Chapter 31 Lia
LIA
Afew hours earlier
They say the fire is sacred. That it blesses the soul before it’s claimed—but that’s a lie.
This isn’t some sacred rite of passage. It’s not about faith or honor or even love. It’s about control. Erasure.
No one walks the fire unless they’re an outsider with something the Society wants. Not just anyone is allowed to be made whole again.
You have to be useful. Dangerous. Pregnant with prophecy, maybe. You have to be a problem they can’t kill outright. Like me.
This ritual was never meant for people like me. I wasn’t born for their bloodlines, their legacy. I wasn’t bred for power or raised for obedience. But I carry something they want. So now, they make an exception.
They give you the illusion of choice. That’s all it is—illusion. Walk or die. Bleed or vanish. Become his—or become nothing.
And the worst part?
They want me to be grateful for it. They want me to believe this is salvation. That love justifies the pain. That by choosing Marco, I’m securing a future for myself and the child.
But this isn’t about love. It never was.
This is about surviving their world without being swallowed whole by it. The truth is simpler. The fire is a punishment. For daring, for trying to fit in where I don’t belong.
And I walk into this room knowing exactly that.
The doors groan shut behind me. Thick stone slams into place like a tomb sealing over its dead.
Maybe that’s what I am—a dead girl walking.
The room is darker than I expected. And hot. Very hot. My skin is already prickling from the heat, my white dress clinging to my back. Everything smells like incense, sweat, and blood.
But the ground feels cold beneath my bare feet, which tremble slightly as I walk. However, the closer I get to the coal path in the center of the room, the hotter the ground feels.
I keep my face expressionless and my body stiff as I am positioned at the beginning of the track. The hot embers illuminate my face, and the last thing I want is for them to see me broken.
Smoke coils in the air, carried on by the chant that starts the moment I stand at the start line of my journey.
I let my eyes linger on the trail that awaits me, at the coals burning in a clean, cruel line up the center of the temple floor. They glow in a deep, pulsing red, like open wounds.
At the end of that path stands Marco. His hands are hanging limp at his sides, and his eyes are red-rimmed and wide. He looks like he’s been crying, and I wonder why. You’d think he’s the person who has to prove to a room full of strangers that he deserves to marry me.
Maybe he knows the kind of pain I’m about to go through. Maybe he’s heartbroken on my behalf. Maybe his empathy should make me feel some sort of support, but I’m too numb to feel anything.
Especially because I remember what he whispered to me moments before this.
I remember the way his voice trembled when he pulled me behind that pillar and how he begged me to choose him.
He told me I could fake it, that I could pretend what we had was real and true. Just walk the path, say the words, and we’d survive it together. He said he’d carry the burden for both of us. That he’d protect me, no matter what it cost him.
And for a second, I almost believed him. But then I saw it, that flicker of something in his eyes. Not strength. Not resolve but fear.
And not fear for me, but fear of losing control.
Fear that I might choose something else. Someone else.
Fear that I’d walk into the fire and come out changed, remade into something he couldn’t claim anymore.
That’s when I knew. He wasn’t asking me to survive. He was asking me to surrender. But I’d already made my choice.
The guards shove me gently into place before the first coal. I don’t flinch. My wrists sting where the ropes are tying my hands like I’m a prisoner, but I can’t dwell on that because the worst pain is still ahead.
I lift my chin, and for the first time, I look around me.
I see the Elders now, all six of them, seated like gods on their raised thrones. Their golden masks catch the firelight, making their faces shimmer like demons, which is exactly what they are.
Only demons would gather to watch someone suffer in the name of tradition.
Several other people surround the room. They are all dressed in black cloaks and have blank expressions on their faces.
I know Francesco is somewhere in the room. I feel it. I don’t know where he’s standing, but I feel him like a ghost somewhere behind me, just beyond the edge of my vision.
Something squeezes in my chest, but I ignore it.
If he’s here, then I want him to watch. I want him to see what they’ve made me become and what they won’t.
The chants rise, Latin syllables echoing off the walls and sinking into my bones. The air is so hot now that I can barely breathe.
A man in black steps forward and cuts the bindings from my wrists, and I feel a beat drop in my chest.
This is it.
The first coal sears my skin like acid. I hear the hiss of burning skin before I feel it, and then the scorching heat roars up my leg like lightning.
I clamp my teeth down on my tongue to hold my scream. A metallic taste explodes in my mouth. My body jerks, and my hands tremble at my sides. But I stay upright.
The second step carves me open.
A jagged edge somewhere in the coals tears into the arch of my foot like a blade. Warm blood rushes down and sizzles on the stone, and the smell hits me immediately.
Flesh. Blood. Smoke.
By the third step, I’m not sure I can keep going. My lungs are screaming, and my legs are shaking. My vision blurs at the edges as tears gather in my eyes. I ball my hands into fists, digging my nails into my palms.
I’m almost halfway. I can do this.
I refuse to stop. For them, this is a ceremony, but for me, it’s a message.
It’s me telling them who owns me—and showing I’m strong enough to bear the weight of that choice.
I keep walking.
The world narrows to the excruciating pain traveling through every corner, crevice, and nerve center of my body. The sound of my own heartbeat pounds in my ears, hammering louder than the chants that surround me.
By the time I reach the middle of the path, my feet are torn and blistered. My knees almost buckle, but I catch myself just in time.
Something pulls me away from the pain, only momentarily.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see movement in the small crowd. Someone shifts closer past one of the columns. No one is supposed to move until the rite is over, but there’s only one person who would do that.
Francesco.
I know it’s him. Even now, I feel his stare like a brand on my skin. I don’t look at him. I can’t. If I do, I’ll fall apart.
The next step almost kills me.
It takes every ounce of strength I have to lift my foot and place it on the next coal. My body is screaming at me to stop, to give up and beg for my life, or to say a big ‘fuck you’ to everyone here and surrender to death.
But my heart perseveres. I’m not just walking on this path for myself. I’m doing it for my father, for my unborn child, and for every outsider who has never had a voice in this place.
The next few steps are the hardest. At some point, I notice even Marco has taken a step forward. My blurred vision can’t make out the expression on his face.
When I finally make it to the end, my knees give out immediately.
The impact sends a sharp pain up my legs. My palms hit the coal. Heat bites at my skin from all sides, and I feel the stone burning through my dress. The chanting stops. Gasps and murmurs erupt in the room, and panic rises in my chest.
They are about to watch me burn to death.
My body seems to have taken control over my willpower.
I want to scream as my body starts falling to the side, but before I collapse on the hot coals, Marco is at my side before anyone can stop him.
He catches me before I fall fully onto my side, his arms wrapping around me tightly.
His hold is firm, but his body is trembling.
He holds me like he already knows I’m slipping away and doesn’t know how to stop it.
With the last ounce of strength I can muster, I straighten my spine and lift my head to stare directly into his eyes. The murmurs around me get louder. I was supposed to bow in completion of the final step.
I keep my spine straight and my chin high. My wounded hands curl into fists as a tear runs down my cheek.
“Don’t do it,” Marco whispers in a broken voice, pressing his forehead against mine. “Don’t condemn yourself to death.”
Tears fall from his lashes and splash onto my cheek.
“You would rather die than be mine?” he whispers again.
I don’t answer right away. I can’t. The words claw at my throat, but I’m choking on ash and pain and a thousand invisible chains, but then I feel it. A kick. A flutter, deep inside my belly—my child, alive inside this hell on earth.
No.
I inhale shakily. My lips tremble, but the words come anyway.
“I would rather die free,” I speak for the first time today.
The stares burning into my back feel hotter than the coals, but I don’t care.
Let them watch.
Let them see what defiance looks like.
Gritting my teeth, I rip my arm free from Marco’s grip and lift my chin toward the Elders on their elevated thrones. My voice is steady—sharp enough to cut through the firelight.
“I refuse this match. The child I bear is Francesco’s. Not his.”
Gasps ripple through the chamber, sharp and collective, like the air itself has been struck.
A sharp crack follows as one of the Elders slams his hand against the table. Silence falls, heavy and absolute.
The Elders lean forward, golden masks glinting in the firelight. The one crowned highest rises, the flames spilling over his robes until he appears ablaze.
“Marco Romano,” his voice booms, echoing through the temple walls, “the girl has spoken. Is it true… or do you still claim her child as your own?”
Everything is silent except for the crackle of coals and the ragged rasp of my breath.