His Nepenthe | complete

15. Please

P L E A S E D O N ′ T B U R N

*

The temperatures I put my skin through were harsh. I bathed in frost and reveled in the stream of fire that cascaded like a waterfall.

My body was dying. I had been awake four whole days – counting on coffee or a run to heal my sleep deprivation. I didn't want to see blood this week, and I knew I would the second I closed my eyes for more than a minute.

I stripped my body from material, aching as I saw my pained expression. There were deep purple circles underneath my eyes, hollow and weakened bones daring me to fall asleep where I stood. I ignored myself, however – as I always did. I let the water run down my skin, burning into the groves of my broken knuckles, bruised shoulders, and carved chest.

I felt lulled by the fire, a plea of unconsciousness. My body slumped against the tiles, seething at the cold wall's touch. My tired eyes ached, slipping in the harmony of falling water and warmth.

The eyes of fire watched me unravel. They dared me to let myself sleep to taunt me. They took my hand and brought me to the iron bed it chose to lay upon, warmth of the glowing metal echoing through the fireplace. The flames lapped at the wood it lay upon my comatose body, turning the logs to smoke that spelt the most transient of beauties amongst hot ribbons of light. The sparks danced along the iron they were trapped in, trying to fly past its confines. They wished to leap and land where they may.

Such a beautiful weapon, shining in glory and roaring in power. The warmth and welcoming of the soft flames deceive you as you slowly approach the flames, before the time you get too close, where it snarls and bites. Everything you love could be gone in minutes at the hands of a single nip.

So warm, so beautiful, so welcoming. So dangerous.

Smouldering, the fire licked the bottom of its metal confines, allowing the wood stray further from the iron prison. Like a hungry kitten, it lapped, crackling. Playful, gentle at first. The fire flared at the carpet, searing the fabric an ashen black with a smirk. It flickered at its own build, rolling the long aflame, a shower of sparks like a fountain. The embers wound around the floor like a great hungry serpent, opening its mouth to devour everything in its path, releasing choking clouds of noxious smoke.

The world became illuminated. From the confines it had once been held to, the flame spat out thick grey smoke to billow into the skies. The once pale sky became shielded by a veil of darkness as the ashen hands take to the sky, lapping hungrily at the quiet moon.

The glowing embers leaped and twirled in a fiery dance, twinkling in a mirror to the stars in the sky, before cascading to earth, setting alight the tinder of papers in the small apartment above dry autumn ground.

The match that had started what was once such a gentle flame was a part of these ashen hands, the leader at the fingertips, dragging the embers further than they should have been taken in the wind. Too much power. Too much influence, that one match.

The fire flashed into my own existence in a wash of red and yellow sparks.

I didn't think of the beauty as I stood confined like the flames had been. It was nothing like natural running water, nothing like the clouds that cried. The fire held its head up regally as its path of destruction spread. The flames glowered at me, daring me to challenge the strength it held against me as a mortal man.

The bright colours of autumn smirked at my unwilling stance, a bow that said I knew of its power.

A figure stood entranced by its beautiful depths by the door of the apartment that was entirely aflame. It seemed like the small boy was brought by lure and curiosity to the fire, bringing its deadly hands closer. He stood alone by the wooden door in the fiery night, bright colours dancing. He observed, each time he watched the flames leap and hiss, always reaching feverishly out for him. The fire was hungry now. The new targeted meal was the young boy. It was trying desperately to grab and hold onto his fleeting shadow. How beautifully they swayed, beckoning him, enticing him. He took a step, reaching out with his pale hand to let his fingertips be immersed in the heat that surrounded the flames.

The fire licked at his arm, daring him to reach out and be swallowed by the colour. He was convinced, bright blue eyes allured. And he let the blazing lips kiss his hands. A sear along his skin in the pattern of the flame and the smell of burning flesh beat the burning boy from his reverie.

His eyes reached mine, a scream breaking from his lips as he felt his skin being melted by a cruel flame that refused to let him go. The tears that left eyes that resembled my own were evaporated the second they dared fall down his red cheeks, another taunt from the fire that he was now their meal. He was merely a pawn in a larger game. He was to be a part of the growing fire that would take to ruin the city.

I was within the fire, I knew I was, but I had no body I could feel, and I wasn't burning the way he was. I was left to watch the flames lapping up his small body, his hand too far away from mine to reach.

A raised brow of the flame asked me if I wanted to be closer to him, and I obliged. His face was hazy in the smoke, but i knew those eyes all too well to confuse who he was. He was so small, and I wanted to protect him from the flame. As I stepped – a feeling that seemed apart from myself – he cried more.

He cried as I reached out to him, screaming to leave him be.

My hands were ashen, too, when I searched for them. I was already swallowed by the flame, and I was trying to convince him he should be too. I was the match and he was the kindling that I wanted to bite with my flame.

The fire swallowed him with a smile, no longer hungry.

I had fed the flame someone I loved, and it was so fucking happy as it licked its lips with a grin.

My breath wasn't a fire as my body felt the water rushing down my back. My eyes were wet, but it wasn't from the waterfall.

I was so lost in my own mind burning another horrid image into the back of my brain. He was never leaving me, and he knew that, too. Even if the way he stayed so present was as he died.

My knuckles split as my clenched fist found the tile of the shower wall, blood being immediately washed away like a flash flood.

I was shaking, I was burning. I was so cold and alone and I just wanted to feel something that didn't hurt so terribly.

I needed something to fix me.