POV: Elara
The crown never made me a queen. The fire did, and now, that fire wanted something from me.
I woke with a gasp, lungs full of smoke that wasn't there. The stone above me was cracked. My back ached where the sigil pulsed like a second heartbeat. My hands trembled, still warm as if I had touched the sun.
"You were burning," a voice said from the shadows. "From the inside out."
I turned sharply. An Elder stood at the edge of the crypt's light, robes tattered, eyes as old as the stones. His presence felt like dust and time itself.
"Where am I?" I croaked.
"Beneath Blackthorn," he replied. "Where the dead kings sleep, and now, where a fire-born queen awakens."
The crypt was silent, thick with ash and memory. I tried to sit up, but pain laced through my spine. The sigil glowed faintly beneath my skin.
"What happened to me?"
"You were chosen," the Elder said simply. "Your body… just remembered."
The crypt doors opened with a creak, and Kael rushed down the stone steps, cloak flying behind him.
"Elara!"
He was at my side before the Elder could speak again, gripping my face with both hands.
"I thought, " His voice cracked. "I thought I lost you again."
I leaned into him. "You didn't. I'm still here."
He looked at the Elder sharply. "She collapsed. She was on fire. What did you do to her?"
"I did nothing," the Elder said calmly. "The fire is not mine to control. It came from her."
Kael's eyes flicked back to me, softer now, yet wild with fear.
"I won't lose you," he said, voice trembling. "Not after everything. I don't care if it's prophecy or war. I can't go through that again."
"Then don't protect me," I whispered. "Stand beside me. Fight with me."
His breath caught.
"I mean it, Kael. I don't need a shield. I need a sword at my side."
For a heart, he said nothing, then he nodded. "Then let's burn together."
Later that night, the Elder brought out the scrolls, old, yellowed, stained with something too dark to be ink.
He unrolled one gently, revealing a symbol that mirrored the one on my back.
"It's the sigil of the Seventh Flame," he said. "There were once seven hybrids, born across centuries. Each one bearing part of the power you now hold."
"Seven?" I breathed. "Where are they now?"
"Dead," he replied. "All but one… lost in wars the world no longer remembers. You are not the first, Elara. But you may be the last who can stop what's coming."
"What is coming?" Kael asked sharply.
The Elder's hand hovered over a drawing of a creature with a thousand eyes, a thousand tongues, all flame and bone.
"The Hydra," he said. "The first blood beast. The one that was sealed behind the Gate of Scales by the Seven."
A chill crawled over me, and now? I whispered.
"The gate cracks," the Elder replied. "And your mark burns because the Hydra stirs."
The door burst open. A soldier stumbled in, armor scorched, eyes wild. He collapsed at Kael's feet, smoke curling from his body.
"Gods, get water!" Kael barked. I knelt beside him. His mouth bled. His hands trembled.
"They're gone…" he rasped. "The Eastern Clans… they fell. Burned. Turned on each other."
My blood turned to ice. "Who did this?" I asked.
He turned his head toward me. "They awoke the others…" he whispered. "The old ones." "What old ones?"
The Elder moved forward, face tight. "Tell us what you saw," he demanded.
The messenger gripped my arm, his skin blistered from within. His eyes locked with mine, bloodshot and terrified.
"They said… it was prophecy. They called it… the Blood Rebirth."
His body convulsed. "One name…" he whispered. "One word…"
We all leaned in, and he gasped...
Hydra, and then he died.
I stared at his burned face, the echo of that word seared into my mind.
Hydra. The gate wasn't cracking anymore. It was open.
"Some are marked by scars. Others by crowns. But me? I carry fire carved into my bones, and war written in my blood."
The silence after the messenger's death was suffocating. No one moved, not even the flames from the torches dared to flicker.
The word he left behind, Hydra, echoed through my skull like a war drum. I had never heard it before today, but something inside me had.
My fire flinched at the sound. Feared it. "What does that name mean?" I asked, my voice low but steady.
The Elder looked older suddenly, like the weight of a century fell on his shoulders in a blink. "The Hydra is not just a creature," he said. "It is the root. The beginning of the war that destroyed the First Age. A god-thing made of blood magic and hatred. When the first hybrids tried to bind their souls, it shattered the lands."
Kael's hand found mine, gripping tight. "You said the gate was sealed."
"It was," the Elder whispered. "But never fully destroyed. Just weakened. Hidden."
"And now?" I asked.
He met my eyes. "Now, it bleeds."
I swallowed hard, trying to keep the rising heat inside my chest from breaking free again.
"Why me?" I asked. "Why now?"
The Elder rolled up the scroll and tucked it under his arm. "Because you are the last. And the gate… it responds to power. To prophecy. And to blood."
I stood, ignoring the shaking in my knees. "Then we find it. The gate. And we close it, for good."
Kael stepped forward. "Not without knowing what we're walking into."
"We don't have time for perfect plans," I snapped. "The Eastern Clans are gone. There are more hybrids out there, maybe twisted or worse, awakened by the Hydra. If we wait, we'll lose everything."
His jaw tightened. "I just don't want to lose you."
I looked at him, truly looked. "You already did once. You want to keep me? Then stand beside me. Not behind. Not in front. Besides."
A long pause.
Then, softly: "Always."
We burned the messenger's body in silence.
Not out of disrespect. But because whatever killed him, it lingered.
In his blood, In the air, In me.
That night, I didn't sleep.
I stood at the balcony of the old watchtower, my hand pressed to my back where the sigil still glowed faintly. The stars above blinked like the eyes of waiting gods, and I knew.
The war hadn't come because I was weak. It came because I was born strong enough to face it. After all, somewhere in the dark... the Hydra was watching, and soon, it would move.