Kira's POV
I can't breathe in here.
The guest quarters are beautiful—carved volcanic stone, glowing lava veins providing soft light, hammocks woven from fire-resistant silk. But beautiful doesn't mean safe. Guards stand outside our door. More guards patrol the corridors beyond.
We're prisoners pretending to be guests.
"This was a mistake." Mom's voice cuts through the darkness. She and Dad think we're all asleep, but I hear every whispered word. "We should never have come here, Jake."
"Where else could we go?" Dad sounds exhausted. Defeated. "Every clan turned us away. The Sky People hunt us everywhere. At least here—"
"Here our daughter nearly burned to death! Here she's promised to some boy who worships fire instead of Eywa! Here we're one wrong move from execution!"
Their words sting because they're true. I've put my family in danger. Again.
"We leave before dawn," Mom says firmly. "I won't watch another child die."
My chest tightens. They're planning to run. To abandon the test, abandon any chance of sanctuary, abandon—
Abandon Vaelor.
The thought stops me cold. Why does leaving him hurt so much? I barely know him. He's engaged to someone else. He's from a people who hate everything I believe in.
But when I close my eyes, I see his golden gaze. Feel his arms catching me before I fell. Hear his voice defying his father to protect me.
Some things are worth dying for.
Is he one of them?
"Kira?" Tuk's small voice makes me jump. "You're awake."
I turn to find my little sister watching me in the dim light. "Can't sleep."
"Me neither." She crawls into my hammock, fitting against my side like she used to when she was tiny. "Are we going to die here?"
"No," I lie. "We'll be okay."
"Promise?"
I can't promise that. Can't promise anything anymore. So instead, I hold her tight and whisper, "I love you, Tuk. No matter what happens."
She falls asleep eventually, but I stay awake, staring at the ceiling carved from volcanic rock. The heat is suffocating. The air tastes like sulfur and ash. And Eywa's whispers won't stop:
Go to the flame. Speak to the forsaken. Bridge the gap. NOW.
The urgency in that last word makes my skin prickle.
Carefully, I slip out of the hammock without waking Tuk. Lo'ak and Spider sleep in the corner. Mom and Dad have finally stopped arguing and drifted off.
I move toward the door, testing the shadows. The guards outside are talking in low voices, distracted. I've always been good at hiding—Neteyam used to joke that I was half shadow.
The memory of my brother makes my chest ache, but I push it down. Focus on now. On surviving.
I wait until both guards turn away, then slip past them like smoke. Down the corridor, pressing against walls, moving through patches of darkness between lava veins. My heart hammers so loud I'm sure someone will hear it.
But no one stops me.
The mountain is a maze of tunnels, but I don't need a map. Something pulls me forward—that rope-around-my-heart feeling that's been growing stronger since we arrived. Leading me deeper. Deeper.
Toward the flame.
The sacred caldera opens before me suddenly. And there it is—the Eternal Flame, burning in its massive basin like a pillar connecting earth to sky. Even from here, I feel its heat. Its power. Its ancient, angry loneliness.
"You shouldn't be here."
I spin around, heart leaping into my throat.
Vaelor stands in the shadows at the tunnel entrance, arms crossed, golden eyes reflecting firelight. He's not wearing his prince armor—just simple clothes that somehow make him look more dangerous, not less.
"How did you—"
"Know you'd come?" His mouth quirks in something that's almost a smile. "I felt you. The moment you left your quarters, I knew."
Our connection. The invisible thread between us that shouldn't exist.
"Are you going to stop me?" I ask.
He studies me for a long moment. Then shakes his head and walks forward, joining me at the caldera's edge.
"No. Because I came here for the same reason. To think. To figure out..." He trails off, staring into the flames.
"Figure out what?"
"Why I can't stop thinking about a forest girl who's going to get herself killed tomorrow." His voice roughens. "Why I defied my father for someone I've known less than two days. Why looking at you feels like—"
"Coming home and burning alive at the same time?" I finish softly.
His eyes snap to mine. "You feel it too."
It's not a question. He knows.
"I don't understand it," I admit. "This pull between us. Like we're connected somehow. Like we've known each other before."
"We haven't." He turns back to the flame. "But you're right about the connection. I can feel your emotions sometimes. Your fear. Your determination. Your..." He stops, jaw clenching.
"My what?"
He doesn't answer. Instead, he says quietly, "Tell me about your brother. Neteyam."
The question catches me off guard. "Why?"
"Because you carry his death like I carry my mother's. I want to understand."
So I tell him. About Neteyam's bravery. His protectiveness. How he always put everyone else first. How he died saving our family from Sky People, bleeding out in my arms while I begged Eywa to save him.
"I saw it coming," I whisper. "Two weeks before. Eywa showed me visions of blood and ash and my brother dying. But I couldn't understand them clearly enough. Couldn't save him."
"That's not your fault."
"Isn't it? I'm supposed to be Eywa's chosen. Special. Blessed. But I couldn't save the one person who always saved me." Tears burn my eyes. "What good is faith if it can't protect who you love?"
Vaelor is quiet for a long moment. Then: "My mother and sister died when I was twelve. Sky People raid triggered a lava flow. Mom grabbed Rya—my baby sister—and tried to shield her with her own body. I watched them both burn. Screaming. Begging me to help."
His voice breaks. "I was twelve years old and completely powerless. I've spent every day since making sure I'm never that weak again. Building walls. Trusting nothing. Believing in nothing."
"Until now?" I ask softly.
He looks at me, and the raw vulnerability in his eyes steals my breath.
"Until you. You make me want to tear down every wall I've built. Want to believe in impossible things. Want to—" He stops himself.
"Want to what?"
Instead of answering, he reaches out slowly and touches my face. His palm is warm—not burning hot like I expected, but gentle. Safe.
"Tomorrow, when you try to make crops grow in dead soil, Sylara will sabotage you. I know her. She'll make sure you fail."
"I know."
"Then don't go. Run. Take your family and leave before dawn. I'll create a distraction—"
"No." I cover his hand with mine. "I have to try. Your people need healing. They need to see that Eywa never abandoned them. Even if I fail, even if I die trying, maybe it will plant a seed of hope."
"I don't want hope. I want you alive."
The confession hangs between us, raw and desperate.
"Why?" I whisper. "Why do you care what happens to me?"
His other hand comes up to frame my face. We're so close I can feel his breath. See the gold in his eyes swirling like real lava.
"Because when I look at you, I see everything I thought I'd lost. Faith. Hope. The possibility that something good can grow even in ash." His voice drops to barely a whisper. "You make me want to believe again. And that terrifies me more than any flame."
My heart pounds so hard it hurts. "Vaelor—"
"Don't." His thumbs brush across my cheeks. "Don't say anything. Just... let me have this moment before tomorrow. Before you either succeed and my people accept you, or fail and I watch you burn."
We stand frozen, balanced on the edge of something that could save us or destroy us both.
Then footsteps echo in the tunnel behind us.
We spring apart just as Sylara emerges from the shadows.
Her beautiful face twists with rage when she sees us—me and Vaelor standing too close, his hands still warm from touching my face.
"How sweet," she hisses. "The prince and his forest pet. Having a secret meeting at the sacred flame."
"Sylara—" Vaelor starts.
"Don't." Her voice cracks like a whip. "Don't explain. Don't make excuses. I see exactly what's happening here."
She stalks forward, and I see something in her hand. A small vial filled with dark liquid.
"You think you'll succeed tomorrow?" Sylara smiles viciously. "You think you'll make pretty flowers grow and win everyone's hearts? Think again, forest girl."
She unstops the vial and splashes the liquid onto the ground around the caldera. Where it touches stone, the rock sizzles and blackens.
"What is that?" Vaelor demands.
"Death root poison. Concentrated. I've just contaminated the soil for miles around the outer villages." Her eyes gleam with triumph. "Nothing will grow there for months. No matter how hard you try. No matter how much your precious Eywa helps you. You. Will. Fail."
Horror floods through me. "You're condemning your own people to starvation—"
"I'm protecting them from false hope! From a goddess who abandoned us! From a forest witch who's bewitched our prince!" Sylara's voice rises to a scream. "Tomorrow you'll fail. Tomorrow you'll burn. And tomorrow, Vaelor will finally remember who he's promised to marry!"
She throws the empty vial at my feet and storms past us into the tunnels.
Silence falls, broken only by the roar of the Eternal Flame.
I stare at the blackened stone where the poison touched. Tomorrow's test. My only chance to prove myself. To save my family. To help Vaelor's people.
Destroyed before it even began.
"She's going to kill me," I whisper.
Vaelor's hands clench into fists. "No. She's not. Because I won't let her."
He turns to me with fire in his eyes—not the cold, controlled prince anymore, but something fierce and protective and absolutely terrifying.
"Tomorrow, when you go to those villages, you won't go alone. You'll have me. And anyone who tries to hurt you will have to go through the Crown Prince of the Ash People first."
"But Sylara—"
"Can burn in her own poison." His jaw sets. "I'm done choosing duty over what's right. Done choosing fear over faith. You asked why I care what happens to you?"
He steps close again, so close I can see my reflection in his golden eyes.
"Because you're not just Eywa's seed. You're the first person who's ever made me feel human instead of made of stone. And I will protect you. Even if it costs me everything."
Before I can respond, alarms start blaring throughout the citadel.
Vaelor's head snaps up. "That's the invasion warning."
"Invasion?"
His face goes pale. "Sky People. They've found us."