The Ash Realm crumbled behind them.
Lucien held Lena tightly as they emerged through the portal — into a world changed.
The sky was no longer soft blue.
It burned with streaks of crimson and violet, as if sunset had become permanent.
Birds no longer sang.
The wind whispered warnings.
And the earth... shivered.
Lucien's strength faltered the moment they crossed back.
His knees buckled.
Lena caught him.
Her touch was warm. Too warm.
He looked up, chest heaving, and met her eyes.
No longer brown.
But golden.
Alive with flame.
Still… her.
"I'm fine," she whispered, lying.
Lucien nodded, lying too.
But both knew: they had left something behind in that realm.
And brought something else back.
They returned to the temple sanctuary at dusk.
Aria was waiting.
But when she saw Lena… she didn't bow.
She didn't speak.
She simply stepped back — a fraction of a step.
But enough.
Lena noticed.
Lucien did too.
"I'm still me," Lena said, her voice quiet.
Aria's eyes narrowed.
"I'm not sure that matters anymore."
The Council convened that night.
The gods, the demi-gods, the old immortals who hadn't spoken in centuries.
They all felt it — like a storm pressing against their temples.
The Ember was no longer dormant.
And its vessel was mortal.
"She will become the Fire Queen," said one voice.
"She already is," whispered another.
"She must be destroyed."
Lucien stood among them, jaw clenched.
"If you lay a hand on her—"
"She is a threat."
"She is a child."
"She is a catastrophe waiting to happen."
Lucien's wings flared, his voice thundered.
"She's mine."
The chamber shook.
The gods fell silent.
But their silence wasn't fear.
It was strategy.
Because if Lucien stood with her...
They would need to destroy them both.
In the days that followed, whispers spread.
Lena's presence wilted flowers, cracked stone, melted snow.
The people began to look at her with awe... and dread.
Children no longer ran to greet her.
Animals fled.
Even the stars seemed dimmer when she walked beneath them.
Still, Lucien never left her side.
Not when her skin burned too hot to touch.
Not when her eyes flickered in her sleep.
Not even when she muttered ancient names in her dreams.
He stayed.
But she noticed it too:
The way he watched her now.
As if waiting for something to go wrong.
As if preparing to stop her — if it came to that.
One night, Lena stood before the sacred lake.
The water refused to reflect her.
She wasn't surprised.
"I don't know who I am anymore," she whispered to the darkness.
A voice responded — not Lucien's.
But a new one.
Female.
Ancient.
Inside her head.
"You are rebirth. You are ending. You are the fire that devours and remakes."
"You are Queen. Start acting like it."
Lena's knees weakened.
She gasped.
Then —
A figure emerged from the lake.
A woman, wrapped in ash and flame, eyes like the sun.
Her voice echoed like thunder wrapped in silk.
"I am what you will become."
Lena shook her head. "No. I won't destroy."
The woman stepped closer.
"You already have."
Elsewhere, Lucien searched the scrolls of the High Library.
Ancient texts spoke of the Ember.
But there was something buried deeper.
A prophecy.
A forgotten one.
"When fire marries godhood, the stars will fall."
"And the Fire Queen shall rise — not to rule, but to remake."
His fingers trembled.
Because he knew.
They weren't just in love.
They were the prophecy.
Lena returned to the sanctuary the next morning.
Her steps were heavier.
The flame beneath her skin no longer whispered.
It screamed.
She looked at Lucien and tried to smile.
He kissed her forehead, gently.
"Stay with me," he said.
She didn't answer.
But she didn't pull away.
And for now, that was enough.
That night, a crack tore through the sky.
A god fell.
From the heavens, burned in half.
The earth trembled.
The stars wept.
And every divine being felt the message etched in that fire:
She is coming.