Cinder

At her core, she burned.

She was not what her lair hoped for and begged for when they prayed to the Flamecaller. She suspected they were willing to sacrifice everything to get that favored son they dreamed of, even her siblings and parents.

Fate can be cruel, but Cinder was not. She was fierce, distant, and obsessed with her craft, but not cruel. She worked with and within the fire melting metal, melting silica into glass, burning through the parchments, maps, and feathers that decorated the windswept lair of her family. Nothing stood against her intensity, not even her flesh, which burned from her body until her bones shone through.

At her core, she burned.

They had had a meeting about her. She had not been invited, but they did not ask her to leave when she joined them. They were kind. They didn’t hate her or shout at her, but they were worried. More for their future and their hatchlings then for her, but there was no malice in their words or hearts. They argued that her fiery soul was not a fit for the lair. That she was a danger to everyone around her. They begged her to leave, to find some place where her fire would be quenched.

Their words turned to ash as they flowed over her. She knew she must leave, but she did not want the fire to die. To be tamped and be destroyed.

At her core, she burned.

So she left. Cinder had no plan, nowhere to go, but no desire to threaten her family. She waited for a time in the cool ice fields to the south, but they did not appreciate her, did not really want her to stoke the furnace and begin to craft again.

At last a emissary came from the Earthshaker’s lands. A clan wanted her intricate creations of metal and glass, wanted her for her, and would not turn to ash, no matter how bright she burned.

At her core, she burned. And it was glorious.