Princess of Fire (The Light-Bringer Trilogy, #2)

One

Winters in the north were always brutal, and they always came early.

Calista Pyro told herself that as she and Matias Gomez made their way through the snow. 

Two days prior, they had crossed the border into Krigere. The snows from the north had crossed into the northern edge of the Verzengend desert—but not much. If they listened closely, the winds howling in the mountains of the Vardand Fjöll sounded eerily similar to a man's wails. 

Cal's teeth chattered, the iron on her biting into her skin. She couldn't warm herself or Matias with her magic because of the iron on her. She looked down at the frost on her gauntlets. 

Out, her magic whispered. Now.

Cal shook her head. No. Not yet.

Now! her magic screamed, thrashing against the leash she held on it—pressing into her muscles and bones.

No! Cal said to it.

She found it easier to keep her mouth shut in the two months following their escape from Valon. Found it easier to wrangle the light and fire in silence. The light was patient and easy-going—just like Baldur. The fire was another story. It was impatient, arrogant, and hard to tame—unpredictable, like Adramelech himself. Some nights, she would scream and howl in agony as her magic and iron burned her. Other nights, sleep was her only reprieve from her magic's calls.

"Let's stop here for the night," said Matias as they stopped at the northern edge of a clearing.

They dismounted, tying the reins to low-hanging tree branches. Matias's feet crunched in the snow as he approached.

"I'm going to go hunting, okay?" he said. "Do you want to look for kindling?"

Cal turned her head to face him. She was glad that she had the mask on.

The cut James had dealt Matias was healed over, but not properly. The scar was jagged and pink, the left corner of his mouth was pulled into a constant smirk.

His hair had grown out and started curling over the tops of his ears. His skin was tanned from the Verzengend desert.

Lover. He was her lover. He had gotten them both out of Valon.

She nodded her head, not trusting her voice. Matias smiled sadly, grabbing the bows and arrows they'd bought in Urbs Flumen, and stalked into the Aspen forest.

Cal wandered around the edges of the clearing, gripping other low-hanging branches and breaking them off. Once her arms were overflowing with wood, Cal stumbled through the snow back to their horses. She dumped the wood into a pile and cleared snow away until she saw dead grass and frozen leaves. She built the wood up, took a flint and steel out of the saddle bags, and struck them together. Once. Twice. 

An ember caught, slowly blooming into a flame. She put more wood on the fire and hugged her knees to her chest. 

Had she not been stuck in the iron, they wouldn't need wood for a fire. They would be able to travel at night. 

Alas, that wasn't the case. Calista Pyro was trapped in iron, left to go mad from the constant burning of her magic.

But there was another option. The option of turning back, of getting the Wii Ron removed by the witch who trapped and tortured her in it. The price for ending her suffering? Bowing down to the Queen of Darkness and letting Melania Andhera force her to inflict suffering upon innocent civilians.

Out of the question! Yielding to Melania was not an option. 

She heard snow crunching as Matias stomped back with dinner. Cal turned her head to glance at Matias, the mask limiting her vision. His bow was sling over his shoulder, an arctic hare in each hand. 

He flopped down across the fire from Cal. He took out a dagger and started the process of skimming them. 

They sat in silence, the popping and cracking of the fire dance and play, watched Matias as he skewered the meat on the two remaining sticks. Matias rotated the sticks in the fire, careful to not burn or undercook them.

Matias took them out of the fire and reached around it, laying on his side in the snow with the skewer outstretched to her. Cal reached out and grabbed it. She poked the steaming, rough-cut meat with her iron-covered fingertip.

Slowly, Calista tore a scrap of meat from a cube and fed it through the thin slit. She burned the roof of her mouth, but it felt better than the biting cold metal. The meat was bland. It was better than being dead.

Cal ate half of the meat before giving up. She handed the rest to Matias. 

Out, the fire purred. Out. 

She laid back in the snow, as close to the fire as she dared. She watched the flames dance and let the crackling of embers lull her into sleep.