Chapter 4 Ashes Don't Lie

Kiera stared at her name, seared in gold across parchment that had no right to know her.

It wasn't a mistake. The script was glowing - pulsing - with the same rhythm she'd felt when she first took the oath.

"How is this possible?" she whispered.

Caelen watched her closely. "Because your oath wasn't made when you thought it was. You didn't choose it. It chose you."

"That doesn't make sense. We swear with blood. We bind the mark ourselves."

He shook his head. "Only after it's already taken root."

Kiera backed away from the scroll. The heat beneath her skin returned - not from power, but panic.

"What are you saying?" she demanded. "That I was marked before I ever took the vow?"

"I'm saying you were bound before you were even told the truth."

He rolled the scroll up and tucked it away, like it was nothing more than kindling. "The Order doesn't train warriors. It breeds weapons. Controlled by fire and fear."

Her hands clenched. "No. That's not what the Order is."

"Then why are you running from them?" he snapped.

Silence.

Ash drifted down from the ruined sky like snow. In the wind, the bones of old oaths whispered through broken stone.

Caelen's voice softened. "You felt it, didn't you? When the fire judged you. It wasn't justice. It was punishment. For asking questions."

She didn't answer. She couldn't.

He stepped closer, slowly. "I was like you once. Loyal. Blind. Until I found this place. Until I realized the oaths were never about protection. They were about control."

She met his gaze, her voice barely a breath. "Then why help me?"

"Because you're the first one since me who didn't die when the flame turned red."

Kiera's breath caught.

"You survived Oathfire, Kiera," Caelen said, voice low and certain. "No one does that."

Her heart pounded. "What does it mean?"

He studied her - not with pity, but with caution.

"It means something inside you is older than the oath. And it scares them."