Inferno

The Story of the Phoenix

(A Bonus The King's Remorse Story)

NOTES: This is from Phoenix's POV, like it was in the original Inferno short story and takes place roughly a decade before The King's Remorse. This is the backstory discussed in Chapter 10 'Poppy' of the Reborn section of The King's Remorse

As you may be able to guess, there are:

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

Everything that was discussed by Phoenix in Chapter 10 'Poppy' of the Reborn section of The King's Remorse happens in this chapter, but instead of it being discussed as events that happened in the past, those things play out in the present and are from the perspective of ten-year-old Phoenix

Please do note the warnings, as these events are no longer spoken about in the past tense; they happen in the present and are shown right when they happen with the immediate reactions. Phoenix's backstory deals with very heavy topics that affected him greatly— he is who he is in the current time, a decade after the events he shared in Chapter 10 'Poppy' in large part because of what happened to him that day

Please take care to protect your wellbeing!

And if you ever find yourself struggling, please reach out for help— there are hotlines available, although the numbers and how to contact them depend on where you are. Your mental health is just as important as your physical health!

I wrote this short story as a Halloween short story two years ago— one of four short stories I wrote during the 'spooky season.' I knew Phoenix's backstory since around the time I created his character about eight or nine years ago; since I knew in 2022 that I would be editing The King's Remorse upon finishing Pockets of Gold and Silver, my previous work, I wrote out the short story. That version, written in 2022, was accurate to the original draft of The King's Remorse. However, it's not accurate to this current The King's Remorse. With the story hitting the plot point where Phoenix finally decides to share, I decided to edit the short story. So, without further ado, here is the edited and updated short story of Inferno:

Phoenix bares his teeth in a snarl.

"Get back here! You coward!" he growls.

"Never!"

"That's it. I'm gonna make you stop. I'm gonna get you!"

Phoenix accelerates to a sprint, paws thudding against the soil as a smile tugs at his mouth. He pricks his ears, tail high in the air as he races forward. He's nearly there. So close he can taste it, and his flames sing on his pelt, responding to his excitement. Just one step more, and -.

His forelegs slam into a barrier and he pitches forward, head over tail. Dirt sprays in the air as he skids across the ground with a low oomph. He grumbles and scrunches up his face, letting the fire covering his black fur blaze hotter to burn off the dirt covering him.

"That was rude, Ky." He spits leaves out of his mouth and glares at his brother from where he lays on the ground. He flicks his tongue against his teeth to loosen the dirt.

Ky gives a smug grin, shaking out his tan fur. His brown eyes glow with humor, and his fluffy tail flicks.

"You have your fire, and I have my illusions. It isn't my fault you're not the Wolf and aren't immune to magic."

Phoenix gives a pouty sulk and sends a thin line of fire toward Ky, who leaps out of the way. Their parents, Ivy and Onyx, had mentioned the so-called Wolf, the person who would take down the evil King. Phoenix thought the King was a made-up bad guy meant to scare him and Ky into going to bed. But he wasn't scared of bad guys. He had his fire.

"Meanie! Don't burn me!" Ky scampers out of range when the line of fire tickles Ky's toes.

"You're just scared. Nothing burns that I don't want to burn, so if I burn you, I mean it."

Ky looks up at Phoenix with big eyes. "You'd burn me?"

Phoenix flattens his expression and nods, narrowing his eyes and leaning forward when Ky's face melts into something sad and pathetic.

Phoenix can only keep a straight face for a few moments before his expression cracks and he shakes his head, smiling. "Nah, I like you too much."

"That's what I thought!" Ky harrumphs stalks forward, chest puffed out and head high. His oversized ears droop slightly over his head.

Phoenix shakes off his excess energy from their interaction, then ducks down, forelimbs braced against the ground as he crouches in a play bow. "Think you can get me?"

Ky prances in a circle. He drops down to mirrors the pose, and the long fur on his chest and belly brushes the ground. "I think I can!"

He lunges, and Phoenix scampers out of the way, jumping up onto a low hanging branch of a nearby tree to escape his brother's attack. He unsheathes his claws to climb. His weight on the joints of his toes aches, but he has to escape his brother. When Ky starts climbing the tree, Phoenix sets a ring of fire around the trunk, blocking his brother's path upward. Ky retaliates with an illusion of rain.

Even though Phoenix knows the rain isn't real, his flames still begin to sputter, despite his efforts to keep them going. His attempts at practicing and growing stronger have yet to truly pay off, like his father, Onyx, say they will. Yet, he reminds himself. Onyx couldn't create his massive, intricate stone creations when he was a kitten Phoenix's age, he said over and over.

Practice, he had stressed when Phoenix grew frustrated at how his magic wouldn't respond during one of their training sessions. Work with your fire, not against it. The two of you are one. You are fire, and fire is you, just as I am stone and stone is me.

What is Ky? Phoenix had asked.

Ky is like your mother. Ivy is a part of everything you see around us.

Phoenix had walked in a circle, eyes wide as he took in everything around him, until he had tripped over his paws. Trees and flowers and vines and leaves surrounded him from all angles.

Ivy's all of that?

Onyx had nodded. Yes, she is. She's woven into the web of the plant life. She's a part of the life. She isn't plants, not like you and I are stone and fire. Ky's like Ivy in that illusions have a life to them, but not in the way that Erebus made illusions for Aiyana to carry into this world. Ky creates his illusions and casts them upon a living being; they don't exist without someone to act upon.

Ky's really powerful. Ivy's super strong.

Onyx had smiled, his slate eyes lightening like a mountainside warming beneath the morning sun. The stripes on his cheeks had shifted as he had dropped his head to make eye contact with his son.

Ivy is the strongest being I know. She's amazing. Both you and Ky are beyond powerful, each in your own way, and more than either of you know. Your magic is powerful, Phoenix, but there's more to strength than physical capability and what you can do with your magic.

"Cheater," Phoenix grumbles at Ky's illusion.

"It's called using your resources," Ky shoots back.

Phoenix opens his mouth to speak, but before he can, his dad appears from the trees.

"Ky! Phoenix! Come over here!" Onyx shouts, an excitement in his voice that has Phoenix leaping off the tree without looking at the ground beforehand.

The landing sends a force jolting up his bones, but he barely feels it.

Onyx towers over Ky and Phoenix, easily over three times their size, with short grey fur and ancient, dark slate eyes. Light fur lines his belly, right where Phoenix likes to curl up and sleep; the fur is long enough to be cozy but not so long that he overheats. Ivy's fur is soft but she's too fluffy and Phoenix doesn't like it.

"Your mother just had her baby," Onyx says, voice trembling as he smiles, fangs showing beyond his lips, just like Phoenix's canines, except that Onyx's are further back in his mouth. "You have a little sister!"

Phoenix gasps. His sister can play with him and Ky!

Ky leaps into the air. "Really?"

Their father nods. "You can come meet her."

Ky turns back to Phoenix. "Come on, let's go!"

"I will be back at the home. Your mom needs me. We'll be waiting for you, so don't be long!"

"Yeah," Phoenix replies distantly.

A sister.

What a big responsibility. Ky and Phoenix will have to show her all their favorite games and make sure she learns all the rules right so they can play properly. They will have to show her the forest so they can run around all day and show her the best hunting spots.

But her magic!

Surely they'll have to make new games to play when they learn what her magic is. The possibilities are endless. What will her magic be? What can they play? What games will they be able to make up? What ideas will she have?

Phoenix shivers with glee at the thought. Maybe she'll think up games not even Phoenix and Ky thinking together could ever come up with!

"I will see you there. I need to help Ivy." Onyx ducks off into the trees, slipping away on the path back home.

Phoenix knows he is using his stone magic to make his journey back home faster.

Their shared home of four —now five— feline individuals is a little den hidden away far off on the side of Ragdon Island, away from the main settlement of the Sea, a place where Ky and Phoenix had been told the majority of the others live and that it is very close to where King Garonda XIV's castle sits

Neither Onyx nor Ivy told Phoenix much, but some bedtime stories featured the King as the villain and the Wolf and the Dove as the sibling heroes who would overthrow the tyrannical King. Phoenix had smiled and wiggled in excitement the first few times hearing the story, clambering up closer to his mother to hear more of the story. More about how the Wolf and the Dove had their own powers and could shift into their respective animal. Ky had gasped in awe at that, and Ivy had returned a smile to the both of them with such warmth and love that made Phoenix feel all fuzzy inside.

Phoenix knew the King was real, but bedtime stories always ended with the hero defeating the villain in a satisfying conclusion, if Phoenix didn't fall asleep first.

Ky bounds ahead a few paces after Onyx is gone and the brothers have gotten over their combined shock at having a sister, then turns around. "Come on, Phoenix! Let's go!"

Phoenix smiles. "Race you there! Last one back has to catch dinner for a week!"

He breaks off into a sprint.

"No fair! You started first!" Ky whines.

"You're just saying that 'cus you know I'm gonna win!" Phoenix shoots back.

"No way!"

"Yes, too!"

Phoenix grunts as Ky tackles him to the ground, swatting at him with his paws, claws sheathed. He sulks, eyes narrowed and nose wrinkled, then rolls over onto his back, kicking his hind legs into Ky's stomach and throwing him off. But his brother just bounds forward again and wraps his paws around Phoenix's shoulders, teeth wrapping around his ear.

Phoenix is just about to bat at the side of Ky's face to get him to let go, when he sees a string of Guard and Soldiers marching through the forest. Members of the army of King Garonda XIV, the King of Ragdon. The Guard carry their usual bows in hand, arrows neatly tucked away in their quivers and leather armor strapped on tight. The Soldiers have their swords sheathed in their scabbards, and their metal armor rattles with every step as they plod through the forest.

What are they doing here?

One of the Guard holds a flaming torch, and the fire calls out to Phoenix, although he ignores it. Maybe they just want better lighting?

Phoenix pauses, foreleg halfway to reaching Ky's face, and his brother's grip on his ear loosens, and then lets go completely as Ky sits back on his haunches. The brothers watch as the Guard and Soldiers slowly make their way past, before they disappear out of sight. The Guard and Soldiers don't spare them a glance, and Phoenix doesn't think they had seen him or his brother.

"What are they doing here?" Ky asks.

Phoenix tilts his head to the side with a frown. He shrugs. "No idea."

"That's strange."

"Very. Maybe they're looking for the Wolf and the Dove?"

"Ooh, yeah! I think so! Maybe the Wolf and the Dove are out searching for ways to kill the King! Like those stories Onyx and Ivy told us."

Phoenix stands up and shakes off the strange interaction with seeing the Guard and Soldiers. "Come on, let's keep going. We need to meet our baby sister!"

The brothers take off again, racing through the forest. Trees pass by in a blur as they follow a trail they have run across a thousand times before.

They are just about to turn onto the final stretch of the path to their home when a boom rolls across the landscape. The ground shakes, and songbirds flutter up into the air with squawks of alarm. Phoenix skids to a halt, looking all around as his ears swivel to find the source of the sound. He draws in a wheezing breath as he shrinks in on himself.

"What was that?" he asks.

"I don't know," Ky murmurs.

It starts off as just an itch, a little tickle in the back of Phoenix's mind. But when he draws in a breath through his nose and that sharp scent makes contact with his brain, Phoenix jerks his head up with a gasp.

Smoke.

He can smell smoke, and it calls to him like those flames on the Guard's torch had. It draws in his powers, and he knows which direction it's coming from. He can see the faint clouds rising above the tree line.

"We need to get home now."

There must be some measure of panic in his voice, because Ky runs just as quickly as he does. They each push the other a little faster, and then a little faster, then faster still.

They cover the distance in not even a quarter of the time it would've normally taken them, and Phoenix hardly sees his surroundings— he just follows the smoke and the growing haze spreading through the trees. Ky sneezes as the smog grows thicker in the air, but Phoenix doesn't react. Fire has never bothered him. It can't. They're intertwined; each inextricable from the other.

"No..." Phoenix breathes as he slows to a halt in front of his home.

What was once a little house made by Onyx and Ivy tucked away within the forest has been consumed by fire, and the flames reach up well over halfway as high as the surrounding trees with smoke pouring out above the treetops. Phoenix's ears draw back against the sides of his skull as he whimpers high in the back of his throat. He starts to shake. The tree their house had been built around is blazing in bright reds and oranges, and bits of the branches and dirt that had made up the walls of their home are blackened and charred.

Shock keeps Phoenix frozen in place, mind blank and flatlining, until Ky bumps into him when he backs up as the flames explode out a former window, sending sparks and debris flying and more smoke billowing out into the air. Phoenix's brain finally makes the connections and realizes what he's seeing.

"I-I..." Ky chokes out.

Phoenix watches the flames dance before his eyes.

He has never been afraid of fire.

Fire is his friend. It is his shadow. His constant companion.

Flames flicker across his pelt, caress his skin with a warm touch, and are his comfort. He is never without his fire. They are each other.

But as he gazes at the fire consuming his home, fear snakes around his heart, digging jagged talons into his chest and making his throat close up.

For the first time ever, he hates fire, and he sees anything but comfort in it. He wants to rip it from his skin, tear himself away from his fire.

How can it destroy his home? It's supposed to be a friend, not burn something so familiar.

"Phoenix!" Ky cries.

"Our mother and father are in there," Phoenix whimpers, eyes wide with horror. He tries to fold in on himself, curl up as tight as he can, and he backs up into Ky, who leans into him just as hard as he leans into Ky.

"And our sister," Ky adds.

"No, no, no," Phoenix gasps.

And once he can get his legs to start working again, he sprints toward his home, ignoring Ky's screams for him to come back. Phoenix isn't sure he can stop running if he tried. He just knows that his parents are inside his home, inside that fire, and so is his sister, and he has to save them. The fire is the bad guy, and he can defeat the bad guy, just like in those bedtime stories. He doesn't want to leave Ky behind, because what if the fire spreads and it gets to Ky, too, but Ky's strong— Onyx said so. Phoenix has to save his parents and his sister.

Phoenix rushes into the inferno, but instead of feeling comfort as the blaze engulfs him and the feeling of coming home, all he feels is pain. Pins and needles prickle at his flesh as the flames lick his skin. Heat sears his paw pads as he makes contact with the floor of his house and he's forced to stop just as soon as he's made it inside. Sparks and blinding reds and yellows and oranges batter all around him, and he soon loses where he is, despite having lived in the house for his whole life. He can't see anything, not even his own nose or whiskers. Each breath is grating, smoke like sand against his throat and rubbing his insides raw. He squints against the howling wind, the tornado of the spiraling flames, and pins his ears to the sides of his skull as he tries to adjust and tell up from down, make sense of where he is.

Phoenix shouts for his parents, begs for them to reply, but his voice is lost to the fire.

He pricks his ears and swivels them around, straining for any sound.

But he can only hear the roar of the blaze, the crackling of the flames, the scream of the wind as it batters him from every angle.

He reaches out with his powers, feels the thrumming energy of the inferno as it merges with the energy within himself, and tries to take hold. He tries to channel his abilities, just like his father had taught him. The fire is me, just as I am the fire.

But the fire is too strong, too chaotic. He cannot get a grip on the flames, cannot latch on and begin to call to the blaze to make it respond to his will.

Phoenix plants his paws on the ground and levels himself. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, curling his lip as the heat of the fire bakes the flesh of his mouth, and then stares down the inferno as its flames dance all around him in a dizzying array of reds and oranges.

"Come on," he hisses as he tries to latch onto the power of the fire, grip onto some small piece and begin casting out his control. But every attempt fails, bounces right off like water on the feathers of ducks he had seen out in the Singing Marshes. He's harmless against the inferno, and he hates the feeling. And as desperation grows within him, he continues to try and he continues to fail.

"Come on!" Phoenix stares wide-eyed at the flames, lashing his tail. "I am you, and you are me. Onyx said so! Why won't you listen? I have to save my family!"

Again and again and again and again he tries to take control of the blaze, and each attempt fails and the fire just continues to howl and shriek on every side of him.

Phoenix begs for his parents to come to him, begs for his newborn sister to somehow make her way toward him so he can bring her to safety.

"Please," he whimpers. "I have to save you. They want to kill you. They're trying to kill you and I don't understand why."

His legs give out, and he slowly crumples to the ground as the flames roar around him. He draws in a shaky breath that rakes against his irritated throat, and he coughs. Fire cannot truly harm him and neither can smoke, but a part of him wishes it could. Wishes it could do real damage so he didn't have to feel the pain and the worry and the agony of the unknown. It hurts so much and Phoenix doesn't know what to do with the pain. He wants his parents. They'd know what to do. They'd know how to help. They always do.

Phoenix sniffles. He looks around, but he can only see the fire.

He tries again. "Onyx! Ivy! Sister! I'm here! I can get you out!"

Phoenix gets to his paws and stumbles forward, moving through memory since the fire still blinds him to everything. He keeps his stance wide as he staggers and tries to keep his bearings.

When he reaches the part of the home where they all slept, a branch crashes the ground, sending up a cloud of sparks and ash in a flare of whites and yellows. Phoenix scrambles back a few paces and shakes his head to clear his vision from the blinding flash of the impact.

He bumps into a wall of stone, half built and mostly crumbled. It's the work of his father— it's too big and intentionally shaped to be natural. As Phoenix looks around, he can see the remains of his mother's magic; charred vines spread across the floor and walls like blackened veins. The beginnings of a thick tree surround the area, curling around the stone, incomplete and hastily crafted, nothing like some of the intricate creations Phoenix has seen Ivy make.

They had been in here. His parents had been in this room.

Hope flares in Phoenix's chest. He's getting close.

If his mother's vines are still here —if his mother's vines and tree haven't yet completely burned— then they must be nearby.

Phoenix clings to that bit of hope. He tries to scent the air but can only smell smoke and everything that's burning, but he catches onto something else, something sharper. Something that makes his stomach twist, though he doesn't know why. He just knows through some instinct that it's wrong. A part of him wants to turn back around and leave fast, but he can't. Not when he's found a sign of his parents, and if he's close to his parents, then he must also be close to his sister. If he's close, he can save them. Ky's waiting, and he has to keep going.

Phoenix takes a few steps forward and then trips over two lumps on the ground. For the second time that day, he falls down face-first. He jolts upright and shakes out his fur, whirling around and squinting into the flames. He slides his paws forward, trying to find what he had bumped into.

He doesn't find it at first, but then he does. Phoenix feels something solid, yet burned from the flames. Crouching down, he nudges the shape with his nose, and his whiskers brush across it. Except, he feels fur. Long fur, singed and broken and stiff and patchy from the flames, bur fur all the same.

Ivy.

Phoenix scrambles back and trips over his paws and tail, falling onto his side and hitting his elbow on the ground. He wants to stay down, but he can't leave what he knows but cannot admit to himself. He claws himself back forward, dragging himself on his stomach and closing the distance.

His heart sinks through his toes and his expression falls as tears well up in his eyes and stream down his cheeks but they evaporate as soon as they fall in the fire. Just as quickly, the hope plummets into horror and decays into despair.

"No," he pleads, voice cracking and raising several octaves in pitch until it borders on a whine. "Please, no. No, no, no, please. Come on, please."

"Please," he begs, ears drawing to the sides as he gathers his legs beneath him, leaning back, and shakes his head. "No..."

His lips quiver, and his body begins to shake.

Up close, Phoenix can catch glimpses through the roaring flames of two blackened shapes and the faintest hint of a third, tucked away beneath limbs. One is the size of his father, one is the size of his mother, and the third is small enough to be his newborn sister.

None of them are moving.

Phoenix gasps, flattening himself to the ground as horror seizes his throat. He claws at his face as he struggles to get enough air into his lungs. He shudders from shock, and his vision blurs. He knows what he is seeing, but none of it makes sense. How can they all be here? Phoenix just saw Onyx. His father just told him that Ivy had given birth to a daughter. Ky and Phoenix were supposed to meet her.

Why did Lucius have to take them?

Why did the King have to kill them?

Why did the King have to send Guard and Soldiers to set their house on fire?

Why couldn't Phoenix save his family?

The Guard and Soldiers and King are the bad guys, and the heroes are supposed to defeat the bad guys. Why couldn't Phoenix defeat the bad guys this time?

"Onyx, Ivy," Phoenix whimpers, voice shattering until he screams and cries and sobs. He falls apart.

He knows he has found the bodies of his parents and sister, but he doesn't want to admit it.

"Sister," he whines, shaking as he curls up beside his dead parents.

He reaches out with a paw toward their bodies without looking but doesn't touch. He can't. He can't touch them. He's afraid, terrified. Onyx and Ivy would know what to do, but they're not here.

"Wake up," Phoenix begs, tears streaming down his face, lost to the flames just like his voice is. "Please, wake up."

Phoenix should go back outside and tell Ky, but how could he? What would he say?

How could he tell his brother that he was too late? That he had the opportunity to save his family but he couldn't do so? That he was too weak to bend the fire to his will and make it stop? How could he tell his brother that he couldn't save his family, when if he had been just a little faster and a little stronger they could both be meeting their sister right now? How could he tell Ky that he was just a little too late, that he was so close?

Phoenix chokes, then draws in a gasping breath.

He's a coward and he knows it, but he can't go face his brother. He wishes yet again that he wasn't immune to fire. That he couldn't just lay in here until the flames die down and then walk away unscathed. Maybe if his powers were over water he could've done something, but he knows that's a lie. He had every ability to stop the fire, but now he's too late.

His parents are dead, and so is his little sister.

It doesn't matter that he's a kid. He can control fire. He should've been able to save his family. And they would still be here if he wasn't so weak.

Phoenix turns his attention toward the bodies of his parents. "Please," he whimpers. "Please wake up. Please come back."

They don't move. Everything is silent despite the roar of the fire and the howl of the wind. Phoenix can't hear any of it.

His parents don't budge, and neither does his sister. The flames continue to eat at their bodies. Phoenix watches as his sister's tail curls up as the fire burns her flesh, the only part of her he can see.

"No, stop it," he sniffles, reaching out yet again to the blaze and trying to take hold of it. To force it to move away and leave his family alone. To stop destroying the last thing he has of them.

"Please, stop."

But the inferno keeps burning, keeps battering every surface of his home, keeps roaring around him, keeps chipping away at everything he has known.

Phoenix curls up a little tighter on the floor of his home, right beside the parents of his sister. He wishes he could see Onyx and Ivy again and get just a little longer with them. He wishes he could meet his sister and know her name. He wishes he could get a little time as a whole family.

He stretches out a paw, squeezes his eyes shut, and imagines, with sobs wracking his sides, that it was any other afternoon and they were all taking a nap together, as one happy family. It was ok that he doesn't know his sister because she was going to play with him and Ky later. She was going to tell him her name when she wakes up, because she's going to wake up. She just needs more time. Lucius is going to give her back, because they can't keep her. They can't keep Phoenix's family.

Can't Lucius understand that Phoenix needs his family?

It's not fair.

He needs his parents.

The world is so big for just him and Ky.

Phoenix shivers despite the overwhelming heat of the inferno.

He can pretend for just a little longer. He can pretend his parents and sister back into life, and then this will all just be a horrible memory. He can wish hard enough, and they'll all be a family again.

But Phoenix knows he can't, and he knows he and Ky are alone.

The fire slowly consumes more of the home he grew up in and the bodies of his parents and sister. Phoenix will have to leave soon; he doesn't know when the house will collapse. He doesn't want to. He wants to stay here forever. He wants to keep pretending. He wants to hide, stay here with his parents and sister. He doesn't want to leave. He needs his parents. He doesn't want to face the world without them. They'd know what to do, and he doesn't.

"Please."

xxxx

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 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.

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 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.

"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."

There were some changes made to the Inferno short story. Somehow both fewer and more than I thought I'd be making. I ended up rewriting quite a bit to try to better capture ten-year-old Phoenix's voice. That day truly did destroy him, but I'd also ask the question of who wouldn't it destroy? The main changes were in the way that Ivy and Onyx did know the King; they were Generals in his army, as said in Chapter 10 'Poppy' of Grey's Reborn section of The King's Remorse, and they left the King, giving what, in the King's mind, was reason enough for him to order his Guard and Soldiers to track down and commit the murders of Ivy, Onyx, and Poppy. Another big change was adding in Lucius- at the time of the previous draft of Inferno, I had not yet fully created Lucius's character, but since I now know them better and they are my personification of Death, I needed to make sure they were added in

In case it wasn't clear already, there was nothing Phoenix or Ky could have done to stop that fire. Ky's illusions alone couldn't have stopped the fire, and the only way he maybe could have saved Ivy, Onyx, and Poppy was by casting an illusion directly on their minds to take control and get them out of the fire. However, Ky wasn't powerful enough yet to do that (he could only create illusions that would affect people in general, not yet individuals). Phoenix did not yet have the power to stop a fire burning that big and strong.

And, by the time Ky and Phoenix reached their home, Ivy, Onyx, and Poppy had already passed away and met Lucius

With this draft, too, I really wanted to make sure that I tried to capture the emotions. Phoenix, and Ky too, are both complicated characters. Phoenix's nature was very largely impacted by this day and what he experienced here with seeing the fire and then facing the Guard and Soldiers, including the Guard with the torch.

I hope you have a great weekend

-Werewolf14- :)

This edited short story was posted on September 7, 2024. I'll likely be writing some more short stories later on this year so keep an eye out! :)