Chapter 17 #2
The fear didn’t pass, but she stepped closer to the pedestals anyway, drawn to the nearest egg cradled in talons of rose-hued stone. Cinderax’s unblinking gaze followed her, a furnace banked within his eyes.
“Do you care which I begin with?” Serenna asked softly.
He tilted his head toward one egg, then another, before prowling close, the sweep of his tail whispering across the rugs.
“No,” he said at last, coiling beside her ankles. “And you aren’t choosing one to die,” he added, as if hearing the hesitation behind her words. “You’re choosing one to free.”
Serenna exhaled slowly and reached for the egg, the cool crystal meeting her palm. She caught Kaedryn’s gaze, and the druid leader inclined her head, stepping to her side. That nearness steadied her, a silent promise that someone would stop her if the sunfire raged wild.
Serenna drew on the flame in her chest, scales rippling across her skin to shield herself. Closing her eyes, she let every doubt fall away and fixed her focus on the shell resting under her hand.
Delving through her Starshard, Serenna plunged into her Well and hauled illumination upward with a shudder that rattled her ribs. The gem ignited against her collarbone, beating in tandem with her heart, pulse for pulse.
Power swelled behind her sternum, pressure mounting, impatient to break. She shaped it, guiding the torrent instead of yielding to it. Essence raced down her arm, crowning her fingertips in a burst of blinding brilliance.
The egg drank in the stream of light. Illumination bent around the crystal in a living halo, refracting in narrow bands of silver and white until the shell lay wrapped in a radiant shroud.
But it wasn’t sunfire yet.
Serenna reached deeper, recalling Vesryn’s fingers twined with hers—his steadiness, his control. This time, she eased the floodgates open herself, coaxing rather than unleashing the storm.
Magic still surged, roaring through her gem. Stars flecked her vision as the flare built faster than her body could channel. Her lungs locked, straining to contain the nova blazing through her like a sun.
The air vibrated with power. Her spine arched as warmth licked beneath her skin. Every nerve shrieked alive, threatening to incinerate her from within.
Serenna staggered, knees buckling before she caught herself. Sunfire tore through her veins as if it already knew the way, no longer asking permission to burn.
For a single, devastating heartbeat she feared it was true—that she’d released the dam and lost the right to steer what raged through.
Essence spiraled out of balance as the line blurred between controlling the sunfire and becoming it.
Heat clawed up her throat, her vision tunneling to a starlit void.
Gritting her teeth, Serenna refused to let panic sweep her away.
She anchored herself to the fragile shape sealed beneath her palm.
Her breath rasped, sweat slipping down her spine as she reached for stillness.
The sunfire narrowed, its flow aligning to her direction while Essence coursed through the faceted channels.
Fine as spun thread, a crack whispered through the crystal. Another fissure branched deeper, sunfire bleeding toward the obsidian core. The glow wavered, perilously bright. Too bright. Panic jolted through her that she’d pushed too far, that the sunfire would turn the egg to ash.
Serenna tore her hand back an instant before the crystal ruptured. It shattered like a dying star. Light flared outward. Fragments scattered across the rugs, glinting like shards of a rising dawn.
And there, cradled in the heart of the pedestal, an obsidian shell steamed.
Whole.
Serenna’s breath caught, a tremor shuddering through her. A stunned laugh escaped—disbelief tangled with relief, a sliver of wonder unfurling that the egg hadn’t cracked open.
Her hands still trembled as she released Essence, the light fading. She turned to Kaedryn and Cinderax, seeking confirmation that the hatchling inside was truly unharmed.
A rush of air brushed her calves as Cinderax flapped his wings and rose, hovering above the pedestal. Fire streamed from his maw, coiling in a measured arc around the egg, a benediction wrought in heat and flame.
“The ember is strong,” he said, pride roughening the rumble in his words.
Heart still racing, Serenna stood buoyed by the belief the dragon would endure.
Cinderax settled beside her again, his warmth radiating close. Serenna turned to the next egg. She drew a breath and reached back into her Well, Essence answering in a rush.
She moved from pedestal to pedestal, each step a quiet reckoning as she shattered the crystalline shells.
Through the Starshard, sunfire spilled from her palm in woven strands, ribbons spun like moons and stars.
Gone was the reckless torrent that had nearly torn her apart.
This was different—no longer a flood to survive, but a stream she could guide.
One by one, the casings gave way. Each time, the air seemed to hold its breath with her.
Yet beneath the awe, fear still lingered—silver-tongued whispers of collapse and crowns, of stars and surrender. Of ascension.
The voices pressed close, but Serenna anchored herself before they could take hold. Each time, she steadied her magic and slowed the current, turning her focus back to the fragile life curled beneath her palm.
By the time she reached the final egg, her limbs shook. The last of her sunfire flickered at her fingertips, her Well thinned to a dwindling pool. The Starshard no longer blazed at her throat but pulsed faintly, its reservoir as spent as she was.
Still, Serenna lifted her hand. One final filament of Essence answered, unspooling as her palm met the shell. Sunfire seeped into the crystal casing. For a heartbeat, the magic wove through the facets as it had before.
Then a fracture lanced across the surface.
Too deep. Too fast.
Light burst outward. Serenna yanked her hand back, the Starshard flaring once before it went dark.
The crystal shattered, fragments scattering across the rugs. Her pulse slammed through her ribs, each beat a warning.
As the glow dimmed and the sunfire faded, a new crack split through the egg itself. Jagged and snaking toward the base, it crawled deeper through the shell.
Another crack snapped through the air, brittle as bone breaking. Serenna flinched as if she’d been struck. Silence fell, heavy as ash, crushing what hope remained.
She hadn’t freed this hatchling. She’d destroyed its only protection.