The next morning, Lena woke him before the sun had a chance to warm the mouth of the cave. She knelt by the banked embers, face half-shadowed, and nudged him awake with a gentle prod to the shoulder.
"Lesson one," she said, voice barely above a whisper. "No time for slow starts."
Kai rubbed the sleep from his eyes, nerves jangling. He wasn't sure if he was more afraid of failing her, or of what success might look like.
Lena beckoned him to sit, cross-legged, just inside the circle she'd drawn the night before. She placed a tiny bowl in the center, filled with nothing but a scrap of dry moss and the thinnest shaving of birch bark.
"Try to light it," she said. "But don't use a sparkstone. And don't force it."
He stared at the bowl, then back at her. "I don't know any spells."
"That's not how your magic works. Forget everything you think you know."
He gave a doubtful glance, but tried anyway. He pictured a flame, just like he'd seen Maya conjure on winter nights to start the stove. He strained, tightening every muscle, willing the dry moss to catch.
Nothing happened.
Lena shook her head, amused. "You're thinking like a Knight. They treat magic like a weapon, something to be commanded and spent. Yours isn't a sword. It's a river. The more you grip it, the more it slips away."
Kai exhaled, frustration rising. "So what do I do?"
She leaned forward, close enough that he could smell the smoke in her hair. "You want warmth, yes? Don't demand it. Invite it." Her eyes met his, intense and unblinking. "Think about what warmth means to you. Not the feeling, but the memory."
He tried. At first, nothing came. Then, slow and reluctant, he remembered Maya's kitchen, the heat from the oven and the taste of fresh bread. He remembered his father's hand on his shoulder, steady and sure even after a long day in the fields. He remembered the blanket, scratchy but safe, wrapped around him when he was small and sick and afraid.
Kai closed his eyes and let the memories run through him. He didn't try to shape them, or direct them, just let them build and crest inside his chest. The ache of it was sudden and raw, but underneath, there was a current of something deeper—an energy that hummed with every beat of his heart.
He opened his eyes.
The bowl in front of him glowed, faint, then brighter, the moss catching with a tiny golden spark. The flame held for couple of seconds, small but perfect.
He stared, hands shaking.
Lena smiled, a real one this time, her face alive with pride. "That's it. Not brute force. Not recitation. Just… allowing."
It was the smallest of victories, but it felt like a miracle.
Lena let him savor it. "That's your real power, Kai. Not what you can break, but what you can make."
He grinned, wild with relief. "Can we do more?"
She laughed, light and easy. "Always. But first, let the fire teach you. Every day, a little brighter."
They sat together, watching the flame until the last of the bark turned to ash.
Kai felt like he belonged to the world, not just as a mistake or a cautionary tale, but as something new.
He looked at Lena, at the faint scars on her hands and the quicksilver in her eyes, and knew she would never steer him wrong. Even if the path was dangerous.
He was ready.
Whatever waited beyond the mouth of the cave, he would meet it head-on.
Tomorrow, they would begin again. And again, until the world learned to make room for them both.
They trained in secret, dawn to dusk and sometimes beyond, Lena driving him with a mixture of fierce encouragement and relentless honesty. Every lesson was harder than the last. Sometimes he failed outright; sometimes he succeeded only to lose control at the last instant, turning potential into chaos. But Lena never flinched, even when a heatless blue flame crackled in his hand and made the air taste of storms.
For three days, Kai struggled to light a candle without flint or steel, the wick stubbornly refusing to catch. He tried everything—focus, brute force, pleading with the universe. Each time, the result was the same: nothing.
On the fourth morning, exhausted and angry, he let his frustration boil over. "I'm never going to get it," he muttered, slamming his fist against the cave wall.
Lena only smiled, serene as ever. "You already have, you just won't see it."
He shot her a look of disbelief, but she gestured for him to sit. "Remember what I said. It's not about command. It's about release."
He took a breath, tried to steady his shaking hands, and thought of warmth—of Maya's laughter in the kitchen, of his father's quiet pride, of the feeling he had when Lena told him he wasn't a mistake. He let the feelings build, let them overflow.
And then, he simply let go.
A single, perfect flame bloomed at his fingertip. It hovered, delicate as a moth's wing, then expanded until it hovered above his palm, bright enough to cast shadows on the cave walls. He noticed, with a flicker of curiosity, that this flame gave no warmth—it was pure light, a manifestation of will rather than elemental heat. He filed the thought away for later.
Kai stared, mouth open. For the first time, there was no sense of effort, no pain or fear. Just… relief. Vindication.
He laughed, then choked on the sound, and tears came—uncontrolled, but not ugly. They rolled down his cheeks, hot and unfamiliar, and he let them.
Lena watched him with a look that was equal parts pride and warning. "That's it," she said quietly. "You found your way."
He cradled the flame, letting it play over his fingers, mesmerized.
Lena sobered, her tone more serious. "This is who you are, Kai. But there's no going back. The Knights' path is closed to you now, forever."
He looked up, unafraid. "I know."
She knelt beside him, closer than she'd ever been, and held his hand steady. "You could change everything, if you survive. If you want to."
He wiped his nose, grinning like a fool. "I do."
Lena squeezed his hand, then let go. "Then we begin for real."
He nodded, feeling the weight of the future settle on his shoulders, but also the warmth of possibility.
They trained every day, in hidden hollows and forgotten ruins, always moving, always learning. The world outside their cave grew more dangerous—rumors of shadow-things and the Church's new "investigations" drifted even into the woods. But for once, Kai wasn't afraid. Not for himself, and not for the girl who taught him to hope again.
Late one night, after the world had gone still, Kai sat alone by the coals and watched the flame dance above his palm. He thought of all the ways a life could go wrong, and how sometimes, if you were very lucky, someone would find you in the dark and teach you how to burn brighter instead.
He made a promise, then, to himself and to the flame: whatever he became, he'd do it on his own terms, not the Church's or the Knights' or anyone else's.
When Lena found him, she didn't speak. She just sat beside him, and together they watched the fire.
Tomorrow would bring more lessons, more danger, and maybe more pain.
But tonight, they had each other and the fire.