C41 The Trial of Flame

The blaze roared around her. Evelyne didn’t flinch. She stepped into the wall of fire, the obsidian blade clenched in her hand. The flames did not devour her. They folded inward, curling like vines around her limbs, searing not flesh—but doubt.

Pain lanced through her mind, not her body. Visions. Lucien, dying in her arms beneath a blood-soaked sky. Viktor crowned in silver