Chapter 14: Some Gifts Come with Fire
The sun never fully rose that morning.
The sky stayed gray—too heavy. Too full.
Like it already knew what was coming.
They were halfway to the apartment when it happened.
⸻
Selene led the way.
Blade ready.
Steps sharp.
Aria followed with the bags—barely breathing, eyes flicking to every window, every shadowed alley.
Then came the sound.
A dragging.
A scrape.
A scream.
They didn't run this time.
They didn't have time.
Three of them—fast, wrong, hungry—rushed from the building beside them.
Aria dropped everything.
One lunged.
She lifted her hand—
And her storage opened.
But not gently.
⸻
The street rippled.
Time bent.
Everything nearby was pulled inward—grocery bags, gravel, even the rusted bench behind her vanished into a white-gold burst, like a singularity cracking open in her palm.
The creature froze mid-leap—
Then disappeared.
So did the ground beneath her.
⸻
She collapsed.
Blood poured from her nose.
Eyes wide. Blank.
"Aria!" Selene caught her—just barely—before she hit the pavement.
Her skin was too hot.
Burning.
Her breath, shallow.
Selene pressed a hand to her chest—
Her pulse thundered with raw power. Uncontained. Expanding.
This wasn't just storage anymore.
This was the beginning of something else.
⸻
"She's evolving too fast," Selene whispered.
But it made sense.
The Aria she remembered had been powerful enough to reshape the world—
And fragile enough to be undone by it.
Selene gritted her teeth and lifted her.
Aria was taller than she looked—all long limbs and unbearable heat—
But Selene didn't falter.
Not this time.
Not again.
⸻
They moved fast.
Past overturned cars.
Burning buildings.
People screaming for help—
Selene kept walking.
Because she wasn't carrying a girl.
She was carrying the key to everything.
⸻
At the apartment, Selene kicked the door open and laid Aria down on the mattress they'd dragged into the center of the room.
She was still burning.
Her hand kept twitching—light curled from her fingertips, storage space flaring and folding in on itself, growing with every flicker.
Selene wiped the blood from her lips.
Sat beside her.
And waited.
⸻
"You did that," Selene whispered, brushing a strand of hair behind Aria's ear. "You did that all by yourself."
Then softer—
A breath more than a voice:
"Please don't leave me again."