Chapter 4 Nythir
Nythir
How to care for a skyborn catastrophe: ignore all the red flags.
Nythir crouched beside the unconscious girl who had just been knocked out by a book—Proper Etiquette for Improper Thoughts.
He burst into startled laughter that echoed through the trees.
It cracked through the forest so sharply that a flock of dusk-feathered finches shot from the canopy.
His companions stared at him as if he had finally lost whatever remained of his sanity, and maybe he had.
Most people would be terrified of a mage capable of obliterating a camp with a single emotional impulse.
But he felt… curious. Intrigued. Alive in a way he hadn’t in years.
She had fallen from the sky straight into his life. This wasn’t a sign from fate; it was a gut punch.
She smelled faintly of embers and roses, with a surprising hint of cinnamon, likely from the pastry mashed into her hair. Her dress was scorched, her cloak half-burned, and the phoenix sigil still pulsed with a faint gold, as if refusing to acknowledge that its wearer was unconscious.
A catastrophe, wrapped in silk and cinnamon.
He brushed a lock of soot-stained hair from her face.
He knew power like that didn’t come from training; it came from heritage.
Or destiny.
He wasn’t sure which was worse.
“She’s either royalty,” he said, “or an explosion disguised as a woman.”
Lyssara groaned. “Are we sure she isn’t cursed?”
Vorrik poked Esther’s cheek and shrugged. “If she’s cursed, it’s a fun curse. Can we keep her?”
Lyssara scowled. “She’s wearing royal silk, idiot. We can’t just keep her.”
“Not just royal silk,” Nythir added, pointing to the unmistakable symbol of a phoenix in flight embroidered on her cloak. “Royal silk with the imperial insignia.”
The orange stitching stood out like a beacon, ready to attract every thief and scoundrel in sight.
She was lucky she’d landed on him and not the bandits.
There was no way she would have survived on her own, even in the safest city in the world, yet she had dropped straight into the middle of a deadly forest where bandits were hiding.
Vorrik gasped. “She’s a symbol?”
“She’s a problem,” Lyssara muttered.
“She’s interesting,” Nythir said.
That was enough for him.
He heard a soft rustle behind him and turned to find a small forest creature, barely bigger than a squirrel, peering out from a burnt shrub.
Its body was smoke-gray, its eyes pale gold, mirroring the glow pulsing beneath the girl’s skin.
A dusk-fawn, half-magic, half-mammal, drawn only to intense arcane signatures.
It approached cautiously, sniffing the air.
Nythir lifted a hand. “Easy.”
The creature stepped closer, not to him, but toward Esther, as if her magic were a hearth in an endless winter.
It touched its small nose to the hem of her cloak, then gave a tiny, chiming bleat.
Vorrik clapped. “It likes her!”
Vorrik tried to pet the dusk-fawn. It bit him hard, tearing his skin with jagged teeth before scampering back into the brush.
Lyssara hissed, “That thing never comes near humans. What kind of magic is she carrying?”
Nythir didn’t answer.
Because he already knew.
Dangerous magic.
Lonely magic.
Magic that would one day demand a price.
And stars help him, he wanted to be there when the bill came due.
“Can you two at least help me search the bodies—well, body parts—I guess, for proof of job completion while we figure out what to do with the girl?” Lyssara grumbled, tossing a scorched leg to the side.
The Adventurer’s Guild wasn’t a single organization; it was dozens of independent groups operating under the same code.
Most took odd jobs: escort missions, monster culling, courier work.
Nythir’s trio specialized in dismantling bandit rings and recovering stolen goods, mostly because Lyssara liked punching thieves and Vorrik liked lifting heavy things.
Proof of completion varied: guild rings, insignia fragments, enchanted seals. Burning bandits to ash complicated matters significantly.
“She looks like trouble,” Nythir said, smiling down at the unconscious woman. She looked so helpless. Dainty.
His instincts told him to protect her, and he had learned a long time ago to always follow his instincts.
“Good,” Vorrik said. “You love trouble.”
“You could say I’m passionate about it,” Nythir said, smirking. “It’s how I ended up with you two.”
Lyssara rolled her eyes. “Wonderful. He’s imprinted.”
“Like a duck,” Vorrik added.
Nythir raised an eyebrow. “A very dangerous, very flammable duck.”
“Which of you is the duck?” Lyssara demanded.
“Unclear,” Nythir said. “Check back later.”
The forest clearing crackled with residual magic. Burnt earth glowed faintly, and the trees, scorched and bowing inward, still hummed with the aftershock of her uncontrolled power. Every guild he had ever worked for would kill to get their hands on someone like her.
Or kill her out of fear.
He felt neither impulse.
Something in her magic tugged at him like an unspoken promise, or a warning.
He wasn’t sure he cared which.
“Found something!” Vorrik shouted, holding up a severed finger with a ring. “Proof!”
Lyssara tripped over a torso, Vorrik caught her, they flirted horribly, and Nythir gagged into his sleeve.
He lifted the girl into his arms, adjusting her carefully so her head rested against his shoulder. She weighed almost nothing.
But her fate, whatever it was, felt heavy enough to crack a kingdom.
He had met runaways before. Many. Some fled debts. Others, enemies. A few, fates they were too afraid to face.
But this girl wasn’t running from anything.
Her magic felt like she had been running toward something, and had landed horribly off-target.
“So, we’re keeping her?” Vorrik asked again as they began to walk.
Lyssara muttered about liability and paperwork, but even she stole a glance at Esther with interest.
They passed the still-smoking ruins of the bandit camp. The bodies were little more than silhouettes etched into the soil. Magic had done that. Her magic.
The dusk-fawn followed for a few steps, then turned and darted back into the trees, leaving a tiny trail of gold sparks behind it.
Nythir exhaled through his nose, slow and steady.
He knew danger.
He knew power.
He knew the sharp edge of fate when it brushed against his skin.
He looked down at the unconscious woman in his arms.
And he knew, with absolute clarity, that nothing in his life would ever be gray again.
“Welcome to the mess,” he murmured. “Let’s see what color you paint it.”
Nythir adjusted his hold on the unconscious girl as they headed back toward camp.
A faint curl of smoke still trailed from her dress, and the pastry crumb in her hair stubbornly refused to fall out.
Her magic twitched against him now and then, like a sleeping cat swatting at dreams, reminding him she was capable of blowing up a small village before breakfast.
He should have been terrified.
Instead, he felt… energized. Curious. Irrationally protective.
Behind them, the clearing still glowed like a recently offended volcano.
Ahead, Vorrik was already trying to brainstorm what to feed her when she woke.
Nythir exhaled a slow laugh.
“Stars above,” he muttered, “I really did adopt a disaster, didn’t I?”
But he didn’t put her down.
Not even for a moment.