Prologue
I was born with my heart aflame.
My whole life I assumed it would only be a matter of time before that fire consumed me, and I knew with complete certainty that I would have let it.
I wasn’t like my brother, after all. His Flame brought him only warmth and light, our earthwitch mother’s gentle nature cooling his blood and keeping the fire at bay.
I, on the other hand, was my father’s daughter, a firewitch through and through.
My Flame had always burned bright; it was a fuel for my joy, and my rage, and my pride.
I let it become a living thing, a wildfire wreathed around my heart.
And I loved it.
This entity within my chest lit me up from the inside, and the more I stoked it, the more I fed it my hopes and dreams for kindling, the higher it raged.
But there came a time when it burned too bright.
When I was young and naive, and believed that I owed it to us both to leave Stormsby behind me.
After so many years hidden beneath the grey skies of my childhood home, I thought we’d earned the space to blaze unfettered. Thought it was what we wanted.
Yet here I stood, alone in the place where I’d once known such love.
I always thought my Flame might consume me — I never dreamed I’d let it fade.