Warm blood dripping down her face and the taste of iron on her tongue, Herah landed atop the rim of a pearl flight-chute wide enough to fit three Cendruex at once.

It stunk of spoiled milk.

Bothered little by the smell, the artist thought back on her day and grinned to herself.

Avoided Noir’s whining and prayed to La Flamme for two hours instead of classes. Trounced Bleucend and Vertcend with ease after the academy let out. Watched all three of the connards froids struggle under thirty thousand ennot boulders for an hour like the weaklings they are. If Feu Rose hadn’t disappeared to whatever event called for her attendance, I’d say today was a great last day at the academy.

Crouching atop the chute and folding her wings in, Herah licked a bit of blood from her knuckles and took in the familiar sight around her home.

Ashfall had grown soft once more, doing nothing to obscure the ashen ground littered with prickly black plants and stout grey bushes nor the scattered crystal homes that made up her feu de camp (what the Cendreux called their neighborhoods).

Whether tall enough to scrape against the sky or wide enough to swallow hundreds of acres of ash, every surrounding home loomed large. The artist looked to one a couple hundred yards to her right, a diamond spire covered from head to toe in jagged spikes, each dozens of feet long. Just a little further out to her left, sat a gargantuan hand of amethyst cupping the air with windows at the ends of all but the middle finger.

Beautiful works of art, though far lesser in comparison to what you made, Momma and Dad.

With that thought, Herah’s attention went to her own home: an amber box with curling pearl horns on either side. Atop one of these horns, the artist currently crouched since both served as entry and exit to the abode. Said house only had two stories and covered little over five thousand square feet, insignificant in scale compared to any nearby residence.

Cause Dad’s all function, no style. Herah chuckled remembering when her mother revealed the only reason the house had horns. You’d never tolerate our home being that boring. Weird that status means that much more to you, Momma.

Thinking of her mother caused Herah to hesitate.

How am I going to tell Momma I dropped out?

The artist scratched the back of her head and huffed smoke from her nostrils, mulling over the question.

Can’t really dress this up. Can’t act like nothing hasn’t happened. Can’t try to dance around the topic.

Herah sighed deeply, red flames spewing from her lips in a cold stream.

Directness is a good policy, might as well stick to it.

The artist leaned over the side of the horn chute and traced its edge in search for small scribbles of Cendreuxah. In less than a second, Herah found the flowing letters spelling out the words: Ahahah Ahcu.

My Family Home, Herah thought before placing a talon against the words and relaxing the tip of her finger. The artist felt a slight burning sensation along her digit as a small bit of blood dribbled out of the end of her claw and onto the words. The letters glowed orange and enlarged, stretching out to cover the entire horn.

The rank smell of spoiled milked wafting up the chute morphed into the fumes of coal, letting Herah know all the traps into her house had disengaged.

With a smile and flip, the artist leaped into and slid down the horn.

The pearl tunnel passed in a blur before Herah dropped out of an opening in the house’s wall and into a crouch.

The artist felt the grainy texture of ash beneath her feet, a patch of the stuff sitting atop the padded, grey floor. Opposite of her own entrance, another opening linked to the house’s other horn showed which also had a patch of ash right in front of it.

I hope it isn’t my turn to sweep up the ashfall.

“Bonjour,” A velvety yet brash, feminine voice greeted Herah, “Could’ve sworn you left for school with clothing, and you’re dripping blood on my floor.”

Herah regarded herself, finding only blood and her sling bag dressing her body.

Hmm. The artist blinked. Forgot about that.

“Dripping blood on our floor, my Precious Tinder.” A charmingly smooth, masculine voice responded.

Smelling the faint spice of annoyance intermingled with an ashy and irony scent, Herah’s gaze drifted up and towards her left.

A silexacier (the Cendreux word for their intersex) with matching skin, scales, hair, and horns to the artist sat atop a high bench made from smokey quartz. Tall even while sitting and visibly muscled, the eight-ten silexacier crossed her long legs and tucked a stray hair back into her own long braid. Eyes as emerald as Herah’s own glared, a frown marking their owners face as her forked-tipped tail slithered across the floor angrily.

Glaring already, Momma? Fuck I do to piss you off? Herah paused for a second, recalling her day. The artist narrowed her eyes cautiously. That you know of.

Dressed in a deep green tunic, Herah’s mother, otherwise known as Rouge, held within her hands a long rifle with a barrel composed of a series of interconnected, small black cubes and a grip made from steel wrapped in brown leather. One of her hands hung right over the length of the barrel, the hum and buzz of electricity filling the air as her fingers thrummed up and down. Different cubes popped out, floating over into a pile on Rouge’s right while other cubes floated up to fill the empty slots from another pile on her left.

“Still dripping blood on our,” Rouge glanced towards Herah’s right, “floor. Seeing as you always complain about cleaning it up, you should take more care to not make a mess.”

“Might I ask why you’re covered in blood, my Petite-flamme?” The other voice called from Herah’s right.

The artist’s nose wrinkled as a familiar smokey and flowery scent hit it. Oddly enough, the cool butteriness of amusement and the sharp but faint smell of worry colored the smell.

Frowning, Herah turned rightward and found a big and buff silex covered from head to toe in gleaming orange scales reminiscent of the gemstone spessartite. Standing behind a long black marble bar counter, the seven-eleven silex lifted his unruly, neck length, and burnt-orange hair up and out of his face to reveal aquamarine eyes that beamed with life and a wide smile.

Weird, why are you worried about me today, Dad? Herah thought, giving her father an odd look.

Herah’s father, otherwise known as Orange, raised a brow in response. His arrow-tipped tail peaked over his shoulder and ignited in blue flames before waving at the artist excitedly.

Herah grinned back, letting a small giggle slip from her lips at her father’s antics.

“You're still dripping blood on the floor, Osmium Cranium,” Rouge said, causing Herah to growl hearing her nickname, “And you haven’t answered your father’s question.”

Herah turned to her mother with a frown.

“I will.”

“Will what?”

“Answer Dad’s question.”

“And the blood?”

“I’ll clean it.”

“Well hurry up, you’re forming a puddle.”

Herah looked down to her feet and found a small blood puddle with ash sprinkled throughout growing larger beneath her toes. With a growl, the artist looked back up and crossed her arms.

“Stop bothering me, and I’ll get to it.”

Rouge lifted a brow and pursed her lips, smoke bursting from her nostrils.

“What, your skull is too thick for you to do two things at once??”

Herah turned away from her mother.

“No, I don’t like doing things while being bothered.”

“You’re bothering me right now, and I’m still working.”

“I’m not you.”

“Clearly.”

Herah looked back to Rouge, eyes narrowed, and lips drawn into a snarl.

“What does that mean?”

The mother’s lips twisted into a smirk.

“What do you think it means?”

“You’re a bit—”

“Petite-flamme and my Precious Tinder,” Orange cut in, causing the mother and child to look at the father. Orange gave both a warm smile, “How about you both stop arguing so Herah can come in here, answer my question, and clean herself off?”

Herah and Rouge shared a look, neither saying a word.

You’re lucky Dad stopped me.

The artist could tell just by her mother’s look, a similar thought emerged.

Both turned back to Orange and nodded in tandem.

“Sure thing, dear.”

“Ok, Dad.”

Talking done for now, Herah took a second to take in her home and see if her parents had made any new additions to the living room.

Ignoring the scents of her progenitors and their emotions, the house smelled of raw meat and oil. Even more spacious than Rose’s classroom, Herah’s living room had substantially less things to take it up. The ceiling sat thirty feet high, clear orbs filled with magma hanging from it by steel cords to bathe the floor below in a soft orange glow. An opening wide enough to fit her body four times over within the ceiling led up to the second story of the house, where hers and her parent’s rooms lied. Bumpy and smooth jadeite made up the walls, lined with the mounted heads of several metallic animals, schematics for a slew of different guns, and colorful, highly detailed portraits of the family in different situations.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Then there was the floor.

Broken into five sections by three variably sized rings, Herah stood within the outermost and one of two non-ring parts of the floor.

Just two feet in front of the artist where a wide, curved, and brown leather couch sat, the outer or family ring took up about two-thirds of the total floor.

Got to be big enough for game night, especially since Momma and I need our space to get pissed.

The middle or couple ring, dubbed such by Herah’s mother and currently occupied by herself and her bench, took up about a sixth of the total floor. Rouge and her seat sat diagonally from Herah’s left, angled perfectly to see anyone coming in through either entrance to the home.

Clearly you were waiting for me, Momma. Hope you don’t know about school already.

The smallest or solo ring took up only a twelfth of the floor and held no furniture. Instead, two slabs sat embedded into the ground, one a prism of spinel just wide enough for Herah to sit atop while the other was a block of steel, about two or so inches lower into the floor and riddled with pores.

My seat and table.

The final section of the floor, surrounded by the solo ring, was a circular pad, with a black stone half as tall as the artist sitting atop it. A perfect perch to land on or take off to fly up to the second story.

Doesn’t seem like there’s anything new to check out in here.

Her observation complete, Herah turned to her right and strolled across the room till her feet stepped off padded grey and onto hot embers.

The artist let out a relieved hiss as the heat from the kitchen floor warmed her already hot toes.

Herah stopped at the rightward entrance into the kitchen, separated from the left by the long bar that also cut the area off from the living room. Differing from its neighbor room, bare obsidian walls enclosed the space.

Tens of feet to her left, Orange leaned upon the bar top facing the artist. Only two feet to her right, a stone oven that came up to her hip sat closed. Directly to Orange’s side, the black box that served as the home’s fridge sat with his tail wrapped around its handle.

“So,” Orange started, pulling open the fridge then grabbing some raw meat which promptly went into his mouth, “What’s up with all the red? It’s been a while since you’ve taken a—”

Orange paused for a moment then shot a finger gun at Herah with a wink.

“—blood bath!”

Herah’s cheeks puffed up before a laugh burst from her lips as Rouge groaned from her seat.

“Why,” Rouge put a hand to her face. “By my name, did our child inherit your shit humor?”

“Well, it had to be mines, my Precious Tinder. Cause just like our food,” Orange turned to Rouge and winked, “Your jokes are always dead on arrival.”

“Boarshit.”

Herah continued laughing as Orange just smiled at his wife. Once her laughter died down, Orange looked to his child and nodded his head expectantly.

“Most of its Bleucend’s and Vertcend’s,” Herah gestured at herself, “They insulted La Flamme and me, so I crushed their skulls.”

The artist’s nose wrinkled, her mother’s scent shifting sharply.

“Could’ve sworn you made an agreement that said you got expelled from school if you caused any trouble during class.” Herah could feel the sharp edges of her mother’s words tracing her skin and her mother’s eyes stabbing through her skull. “Did you get expelled from school?”

A small bit of sweat seeped up from Herah’s cheek and crawled down her chin. While unwilling to admit it aloud, the artist feared Rouge’s inevitable rage. Not because of the physical fight it’d ensue but the verbal one.

“No, I scheduled our duel after classes.” Herah looked to her mother, grinning and locking eyes, “And Feu Rose released me from said agreement after hers.”

“Rose released you from the Deal?” The artist looked back to her father, his head tilted to the side and teeth still gnashing some meat. “Why is that?”

“So, we’d fight.”

“What?” Orange and Rouge asked together, both blinking at Herah.

The artist shrugged.

“Feu Rose ended the Deal, so we’d fight.”

“Are you telling me,” Rouge sat down her gun and skipped over to the bar counter with a grin, “The reason I smell your blood right now is because Rose finally kicked your ass?”

Herah’s nostrils flared, smoke spewing from them.

“I smashed her head.”

Rouge leaned over the counter, her grin widening.

“But Rose won?”

Herah blushed, looking at the embers beneath her feet.

“Yes.”

Laughter rocked Rouge’s body, the mother leaning over the counter while beating it with her fist.

“You finally got what you were asking for!" Rouge lifted her head up, grin so wide it reached from cheek to cheek. “Did you enjoy it?”

“I don’t enjoy losing, Momma.” Herah’s voice came out low and growling. “You know that.”

Rouge’s head dropped back down as her laughter overtook her body once more.

The artist couldn’t bear to look at either her mother or father in the moment, her flame growing hotter as her anger at herself from earlier rose back up.

“But I bet you enjoyed getting Rose to fight you, Petite-Flamme.” Every word Orange spoke was like a soothing tune, calming and easy to take in. “Getting anyone as staunch as that teacher to fall back on a tradition abandoned largely millennia ago is a true feat.”

Herah’s head snapped up, locking onto Orange, who closed an eye and chewed with a softer grin than her mother. The confidence of his words and the casualness of their delivery touched Herah as they always did.

Right where the artist needed them most.

Feeling her flame cool, Herah smiled back at her father.

“I made progress.”

Orange nodded and chuckled, smoke escaping from his lips as his teeth continued their munching.

“That’s good.”

“I concur.” Rouge added, her laughter now faint chuckles, “As impossible as your goal is Osmium Cranium, to make any progress is to be celebrated.”

Herah looked between both her parents and smiled, feeling warm and bubbly from their praise.

The artist bowed to them.

“Thanks, Dad. Thanks, Momma.”

Herah came out of her bow and looked to her father, still chewing upon his meat from the fridge. Taking a whiff of it, Herah found the smoke from her father’s mouth blotting out the meat’s smell.

The artist shrugged before walking up to her dad. Once Orange looked at Herah, the artist pointed at her own teeth.

“What’re you eating?”

“Tendon.”

“From?”

“An animal.”

“Which?”

“A dead one.”

“Species?”

“Edible.”

Herah couldn’t help but chuckle, her father’s grin never shifting throughout the entire exchange.

Turning to the fridge, the artist opened it up. Herah checked inside and noticed amongst the stacks of meat organized by animal and type being blasted with cooling red flames, every section for pork had some new additions.

Closing the fridge, Herah grinned at her father.

“Boar?”

“I bore right through it.” Orange responded, shooting another finger gun at his child.

Another groan left Rose and a laugh Herah.

While the artist laughed, her thoughts drifted back towards the worry coloring his scent. And towards her conversation with Rose earlier in the day.

Maybe Dad knows why Rose knows my past?

“Hey Da—”

A thump on the side of her head caused Herah to pause then turn to her mother, who retracted her tail and gave the artist a blank look.

“So, what had you worried about coming into the house?”

Herah froze.

Merde! How?

The artist noticed her mother’s scent shift towards the stale, buttery smell of satisfaction. Seemingly sensing her question, Rouge grinned and tapped her nose.

“I’m always attuned to your smell, Herah. And since the academy is only forty etrèmolikas away from the house, it’s pretty easy to notice you getting here in about two seconds then spending two minutes just sitting on the horns.”

Ashdammit! Fuck! Shit! And more curses ran through Herah’s mind as the artist gave her mother a blank stare.

“So,” Rouge hooked a finger around one of Herah’s horns, lightly tugging her child forward, “Why were you afraid to come back home?”

Unwilling and unable to try and avoid the situation, Herah took a deep breath and bit the bullet.

“I quit the academy.”

A moment of silence filled the home, only Orange’s chewing and the crinkling of the floor embers heard. Herah felt a phantom cooling of the air, sensing the flame in her mother’s chest grow cold and her scent stop shifting completely.

Rouge turned to her husband with a blank smile.

Momma is going to try killing me.

“Orange, what would you like to name our next child?”

“I’m thinking Jakob or maybe even Camilla.” Orange instantly responded, reacting none to the shift in atmosphere.

I might die.

“Ah,” Rouge let out a weak laugh as her smile widened, “More odd and non-Cendreux names, like Herah.”

“I like em!” Orange said with a laugh, “Plus, one of those is the name of Iesha’s dad.”

Rouge shook her head, glancing at Herah with her unnatural smile.

Today could be my last day.

“You’ve spent too long away from home.”

“Nah. Also another kid?” Orange tilted his head to the side and nodded towards Herah. “Could’ve sworn you only wanted the one.”

I’m in for the fight of my life.

“Well,” Rouge nodded towards Herah, the artist sensing her mother’s fire grow hotter and her scent grow spicier. “I’m about to kill that one right now.”

“Don’t do that,” Orange reached up and gave Rose a slight and affectionate bop on the nose. “My Precious Tinder.”

I’ll go out swinging!

“Try and stop me.”

“Okay.”

Never one to retreat, Herah raised her fist as her mother turned.

“It was nice knowing you, kid.”

“I’m not going down without a fight, Momma.”

“Uh-huh.”

Rouge’s fingers wrapped around Herah’s throat before the artist even realized, her mother’s arm reaching over the counter.

Before any squeezing occurred, Orange’s tail wrapped around his wife’s wrist and the same finger to bop her nose hung over her eye, talon extended.

The family stood locked in place, Herah not struggling for breath, Rouge not strangling Herah, and Orange not letting go of Rouge.

Herah snarled up at her mother defiantly, Rouge glared between her husband and child, and Orange looked at no one still grinning.

“Let go of me, Orange.”

“No.”

“Go ahead and do it, Dad! I got this.”

Orange stared at Herah, still grinning.

“No, you do not.”

“Listen to our idiot child, Orange.”

“Hey!”

“No.”

“Why not?” The mother and child asked, both growling.

Orange still only smiled.

“You know the rules, no fighting in the house.”

“Then let us take it outside.” Rouge said, fidgeting her arm in her husband’s tailed grasp.

“No.”

“Come on!” Herah shouted, still staring at her mother.

“No.”

“Why not?” Herah and Rouge asked together.

Orange’s smile did not change.

“Cause, we all know where and how it ends. So, we’ll be skipping to that part.”

“I don’t want to.” Rouge spat out.

“Neither do I!” Herah responded, dreading a skip.

Orange closed both of his eyes, grin still in place.

“Then why don’t you both fight me at the same time, and if you win, I’ll let you carry on as you like.”

Before going any further, it should be understood that the Cendreux did not freeze. Not in the literal sense at least. Cendreux didn’t even get cold, their concept of being chilly meaning anything cooler than fire. These people were never meant to know the cold. Their flames made such an idea impossible.

So as frost formed atop her scales and skin and true cold pierced her entirety, Herah cursed the familiar impossibility of her father’s power.

Blue and translucent snowflakes as large as ingots appeared and rained down all around Orange. Frost blossomed from his feet, spreading across the kitchen and into the living room in a shimmering wave.

This same frost swallowed Rouge and Herah, covering every inch of them in a shining blue ice. Neither could move, only shiver. Their pupils unslit, becoming round and enlarged. Every breath they let out solidified an inch before their faces, plunking and shattering against the frozen floor.

Herah focused on none of this, her nose twitching at her father’s smell and her gaze held by his face.

The faintest spice of anger wafted off his form.

And his grin was gone.

“You two want to do that?” The question was colder than the ice freezing his family and sharper than the talon still hanging over his wife’s eye.

There was only one answer.

“No, Father.”

“No, love.”

“Good, then it’s time for a family meeting.” Orange clapped, all the ice shattering into nothingness and his snowflakes disappearing as his eyes popped back open and his smile reemerged, “Clean yourself off Herah, and let’s all assume our seats.”

Herah’s pupils shrunk and slit once more, the artist letting out a few pants before glancing towards her mother doing the same.

Later. Herah thought, knowing the same thought passed through Rouge’s head.

Orange and Rouge moved out of the kitchen as Herah stepped over to where her father stood moments ago. The artist took off her bag and sat it down onto the bar. Beneath it, a titanium sink and faucet with a single nob sat. Herah turned it on, and lava poured out into the basin.

Cupping some of the liquid rock in her hands, Herah raised it over her head and let it wash down her body. The artist repeated this action four times more before her entire body dripped lava.

Enjoying the warmth of the thick liquid engulfing her form, Herah exhaled orange flames. This fire coalesced around her body, pulling the lava off the artist and into a flowing blob over her head.

Now spotless, Herah warmed her orange flames till they turned yellow, causing the lava within to turn to vapor while the blood inside stayed liquid.

Opening her mouth, the artist inhaled the fire, lava vapor, and blood in one breath followed by a small burp.

Done with her cleanup, Herah walked back into the living room and over to her own seat.

Orange spread his legs and let his body sink into his couch on the family ring, Rouge crossed her legs and straightened her back on her bench in the couple ring, and Herah folded her legs and leaned on a fist atop her spinel gem embedded in the floor within the personal ring.

This left Herah facing the kitchen, her back to her mother also facing the kitchen, and Orange looking at the pair from their right.

“Precious Tinder, mind setting the floor right?”

“You’re better at Geology than me.”

“Your body is better built for Science than mine.”

“True.”

Herah twisted her neck back to watch as her mother held a hand out and over one of the crevices that outlined the second ring of the living room floor. A scale in the palm of Rouge’s hand popped off and fell into the nook. The mother lifted the same hand and traced a line across the air.

A second later, the floor shook and Herah’s and Orange’s rings started rotating.

As the floor moved, Herah placed a hand atop the metal block in front of her seat. Yellow flames seeped from beneath her fingers and flowed down and through the pores of the metal. Just as her ring paused, the prism the artist sat atop started rising while the metal before her seat began sinking. The artist’s seat halted, leaving her body a foot off the floor as her father’s ring came to a stop.

This left Herah’s back to the kitchen, her father on her right still, and her face towards her mom and the bottom floor’s sole window, the entire wall opposite of the kitchen.

As ash gently fell behind the mother casting flickering, gentle shadows through an orange tinted lens, Rouge gazed upon her daughter with anything but gentleness.

“Do you enjoy disrespecting your father and I?”