LITMIR.BIZ

      Immediately after the battle, Madael took her to his tower. He said he had urgent work to do here. It seemed strange to Rhianon, but she was no longer afraid of being alone in his tower with the ifrites and crawling creatures. Maybe she was just used to the strange surroundings. She settled down on a gilded chair, more like a throne, and waited. The fire in the great yawning fireplace danced in tongues of black and orange. She had never seen flames like that before. It seemed to form into bizarre shapes, frightening facial expressions and even grimaces. Inside the fireplace, as if some sort of spectacle was unfolding, depicting a tournament or a battle, she could see everything in the glimpses of the scenes: fights, quarrels, crossed swords, rage, anger, and oddly enough, even an embrace. Passion and strife, it was as if they were one inseparable unit.

      “First the embrace, then the battle, that’s how love always ends.”

      Rhianon turned sharply away from the fire. She never understood who had said it, but she expected to see an evil charred creature crawling toward her on the marble slabs, but there was none.

      She watched the flames again and listened to the echo of ghostly voices. With such interest she would not even look at the scene. The flames did not give clear visions or outlines, but the blurry scenes were suggestive of certain thoughts. The flames whispered and showed her something. And surprisingly, the heat from this fire did not awaken the flames in hers. Could it be that the fire here was unusual? In Madael’s tower, anything could happen. She no longer felt in danger here. Even the flames only showed her fascinating pictures and whispered something in a multitude of voices, but did not arouse unpleasant feelings.

      She listened to the chorus, so quiet not even a whisper, but she could hear the screams, the threats, the clang of swords and groans of pain, and the terrifying cries of those who were struck.

      “It is the echoes of war in the skies,” someone said above her ear.

      Rhianon looked up and saw an ifrit in the high wall archway. She nodded at him, not knowing why.

      “I see.”

      “Yes?” the monster’s claws clawed at the archway, its leathery wings fluttering gently, fluttering against the flames of the candle in the nearest lamp.

      “I can see them, bodies pierced by swords but still alive, wriggling on stakes or spears,” she frowned, the images fuzzy. “They were beating in agony, and their wings were blackening. Even blacker skin, burning angelic curls, eyes blazing from within, like shards of heaven, from now on they will be black as coals, and full of such hatred. I even understand the source of their anger. To endure such pain is no joke. Anyone gets angry. You live and feel like you’re burning alive.”

      “Like you?”

      “Yes,” she thought and nodded. He was right. That was how she often felt because of the fire living inside.

      “What else do you see?” The ifrit flew a little lower and sat on the carved decoration of the fireplace, like a bird on a perch. His sharp claws circled the carved panel above the mantelpiece. It was so huge, but it hung on the thin rung with ease.

      Rhianon stared at him and didn’t answer at once.

      “I see you as you were before, translucent and delicate and so vulnerable. One call from your master made you follow him. You didn’t know you would lose your golden curls, blue eyes, and ethereal body. It was a loss of innocence. Innocence is what I call beauty, inner and outer, not something else,” she hesitated. “I look at ugly bodies, and I imagine you as you were before.”

      He looked at her skeptically.

      “What do you imagine me to be like?”

      She squinted as if she was looking at the sun and it might burn her eyes. She struggled to see his essence beneath the standing blackness and ash and burns.

      “The blond strands below his shoulders, that rare golden hue that no mortal had, the eyes slightly less bright than those of your brethren, and the lack of that angelic austerity on his face that was common to the others. It was not even innocence, but naivety. You followed the others, even though you didn’t always understand what they wanted. You were always a little simpler than the others, so you were cuter. You didn’t care why you were there or who was going to be the master. Thus others drew you into their circle. And now that circle has become black. When I see you in a pack of others, I may not even recognize you, but now, since I have managed to snatch your former appearance from the past, I can see that I like it.”

      That’s all. She couldn’t detect any other noteworthy features. The acolyte, who had listened to her, was dejectedly silent. She seemed to have hit the nail on the head. She didn’t know how. She’d just spoken her impressions out loud, and they seemed to be the right ones.

      “I didn’t want to wake up the pain.”

      He nodded his ugly and perhaps too big for his thin, long neck deformed head. Even noticing the rows of black teeth and bifurcated sting in its mouth didn’t make Rhianon shudder. It could hiss and spit venom or fire, and she was not afraid, for she saw the world as in an upside-down mirror. In his reflection, the monster was still an angel, and Rhianon smiled condescendingly at him, as if she were a queen in a tournament, encouraging the competitors.

      “It wasn’t your fault,” she remarked, smoothing the brocade folds of her robes. “It wasn’t your fault for the war, nor is it your fault that you want to do something to hurt me now. Anger and resentment and anger at anyone who possesses all that is taken from you are but a consequence of being burned. I have no grudge against you. Even if you say something disgusting now, you still won’t hurt me as much as you went through yourself. And so it turns out that your revenge is meaningless.”

      She herself didn’t understand why she was so selfless. Actually, she was not prone to pity or philosophical reflection. It was her own trials that robbed her of sympathy for others. It used to be that way. When you suffered too much yourself, you didn’t believe anyone else could be worse off. Now she was convinced of the opposite. These creatures had suffered far worse than she had.

      “Do you always pity the disease that comes to torment you?” He asked arrogantly. “If plague or death touched you and tortured you, would you treat them with royal indulgence?”

      “I don’t think so,” she answered honestly. “Self-sacrifice is not my virtue. I’m

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