On the eighth day, Lavender could move her fingers without screaming.
On the tenth day, she summoned a flame.
It was small, barely more than a flicker worth, but it came when she called. The fire danced in her scarred palm, warm and obedient, and something in her chest loosened.
"Good." Brute watched from his usual spot. "Again."
She called it. Released it. Called it again.
The fire answered each time.
Excellent. Zemmal's voice carried approval. He'd been walking on his healed leg for two days now, testing his weight, flexing muscles that had atrophied. Your control has... deepened.
"The healing changed something." Lavender studied the scars on her palms. "I can feel the fire differently now. Like it's part of me instead of something I'm fighting."
That is because it is. Zemmal settled beside her, his massive body radiating warmth. You reached into yourself during the healing. Deeper than you ever had. The magic recognized that. It bonded to you.
"Is that normal?"
Nothing about you is normal, little flame. His tone held something between amusement and wonder. But no. What you did, what we did together, that should not have been possible. Human and dragon magic do not... combine.
"Then how?"
Zemmal was quiet for a long moment.
My mother could answer that question better than I.
Lavender looked up. "Your mother." Her voice dripped with contempt.
The one we journey to meet. His eyes held hers, ignoring her tone. She has been waiting for you, I think. Longer than you know.
"Waiting for me specifically? I’m getting tired of all this talk in riddles."
Perhaps. Perhaps not. Zemmal rose, stretching his healed leg. She has always had an interest in your kind. Too fond of you, some would say.
"Fond of humans? A dragon?"
She is... unique among her kind. Zemmal began walking, and Lavender fell into step beside him. Brute followed. She defies expectation.
"That's not an answer."
It is the only answer I can give. His voice carried weight. As I have told you before: some truths cannot be told. They must be witnessed.
They walked in silence for a time. The forest had changed around them, growing stranger with each passing day. The trees were older here, their trunks thick as boulders, their branches forming a canopy so dense that little light reached the ground. Strange mushrooms glowed in the shadows, casting pale blue light across their path.
"Where are we?" Lavender asked.
The border lands. Zemmal's voice was soft. The place between the world you know and the world you will come to know. Few humans have walked here. None have walked out.
"Encouraging."
Truth often is not.
Brute pressed against her leg. "Stay close to me, Lav. This place has... rules. They are not the rules you know."
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
"What kind of rules?"
"Time moves differently here. Memory becomes fluid. The land itself is... aware."
Lavender stopped walking. "Aware of what?"
"Of us." Brute's eyes met hers. "She is aware of us. Has been since before you were born."
"She who?"
Neither of them answered.
They walked.
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That night, Lavender tried something new.
She sat cross-legged on the forest floor, her scarred hands resting on her knees, and closed her eyes. Zemmal had mentioned sensing; she wanted to understand what he meant.
The fire was there, burning steadily in her chest. She'd grown used to its presence, the warmth that never quite faded. But there was more.
She pushed her awareness outward.
Her own magic came first, orange and gold and hungry. Then Zemmal's magic, vast and purple and crackling with contained lightning. Then Brute.
Lavender frowned.
Brute's warmth was strange. Different from dragon magic, different from her fire. It felt like... sunlight on old stone. Like something familiar and patient and impossibly gentle.
She pushed further. And recoiled.
Something unnatural pressed against her awareness. Cold and gentle and older than anything she'd ever touched. It filled the spaces between thoughts, between heartbeats, between moments. It was everywhere and nowhere, watching without eyes, knowing without asking.
Lavender's eyes snapped open.
"What was that?" Her voice came out too loud. Too frightened.
That Zemmal said, was my mother.
"That's... that's impossible. We're still days away."
Distance means little to her. Zemmal's eyes gleamed in the mushroom light. She exists in ways you cannot comprehend. The healing merely... caught her attention.
"The healing? Why would that have caught her attention?"
You reached into the space between life and death. You pulled me back from the edge. Such things do not go unnoticed.
Lavender wrapped her arms around her. The sensation still lingered at the edges of her awareness. That cold and gentle presence.
"Is she... is she dangerous?"
Brute answered before Zemmal could.
"She is the most dangerous being you will ever meet." His voice was gentle, but firm. "And the kindest. Fear without hatred is wisdom, Lav. Fear her. But do not hate her. She has earned better than that."
"Why can you two never make any sense?"
"It will make sense soon enough."
They didn't speak again that night.
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The next few days blurred together.
The forest grew stranger. The mushrooms gave way to crystal formations that hummed with energy. The trees became stone, or perhaps they had always been stone and she was only now seeing them clearly. Time seemed to stretch and compress; hours felt like minutes, and minutes felt like days. Yet the way the light played on the landscape suggested that no time had passed at all.
Zemmal led them through with quiet confidence. His leg was fully healed now, new scales gleaming purple and green in the strange light. He moved with grace that belied his size.
Lavender practiced her magic as they walked.
She summoned fire in her palm, shaped it into spheres, into spirals, into the outline of a bird. She learned to modulate the heat with precision, creating flames that warmed without burning. The lightning was another story.
Every time she attempted the same with her lightning, she would only manage sparks on her fingertips, or arcing flashes that she could not control. Frustration grew within her chest.
On the second day, Brute had her practice projection.
"Burn that leaf." He nodded toward a fallen leaf twenty feet away.
Lavender focused. Extended her awareness. Pushed.
The leaf smoked. Then caught.
"Good. Now the stone beside it. Heat it up"
She reached deeper. The stone began to glow red.
"Control the heat. Make it warm, not hot."
The red faded to orange, then cooled to a gentle warm pulse that could be felt to the touch.
"Excellent." Brute's tail wagged. "You understand now. Fire is not just destruction. It is warmth. Life. Energy."
"My father used to say something similar." The words came out before she could stop them. "About kindness being warmth."
"Your father was wise."
"Wise didn’t help him in the end. He died."
"Death does not diminish wisdom." Brute pressed against her. "Only forgetfulness does."
Eventually, Zemmal stopped. His head swiveled as if he were looking for something. Brute stopped, heckles raised.
We are no longer alone.
Lavender halted. She tried to slow her breath and racing pulse. Reached out, sensing.
That’s when she felt it. Violence. Malice.
“What is out there?”
“Nothing friendly,” quipped Brute. “Be on your guard.”
As Lavender steeled herself, the trees up ahead began to rustle. The sound of shattering branches and something large, moving fast, could be heard. Her vision was filled with stone trunks crumbling to pieces.
As quickly as they had sensed the presence, they found themselves before a towering beast. It roared and raged, giving flashes of ivory claws and dripping teeth. Eyes, black as an endless void made contact with Lavender. It let out a roar.
