Moth Wings

Darkness had always possessed the power to become all-consuming to those less astute than the boy. He reveled in it, craved it. He owned it as much as he could, grasping ahold of whatever he could manage to catch. Somehow, he had managed to catch ahold of me, and without will nor warning, I was summoned to him. Something in his voice pulled at me as an anchor would its ship; slipping past murky waters to grip onto some semblance of tangibility.

A sigh would pass bitten lips, ghosting into the heavy air with caution, and I would swallow it whole; darkness pulsating around the little tendrils that I could not hold... could not keep.

————

The kitchen was unlit save for the small candle burning over the wax-wood countertop. The small amount of light was comfortable as it shuddered over my oversensitive eyes, flickering gently into the silent air. I rolled a batch of dough between my ungloved hands, powdering it with flour when it became too sticky. The midnight air hung around me in an empty expression, some mundane lack of substance overwhelming the moonlit curtains above me. I sighed, continuing to knead the bread slowly.

Some twisted stirring came about my atmosphere, and it prickled at my ears and eyes like ice... tempting me to follow it. The boy was awake. I listened soundlessly, moving not an inch. My eyes flickered about as I attempted to catch onto him, mind restlessly searching for a thought to rouse from his tired mind. There was nothing but empty static that hung into the air like glass; sharp and rough and useless. I wiped my hands on a kitchen towel, turning to start up the stairs.

'Sebastian.'

I heard it clearly, some incessant longing to approach tugging at my senses, and I quickened up the stairwell into his room, knocking quietly at the mahogany door.

"Come in."

He spoke just loudly enough for me to hear, and I drew open the door silently, slipping inside.

"My lord."

I whispered, approaching his bedside with that wolfish attitude I could not seem to break. He did not reply, staring up at me with those infuriating eyes of his. The violet of one glowed softly onto his long lashes, bouncing down to glitter over the smooth skin of his cheek. I had felt it enough to know how soft it was... how desperately it would awaken with gooseflesh at the slightest touch. Something shimmered in those impish irises, daring me to make a step out of line... to allow Sebastian to fade away into something unimaginably wild and unconfined.

He sat up to bring his fingers up to my jawline... stroking along it with a featherlight caress. He lingered there for longer than he should have, before letting his hand drop back down to his side in defeat.

"You wish to hurt me."

It was a surprising thing, yet I supposed I had the tendency to underestimate him on many occasions.

"I'm afraid I do not understand."

I replied softly, though I needed not words nor glances to express the infidelity of his own mind.

"When this charade is over, you'll hurt me, won't you?"

"Charade?"

"Yes."

He muttered,

"Do not avoid the question."

Part of me begged my tongue to reply with yes... to make him fear me, want me. Though I had promised him that I would never lie, and so some horribly attractive burning forbade me to do so.

He had been the only creature I had ever regretted meeting, for he was the only thing I feared I would remorse in ending. I had wanted badly to tear at his very being; to scratch away at his lungs with my breath... to tear open his ribcage and taste the fiery blood which tumbled just beneath his skin. Whenever I imagined this, some sick regret would tear at me until I could not ignore the burning tempest of his eyes.

When I was made to end him, I would take him softly.

I would stroke along the silk of his hair... caress his skin with uncertain care until he fell asleep in my arms. Then I would finally taste the enigma that was his soul... begging to burst from within its confines, and I would keep it safe within me until it decayed into something as wretched as I am, and it would melt away into nothingness to begin anew.

I imagined that it would flit away into the cosmos, or whatever it was that called from above, crying out for something it longed for; something familiar to me.

"No. I do not wish to hurt you."

But perhaps to me, the definition of destruction was some warped interpretation of life as he knew it to be. All he knew it to be was some small blip of time as young as he was, barely a fragment of what was definable as enough. Perhaps to him, he was begging me to be destroyed... searching with that unresting gaze as it bore into mine as none other had, and it unnerved me.

"Then I'm afraid you have failed me."

He murmured, taking my hand in his... kissing it softly as I knelt down beside him to hush the child to sleep once more.

————

I watched silently as he picked at his raspberry tart. The sweet scent sent a sickness through me, and I found interest in his cravings, as eager to attend to them as I was to starve them, if only to study him in close proximity. The child seemed to have grown moth wings; his temperament one of darkness, yet he was incurably drawn to the light. He would refuse to admit this, but the reality of his very own paradox left him something to be desired. He had made something dreadful of me, and though it had become undefinable, it rested just beneath my skin... in-between my teeth and underneath the silver of my tongue.

I cleared his plate when he was finished, and the scent of him lingered around me, teasing that hungry part of me which seemed to refuse to quiet.