power I hadn’t encountered before. It made sense—Endrina was a wild, untamed place—but El Valle de los Sue?os sounded like something entirely different.

“Okay,”

I said slowly.

"But what happens if we cross into their territory?”

Malakai’s stride faltered for just a moment. His hands clenched at his sides. When he finally spoke, his voice was tight, controlled.

“My mother lives there.”

The words landed like a sharp blade between us, cutting through the space with invisible weight.

I blinked up at him. I didn’t know much about his mother—he rarely talked about her, and when her name did come up, it was always laced with a bitterness that made my skin crawl. I wanted to press him, to ask what exactly made her so dangerous, but the stormy look on his face kept the questions lodged in my throat.

Instead, I just nodded and kept walking.

For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t the only one haunted by a past I wanted to outrun.

The heat of the midday sun pressed down on us as we walked, our boots crunching over the damp jungle floor. I could feel Dom lingering in my periphery, hovering just close enough that I knew he had something to say, but not close enough to say it.

By the time the sun reached its peak and Malakai called for a break, Dom finally stepped forward. His shoulders were squared, but his gaze was downcast.

“Can I talk to you?”

His voice was low, hesitant.

I flicked my gaze to him and set down my meager meal of dried meat and fruit. Xixi had been eyeing it like a starved beast, her tail flicking with anticipation. I gave her a pointed look.

"Don’t touch.”

She huffed but didn’t move closer.

Malakai watched our exchange with wary eyes, his hands loose at his sides, but he didn’t interfere. I followed Dom a few paces away from the others until we were out of earshot.

Dom exhaled sharply, like he was trying to push something heavy from his chest.

"Look, I wanted to apologize.”

I tilted my head.

"For what?”

His weight shifted from foot to foot.

"I told you I’d come if you blew on that whistle.”

He nodded toward the leather cord still looped around my neck.

"But I didn’t.”

He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing.

"I heard you. I heard your call for help, and I—”

He hesitated, as if forcing himself to admit it.

"I ignored it.”

A sharp, unexpected pain lanced through my chest. He ignored it.

I shouldn’t have been surprised. Even with the tentative truce we’d built, we weren’t friends. Not really. I wasn’t someone Dom would ever trust completely, and I wasn’t sure if I blamed him for that.

Still, the admission stung.

I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, pushing away the lump in my throat.

"Dom, you don’t owe me anything,”

I said, trying to sound unaffected.

"I understand why you didn’t come.”

He shook his head.

"No. It wasn’t right.”

His voice was tight.

"I said I would. I made a promise to Malakai. And I broke it.”

He finally lifted his gaze to mine.

"It won’t happen again.”

Before I could find a response, Dom reached for the hunting knife at his belt. The wooden handle was worn smooth from years of use, the serrated edge sharp from recent care. He held it out to me.

I hesitated before taking it from him.

Dom exhaled, rolling his shoulders like he was shedding something heavy.

"Just promise not to cut my throat while I sleep,”

he said, his tone wry but not entirely joking. He gave me a brisk nod and turned back to the others.

I glanced down at the knife in my hand, running my thumb over the hilt.

Trust.

That was what this was. Dom would never say the words outright, but actions spoke louder. To willingly arm me, to place a weapon in my hand, meant more than anything he could’ve said.

A step forward.

My heart warmed at the thought.

I tucked the knife into my belt, not bothering to hide it along with the others, and returned to my spot to finish my meal.