TRIGGER WARNINGS: murder of both adults and an infant, neonaticide (not by the parents, but that’s the closest exact word that I could find for what happens), young children left behind by the murders committed and who witness the murders but not directly, the grief and pain and horror and anger and all the emotions that come with that, children lashing out in rage and grief, a child committing a murder in retaliation

Chapter 10.5

Inferno: Hecatomb

Phoenix doesn’t know how long it has been when he finally leaves the burning remains of his home. The fire still blazes within, and smoke continues to billow out into the sky, leaving the air heavy with ash and smog. Tears blur his eyes, soaking his cheeks with salt and soot that not even the flames on his own body can seem to burn away. Phoenix stumbles outside, unsteady, gaze unseeing. He manages to sit down. He sniffles as his lip quivers.

Phoenix had wanted to stay longer, stall for just a little while more with his parents and sister, pretend for as long as he could that it was any other day at any other time and they were all one happy family taking one happy nap. Half of the house collapsed after the flames destroyed too much of the support structure and Phoenix still couldn’t meld his energy with this fire to gain control, and the fantasy Phoenix had created to pretend so he didn’t have to face reality shattered.

He had cried and cried and cried and begged Lucius not to take them. He begged his parents to wake up. He begged his sister to come with him. He’d protect her, like a sibling should do.

Another part of the house had come crashing down, and Phoenix had flinched, scrambling out of the way as it nearly hit him and a blinding wave of sparks arced in front of his eyes in dazzling whites. They had sizzled as they rolled across the ground.

“I have to go,” he had realized out loud. “I can’t stay.”

He got no response, and his stomach dropped out from beneath him. It was the loudest silence he had ever heard. It was the first time his parents had never replied to him. It was the permission he needed but couldn’t get. He couldn’t leave the bodies of his parents and sister, but he had to. He needed his parents to tell him that it was ok for him to leave, but they would never reply.

Phoenix couldn’t burn, but he could be crushed.

“I’m sorry,” he had pleaded. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry.”

He had started to leave, then turned around when he couldn’t make it more than a few steps. He darted back to Ivy’s side; he couldn’t reach Onyx, not with the house collapsing around him.

“Please,” he had begged. “Wake up. I need you. I love you. I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened, but I’ll keep you safe. I promise. Please, I need you. Ky needs you.”

He had closed his eyes, though he could barely see anything. Behind his eyelids, he saw Onyx and Ivy. Short, grey fur, and long, violet fur. Warm smiles, kind personalities. Teaching him and Ky how to harness their powers, how to hunt, how to find water, how to play fight.

“I’m so sorry,” Phoenix had sobbed when he was forced back as everything crumbled around him and he fled the house.

Outside, Phoenix shakes as his flames crackle in uneven patches across his fur. He sinks to the ground as he pants.

“Phoenix!” Ky races over to him as he picks his way through the field of debris.

There is hope in Ky’s brown eyes.

Phoenix doesn’t like that hope. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say. Onyx and Ivy would know, but he doesn’t.

How is he supposed to explain that Onyx and Ivy and their sister are all dead?

Phoenix had hope, and it was right before he found his parents’ bodies. Right before he found his sister’s body. He thought that the stone and vines and the tree would lead him right to his parents and sister. They did, but he thought they’d all be alive.

Maybe Ky believes that their parents and sister made it out ok. Maybe he believes that they’re racing off into the woods to some unknown location because he and Ky can take care of themselves, just like Onyx and Ivy had taught them, and their sister is currently helpless. Maybe he believes that their parents were never actually home— they left for some reason he and Phoenix don’t yet know.

A part of Phoenix wants to let Ky hold onto that hope for however long he can play along for. That feels less cruel than what Phoenix is feeling right now. Phoenix doesn’t know what he is feeling, but he doesn’t like it.

It’s an ugly monster inside, some spitting demon with gnashing fangs and jagged talons whispering awful things to him. A part of Phoenix agrees. It’s the King’s fault.

But Phoenix should’ve been able to save his family, and he was too weak to do so.

Phoenix controls fire, and his family died by fire.

“Where are Onyx and Ivy? Our sister? Did you find them?” Ky stares at Phoenix, ears drawn back and eyes wide. Panic fills his brown gaze.

And still hope.

Phoenix grits his teeth and looks away, eyes flitting across the field. Guard and Soldiers mill about, though they don’t seem to have noticed the two brothers.

“I couldn’t find them,” Phoenix lies through his teeth.

The pain hurts so much for Phoenix, so why would he do it to Ky?

Onyx and Ivy would know what to say, but Phoenix doesn’t know.

“What?” Tears begin to well up in Ky’s eyes, and it takes everything Phoenix has not to double back and tell the truth.

Ky doesn’t need to know what Phoenix saw. He doesn’t need to know how close Phoenix was. How long he spent laying beside the bodies of Onyx and Ivy and their sister because it was the only chance he’d get to spend time as a family and he couldn’t leave and he just wanted to pretend and couldn’t stop himself from crying and he couldn’t make himself leave.

“I couldn’t find them,” Phoenix repeats, then adds in a bit of truth. “The fire was… so strong. So chaotic. I could hardly see anything.”

“So they’re outside? They’re safe somewhere?” Ky’s voice wavers, teetering on the line between hope and realization. “They’re safe, right?”

“I…” Phoenix’s lip quivers, and he bites his tongue so he doesn’t tell his brother what he saw. But he can’t lie and say they’re alive. He can’t say that. His voice drops to a whisper, so soft that Ky has to prick his ears to hear. “No, they’re not. I’m sorry.”

Ky shakes his head, stepping back and swishing his tail. He shakes his head again. “No, no. The King wouldn’t do that. He’s mean, but he’s only in the Sea. We’re far away. He’s a bad guy, but he’s over here. And the Guard and Soldiers wouldn’t do that. Ivy and Onyx… Ivy and Onyx said they’re not very smart, so Ivy and Onyx are way smarter. If the Guard and Soldiers set the house on fire, our parents would’ve just escaped.”

Phoenix’s sides shake with sobs he can barely choke down. He doesn’t know what to say. He silently begs for his brother to understand, but Ky just shakes his head, eyes wide with panic and fear and confusion plastered across his face.

“That’s not what happened. They-they-.” Phoenix can’t continue. He can’t say it. He can’t make it real in that way. He knows it’s true, but saying it makes it that much more concrete. That much more real. “They’re gone, Ky. They’re dead. Ivy and Onyx and our sister are…”

“You’re lying.”

Phoenix looks down at his paws. He is lying, but not in the way Ky thinks. “I don’t wanna be telling the truth… but I am.” His voice is hardly more than a whisper.

They sit in silence.

“Hey! I found them!”

Phoenix’s head snaps up as he sees Guard and Soldiers running toward him. Ky jolts to his paws, yanked back to reality by the thundering footsteps of the Guard and Soldiers.

That ugly thing in Phoenix’s chest rears its head, snarling and snapping its teeth, eyes flashing as it spits and bays for blood. It feasts on Phoenix’s pain and grief and confusion, gobbles it up. It calls to him, tells him that if he can just kill, he will feel better. Blood will soothe his pain.

Phoenix doesn’t know what to do.

Please, he calls out to his parents. I don’t know what to do.

The Guard and Soldiers draw closer as they all realize that Ky and Phoenix are standing near their collapsed and burnt home. A growl echoes in Phoenix’s chest.

They took his parents and sister from him.

Something settles in Phoenix’s chest. It fits into place, sliding just right and nocking perfectly, designed just so. A spark of anger he’s never felt before flares to life in his gut, feeding the demon in his chest and the flames on his pelt.

“Go away!” Ky squeals, rushing forward a couple of paces as tears drip down his cheeks, staining his tan fur darker. He fluffs out his fur to make himself look bigger. “Get away from us! You’re mean!”

His eyes glaze over, turn distant, and the Guard and Soldiers stop, frowning in confusion.

“What the fuck?” one of the Guard murmurs.

Ky weaves an illusion, then casts it with a bitter glare. A hulking monster materializes, unfurling from the ground and rising to tower over the Guard and Soldiers, and it swipes a clawed hand at them. Purple skin stretches across its lean, muscled frame, and wiry hair sprouts across its back in uneven clumps. Horns curl from its head and a thin tail snaps as it lashes it back and forth. After it draws in a breath, it bellows, revealing sharp fangs. The ground rattles as it stomps a foot against the ground, crushing grass. Phoenix recognizes the beast immediately; Ky had summoned it many times before.

The edges of Ky’s illusion are jagged, and there’s a clear line between the monster and reality— Ky cannot yet blend them together seamlessly, just like Phoenix doesn’t have complete control over fire.

Guilt coils in Phoenix’s gut like a snake. He flexes his claws into the ground until his toes ache.

Ky’s monster flickers in places and some proportions are warped.

“What?” a Soldier taunts, waving his sword at the seven-eyed monster Ky had scared Phoenix with in the past. “You think I’m gonna be afraid of something as fake as that?”

Get them, the angry part of Phoenix rumbles, the part frothing at the mouth, baying for blood. Kill them. You’re strong enough.

Phoenix doubted that. He hadn’t been strong enough to save his family. There were far more than three Guard and Soldiers who stood before him.

He was one kitten, not even an adult. He had much more growing to do, much more practice to do before he knew how to control fire like Onyx did stone and Ivy did plants.

Kill them.

Phoenix wanted to, but some part of him questioned that. The questioning part grew smaller with every heartbeat. The Guard and Soldiers didn’t question when they killed Onyx and Ivy, and his sister. They weren’t even leaving him and Ky alone after burning their home and destroying everything. They weren’t letting him and Ky try to somehow make sense of what the King had just ordered his Guard and Soldiers to carry out, even though Phoenix couldn’t think of a way that it could ever make sense.

Phoenix stares down the Guard and Soldiers who continue to mock Ky and his unsuccessful attempts to chase them off with illusions.

Anger churns in his gut, broiling into a frothing mess that bubbles over and warps into a raging storm. These were the Guard and Soldiers who murdered his family. The King had given them their orders, and they followed through. They could’ve said no, and they didn’t.

And as Phoenix finds the Guard who is still holding the burning torch, something snaps within him and breaks into a jagged edge sharp enough to draw blood. It makes his lips curl.

Phoenix reaches out to the fire, lets his powers brush against the flames and caresses them. This time, he can take hold. He wraps his grip around the flames and takes control off the fire. It bends to his will and his bidding. The fire is his now, not the Guard’s.

Why couldn’t this be me before? I could’ve saved my family.

“I’m done with this. Let’s get him,” the Soldier says, the same one who had been poking fun at Ky.

“No.” Phoenix takes a step forward. His voice is small, tired, hoarse. “You won’t be doing anything to my brother, not after you took my family from me.”

“And what are you gonna do about it? You’re such a small little cat.” The Soldier smirks, and the demon in Phoenix’s chest grins back, all teeth and smug satisfaction.

Phoenix gazes back with big eyes. He just wants the Guard and Soldiers gone, but there’s only one way. He wishes for the millionth time he could go back to the morning when it was just his family and his sister on the way, but he and Ky were debating the gender of their sibling. He wants that back. He wants the safety of his parents, where they had all the answers to all the questions he could think of, and they could help with any problem he needed help with.

Phoenix turns his attention back to the Guard’s torch. He feeds energy into the fire after regaining his control over the flames. The torch crackles and snaps, sparks bursting from the flames and flying through the air and popping.

A few moments later, the flames explode, billowing out and engulfing the Guard and Soldiers in oranges and yellows and reds. The Guard and Soldiers begin to scream.

Every breath Phoenix takes shakes in his chest, a mix of adrenaline and anger and fear that sharpen everything he sees. Every breath rakes against his throat, a reminder of the fire still burning in his home, of his family charred on the floor, of what the King ripped away for reasons Phoenix doesn’t understand.

Phoenix seethes and bares his teeth in a snarl he has never meant before but knows he means now. He growls in pure anger for the first time in his life, snarls in rage and fury.

How dare they.

Phoenix continues pouring his powers into the roaring flames, funneling his anger and twisting it into fuel for the fire. He gasps for breath as tears sting in his eyes. His jaw trembles, teeth chattering together as he loses himself into wrath for the first time. His body shakes and he doesn’t know what to do, but it feels right.

How dare they. Ivy and Onyx didn’t deserve this. Neither did my sister. How dare they send them to Lucius like this.

The Guard and Soldiers scream and howl, and they rush about as they attempt to put out the fire. Phoenix’s flames are hot, but not hot enough to incinerate.

Not yet, he tells himself. Someday.

The leather armor of the Guard wrinkles and cracks, and the metal armor of the Soldiers glows but does not melt, instead acting as insulation and trapping the heat against their bodies.

They killed my family. They burned my family alive.

Phoenix would feel pity. He would feel remorse. He would feel bad for them.

Onyx and Ivy taught him and Ky all of those things. They taught him and Ky to care about others.

But Phoenix doesn’t feel any of that.

It’s karma.

Phoenix was too weak to save his family, but he is strong enough to get some small bit of justice for them. He is strong enough to take down the Guard and Soldiers who murdered them.

xxxx

Phoenix keeps the Guard holding the torch alive the longest.

He doesn’t know why he does it; the other Guard and Soldiers drop dead one by one, falling limp against the ground with dull thumps. Smoke curls from their bodies in lazy trails as they twitch and gasp for breath in ways that only make Phoenix think of his parents and sister in the inferno that the home had been before they all go still. A part of Phoenix knows it’s because he wants to know the why.

Surely there’s some reason, some explanation. The Guard can tell him, and then it will just make sense, because Phoenix doesn’t understand.

Why are his parents dead? Why is his sister dead?

He begins to cry again, though he’s not sure he ever even stopped.

Phoenix approaches the Guard with the torch. He’s gasping for breath on the ground with only minor burn marks on his body. Nothing like what his family suffered in the inferno before their deaths. Phoenix hopes they inhaled enough smoke fast enough, though the thought makes his insides twist and his face twist into something sad. His ears droop and his tail drags across the ground. He knows smoke will kill faster than the actual flames, but his family didn’t have to die.

The Guard would be dead if Phoenix had let the flames do their full damage.

“Aww, kitty feelin’ sad?” the Guard mocks, raising his eyebrows as he pushes himself up onto an elbow.

Phoenix bristles and bares his teeth, flames jumping and crackling on his inky pelt in reaction to his sudden burst of rage.

“Cute,” the Guard snorts, squinting, then circles a finger to gesture at the dead Guard and Soldiers. “You think this is gonna change a fuckin’ thing?”

“You murdered my family.” Phoenix draws in a ragged breath as he stalks closer, making a sound somewhere between a snarl and a sob.

“It wasn’t me! I swear!”

“You’re holding the torch.” Phoenix jerks his muzzle toward the Guard’s hand that still holds the piece of wood, burning at one end with flames that call out to Phoenix’s powers.

The Guard leans back as Phoenix steps closer, and Phoenix feels Ky watching from a few paces away.

“I had my orders.”

“You could have said no.”

Phoenix shoves the Guard to the ground and pins him down by sitting on his stomach. He’s not big enough to hold the Guard down with just one paw, but with his entire weight he can do it.

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“My Sovereign, His Excellency, His Honor, His Highest of all Highnesses, King Garonda XIV is not someone you say no to,” the Guard gasps, disbelief and horror washing over his face. “You do not disobey the rightful King of Ragdon! You must be the children of Onyx and Ivy.”

The Guard looks between Ky and Phoenix from his position on his back on the ground.

“You are,” he breathes. “We were not aware Onyx and Ivy had any children.”

“You say no to a bad guy,” Phoenix growls. “If they do bad things, you say no and you stop them. The King told you to murder our family.”

“My Sovereign, His Excellency, His Honor, His Highest of all Highnesses, King Garonda XIV is not a bad guy, little black cat,” the Guard says, returning his attention to Phoenix. “What he says is law. Everyone obeys, because he is the King of Ragdon. He told us Onyx and Ivy must die, so they did.”

“But if someone is doing something bad, you have to step up and stop it,” Ky protests. “You can’t do something wrong. Bad guys can’t get away with it. The King told you to kill our family.”

“The King of Ragdon does nothing bad. He is justified in the deaths of Onyx and Ivy. Whether or not he shares his reasoning is up to him.”

Phoenix frowns. Onyx and Ivy had told him otherwise. No one ever did nothing bad. Everyone messed up and made mistakes. The Guard is wrong.

“The King told you to murder our family,” Phoenix snarls.

How come the Guard cannot understand?

The Guard cranes his head up, raising his eyebrows again. “I had my orders. The King of Ragdon is always right, and I will live my life serving him. End of story.”

Phoenix opens his mouth, pulling his lips back and showing his teeth as rage broils within him. He swipes a paw at the piece of wood in the Guard’s hand, and it cracks from the force. Splinters dig into his paw pads, but Phoenix barely feels them.

“Scary,” the Guard mutters. “Why are you doing this? It won’t change anything. We killed two at the King of Ragdon’s orders, and you have killed far more at no one’s orders. You’re a child. I’m not. I had orders and it’s my job. You had no orders and it’s not your job. You and your brother will be tried by the Judge and Justice. You will be separated and each held accountable for your actions today. The loss of your parents will be taken into consideration, but ultimately, you are both responsible for your own actions, and you had no orders to take any lives. You should know better, but it seems neither of you do. The Judge and Justice will likely order me to testify at each of your trials, and I will have no choice but to recount what I witnessed.”

Phoenix’s ears start ringing, but he hears almost none of what the Guard says. Ky whimpers, and Phoenix sees him turning to him with wide eyes and tears in the corners of his eyes. His oversized ears droop by the sides of his head, and Phoenix hates seeing his brother that way. Phoenix watches his brother for several moments as he pants, unable to process and make sense of what the Guard just said.

Two? They killed two at the King’s orders?

“You killed three,” Phoenix corrects.

“Three?” the Guard echoes.

When Phoenix sees the genuine confusion on the Guard’s face, he roars and he rears back and slams his paws down on the Guard’s chest as hard as he can. The Guard grunts and curls up, blood dribbling from his mouth as his face contorts with pain.

“You murdered three. THREE!” Phoenix snarls. “You murdered my parents and my sister. She was hardly here before you-you forced her to Lucius. She didn’t get to live. We didn’t get to play.”

“Grow up. Life isn’t about play. So what? At least she didn’t have to grow up with parents who turn their back on others. Onyx and Ivy were Generals, you know? Your parents would’ve left you the second they thought they coulda got somethin’ better. You’re better off without them.”

“You lie,” Phoenix spits. “My parents cared about us. They loved us. You murdered them, and you murdered my sister. I don’t care what you think.”

The Guard snorts. “You must, because I’m still here.”

“I want to know why you murdered my family.”

“I’ve told you already; My Sovereign, His Excellency, His Honor, His Highest of all Highnesses, King Garonda XIV gave us orders to kill Onyx and Ivy. We carried out his orders.”

“Why?” Ky asks.

“The King of Ragdon ordered it.”

“Why would you carry out his orders?”

“He ordered it,” the Guard says.

“Why would you do that? He ordered you to commit murder.”

“The King of Ragdon ordered me to do something, and I will carry out his orders.”

“Why?”

“Because the King of Ragdon ordered me to do so.”

Phoenix wants to scream.

“You don’t understand it, because Onyx and Ivy didn’t teach you right. Come with me, both of you. You’ll see. You’ll understand. There’s a Soldier, a real good one. A model Soldier. He’s rising up through the ranks fast. One of the good ones. Not many like him, but if you can learn from the ones like him, then you’ll do good. You’ll understand. Onyx and Ivy could never teach you right.”

“I’m never going with you,” Phoenix growls. “You murdered my family. They didn’t deserve it.”

The Guard narrows his eyes, and Phoenix glares back, forcing him to stay still despite how his skin crawls.

The monster within Phoenix stirs to life. It whispers to him, telling him to make the Guard pay, to make the Guard hurt, to make the Guard bleed.

Anger and frustration and guilt build up in Phoenix’s body, a boiling ball of energy with no outlet. The Guard must see the shift in Phoenix’s posture. He pushes at Phoenix’s throat and tries to move him away, but Phoenix leans back on his hind legs and drives his forepaws into the Guard’s chest again, slicing through the leather armor. Blood trickles down the Guard’s chin.

He snarls as the Guard coughs, grimacing and crying out as the skin of the palm he had pressed into Phoenix’s neck bubbles and blisters from the heat.

Rage cracks and splinters into something more, and Phoenix begins to shake as he loses control. His vision blurs, he unsheathes his claws, and his lips curl, gums aching for vengeance that he longs to taste on his tongue.

“You murdered my mother.” Phoenix lashes out, claws slicing through the Guard’s cheek. “You murdered my father.” He rips into the Guard’s other cheek. “And you murdered my newborn sister.” He slashes across the Guard’s forehead and nose.

The Guard laughs, and Phoenix pauses, sitting back on his haunches on the Guard’s stomach with his full weight. The Guard’s face is swollen. Blood coats his body like a second skin.

“They deserved it,” he snickers, choking on blood and saliva until he spits it out and clears his mouth. “Do what you want— I don’t care. But Onyx and Ivy deserved it. They supported the Wolf and the Dove. And you know what? No one even knows who the fuck they are! For all we know, it’s just a stupid fucking lie made by a few disloyal citizens. Ivy and Onyx spouted that horrific false tale about how My Sovereign, His Excellency, His Honor, His Highest of all Highnesses, King Garonda XIV is anything but the rightful King of Ragdon. And as for your sister, are you sure she was actually born? You know, you sure you didn’t see, like, a little patch of dirt? Maybe you just really wanted a sister but you didn’t, you know, actually have a sister?”

Phoenix inhales through his teeth and every muscle in his body locks up as his vision turns red with fury. His tail lashes like a whip, and his flames rumble and thrum with energy. He hears Ky taking several steps back.

“You won’t learn the truth from your brother over there,” the Guard says.

“Shut up,” Phoenix says, shoving his face in front of the Guard’s. “Do not speak of my sister again. Do not speak of my par-”

“You can learn the truth with me, with the ranks of the Guard and Soldiers. You never will learn anything from your fami-.”

Phoenix screams as his insides shatter and the building, broiling mess of anger and rage and grief and confusion and horror and pain and sadness and sorrow and fear detonates within himself. Flames erupt across his body, snapping and sizzling and sparking as they explode. He rises up into a low crouch on his hind legs and raises a foreleg, then brings his paw down hard against the side of the Guard’s head. His claws latch on behind the Guard’s ear and hook onto the underside of his jaw. His skin rips and tears as Phoenix snaps his head to the side. His neck twists as blood spurts from the shredded flesh. And then his neck snaps.

Phoenix gulps down a huge breath of air, and then another. Once his mind isn’t so dizzy, he looks down at the Guard beneath his paws.

He hasn’t moved, and his eyes are half closed and glazed over. The blood on his skin is starting to dry in cracked, scaly patches.

Horror washes over Phoenix. What has he done? The Guard’s head is twisted at an impossible angle and he’s nearly beyond recognition as something human with how torn up he is. Phoenix did that, but neither Ivy nor Onyx would teach him that. Nor would they teach him to kill the way he did all the other Guard and Soldiers.

They aren’t here to tell you not to, the demon within him purrs. The Guard and Soldiers deserve it.

A part of Phoenix agrees.

The Guard doesn’t move again, and Phoenix manages to stumble a couple of steps away before his legs give out and he crumbles to the ground as he sniffles and then sobs. He doesn’t budge when Ky bumps his head into his shoulder and lays down beside him.

“I’m here,” Ky croaks. “I’m here.”

It takes Phoenix what seems like ages before he can reply.

“I know,” he manages to say.

Exhaustion slams into him, and Phoenix slumps to the side with the force it hits him with. He rests his head on Ky’s shoulders. He needs a familiar scent. He needs something other than smoke. Fire has always been familiar, a constant companion on his body, but now he can’t escape it. Phoenix buries his nose in Ky’s fur as sobs wrack his body.

He can’t stop shaking, can’t stop crying, can’t stop gasping for every breath, can’t stop the tears soaking through Ky’s fur, can’t stop the sobs as he begins to be able to think and realize what’s just happened. He feels like he can’t breathe. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever stop trembling.

He doesn’t know if he’ll survive. It feels impossible.

Phoenix presses closer to Ky, inhales his brother’s scent, and reminds himself that he still has his brother.

Ky is still here.

xxxx

The next time the silence is broken, Ky speaks and it’s dark. The silvery moon hangs high in the sky and stars twinkle. Phoenix cranes his neck back and wonders where Ivy and Onyx and his sister have gone.

Where did you take them, Lucius? Why can’t I see them again? Bring them back. I need them. It’s not fair.

“Are they really gone?” Ky whispers. It’s not a question, and his voice is so soft, unsure, shaky.

“Yeah,” Phoenix replies, nose still buried in his brother’s thick fur, fluffy strands tickling his cheeks, the only thing keeping him tethered to reality. His voice is as thin as a spider’s web, and he’s not even sure Ky heard him. Phoenix repeats himself. “Yeah, they’re really… they’re-. They… they’re really… really gone.”

“Are you…” Ky exhales. He doesn’t turn back, but when Phoenix glances up, he can see the tears dripping down Ky’s muzzle as he stares at his paws and the way his nose quivers as he shudders with every breath. He can feel it, too, with how heavily he leans against Ky, two brothers clinging to each other support. “Are you sure?”

Phoenix bites his lip. How is he supposed to tell Ky what he saw in their home? How is he supposed to tell his brother what really happened to their parents and sister?

The frustration builds and builds within Phoenix. Exhaustion pulls on him and tries to drag him down, lull him into sleep. But every time he closes his eyes, all he sees are his parents’ bodies and his tiny sister wrapped up in their grip. Phoenix didn’t even get to learn her name, and now he never will. Her name is lost with his parents, and a part of Phoenix wishes he can go after the Guard and Soldiers all over again, the same part twisting within him in an oozing, gelatinous form, bubbling and frothing with spitting fangs demanding blood, the same part with emotions Phoenix cannot identify and doesn’t understand, because he doesn’t understand what’s happened. He doesn’t know how to make sense of it all.

Phoenix wishes he had a chance to tell the Guard and Soldiers everything they just stole from the world by not telling the King no, like they should’ve done. Like Ivy and Onyx always said to do if he or Ky ever felt someone was doing something wrong. But Phoenix also felt that the Guard and Soldiers never would’ve listened. The Guard with the torch never did.

“Why?” Phoenix spits, and the word leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

Phoenix knows why, at least according to what the Guard said. His parents once supported the King, and then they left him.

But didn’t the King know what he had taken? Didn’t the King know who his parents were? Didn’t the King know who his sister might’ve been? She would’ve been the best sister, and Onyx and Ivy were the best parents Phoenix could ever want.

All Phoenix has left are memories and what ifs and the burnt remains of his home and whatever parts of a body cannot burn. Phoenix doesn’t want to know.

His eyes find the Guard who’d been holding the torch, and anger sizzles through his body, burning along every nerve hotter than he’s ever felt. He hopes that wherever Lucius brought the Guard makes him suffer. He hopes wherever Lucius brought all the Guard and Soldiers makes them all suffer. He wants them to feel everything they’ve done, all the fear his family felt as they burned alive. Phoenix can never burn, but he knows fire, just as it knows him. Phoenix knows what fire can do, what it did to them and their bodies.

Phoenix doesn’t realize how much he’s shaking until Ky jabs a paw into his chest and snaps him back to reality.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

He snorts.

“I know that look.” Ky frowns, drawing his ears back with a cross expression. “I know what that look means, and it wasn’t your fault.”

Phoenix can’t meet his eyes. “I know that."

“It wasn’t your fault,” he repeats, ducking his head to force Phoenix to make eye contact.

Phoenix shrugs away from Ky’s advances. “I know that.” He turns his back to his brother.

They stand side by side, until Ky grumbles, moves to stand in front of Phoenix again, and swats him across the face. Phoenix growls in response, scowling at his brother before turning away from Ky.

“It wasn’t your fault!” Ky says yet again, walking around Phoenix to speak to his face.

Phoenix grumbles. “I know that!”

“Clearly you don’t, since you don’t believe me.”

“Just drop it.”

“Did you order our parents deaths? Did you demand that our sister be killed?” Ky asks.

Phoenix shakes his head and rolls his eyes. “Of course not!”

Why would he do such a thing?

“Did you set our house on fire?”

“No, bu-.”

“Then it wasn’t your fault, Phoenix.” Tears sparkle in Ky’s eyes, but he holds Phoenix’s gaze.

Phoenix looks back until he starts to cry again.

“There was nothing you could’ve done. It wasn’t your fault.” Ky sniffles.

But there was, Phoenix murmurs to himself.

There was something he could’ve done, but he was too weak to do it. He doesn’t voice his thoughts aloud. Ky wouldn’t get it.

Phoenix blinks away the tears, but every time he closes his eyes, all he can see are the bodies of his parents and sister. How the fire had burnt their skin in the glimpses he caught through the raging flames. How his sister was tucked away between his parents, but even their protection wasn't enough.

How much time had Phoenix spent snuggled away in that exact position in the past? How often had he been cuddled up between his parents, never feeling as safe as he did between them just like that?

Phoenix glances at Ky. At least he doesn’t have those memories. At least he can remember their parents only as they were and their sister as she might have been. Not as they were in their final moments.

Phoenix’s heart twists as he thinks about just how close he might have been. If he had just been a little faster, a little stronger, who knew what could’ve been?

“What’s going on, Phoenix” Ky asks. “I know you. What aren't you telling me?”

There’s something in his brother’s gaze. Something so honest.

What is Phoenix supposed to say? Onyx and Ivy would know. They could help Ky and Phoenix through the conversation. There’s only been a handful of times where Phoenix has outright lied to his brother. Phoenix knows Ky deserves to know. He deserves to know and have answers, even if it’ll hurt. Even if Phoenix can barely get the words out.

He clenches his jaw so hard his teeth hurt and steels himself. He digs his claws into the ground to steady himself. He takes a deep breath because he feels like he’s about to pass out and the world is spinning and warping and his heart is about to beat out of his chest. What had he thought when he woke up this morning? That it was a beautiful day and that he had a gut feeling he would be meeting his new sibling soon?

Phoenix didn’t think he could be more wrong. He did get to meet his sibling, but only in the most twisted of senses— he met his sister dead as her body burned.

Eventually, he’s able to speak.

“They died there,” Phoenix whispers.

He doesn’t want to tell his brother. He doesn’t want his brother to know what their parents and sister looked like. He doesn’t want his brother to know it was him who couldn’t save their family like he was supposed to.

Ky closes his eyes, bites his lip, and deflates. He bumps his head against Phoenix’s neck and presses in close. Two brothers seeking out the only comfort they have.

“I…” he trails off. “I know. I knew what you weren’t saying. I didn’t want it to be true, but why else would you lie?”

“How?” How could Ky have known that Phoenix was lying to him?”

“You’re my brother, Phoenix. I know you, and I know that you wouldn’t want me to be hurting.”

“I couldn’t save them,” Phoenix whispers into the fur around Ky’s shoulders.

“It was’t your fault. It’s not on either of us to stop the King. It was such a big fire, and we’re kids. It’s the King’s fault.” Ky chokes as he starts to cry. “They shouldn’t have died, but it’s not our fault. It’s the King’s fault. I couldn’t have done anything, and neither could you.”

Phoenix steps back, lashing his tail.

“You don’t understand. You control illusions, but I control fire. Onyx said fire is me like I’m it. I should’ve been able to stop it.”

Tears stream down Ky’s face as he sobs.

“Phoenix, please. The fire was so big. It was already so huge. It was as big as the house. You couldn’t have stopped it. It was too big. It’s not our fault.”

“But I should’ve been able to. I was weak, Ky. I was weak, and it cost them their lives. I should’ve been able to save my family.”

Phoenix wants to scream. There’s too much energy coursing through his body, buzzing within, the beginnings of a firestorm with nowhere to go.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Ky whispers. His voice breaks, and Phoenix exhales through a snarl.

He doesn’t want to hear his brother cry. He doesn’t want to hear any of it. Phoenix pins his ears to his skull.

His claws dig into the soil. Fire bristles on his pelt. Every nerve in his body is alight, thrumming with energy and singing for destruction. Hate burns in his chest, and anger broils in his gut, a bubbling, churning storm howling within him. A demon baying for blood.

And Phoenix wants to feed it, wants to nurture that best in his soul the same way his parents did him until the King murdered them.

He grew stronger when he fed his fury to his powers. He managed to take down the Guard and Soldiers with that rage.

Phoenix could do it again. He could do it over and over again.

He could take down the King who’s not a King.

He was never a King. A true King wouldn’t murder those who disagree. A true King wouldn’t be the bad guy. Right?

Phoenix swipes at the grass, claws shredding through the blades, and he hisses out a sharp breath.

He has seen the bodies of his parents, lying motionless on the floor and he can’t forget. He knows what they looked like when they were alive, and he knows what he saw in the fire. He can’t put those two thoughts together; they won’t fit. How can the two be the same. How can the image of what he thought his sister might be fit with what he saw of her in the fire, too? Phoenix can’t make either of them work.

Phoenix stares through the ground, feeling hollow, and his jaw chatters as he shakes.

“I know they died in that fire, Phoenix,” Ky says softly, sitting down and wrapping his tail around his paws. His ears draw back to the sides. “And I think you saw them. It was the King. It was the Guard and Soldiers. It was them. It’s their fault. They’re the ones to blame!”

Phoenix’s eyes sting and he throws his head to the side with a snarl. Now is not the time for tears. Tears won’t solve anything. Tears won’t bring back his parents and sister. They’ll still be dead.

“I could’ve done something. I should never have stopped. We should’ve been faster. We should’ve run straight home. We should’ve fought the Guard and Soldiers. I should’ve burned them all! I felt the fire in the torch. I’m the fire and the fire is me, like Onyx said. I should’ve burned them all right there. I should’ve killed them when they were walking there. Ivy and Onyx would still be alive, and so would our sister.”

Ky shakes his head with teary eyes. “What reason did you have?

“Look what they did!”

“What reason did we have to suspect them? We thought they were trying to find the Wolf and the Dove.”

Phoenix twists his lips. “But we should’ve known. Why else would they be carrying a torch? Surely they were going to light something else on fire!”

“It was a torch!” Ky paces around a few steps, sniffling. He flicks his tail and sits down again. “Come on, Phoenix. It’s not your fault. It’s the King’s fault. He’s the one who did this. I want Ivy and Onyx back. I want Lucius to give them back. I… there-there wasn’t anything we could've done.”

Tears stream down Ky’s cheeks and his sides quiver with every breath. Voice thick, he chokes on a sob.

Phoenix holds his brother’s gaze for a moment, then looks away with a huff and a scowl. There must've been something he could’ve done. His parents and sister died by fire, and he controls fire. There has to have been.

Phoenix glares at the Guard who had been holding the torch. It’s his fault in part. Phoenix reaches out with his powers and latches onto the Guard’s skin and armor. As Phoenix feeds his energy into the Guard, he feels the heat building and building. There’s a new curl of smoke as broken flesh catches flame, a thin tendril that twists, following air currents, and it grows until the Guard’s body sparks and flickers and bursts into flames.

Phoenix watches as he channels more and more energy into the blaze. He feels himself growing tired and he wants to react, to feel something as he destroys another being’s body, but he feels almost nothing.

Why did you have to take away my parents? Why did you have to take away my sister?

The fire burns tall and bright, casting harsh shadows on the ground. As the flames flicker, light dances across the surrounding grass and trees. The hurt remains, but something settles.

I can destroy the cream puff.

Because the King isn’t the King.

He was too weak to do it himself. He couldn’t commit the murder of Onyx and Ivy and their daughter himself. He had to go and send others to do it.

Phoenix hates that so much. The hate burns in his gut and feeds that angry, churning thing, that feeling he cannot understand, doesn’t know what to do with, within him.

The King is like the little pastries Onyx and Ivy had told Phoenix about in their stories, soft and squishy and entirely destructible.

Because Phoenix will destroy him. He doesn’t get to order the deaths of Onyx and Ivy and kill them and their daughter and take away his and Ky’s parents and sister and then get away with it.

“You feel better now?” Ky asks.

Phoenix shakes his head. “No.”

Ky sighs. “Me neither.”

“Do you think we ever will?”

Ky shrugs. “I don’t know.”

“Ivy and Onyx would. They know basically everything.”

“Knew,” Ky corrects, and Phoenix wants to cry all over again.

“Knew,” he whispers.

xxxx

A flash of red in the grass catches Phoenix’s attention. It’s way off to the side of where their house used to stand. It’s not blood; it’s a different shade, and it intrigues Phoenix enough that he wanders over to investigate.

A red blanket, singed in places and smeared with dirt, but red. A soft shade, not harsh like the fire had been but not so soft that it borders on pink. A solid, yet soft, shade of red.

A baby blanket, Phoenix realizes.

One his parents had created. Phoenix nudges it with his nose, careful not to poke it with his canine teeth, as Ky approaches from behind. He recognizes the energy of Ivy’s magic. She hadn’t created it long ago, likely right before his sister’s birth. Phoenix hasn’t seen the blanket before.

“What’s that?” Ky asks.

“It was for our sister,” Phoenix murmurs, voice distant.

“Ivy made it?”

Phoenix can’t speak, so he nods. He folds his legs and curls up, rubbing his cheek on the blanket, careful of his upper canines and his flames. The blanket is already damaged; he doesn’t want to lose the last thing he has of his parents and the only piece of his sister he will ever get to truly see. Tears spring to his eyes and he can’t hold them back. Ky lays down beside him, length of his back against his.

“We can’t leave this here,” Ky says.

Phoenix shakes his head. “No.”

“We can’t carry it.”

Phoenix shakes his head again. “No.”

Ky is quiet for a few moments. “I want to wear it,” he states.

“Wear it?” Phoenix lifts his head and cranes his neck.

“Yeah, like around my neck. Tie it on.”

Together, they do manage to knot the blanket around Ky’s neck. The blanket is big enough that it will stay loose enough for Ky to grow into, but Phoenix hates the reminder that there’s going to be an after his parents and sister. A with Onyx and Ivy, and an after, a life without them when he cannot even imagine what it's going to be like without them to turn to, without them to guide him and Ky and teach them. A before his sister and now a without, because Phoenix never even knew her.

All she got was the shortest little life, when she should’ve gotten so much more before meeting Lucius.

Phoenix bristles.

His family is dead because of the King, the cream puff.

The cream puff has to pay.

The demon in Phoenix’s chest twists and pulls him in and he goes. Onyx and Ivy would know what to do with all these feelings that Phoenix can’t even take apart and make sense of. Onyx and Ivy would know what to do about a King who had just done something so bad, so horrific, like ordering the deaths of those who didn’t deserve it. Phoenix doesn’t know, and he hates it. He will figure it out. He has to.

The cream puff won’t pay by Phoenix sitting around and doing nothing. The cream puff will pay by hunting him down, and Phoenix will do that, no matter how long it takes and how hard it is. The cream puff will pay by Phoenix ripping him from this throne and destroying his life the same way he destroyed Phoenix’s life.

Phoenix was weak, and it cost Onyx and Ivy and his sister their lives. He won’t be weak like that again. He will grow stronger. He will learn to wield his power until no one can beat him, until he can stop any fire in its tracks, until no home will burn down again. He will learn to wield his power until no Guard and Soldier can destroy Onyx and Ivy and their daughter and Phoenix and Ky’s sister and hurt Phoenix and Ky like they did ever again.

You can’t do that. You don’t get to do that.

You will pay, Phoenix vows. You will all pay.

A growl rumbles deep in Phoenix’s throat, and his lips twist and contort into a grin that is all teeth.

“You just set the clock on your reign, cream puff.”