Imogen moved through the trees like a ghost, Her hands brushing past fern and bark, Her breath is quiet and unsteady.

  The forest was still, eerily so. As if the world itself held its breath after the carnage they’d left behind.

  But here, beneath the hush of twilight and the soft trickle of a waterfall, there was no blood. No smoke, only the scent of pine, damp earth, and moss-covered stone.

  Imogen crouched at the stream’s edge, unsteady, her boots sinking slightly into the wet soil.

  She looked around slowly, scanning the trees, the rocks, and the underbrush.

  “Alright,” she muttered. “Think. If the moss is anywhere, it’ll be near the water.”

  She moved with care, her fingers brushing aside fern and fallen leaves until something pale caught her eye, delicate silver strands clung to the stone like spider silk.

  “There you are,” she whispered, plucking the silver moss and tucking it gently into her pouch.

  One down.

  She rose and stepped toward a patch of clustered spirals near the stream.

  Bellroot. The petals trembled faintly as she reached for them, though the air was still.

  She hesitated, then spoke softly. “It’s okay. Just borrowing what I need.”

  Her fingertips tingled as she touched them, but she didn’t flinch.

  Instead, she gave a quiet, almost reverent nod. “Thank you.”

  It wasn’t just herbalism anymore. The plants were reacting, reaching, and resonating. Like they knew her. Like they recognized something in her.

  She didn’t question it. Not now. Not when every second mattered. “Last one… Thornleaf,” she said, scanning the forest floor but had nothing.

  She ventured farther in, pushing through low branches. The canopy thickened above, shadowing the woods in green.

  Every part of her ached, her strength stretched thin from the magic she’d already spent.

  But she didn’t stop.

  “You can do this,” she said aloud. “Just a little farther.”

  Her voice was quiet, but steady. Anchoring. She pressed on, each step carrying her deeper into the forest’s waiting silence.

  The moment her hand touched the bark, a flicker of gold sparked beneath her palm. The tree pulsed beneath her fingers, soft, rhythmic. Alive.

  The underbrush ahead rustled faintly. She turned her head, eyes narrowing.Just beyond the roots, tucked between twisted branches, a patch of serrated leaves shimmered faintly, edges glowing like moonlight.

  “Thornleaf,” she breathed, her voice tight with wonder.

  She moved toward it slowly, reverently, and knelt. Her fingers shook as she plucked the leaves one by one, careful not to bruise the stems. Tucking them into her pouch, she exhaled. A sound caught somewhere between relief and awe.

  Tears welled in her eye but not from pain.“This place… it isn’t trying to hurt me,” she whispered. “It’s showing me the way.”

  She rose unsteadily, her legs trembling from exhaustion, and glanced back through the trees, back toward the cliffs where Darius and Axel waited.

  For the first time since the battle, the weight in her chest shifted. Not gone, just lighter.

  She adjusted herself fully sitting on her legs, tying off the last bundle of Thornleaf. Her hands moved with practiced ease, but her breath was uneven.

  The forest around her was still, only the wind through the leaves and the soft trickle of the stream. It should have felt peaceful. But inside, she was splintering.

  She swallowed hard and whispered to the trees, “I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

  The words felt strange in the air, she stared down at her hands. The same hands that had glowed gold. “It’s like it was always there,” she murmured. “Just… waiting for me.”

  Her gaze drifted upward, past the canopy where fading light slipped through the branches. Then she stood, steadying herself. She didn’t have all the answers.

  But she had what she came for. And that would have to be enough, for now.

  Since Axel had looked at her like she belonged to a world she didn’t remember, nothing had felt quite real. Her fingers brushed the edge of a thornleaf plant. A sharp sting as its serrated edge sliced a clean line across her skin.

  Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

  She didn’t flinch. The pain grounded her. “Darius,” she breathed, the name barely more than a whisper. It moved through her like a pulse, constant and unshakable.

  He’d looked at her like she was more than a weapon or the battlefield. Like she was his anchor in a world burning down.

  Her thumb traced the cut on her finger, smearing a line of red into her palm, blood over gold. Human and something else. “I don’t know what I am,” she said softly. “But I know what I have to do.”

  Axel was dying and Darius was waiting.

  And whatever truths waited beyond this, she’d meet them with her eyes open.

  She scanned her gathered ingredients one last time. Bellroot, thornleaf, and silver moss carefully bundled and accounted for. Confident she hadn’t missed anything, she slipped the herbs into her satchel and sealed it tight.

  Her legs moved before her mind could catch up. Urgency pushed her forward, but her body had limits.

  Halfway between the clearing and the stream, her knees buckled. She lurched sideways, catching herself against the rough bark of a nearby tree.

  The impact stung but it held her. Kept her upright when her legs nearly gave out. Her other hand clutched the satchel tightly to her chest.

  It should have felt like a victory. She had done what she came to do. She could help.

  But triumph never came.

  Only exhaustion thick and sharp, curling around her chest like a fist.

  Her forehead pressed to the bark as her breath came in short, shaking bursts. Above her, the darkening canopy rustled softly. Faint slivers of moonlight slipping through the branches like cold veins of silver etched across the night.

  Like the glint on Darius’s scales, black streaked with silver, obsidian touched by starlight.

  She blinked hard, her eyes burning.

  He had carried them from death. Shielded her, fought with everything he had. For her.

  And it broke something deep inside, because she didn’t know how to hold that kind of devotion. Not when she wasn’t even sure who she was.

  Her voice cracked in the quiet. “They called me a Dragon Singer.” The words sounded wrong in the open air, too large and important.

  She looked down at her hands, stained with dirt and blood and something golden she couldn’t name.

  “I’m not just a healer,” she whispered. “Not just some village girl with herbs in her pockets and potions on her shelf… or the girl who was Aunt Elanor’s charity case.”

  No. Not just magic but something ancient, hunted. Something once thought extinct.

  Her whole life, she had felt out of place. Like she was living in a world meant for someone else. Now… she was starting to understand why.

  The warmth that surged through her when she touched Axel. The way her magic had responded to his pain. The pull toward Darius, strong, inescapable, like gravity itself.

  It wasn't a coincidence. It was real. And it terrified her. Because if she accepted it, If she stepped into it fully. There would be no going back. No safe little life. No pretending to be something small. No more hiding behind herbs and half-truths.

  The wind stirred through the trees, catching strands of her hair and lifting them like a whisper. She closed her eyes, letting the stillness settle in.

  Letting herself feel it.

  The ache and fear. The wonder, the pull.

  And beneath it all, something that was undeniable but steady, was the bond.

  Not chains or a cage. But a choice.

  Her fingers curled into fists at her sides. “I don’t know who I was,” she whispered aloud, voice raw. “But maybe I’m about to find out who I’m meant to be.”

  She took in a slow and steady breath then turned toward the path ahead and walked.

  Back to Axel and Darius. Back to the firelight and the ache of truth waiting in their eyes.

  Her footsteps were quiet. But her heart was no longer uncertain

  Far beyond the clearing, Darius stood at the edge of a cave. Arms crossed over his chest, shoulders taut with strain.

  The wind pulled at his dark hair, carried the scent of ash and pine, blood and wildflowers.

  But beneath it all, threaded faintly through the night air, so soft it might’ve been a memory of her.

  Imogen.

  Darius closed his eyes and inhaled slowly, willing his heartbeat to settle. To trust.

  She was alive. He could feel it.

  That cord between them, thin but impossibly strong still thrummed with life.

  But it was changing.

  The fear and confusion that had once laced her presence like a storm… was ebbing.

  Shifting.

  Becoming something quieter and sharper.

  He felt it. Felt her steady herself. Felt the pain being shoved aside and replaced by something fierce. Something grounded.

  And the bond… answered.

  A heat bloomed low in his chest, tight and aching. Not desire, something deeper. Older. A fierce, almost reverent kind of awe.

  She was still choosing this. Still choosing to fight. To stay and more importantly to try.

  Even when she didn’t understand what she was. Even when he hadn’t told her the full truth. Even when it would’ve been easier to run.

  Darius tilted his head back, eyes tracking the sky through the canopy. Sunlight filtered through the trees, catching on the faint white sheen hidden in a few of his black scales.

  His mother’s light.

  A legacy etched into him, born of a queen who died protecting something greater than herself.

  And now…

  Imogen carried a light of her own. And it was a light he would kill to protect.

  A small smile ghosted across his lips, grim, but real.

  “She’s stronger than she knows,” he murmured, half to himself, half to the forest listening in silence.

  Behind him, Axel stirred.

  A soft, rasping breath. He was still alive and fighting. But just barely.

  Darius’s jaw clenched.

  Not yet, he thought. We’re not done yet.