Inked

36

It was as awful as he remembered. Damp, dark. A chill trickled down his spine, and he called the fire to warm him. Not his fire, not the old, friendly kind, but Soleil's darker, wild fire. It whispered and hissed in a language he wasn't fully familiar with yet. But it did the job.

He could hear her before he could see her. She was pacing back and forth in her cell, murmuring to herself, to Mo, to God for all Farid knew. What he did know is that no one was going to come to her rescue.

"You might as well give up," he called, and there was a pause in her footsteps. "No one, not even your precious Bluejay, can get you out of this one." As he reached the door of the cell, the fire crawled eagerly through his veins and out his fingertips, throwing shadows against the walls. Meggie was pale in the low light.

"Who are you?" she breathed, narrowing her eyes at him.

He chuckled darkly. "What do you mean?"

Meggie replied with a bitter laugh of her own. "You are not the Farid I know. As far as I'm concerned, you are not even human."

Farid gripped the bars of the cell and leaned against them, the light of the flames wrapped around his hands reflecting in his black eyes. "I may not be the Farid you once knew, but you no longer know me at all. And that was your decision, not mine."

Meggie stepped closer to the cell door, her livid face inches from Farid's. "Your leaving for a year was not my choice. Your distancing yourself from me was not my choice. Your pushing me aside for your precious fire was not my choice. Your - your betrayal of our friendship for a girl you barely know was not my choice, Farid, and I don't know what kind of girl you think I am, but I know for a fact you once loved me, and I you. I came here for Mo, yes, but also for Dustfinger, also for the ones back home - Resa, little Val - and for you, Farid, your goddamned, conceited, confused self. Maybe things between us are not as they once were, but you cannot - you will not - blame me."

The humid air was made thicker by the tension and anger that hung between them. Breathing deeply, Farid began in a low voice, "I know what you think of me, but I truly do hope you make it through this. Knowing you - because yes, no matter what you believe, I do know you - I believe you will succeed in fighting for those you care for, even if I am no longer on that list. Good luck to you, Meggie." And with that, Farid extinguished the flames in his fists and left the dungeon as cold and dark and quiet as he had found it.