Not with fire—the Metkayina had no flames, only spears and fury—but with the roar of battle. Waves churned red under a bruised sky, churned with blood and brine as the two clans clashed in the shallows.

Y/n stood at the prow of her skiff, watching her sister Varang signal the charge from the reef's edge. The fire clan had come for the spirit tree. The Metkayina had come to stop them.

It was a good fight. A necessary one.

The water was alive with movement—bodies crashing into one another, war cries splitting the air like lightning.

And then, through the chaos, a figure. A young Metkayina warrior, water glistening off his shoulders, his braided hair dark with seawater. He was fast on the waves, surfing them like they were his own heartbeat, carving toward the mangroves with a ferocity that made Y/n's fingers tighten on her blade.

He didn't see her. He was looking at Varang.

And Y/n realized, with a cold thrill in her chest, that she was standing in the path of it.