Chapter 20
Delia
The Healer’s Pavilion, The Ember Vein Mining Camp
I pause just outside the tent.
Not because I’m scared, exactly.
Okay, a little because I’m scared.
But mostly because this matters.
Thorne slows with me instead of tugging me along, which is already Surprise #432 in the “Apparently This Demon Lord Has Layers” file.
The wind tugs at the edge of my ember-colored cloak, warm and dry, carrying the ever-present scents of the Broken Plains—smoke, molten stone, and something that is just him.
Spicy, rich, succulent.
Like burning embers, ash, and caramel.
I didn’t notice it at first.
Now I can’t not smell it.
On my clothes. On my skin. In my hair.
His scent.
Mine, now.
His fingers tighten around my hand like he’s seconds away from turning back and throwing the entire tour out the window just to haul me somewhere private and kiss me stupid.
Honestly? I wouldn’t complain.
But the fact that he’s here at all—taking time away from reinspecting a magical mine that literally keeps the multiverse running—just to show me the Healer’s Pavilion?
Yeah, that does things to me.
“This is really important, right?” I murmur, eyes still on the tent flap. “The Ember Vein. The wards. The SoulTaker threat. All that end-of-the-world stuff you keep underplaying like it’s no big deal.”
“It is important,” he admits, voice low behind me. “But so are you, Shula.”
My heart gives an embarrassing little stutter.
This has to be the honeymoon phase, right? That short window where everything is intense and shiny and you pretend you don’t have flaws and you both smell good all the time?
But God, I hope it lasts.
The earlier scene with Grier flashes through my mind—Thorne’s growl, the way the poor guy nearly tripped over his own feet when Thorne decided he didn’t like him talking to me.
The way my Demon Lord practically radiated touch her and die energy over what was basically a tourist-level question about the camp.
He’s jealous.
Jealous. Of. Me.
And I like it.
“So, you think I’ll do okay in there,” I say, more to distract myself than anything. “I don’t want to mess up anything.”
He huffs a quiet noise.
“Shula, you are in no danger. The wards will not allow anything to harm a single strand on your head. Nothing will touch you unless I allow it.”
“Of course,” I mutter. “Control issues. Got it.”
He moves closer, and I feel him before I see him: a wall of heat at my back, steady and overwhelming in a way that should scare me more than it does.
His free hand comes up, callused fingers brushing my knuckles.
Then he lifts my hand, slow and deliberate, and presses a kiss to my fingers.
My lungs forget how to function for a second.
“We go in together,” he says, gaze locked on mine, ember bright. “You ask what you wish. Learn what you wish. No one here will deny you answers.”
I arch a brow.
“Because I’m your viyella?”
His expression softens, just at the edges.
“Because you are you. And also because I will incinerate them if they do.”
The laugh bursts out of me, a little breathless.
“God, why are you so cute?”
He recoils like I slapped him with a wet towel.
“Cute? Puppies are cute. I am the Lord of Fire.”
“Oh, excuse me,” I say, grinning now. “Why are you so terrifyingly adorable?”
He bares his teeth—definitely not a smile, absolutely working on me anyway. The flames on the braziers flanking the entrance flare as if they agree with me.
“For you, Shula,” he murmurs, voice gone rough, “I will always be a little bit monstrous.”
And the ridiculous thing is that makes me feel safer than anything else ever has.
One of Grier’s honor guard steps forward and pulls the tent flaps aside.
A rush of cooler, herb-laced air spills out, brushing over my overheated skin.
I squeeze Thorne’s hand once—not because I need reassurance, but as a silent thank you.
We step inside together.
Whatever I expected from a mine’s infirmary, it’s not this.
The first thing I notice is how clean it is.
Not hospital-clean in the Earth sense—no sharp bite of bleach or antiseptic—but something softer and somehow more thorough.
The air feels filtered.
Like every speck of ash and dust from the Broken Plains stops dead the second it tries to sneak past the wards.
White stone floors shimmer faintly with alchemical sigils.
The walls are lined with shelves of glass vials, clay jars, and neatly labeled bundles of dried plants tied with silver thread.
Low cots with crisp linen sheets sit in perfect rows, each with a small standing brazier nearby burning a gentle, steady flame.
It’s calmer than any ER I’ve ever stepped into.
No screaming. No frantic crashing of gurneys. Just a hum of quiet readiness.
“Whoa,” I breathe. “This is… I mean—this puts a lot of Earth hospitals to shame. Do you have, like, a magical HEPA system in here?”
“The wards here separate ash and corruption from clean air,” a warm voice answers. “You are quite perceptive, Lady.”
I turn.
The healer walking toward us is an older woman, hair braided back in a thick silver rope, dark gray skin marked with faint glowing sigils that trace the backs of her hands and climb up her forearms like living ink.
Her eyes are sharp, intelligent, and kind.
There’s a strength to her that I recognize instantly.
She looks like the kind of woman who’s held dying people and refused to let them go.
“Welcome, my Lord and Lady,” she says, bowing slightly to Thorne, then to me. “I am the healer on duty this morning. My name is Evonne Withers.”
“Evonne,” I repeat, smiling. “I’m Delia. And, uh, this is incredible.”
“If anyone is incredible, it is you,” she says. “Word travels quickly in camp. The Lord of Fire does not often bring visitors here.”
Heat spikes in my cheeks.
Thorne’s hand settles low at the small of my back, possessive and proud. “Greetings, Healer Withers, my viyella is familiar with the healing arts of Earth and wishes to learn Nightfall’s ways,” he says. “Show her what you can—tools, salves, methods. Anything she asks, you answer.”
Evonne’s eyes crinkle with what might actually be delight. “With pleasure, my Lord. Lady Delia, I imagine our medicine is more like alchemy, in your world’s terms? Did I say that correctly?”
“You did,” I say, grinning. “And yeah, that tracks. Herbs, potions, weird glowy runes—I’ve seen enough fantasy movies to know a magically infused bandage when I see one.”
Thorne makes a low sound in his chest that I think is amusement. It curls through me like warm smoke.
I should be intimidated.
I should be overwhelmed.
Instead, standing here with Thorne’s heat at my back, Evonne’s steady gaze in front of me, and the soft roar of distant forges thrumming through the ground, I feel something I haven’t in a long time.
Like I belong.
On Earth, I had a job. An apartment. A routine.
But maybe? Maybe here I have a purpose.
A realm at war.
A mine that keeps dreams alive.
A rough, terrifying Demon Lord who looks at me like I’m the one holding him together.
Thorne surprises me at every turn—with his jealousy, his gentleness, his willingness to take time from world-saving to walk me through a healer’s pavilion just because I asked.
Yeah. This might be the honeymoon phase.
But as I step further into the infirmary, fingers still laced with his, ready to ask a thousand questions and learn an entirely new way of healing, one thought burns bright and clear in my mind.
I think I just found my place.
Let it last.
Let him last.
Because I’m in this now.
And for the first time in a long time, I’m ready to see where the fire leads.