The fire burned green.
Not from gasoline.
Not from chemicals.
But from the body.
They laid the man on a pyre of scrap metal and dry wood, his hands bound, his mouth sealed with ash. He didn't scream. Not once. Even as the flames took his boots, then his legs, then his chest.
He only stared at Kael — his commander, his brother-in-arms — and whispered, just loud enough for the circle to hear:
"You're already one of them."
Then the fire swallowed his voice.
I watched from the edge of the ridge, hidden behind a curtain of ivy that hadn't been there a week ago.
The Fire Clan had gathered in their compound — a repurposed warehouse on the city's eastern rim, surrounded by scorched earth and rusted barricades.
No banners. No speeches.
Just silence, broken only by the crackle of unnatural flame.
Kael stood at the center, face unreadable, hands clasped behind his back.
No flinching.
No hesitation.
But I saw it — the way his jaw tightened when the man's fingers curled in the fire.
The way his eyes flickered toward the woods, where the first wild vines had begun to climb the perimeter fence.
They called it justice.
I knew it was fear.
And fear, when dressed as law, is the most dangerous fire of all.
An hour later, I found him alone.
Not in the command room.
Not by the fire.
But in the supply shed — a dim, forgotten corner of the compound, where old fuel canisters and medical kits gathered dust.
He was cleaning his knife.
Not a weapon.
A ritual.
"You saw," he said, without looking up.
"I felt it," I said.
"The network recoiled.
Not from the fire.
From the intent."
He paused.
Then set the cloth aside.
"His name was Dain.
He served with me since the System came.
Saved my life twice."
He looked up.
"He poisoned a sapling in the west tunnel.
The one that fed water to three families.
Killed it in minutes.
Said it was a 'biohazard.'"_
"And the fire?"
"Our law.
Fire for fire.
Life for life."
A bitter smile.
"We don't get to choose our rituals.
We inherit them."
I didn't flinch.
"You didn't have to burn him alive."
"No," he said.
"I could've shot him.
Or buried him.
But the others needed to see."
He met my eyes.
"They need to believe I'm still one of them.
That I haven't… changed."_
Silence.
Outside, wind stirred the vines on the fence.
One slithered forward, touched the shed's metal wall — then withdrew, as if sensing sorrow.
"He wasn't the first," I said.
"Others have tried to kill the green.
You didn't burn them."
"No," he said.
"But he left a message.
Scratched into the bark before he poured the acid:
*'Purify the rot.'"_
He exhaled.
"He wasn't acting alone.
Hollow's reached inside my clan."_
That changed everything.
Not just that one man was corrupted.
But that the idea had taken root.
Like a seed in sterile soil — somehow, it had grown.
"You're not just fighting him," I said.
"You're fighting what he represents.
The belief that life can be too wild to deserve living."_
Kael laughed — short, hollow.
"And you?
What do you represent?"_
I didn't answer at first.
Because I didn't know.
Not savior.
Not queen.
Not even guardian.
Just someone the land had chosen to remember.
"I represent the thing you burn," I said.
"And the thing you can't kill."_
He looked at me — not with anger.
Not with awe.
But with something worse:
Recognition.
"Then why are you here?"
"Because you're still human," I said.
"And the garden hasn't given up on you."_
He turned back to the knife.
"Go.
Before someone sees you."
Then, quieter:
"And don't come back.
Not like this.
They'll kill you on sight."_
I left.
But not before the ivy at the door curled once — not toward me, but toward him — and released a single drop of dew onto the threshold.
Like a blessing.
Like a warning.
That night, the network dreamed.
Not of roots.
Not of trees.
But of flame.
Not fire that destroys.
But fire that protects.
A hearth in winter.
A torch in the dark.
A spark that refuses to die.
And for the first time, I wondered:
Maybe the world wasn't just earth and leaf.
Maybe it was ash and ember, too.
And maybe — just maybe —
Kael wasn't the enemy.
Just another root,
growing in poisoned soil,
trying to reach the light.