Akari stumbled backward into the guard when he saw the flames and the guard himself started yelling for his compatriots.
Chenzhou flung himself out of bed with energy he didn't have and managed to look out the door despite everyone's attempts to keep him back.
"Try the other door." The guard captain ordered but the flames were there too.
"How this happen?" Anna clutched Chenzhou's hand, eyes wide with fear. "Why aren't the alarms sounding?" There should be horns alerting the residents of the Camelia to the fire. And answering bells from the guard towers as help rushed to assist.
There had been fires in the Camelia before, but she was made of stone. Sure, she had a few small wooden structures, mostly shops and sheds and decorations like doors. And carpet and tapestry and the like.
But most of her was the black volcanic rock that dominate the region from some eruption so long ago it wasn't in any human record of history. Rock didn't burn, but some did explode or melt under great heat.
But the temperatures needed for that couldn't be summoned by human hands. Maybe a powerful wizard with enough magic could turn a boulder into shrapnel, but to melt the Camelia's black stone, well, that could only be done with dragon fire, and it had been a long, long time since a dragon had been seen by any human.
Akari stepped back, careful to stay out of the way of the guards as they tried to figure a way out. One of the younger one's was even eyeing the windows. They're too far up to survive jumping. When he starts tugging at the drapes, Akari starts to worry.
Before the kid can even make the suggestion though, Chenzhou pushed his way back to the door and stuck his head out, sending the guards into a panic.
"Sir!"
"Lord Ye, get back!"
"For god's sake, get away from the fire!"
"What are you doing?"
It had always, and this was something better dwelled on when they weren't surrounded by fire, but he couldn't help the thought, been a bit strange the way Chenzhou allowed such familiarity from his servants and guards, but so little from his peers and commanders.
Akari had struggled to understand it while he was married to Yuze, and it seemed it hadn't changed at all while they were separated.
Chenzhou still had no issue leaning on one of them while he looked out into the hall, when he barely ever just shook Akari's hand.
Ye Chenzhou had always seemed a bit removed, a statue mounted just a bit higher than the rest and thus untouchable. He was never rude, or cruel, he just wasn't…friendly.
And it had always rubbed Akari the wrong way that he was so friendly with the help, but he couldn't be bothered to be friendly with his best friend's husband. Never mind that they shared so few personal interests aside from Yuze.
"Something's wrong," Chenzhou is saying and Akari has to bite back the urge snap at him.
The guard captain joined him at the door, shoving Akari and Anna back. "What?"
"Look," Chenzhou's was getting frustrated, worried, as he gestured at the flames filling the hall. "What's burning?"
"Everything!" But even as he says it the guard captain's expression changes from concern to confusion.
"Do you hear it?" Chenzhou asks and they all stop.
There's nothing but silence as they stand there listening, huddled between Chenzhou's guard.
"I don't understand." Anna made her way to Chenzhou's side and peered out.
"Okay, stay put." The guard captain orders as he stepped out into the hallway.
The flames were growing, shifting and moving across every surface but nothing was actually burnt? There was no smoke. There was no crackle and snap and roar from the flames.
But there is a fire. They can all see it.
And it is burning something, because the way it's moving starts to remind Chenzhou of a sword fight. Of the parry and thrust between opponents fighting for the advantage, each looking for that final, fatal opening.
"How is this possible?" Captain Li had been the head of Chenzhou's guard since he was fifteen. Ten years he's spent by Chenzhou's side, and the man was unflappable in the face of screaming lords and drunken soldiers. He'd even remained famously stone-faced when a rival had framed him for treason, and it had gone all the way to a tribunal before the truth came out. He'd showed up to duty the next day as if nothing had even happened.
Nothing could shake him.
Until now.
"I don't understand." Anna isn't stupid either. She's survived this long at Chenzhou's side, stayed strong and resolute in the face of all those vicious accusations and interrogations. She even accompanied Chenzhou on several campaigns in the tribal controlled lands along the border and witnessed the horrors of war in person.
But this is something different. Something otherworldly.
"Stay back," Chenzhou ordered as he stepped into the hall and joined Captain Li.
"Sir!"
"Chenzhou, don't!" Terror filled Anna's voice as the flames erupted and swirled around Chenzhou.
He was engulfed in seconds, but even as he stared at his hands, watched the flames curl around his fingers and burn even brighter.
He felt nothing.
And there was a time, a short time, the space between one heartbeat and the next, that he thought his illness had finally taken him. Taken the last pleasure he had in life. The ability to feel the softness of Anna's skin. The warmth of her touch. The strength of Yuze's grip.
The cool comfort of Huaban's frost and the steel that never warmed no matter how long he held it.
Her gentle breeze surrounds him even now, cutting through the flames without issue.
Flames that don't burn. That don't make his flesh bubble and melt.
"What kind of fire doesn't burn?" He murmured watching is crawl up his arms and spark across his chest.
Oh.
He realized then.
Eirian's magic manifest as flames.
And he started running.
"EIRIAN!"
~ tbc