Page 1 of Fire to the Stars

Chapter One

Abel

I turn the charred body on its back. Tattered clothes. Flaky skin. In the mud, a small piece of metal reflects the low sunslight. It’s a Slayers Guild badge—a crescent moon encircling twin suns—identical to the one on my chest.

Not a great start to a dragon hunt.

The last ray of sunslight dies on the horizon. Nightfall swallows the ten other bodies I found scattered across the decimated vineyard—just before a set of footsteps comes up beside me. The stark glow of a lantern exposes my visitor: an officer from the local Gendarmerie station. Ash smears the man’s red uniform so thoroughly that the silver trim looks brown. Even his tricorne is crusty with it. The musket slung over his shoulder will need a deep cleaning once he and his fellow gendarmes finish collecting the corpses.

“I found your resident slayer,” I say, flashing the badge. “I heard he was missing.”

“I’m surprised you bothered to search for him,” he replies. “Most traveling slayers don’t help with cleanup.”

“I’m not most slayers. Where is his helmet?”

“Unaccounted for.”

Like the rest of his equipment. “Bourlin is lucky a rainstorm moved in. Half the town survives because of it.”

A firefly crawls out from the corpse’s mouth and illuminates the black teeth. I nudge it away with the back of my hand. The light in its abdomen flickers as it flies into the night, probably searching for fellow survivors.

The gendarme grimaces. “Good luck tracking the dragon in this mess, Monsieur…”

I hesitate. “Abel Estellio.”

He steps backward.“You.”

“I know there are rumors—”

“That you’re trying tocurethe dragon curse? That you’reendangering the entire kingdomby keeping a dragon in captivity?”

My grip on the badge twitches. “You’re talking about my brother.”

“The Gods went to war over sinners like him. How are we supposed to trust a slayer who protects someone from his Diu-given punishment?”

I drop my pack in the mud. The dragon-skull helmet I keep strapped on top of it lolls forward, as if snapping at his feet. The gendarme stumbles away from it.

“As you can see, my brother isdead.”

The rest of Florent just doesn’t know it yet.

“Now that the suns are down, your dragon will have shifted back to human form,” I explain. “Tell me if any civilians report stolen clothing. That might offer clues to the human identity.”

He watches me warily. “How can we be sure you’ll kill it?”

“You can’t. But right now, I’m the only slayer you have.”

He scoffs, then places his handkerchief over his nose and walks away—likely searching for any excuse to maintain distance from the slayer who allowed his esteemed family to fall into ruin.

He isn’t the first.

I slide a hand through my hair and sigh up at the infamous owl constellation.

No matter the time of year, that damn owl is always there, watching, even as the rest of the sky changes with the seasons. The left wing is outstretched in a taunting wave. The eyes twinkle, as if my scorched reputation amuses Noctu—the War-Torn God who rules the night.

“I learned my lesson, all right?” I grumble. “No need to revel in my misfortune.”

No response. Unlike Diu, his brother—who rules the day—Noctu is the God who wants humanity to perish. If he had it his way, we’d all be extinct.