To Flame a Wild Flower

A child with no memory hides beneath a bed in Castle Noir, teeth chattering, her screams trapped in a throat that makes no sound.

A child with no memory hides beneath a bed in Castle Noir, teeth chattering, her screams trapped in a throat that makes no sound. A man named Baze arrives, drags her into the light, and wraps her in arms she claws and bites. His hands radiate warmth that thaws the ice crystallizing in her veins. He tells her small seeds grow into big, strong things—but they need sunlight and warmth to set their roots. She doesn't know the name they keep calling her: Orlaith. She knows only the cold, the whispers, and the black hole in her chest that swallows everything. Baze promises he'll be there for her. Always.

After stabbing Rhordyn, Orlaith seals her grief in crystal

Orlaith rocks beside a waterfall, Rhordyn's blood cracking on her skin. She watched him fall with a talon through his chest—a weapon Cainon taught her to wield against the man she's only now realizing she loved. She slashes crystal blooms from her own shoulder, trying to wake from a nightmare that won't dissolve. When she nearly steps off the cliff's edge, a krah's cry breaks the moment: two sprites plummet from the canopy, and Irilak swarm toward the helpless prey. Orlaith screams at the shadow creatures to stop—and they obey, cowering from a darkness splitting through her skin. She rescues the sprites, then begins forging crystal domes inside her chest, sealing every emotion beneath lustrous shells. A technique for surviving what she's done. A technique she'll need for everything coming.

Over clotted cream and tangles, a tyrant plots his throne

While Orlaith stumbles through Parith, Cainon—High Master of Bahari—prepares vanilla-folded cream for his monthly tea with Heira, the High Septum who leads the Shulák religious order. He brushes her golden hair while she reports progress hunting Shadow's Hand, the Aeshlian prophesied to end the world. Cainon confides his true aim: once he becomes Orlaith's consort, Heira gains access to Ocruth's vast resources. But he also confesses something that unsettles even her—he wants to keep Orlaith personally, regardless of the trial's outcome. He'll accept a public whipping instead of a burning if she fails. Heira warns that big feelings can wound, stabbing you while you sleep. Cainon already knows. The scar above his heart proves it—a mark his own mother put there.

A pickaxe and a drawing reveal the love she murdered At Graves Inn, where Rhordyn's smuggled soldiers drink in disguise, Cindra—his Warrior General—forces Orlaith to eat chowder and hands her a key to his room. Inside, his scent punches through her defenses. Under the bed, placed exactly…