Dawn After the Burning

Victor POV

I woke to needle pain.

"Hold still," Widow Cora said, stitching my forehead. "Almost done."

My body ached like I'd been dropped from a great height. Every breath hurt, and when I sat up, the world spun.

"Easy, sprout." Papa's voice was rough. His hands helped me sit while Widow Cora finished. His face was bruised and bloody, eyes that had seen terrible things.

"There." Widow Cora tied off the stitches. "You'll have a scar, but could've been worse. I'm no Master Elena, but I learned enough."

I touched my forehead, feeling rough stitches.

"Papa? What happened to you?"

"What happened to me?" He made a sound like broken laughter. "Victor, look around."

I did, and my stomach dropped.

We weren't in my bedroom or cottage. We were in Papa's tool shed, except now it was broken wood and metal scattered everywhere. Sunlight streamed down because there was no roof.

"The bad men," I whispered, and it all came back. The crash. Mama's scream. The big man trying to grab me. An enormous force breaking loose inside me.

"They're gone," Papa said quietly. "The raiders left hours ago."

"Where's Mama? Where's baby Naelira?"

Papa's face went stone-still. "They took them, Victor. They took a lot of people."

The words hit like physical blows. Mama, gone. Baby Naelira, my perfect little sister, taken by bad men.

"Are they hurt? Are they scared?"

"I don't know." Papa's voice was steady, but pain filled his eyes. "But we're going to find them. We're going to bring them home."

I tried to stand, but my legs were shaky. Papa caught me, arms wrapping around me like he was afraid I'd disappear too.

"The shed," I said, looking at the destruction. "I made this happen, didn't I?"

"You survived," Papa said firmly. "That's what matters."

But the truth was obvious in the twisted beams, in the perfect circle of destruction centered where I'd been standing. The magic I'd been so careful to control had exploded out like a storm.

"I couldn't stop it. I tried, but it was too big."

"Sometimes when we're afraid or angry, things happen we can't control. That doesn't make them your fault."

The Village Square

The center of Hearthvale looked like a battlefield.

Three cottages had burned to foundations, timbers smoking. A dozen more showed violence: doors torn off, windows smashed, walls scorched. Bloodstains darkened cobblestones.

Survivors gathered around the old well, maybe forty people. Some nursed injuries. Master Willem had his arm in a sling, Widow Cora's face bruised. Others just looked lost.

"They came from three directions," Henrik said, pointing toward hills. "Professional work, they knew what they were doing."

"How many?" asked Sarah, voice shaky.

"Fifty, maybe more. All armed, all trained. This wasn't bandits, this was organized."

I leaned against Papa's side, listening to adults talk about terrible things. But underneath their words, fear and anger radiated from everyone.

"They took Lyra and the baby," Papa said when his turn came. "Along with most women and children they could catch. They tried to take Victor too, but he was trapped when the shed came down."

"Lucky thing," muttered Old Willem. "From what I hear, they were asking specifically about a child with unusual eyes."

My stomach clenched. They'd come for me. All of this because someone had seen me practicing magic.

"Who knew?" Papa's voice was quiet but dangerous. "Who knew about Victor's abilities?"

Confused murmurs rippled through the group. People looked at each other with genuine bewilderment.

"Kael the merchant," Henrik said finally. "Came through about eight months ago, seemed interested in asking questions about unusual happenings."

"Information gathering. They planned this for months," Papa said, hands clenching into fists.

"What do we do now?" Henrik said grimly. "We can't fight fifty professional raiders with garden tools and a few swords."

"We get help," Papa said immediately. "Send messages to larger towns."

"From who?" Willem laughed bitterly. "The king's soldiers? They came for Seraphine, but that was court business. They're not coming back for village problems. Face it, Gregor, we're on our own."

"Then we handle it ourselves," Papa replied, voice hard as iron. "I won't leave my wife and daughter in slavers' hands."

"You're one man against an army," Henrik pointed out. "That's suicide."

"Then it's suicide." Papa's arm tightened around me. "But I won't abandon my family."

I looked up at his battered face, determination there, and felt a shift inside me. Papa was willing to die trying to rescue Mama and Naelira. Unless he wasn't alone.

"I want to help," I said quietly.

The adults turned to look at me with surprise, concern, pity, fear. To them, I was still young, even if I'd shown abilities beyond my years.

But I was more than that. I had power, dangerous power that had already killed at least one raider.

"Victor," Papa said gently, "I know you want to help. But this is work for adults."

"They took Mama and Naelira because of me," I said louder. "Because I have magic and someone saw it. This is my fault."

"No." Papa knelt so we were eye to eye, hands gripping my shoulders. "This is not your fault. These men chose to hurt innocent people for money. That choice belongs to them, not you."

"But I can help fight them," I insisted. "I have power."

"You're seven years old."

"I'm stronger than I look!"

Papa studied my face for a long moment. Around us, the other villagers watched with careful attention.

Finally, Papa stood up. "If you really want to help," he said slowly, "you'll need to prove you can handle yourself in a fight. Real fighting, not practice."

"Gregor," Henrik warned, "what are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking that if my son is determined to come with me to Blackhaven, I'd rather know how much I can count on him before we're facing fifty armed raiders." Papa walked over to the weapons pile and selected two practice swords, both wooden but weighted like steel.

"If you can land one solid hit on me," he said, offering me one of the swords, "I'll consider letting you come. If you can't, then you stay here with the other survivors."

I stared at the practice sword he held out. Papa was hurt from the night's fighting, but he was still Papa, the man who'd been a soldier before he was a blacksmith.

"I don't really know how to use a sword," I admitted.

"Then this will be good practice," Papa said. "In real combat, you might need to use whatever weapon you can find."

Aunt Seraphine's lessons came to mind: control and precision and never using magic when emotions were running high. But so did Papa's words. Mama and baby Naelira taken by strangers, scared and alone somewhere far from home.

"Okay," I said, and felt magic begin to stir in my chest like a sleeping dragon opening one eye. "But if I win, we leave for Blackhaven today."

Papa smiled, and for the first time since I'd woken up, it looked genuine. "Deal."

The Test

We faced each other in the center of the square, both holding practice swords.

"Rules," Papa announced. "This is a combat assessment, not a duel. I need to see your full range of abilities. We stop when I'm satisfied you can handle yourself in a real fight." He looked at me seriously. "And Victor, no holding back. If you're coming with me, I need to see everything you can do."

I nodded, trying to calm the nervous excitement building in my stomach. Around us, villagers had formed a rough circle.

"Begin," Henrik called out.

Papa moved first, advancing steadily with his sword in guard position. He was being careful, testing what I would do.

I tried to copy his stance, holding my practice sword the way I'd seen him work at the forge, but it felt awkward and heavy. When he committed to his first attack, a controlled thrust aimed at my shoulder, I attempted to block like I'd seen soldiers do.

The impact jarred my arms and nearly knocked the sword from my grip. Papa's blade slid past my clumsy guard and tapped my shoulder.

"Dead," Papa said calmly, stepping back. "Try again."

I reset my stance, but it was obvious I had no idea what I was doing. Papa's next few attacks came slowly, giving me chances to learn, but even his patient instruction couldn't overcome my complete lack of training. After the third time his blade found its mark, I was breathing hard and frustrated.

"I can't do this," I said, lowering my sword. "I don't know how to fight with weapons."

"Then use what you do know," Papa said. "In real combat, you'll need every advantage you can get."

I dropped the practice sword and stepped back, feeling magic stir in my chest. This was what I'd been trained for.

When Papa advanced again, I was ready. Not with steel, but with power that had been growing inside me for years.

When he committed to his next attack, I was already moving. Not away from the blade, but inside his guard, slipping under his extended arm like water flowing around a stone.

My small fist, enhanced with just a touch of force magic, caught him in the ribs. Not hard enough to break anything, but enough to drive air from his lungs and make him stagger.

The crowd gasped. I'd actually hit him.

But Papa recovered faster than I'd expected, spinning to backhand me with the sword's pommel. I managed to duck, but just barely.

"Good speed," Papa said, not even breathing hard. "But one lucky shot doesn't win a fight."

He came at me again, more aggressively. The practice sword wove through air in patterns I couldn't follow, forcing me to give ground with each step. I tried to use my size advantage, staying low and close where the longer weapon was awkward, but Papa had decades of experience fighting smaller, faster opponents.

A thrust that turned into a pommel strike caught me across the shoulder, sending me stumbling. I was losing, and we both knew it.

That's when I stopped trying to fight like a normal person and started fighting like a mage.

The water trough beside the well exploded upward in a geyser of liquid silver, every drop moving according to my will. Papa's eyes widened as a wall of water slammed into him from the side, not enough to hurt but sufficient to knock him off balance.

While he was recovering, I called fire, not the gentle flames from my lessons with Aunt Seraphine, but hotter and brighter. A ribbon of golden flame spiraled around the practice sword, heating the wood until steam began to rise from Papa's grip.

He dropped the weapon with a curse, shaking his burned fingers. But instead of retreating, he did the unexpected: he smiled.

"Now we're getting somewhere," he said, and launched himself at me with nothing but bare hands and reckless courage.

What followed was the strangest fight of my young life. Papa couldn't match my magic, but he knew how to read people, how to predict their movements, how to turn their strengths against them. When I sent fire at him, he rolled aside and closed distance while I was concentrating on the spell. When I tried to trip him with animated vines, he was already moving to where the plants couldn't reach.

I was faster and had more raw power, but he was smarter and more experienced. We danced around each other in the morning sun, neither able to land the decisive blow.

Until Papa made a mistake.

He'd been favoring his left side since the fight began, an injury from the night before. When he pivoted to avoid a burst of pressurized water, he moved just a fraction slower than he should have.

The opening appeared and I took it without thinking. I reached for that scary feeling from the shed, when everything went wrong and the air got thick and heavy. But it wouldn't come back no matter how hard I tried. Instead, a different force built up in my chest: hot and angry and wanting to push. The invisible force shot out of my hands and sent Papa flying backward into the well's stone rim.

The impact echoed across the square like thunder. Papa slumped against the stones, the breath knocked out of him, blood trickling from a new cut on his forehead.

For a moment, nobody moved. Then Papa started laughing.

"Well," he wheezed, struggling to sit up, "I guess that counts as a solid hit."

The crowd erupted in shocked murmurs. I ran to Papa's side, terrified that I'd hurt him badly, but he waved me off with a rueful grin.

"I'm fine, sprout. Bruised pride hurts worse than bruised ribs." He looked at me with awe in his eyes. "Where did you learn to fight like that?"

"I didn't," I admitted. "I just did what felt right."

"Natural instincts." Papa struggled to his feet, accepting Henrik's help. "Combined with that level of raw power... Victor, you're not just magically gifted. You're a born battle-mage."

I didn't know what that meant, but from the way the other adults were looking at me (with respect instead of pity, wariness instead of dismissal), I understood that a fundamental shift had occurred.

"So," I said, trying to keep my voice steady, "do I get to come with you?"

Papa looked around the circle of watching faces, seeing the same thing I did: people who'd just witnessed a seven-year-old boy defeat a veteran soldier using nothing but instinct and magical power.

"You get to come," he said finally. "But Victor... what we're planning isn't a rescue mission. It's war. Once we leave Hearthvale, there's no going back to the way things were."

Mama's gentle hands checking my forehead for fever came to mind. Baby Naelira's tiny fingers wrapped around mine. The promise I'd made to always protect my little sister.

"I know," I said quietly. "But they're my family. I'm not leaving them with the bad men."

Papa nodded slowly, understanding passing between us. "Then we'd better start planning. Because if we're going to war, we're going to do it right."