The wheatfield was black now.

No golden sea. No harvest. Just stalks like broken needles and smoke curling from the soil. Charcoal veins etched through the earth in jagged spirals. Cinders whispered where the farmhouse had been.

Ethan Campbell limped barefoot between the stumps.

He had no shoes. No sense of direction. Just blood down his neck and a whisper in his ear that hadn't stopped since the fire.

Not the first fire.

The second one.

Maybe the third. It was hard to count.

His shirt was torn, sticky with old sweat and fresh wounds. His left shoulder hung at the wrong angle, and the skin there blistered around something moving under it. A pulse. Like a second heartbeat. Like a seed trying to bloom.

He didn't notice. Or he didn't care.

He was humming.

"Hush now, April. Don't cry."

The words barely left his lips before dissolving into laughter. It came out too sharp. Too wet. Like it had been carved from the inside of his lungs with a spoon.

He stepped on a thorn. Didn't flinch. Just stared down as the blood smeared into the ash.

"She liked flowers."

But not as much as fire.

He remembered the first time – the trash bin behind the school. Just paper and matches. But it had danced. It had loved him. And he had watched it consume everything with such grace.

"Everything's more honest in fire."

Max had tried to call it an accident. But Ethan had known better. Max had always been afraid of it – of what it could really do. That's why Max didn't deserve it. Not the heat. Not the burn. Not her.

The wind moaned across the empty paddocks. No animals. No fences left. The world had been cooked. And somewhere in the wreckage, Ethan saw a silhouette.

Max.

Max standing in the fire, backlit by orange glow, holding April's hand.

Ethan's hands twitched at his sides. The hallucination flickered.

"Mine," he muttered.

He looked down. His palm was burned, crusted with dried black and red, flesh torn from the knuckles. A memory surfaced – just long enough to sting.

Kimaris had tied him to the rafters. Hooked into his ribs like fishline. The demon had whispered things with no language, just colour and hunger.

"Make it stop."

He'd begged. And Kimaris had smiled.

He kept walking.

A scarecrow half-burned in the field watched him from a distance. The wind turned, and for a moment Ethan was sure it whispered Max's voice.

"You don't belong here."

He stumbled and dropped to one knee.

The dirt beneath his hands was hot. Not from the sun. From something else. It pulsed faintly, as if the soil remembered the fire.

He pressed his fingers deeper. Ash stained his fingertips. It felt good.

He whispered, voice raw:

"You never really die in fire. You just change."

Then he whispered another name.

"Liz..."

And he smiled.

Not the smile of a man who had healed. The smile of a man who had burned himself to the edge of death… and fell in love with the flame.

…………………

The ditch was shallow and dry, cracked like an old scar across the earth.

Rusting wire and shattered fencing marked the border between ruin and memory.

Ethan lay inside it, curled into himself like a fetus. A child made of ash.

His breath rattled in his throat, his skin raw with sunburn and fever. His hand trembled as it traced the groove of his ribs.

One of them jutted out too far. A leftover from the training.

"The beautiful things break first," Kimaris had said.

"They're the easiest to repurpose."

That voice hadn't left.

Even now, buried under wind and silence, it pulsed behind Ethan's thoughts like a heartbeat in his teeth.

He clutched his arm. His nails dug into the scarred skin – searching for the thing embedded there.

Not memory. Not infection.

A tooth.

Kimaris's, he thought.

Planted like a seed under the skin.

It pulsed when he touched it. Like it was happy.

He remembered the first session.

Not the pain – that was ordinary. Ethan had known pain. Childhood fractures. Burned fingers. Broken nose in a school fight.

No – what stayed with him was the moment Kimaris asked for help.

Not demanded. Asked.

Politely.

"Would you hold him down?" "You have steady hands." "I'm told you used to help in hospitals. You saved lives once, yes?"

And Ethan had said yes.

That's what broke him.

Not the screaming. Not the carving. Not the eyes.

It was how easy it had been to agree.

He hadn't been forced. Not at first.

He just wanted it to stop.

And Kimaris knew.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Ethan rolled onto his side and looked at the bones in the dirt. Cattle, maybe. Maybe people. It didn't matter anymore.

He whispered, "I was a good man."

No one argued.

He used to donate blood. He used to volunteer for youth outreach. He remembered coaching Liz's T-ball team once, back when April was still alive. Back when Max still came to dinner. Before the fire.

But even then—

Even then—

He'd felt it.

That little hunger. That satisfaction when someone cried and it was his words that caused it. That flicker of pleasure when he won an argument by making someone feel small.

"Maybe I was always waiting for permission."

He blinked, and his hand was bleeding. He didn't know when he'd started clawing again. The tooth under his skin pulsed faster.

"You didn't make me do it," he whispered to the wind.

"You just… opened the door."

He saw her again in his mind—April. Not when she died. Not in the fire.

But on the night before her wedding.

The way she laughed. The way her hand brushed his arm. The moment she asked if he was okay, and he thought maybe – just maybe – there was still a chance.

And then came Max.

The golden boy.

The flame thief.

The one who never deserved her.

The one who didn't even see it – how she looked at him. How she tried. How she hesitated that one night—

Ethan clutched his skull. His fingers dug into his scalp like claws.

"I loved you. You were supposed to be mine."

The whispers were louder now.

Not Kimaris. Something else. Something deeper. Lower in the food chain. Older. They didn't come in words, exactly – just heat behind the eyes. Like someone lighting a match inside his thoughts.

And Liz.

Sweet Liz. Beautiful Liz.

April's daughter. Max's daughter.

But also – his legacy. His redemption.

She looked so much like her now. The same quiet depth in her eyes. The same way she tilted her head when she was listening. The same stubbornness.

"I'm not wrong," he said, to no one.

"She's part of you. She's what we were meant to be. It's not wrong if you came back to me through her. You sent her to me, didn't you?"

The silence didn't argue.

The tooth in his arm pulsed again.

And from the trees, something began to watch.

Something barefoot.

Something small.

Something very, very wrong.

…………………

The shack leaned sideways like a dying thing.

Its tin roof had buckled in the heat. The wood slats were brittle, sun-bleached, and scarred with long, clawed streaks – like something had tried to climb out, not in. One window remained. Boarded. The rest were gaping sockets.

Ethan stepped through the doorway without hesitation.

Inside, it smelled of iron and mould. Dried blood. Burned plastic. A mattress was curled into itself in the corner, blackened and clawed open like a moulting cocoon. In the centre of the room stood a mirror.

Cracked.

But standing.

Ethan saw himself in it – and paused.

His chest rose and fell. His face… wasn't right.

For a moment, it wasn't his face at all.

It was Max's.

His hair. His jawline. His eyes. Calm. Measured. Infuriating.

Ethan's hands clenched at his sides.

The reflection didn't move.

Not quite.

It watched.

"You took her from me."

His voice was barely a breath.

"You never even knew what she gave you. What she meant. You just walked through life like it was owed to you."

The reflection blinked.

So did he.

Then it smiled.

Not Max's smile. Not Ethan's.

Something else.

Too wide. Too slow. Like it was learning what a smile was supposed to look like.

Ethan lunged.

His fist hit the glass. It didn't shatter – not fully. Cracks spidered out from the centre like veins across a bone. Blood smeared the silver surface. His knuckles split again.

He screamed.

But it wasn't his voice that came out.

It was Max's.

Low. Controlled. Kind. "You've always been like this, Ethan."

Ethan staggered back, gasping.

The voice echoed again – this time from behind him.

"You blame the flame, but you lit the match."

He spun.

The room was empty.

Just shadows.

He turned back to the mirror.

Now it showed April.

Standing in a hospital hallway. Hair tucked behind one ear. Smiling. Reaching for him.

Then she burned.

Right there in the mirror – flames blooming across her face like petals. Her skin blackened. Her lips melted. Her eyes never stopped looking at him.

Ethan didn't scream. He just watched. Then something inside him cracked sideways.

He laughed…

He sank to his knees in front of the glass.

Pressed his forehead to it. His blood smeared down the surface.

"I'm not a monster," he whispered.

"I just did what had to be done."

The flames in the mirror grew higher.

His reflection was now wrapped in fire, not consumed by it but reborn.

A man-shaped shadow, haloed in smoke, stood tall in the centre of the blaze.

Not Max. Not him.

Something else.

It held out a hand.

The mirror rippled. Not like glass. Like water.

Ethan didn't move.

But somewhere, far behind the shack, the wind stopped again.

And something stepped into the world.

…………………

The sky turned the colour of bruised meat.

Not night. Not dusk. Just a wrongness smeared across the horizon like something had bled through the clouds.

Ethan stepped out of the shack with blood on his hands and glass in his feet. He didn't remember breaking the window, but his toes were leaking red across the wheat stubble.

He didn't feel it.

The world was quiet.

Too quiet.

No insects. No birds. No wind.

Even the smoke seemed to hang midair, coiling around his shoulders like a shroud. He looked up and saw the sky twitch.

Like it was watching him.

Then— Footsteps.

Not loud. Not heavy.

Barefoot.

The sound of skin on dirt.

He turned toward the noise.

And saw a boy.

Thirteen, maybe. Maybe less.

Thin. Pale. Black hair hung damp over his forehead in uneven tufts. His feet were covered in ash. No shoes. No wounds. Just long, bare limbs that moved too slowly. Too deliberately.

The boy didn't blink.

He walked with the weight of an army.

Ethan stared. His voice caught.

The boy stopped ten feet away.

Said nothing.

Ethan's mouth moved. "Are you lost?"

The boy tilted his head – just a little. Like a crow.

Then he smiled.

No teeth.

Just a quiet curl of the lips that suggested he already owned everything he wanted.

Ethan took a step back.

The boy followed.

"I don't know you," Ethan whispered.

Still no answer.

But the boy looked down – at Ethan's bloody feet. Then at the ground behind him.

Where no footsteps followed.

Ethan realized he hadn't heard the boy approach.

Not from behind. Not from the trees. He hadn't come from anywhere.

He had just... been.

The boy finally spoke.

"You've been walking in circles."

His voice was soft. Flat. Unaged.

"You think you've been wandering for days. It's only been nineteen minutes."

Ethan's breath caught in his throat.

"I—what are you?"

The boy didn't answer.

Instead, he reached down and plucked something from the dirt.

A single tooth.

Human. Yellow. Still warm.

He held it out in his palm, not offering it – just letting Ethan see it.

Ethan's mouth went dry. His body wanted to run. His mind couldn't remember how.

The boy stepped closer.

"They always want to blame the demons."

Another step.

"But demons don't create monsters."

Another.

"We just invite them home."

He reached Ethan, finally. Looked up at him with flat, black eyes—no whites, no pupils, just depth.

Not emptiness.

Weight.

"You've already been chosen once," he said.

"By Kimaris. A petty thing. A scribbler. He peeled you open and found rot."

The boy smiled again. Still no teeth.

"But rot can be useful."

Ethan tried to move.

Couldn't.

The boy raised a hand.

Not threatening. Not magical.

Just a gesture.

But every tree on the horizon bowed slightly – like the land itself had breathed in.

"Do you want to matter?" the boy asked.

Ethan swallowed.

"I—what—who are you?"

The boy didn't answer.

Instead, he walked past Ethan, bare feet brushing ash and glass without sound.

Stopped behind him.

Whispered into the back of his neck.

"You love the flame. That's your secret."

Ethan shuddered.

"You say it was guilt. Or grief. Or compulsion. But no. You lit the fire because you wanted to see what she looked like burning."

Ethan closed his eyes.

The boy circled again. Came to face him.

"Do you want power?" he asked.

Softly. Like a prayer.

"Do you want revenge?"

Ethan trembled.

"Do you want fire?"

The sky cracked above them.

Not thunder.

A sound like something breaking free.

The boy stepped forward. Reached out. His fingers left trails of ember in the air. Not light. Not heat. Just the memory of combustion.

"Say yes."

…………………

The boy stood with his hand outstretched.

Ash swirled around them, caught in a circle of stillness. Nothing moved. Not the trees. Not the clouds. Even the flies had vanished.

Only the sky responded—

Flickering.

Splintering.

Something ancient stirred behind the clouds.

Ethan looked at the boy's fingers – trailing glowing filaments of smoke and red ember, like the last breath of a dying star.

He didn't understand. But he felt it.

"Say yes," the boy whispered again.

Not command. Not temptation.

Inevitability.

Ethan took a step forward.

Then another.

His bare foot pressed into ash, and it curled around him like petals.

He reached out, bloodied fingers shaking—

And touched the boy's palm.

The world inhaled.

Silence ruptured.

From the treeline, birds exploded into flight. The wind roared back in reverse. The sky peeled open.

Not physically. Not visibly. But in some deep, soul-felt way.

Ethan screamed as something entered him – not a presence, but a permission. A key turned in a lock that had always been inside his chest.

Fire erupted beneath his skin.

Not flame.

Not heat.

Meaning.

His veins lit up like molten scripture. His scars split wide and hissed with steam. The tooth buried in his shoulder blackened, cracked, and fell away – replaced by something older.

Something that remembered the shape of sacrifice.

The boy smiled.

And changed.

His frame didn't grow. His skin didn't warp. There was no grand explosion of wings or horns.

But suddenly—

He was not a boy anymore.

He was Moloch.

Not in form.

In presence.

The god of child-flesh. The eater of innocence. The architect of fire-born kingdoms.

Ethan fell to his knees, coughing soot.

Moloch stepped closer, barefoot on bone and glass, and knelt beside him.

"Good," he said softly.

"You'll be my first."

Ethan's lips trembled.

"Your first what?"

Moloch leaned in.

His breath smelled like incense and rot.

"Apostle."

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