Blood Moon

Chapter Fifteen - Soul Fire

There was a whooshing sound and Nina's ears. Barely recovered from the suddenness of the bang stung with it.

In fact, everything stung. The smoke ran ruthlessly down her throat, her skin tingled from the heat of the explosion. Her eyes watered too but from what Nina couldn't tell: the smoke, the heat or what they had seen.

People she recognised, crawled from the crowd towards her. The others, who had been on the sidelines, like her, for one reason or another were running. Flesh was everywhere. Distantly she realised she needed to help them but the emptiness inside her rose up in waves.

Something ancient was rising too, something that had risen in the blind panic after Lilo collapsed. Then again, when the grief of Lilo's change had suddenly become too much to bear, that day when Lilo had spoken again. Her soul rubbed against the steel of her witch's heart and sparks flew into the gulf of it. She rubbed so hard that parts of her soul splintered off but it was not enough. The nothingness inside her was too bleak a home, a fire would need more.

So, desperate now, she sawed off twigs from her being and offered it to the fire. Forming a small Teepee in the very base of her stomach. A candle flame emerged and flickered - burning her stomach lining. It was still hungry. Frantically now she prepared logs: the anger that her parents were never home, laughing with Albie, Lilo. In a blaze of emotion the fire rose till it's smoke filled her head and the flames licked the top of her throat, gently now she nurtured it further. Letting the heat rise up her arms till her hands glowed white like swords in a fire. They burnt, as running now she beat them to her will.

A young boy crouched, the flesh of his face puckered and cracked with the heat from the bomb as he shouted for help. When Nina touched him, he yelled even harder. Then collapsed in tears, as his hands rummaged through his now soft skin. 'Thank you.' He mouthed but Nina had already moved on.

There had been an army of almost five thousand at the climate march.