Beneath the fading echoes of battle, all that remained was stillness. The lagoon shimmered in restless ripples, reflecting fragments of the moonlit sky above. It bore no memory of the chaos Phoenix had felt moments before, no trace of the Stalker's towering form or the darkness that had tried to swallow her whole. But the weight of it lingered, less tangible, yet no less real.
Phoenix sat in the shallows, wolf-shift paws partially submerged, and stared into the crystalline waters. Her reflection stared back—a gleaming mirror of molten silver and icy light. Her breath trembled as tendrils of unfamiliar calm wrapped around her. The fight was over, the creature vanquished, yet it wasn't victory she tasted. Not yet.
"Phoenix." Drax's gentle call broke through, his heavy footsteps splashing forward. The knight's armored figure appeared beside her, a battered yet stalwart presence. His broad-shouldered shadow loomed over her like a wall, yet the concern breaking through his voice was sharp, clear. "I thought you—" He stopped when he caught her gaze. "You're … glowing brighter."
Phoenix blinked, dazed, as if pulled from a dream she hadn't fully awoken from. "Am I?" Her voice was softer than she expected.
He knelt beside her, his armor scraping faintly as he dipped his fingers into the lagoon's icy surface. "Lillian, what just happened? You went under, and—" He gestured to the faint shimmer left hovering in the air around her, silver dust catching on the edges of his words. "Whatever that was, I've never seen it before."
Phoenix looked back down at the water and let the moment stretch between them. What had happened? She wasn't sure she could answer—not entirely. She remembered falling into the lagoon, feeling the shadows grasp at her like familiar claws. She remembered that whispered laughter, the way it slithered between her wounds, reopening old scars as easily as if they'd never healed.
Her throat thickened. For so long, she'd carried the scars like an anchor, shackling her to the person she had been. The quiet girl, the small one, the target. It had weighed her down, filling her lungs with the voices of those who had towered over her: classmates who had made their joy from twisting hers into something hollow. They'd left their mark in whispers and wounds she thought the flames of Phoenix could erase. But it wasn't fire that had burned away the lingering shame tonight. Fire would have been too loud, too destructive.
"It wasn't fire," Phoenix murmured aloud, her ears twitching faintly.
Drax frowned slightly. "What?"
Phoenix didn't answer immediately. Instead, she waded a bit farther into the shallows. The rippling reflections greeted her the same way as before, but this time—there were no faces staring back. No shadows clinging. Only her. Only Phoenix. The sight filled the hollows in her chest with something like relief, cool and calm yet unbreakable. Soft, but sturdy.
"Fire wasn't what I needed back there," she said finally, her voice surer now, as if speaking made the truth settle more firmly. "It wasn't heat or anger or raw force. It was something colder. Sharper." Her gaze flicked to Drax, who watched her warily, confusion battling concern in his eyes.
"And your light?" he ventured carefully, but no less resolutely. "That frost—it wasn't just your own power. It came from something else, didn't it?"
Phoenix nodded, the faintest fragment of a smile tugging at her lips. "It did."
As the memory drifted back, she could almost hear it again: that voice, softer than breath but carrying the weight of stars, threading between her and the past like a silken tether. Seek the light, it had said. And it wasn't light meant to outshine… but to endure.
Lillian couldn't have endured. But Phoenix—Phoenix could.
"Someone once told me shadows bow to light, Drax," she whispered, letting her voice barely graze the lagoon's edge. "But I think… they were wrong about one thing."
Drax stepped closer, his head tilting faintly in question. "Oh?"
"Not all light burns the same way," she said, and then, almost to herself, "Sometimes frost can burn, too. And shadows bow to that, just as surely as they do heat."
The silence that followed was profound, thick with quiet understanding. Drax nodded slowly, though she wasn't certain he fully grasped what she had meant—or needed him to. He didn't press further, just clapped a gloved hand against her shoulder and squeezed gently. "Well," he said at last, his tone softer now, "Whatever you've tapped into, it saved us all tonight. For what it's worth…" He tipped his head, smiling faintly. "I think it suits you."
Phoenix glanced down at the faint glow still etching along her paws, the edges of her fur caught between frost and moonlight. Yes, it suited her.
With a steadying breath, she looked back to the path ahead. Her reflection flickered one last time in the water, not a girl shackled by the past, but something else entirely.
A quiet certainty flickered through her: she would not burn herself to ashes to prove her strength anymore. She would endure. And for the first time, it truly felt enough.