The Third Flame

Violet

The first thing I saw every morning was Salem.

Not my alarm clock. Not the suspicious water stain on the ceiling that had recently started looking like a skull if I squinted. Not the tiny kitchenette shoved into the corner of my apartment like an afterthought.

Salem.

My enormous black tomcat was sprawled across my chest like he paid rent.

Which he did not.

In fact, considering the amount of expensive food he refused to eat unless I pretended not to care, he was actively ruining my finances.

I opened one eye.

He opened one eye.

Neither of us moved.

“You’re heavy,” I rasped.

Salem blinked slowly, with the kind of judgment usually reserved for ex-boyfriends and people who clapped when planes landed.

Typical.

I sighed and shifted him off my chest. He allowed this because he was gracious. Or because he wanted breakfast. Hard to tell. Salem operated on a mysterious moral code that mostly involved emotional manipulation and screaming at closed doors.

My apartment was quiet around us, bathed in soft morning light.

It wasn’t much.

A small one-bedroom tucked into the top floor of an old brick building with creaky floors, hissing radiators, and a kitchen so narrow I could open the fridge and block the entire room like a dramatic culinary hostage situation.

But it was mine.

For the first time in my life, it was mine.

No foster parents. No caseworkers. No group homes. No waiting for someone to decide I was too much trouble and toss my things into black garbage bags.

Just me.

A secondhand sofa with one suspicious spring. A thrifted coffee table stacked with books. Plants that had no business still being alive. A cozy reading chair by the window. A framed diploma hanging beside my bookshelf.

And Salem.

Always Salem.

I stared at the diploma.

Business Strategy and Corporate Finance.

Highest Distinction.

Valedictorian.

The words still felt fake, like someone had printed the wrong name and no one had noticed yet.

Violet Ashwood.

That was me.

Apparently.

The orphan girl who had clawed her way through school with scholarships, caffeine, spite, and the kind of anxiety that made planners look like sacred religious texts.

Nobody expected much from foster kids.

People acted like surviving childhood trauma was already an achievement, and everything after that was just bonus content.

But I had done more than survive.

I had graduated at the top of my class.

And today, I started at Drakon Industries.

The Drakon Industries.

The kind of company business professors discussed with reverence. The kind of company that made governments sweat, competitors panic, and finance bros develop personality disorders.

And somehow, they had hired me.

Me.

The salary alone was enough to make me stare at the offer letter for twenty minutes and whisper, “Absolutely not,” like the PDF had personally offended me.

I’d spent the last month convinced someone would call and say there had been a mistake.

No call came.

The job was real.

The future was real.

For the first time in my life, I wasn’t surviving.

I was living.

Which was terrifying, obviously.

Salem jumped onto the windowsill, his sleek black fur catching the light. His green eyes locked on me.

Watching.

Always watching.

Sometimes I swore he understood every word I said.

“Big day,” I told him.

His tail flicked once.

I narrowed my eyes. “That better have been supportive.”

He yawned.

“Rude.”

I made coffee strong enough to resurrect a corpse and stood at the window, looking toward the glittering city skyline. Glass towers rose in the distance, sharp and silver against the morning sky.

Somewhere among them stood Drakon Industries.

Today I was finally becoming part of that world.

Or at least pretending convincingly enough that no one noticed I had no idea what I was doing.

Because despite the degree, the grades, the scholarships, the polished blazer hanging on the back of my closet door, I had never fully believed I belonged anywhere.

There had always been something different about me.

Something off.

Like everyone else had been born with instructions for how to be normal, and mine had been replaced with a cursed treasure map and unresolved emotional damage.

And then there were the instincts.

The knowing.

The thing beneath my skin that whispered warnings before anything happened.

I knew when people were lying.

I knew when danger was near.

I knew when someone’s smile hid cruelty.

It had saved me more times than I could count.

It had also made me lonely.

Because how exactly did one tell a normal person, “Hey, your boyfriend gives me murder vibes,” without sounding like the unstable one?

I had learned early to keep quiet.

To smile.

To blend.

To survive.

But today wasn’t for old scars.

Today was for new beginnings.

An hour later, I stood by my apartment door in my best blazer, my hair curled into soft auburn waves, my stomach flipping like it was auditioning for the circus.

Salem sat at my feet.

Watching.

Waiting.

Almost like he knew something I didn’t.

I crouched and scratched beneath his chin.

“Wish me luck.”

His green eyes fixed on mine, suddenly intense.

Too intense.

Then he bumped his head against my hand.

Warmth bloomed in my chest.

Comfort.

Safety.

Love.

The kind I’d spent my whole life looking for and had somehow found in a stray black cat with attitude problems.

I smiled.

Then I left.

Neither of us knew everything was about to change.