by Tillie Cole
My chest tightened as she told me she didn’t fear me. She wasn’t scared of me.
I tried to lift my head, but I couldn’t find the strength. And I was cold. I was so cold. My eyes began to close, but I didn’t want to sleep. I thought of him in my sleep. It hurt when I slept. I wanted to stay here with Maddie. I needed to stay awake.
“Flame?” Maddie’s voice forced my eyes to open. “You need to drink. You are dehydrated. Severely dehydrated.” I watched her as she got to her feet. My body twitched, bracing to stand when I thought she was leaving, but she just walked to the kitchen and filled up a glass with water.
Maddie brought it over to me and sat down. “Can you lift your head?”
I forced my head to lift. Carefully, Maddie brought the glass to my lips. And I stared at her the whole time. I drank the entire glass and Maddie placed it beside her.
“You should sleep,” she said soothingly, but my body twitched. Maddie jumped at my sudden movement, her eyes widening. “What is wrong?”
“I don’t want you to leave.”
Maddie took a deep breath, and she blushed again.
“Why do you blush at things I say?” I asked, as her cheeks turned pink. I had to fight to breathe at the sight. It made my heart beat harder.
Maddie dipped her head. “Because I like what you say. It makes me feel… I do not know… special, when I am with you? It…” She held her hand over her chest, over her heart. “I feel it right here.”
“You are special to me,” I answered honestly.
Maddie glanced away, then when she stared down at me again, she was smiling. I liked it when she smiled. She didn’t smile much at all.
“I will stay, Flame. While you sleep, I shall stay.” She stood and walked to my bed. It had been moved into the middle of the bedroom. I watched her pull off the linen, linen covered in blood, and leave it by the door. She looked around, then asked, “Where do you keep the linen for the bed? I will dress the bed so you can sleep on clean sheets.”
“I sleep here,” I said. Maddie cautiously walked forward. Her forehead was pulled down again.
“You sleep on this floor?” she asked quietly. “Over this hatch?” Her voice had lost strength.
“Yeah.”
“Every night?”
“Yeah,” I answered again.
“Without linen or bedding? Just you on this floor?”
“Yeah.”
Her face straightened and turning, she said, “Okay.”
Maddie moved to the only chair in the room and pulled the old blanket off the top. She walked back to me and held it out. “May I cover you with this? Your skin is shivering because you are exhausted. You need to be warm.”
“I’m always cold when I sleep,” I told her. Maddie’s hand tightened into fists on the blanket. “I’ve always slept in the cold.”
“There is no need.” Her words confused me. I tried to find an answer for why I should be cold, but I couldn’t. I’d always been cold in my room as a kid, and then in the cellar. But I couldn’t think why I had to be cold right now.
Maddie moved to stand above me, and said, “Use this blanket, for me? Please…”
I nodded my head, and braced for the material on my body. Maddie laid it over me, but she didn’t touch me.
The blanket felt strange on my skin. Another new feeling burst into my stomach. Maddie was the first person ever to want me to be warm. The first person to ever care since my mama.
I tracked Maddie as she stood still, her back turned to me. Her fingers were tense, but then she turned and looked down upon me. The expression on her face was new. I thought I knew her every look but, in this one, her lips were tense and her shoulders were pulled back. Then she lay on the floor in front of me again, her hand landing just an inch from mine.
Her cheek pressed flat to the wood. “Sleep, Flame. I will not leave you. I will stay right here until you are awake.”
My eyes began to close, darkness pulling me under. But the last thing I saw was Maddie’s green eyes, still staring at me. And even when the dark closed in, the darkness that I hated, her eyes shone bright. They chased away the pain.
Chapter Twelve
Maddie
He slept soundly.
He barely moved. The only movement was of his chest rising and falling with deep and peaceful long breaths. This lulling sound helped me relax, but each time my eyes drifted to a close, all I could see was Flame rocking against the wall, hands on head as he hummed.
I was convinced that he was not even aware he was humming. It seemed to me that he was trying to block something out of his mind. I sat frozen in fear at what it could be, when his eyes lifted to look at me. Yet they did not see me. He focused on something behind me. Something that caused his face to turn ashen, his eyes to bleed out life.
I squeezed my eyes shut when I remembered him staggering over to this hatch in the floor, and how he fought to remove his leather pants and… Lord… to touch himself. Roughly, painfully, and at the same time slicing his blade across his flesh eleven times. His entire body was covered with tattoos. Every part of him pierced. Every so often my eyes would catch sight of a strange scar, boasting two raised lumps. I had no idea how one could acquire such injuries.
And he found release on the floor, his back hunched forward. But not like he was in a pleasurable rapture, rather he was so pained by the manner of his release that it caused his body to expel his seed.
Then there was the vomit.
I remembered the vomit. I remembered it well. Because after Moses would take me as a child. When he would tie me down, rip through my womanhood and take me to rid my body of evil, I would vomit. It was part of the course. My shame, expelling the shame the act had caused.
I thought of Flame on the bed, his back arching like someone was penetrating him from behind. It dawned on me that we shared more in common that I had previously thought. Though, I was sure, what was done to Flame was far worse.
I thought of him talking to me. And in the quickest of turns, my heart fluttered. As I lay on this floor, I struggled to suppress the smile forming on my lips.
I like your hair…
Such a simple truth, yet one that sang to my heart. Because I was sure Flame did not offer compliments. Viking had told me Flame was shy and that he did not understand the subtlety of human emotions. The more we spoke, the more I could see for myself that he struggled to understand my emotions. His dark eyes would narrow on mine when I assumed my expression was changing. But he could not read me. Yet he felt comfortable enough with me to ask why I shed tears. Why I blushed.
Some may find it abrupt, the way he spoke, and question why such simple understandings did not come to him as easily as they did to others. But I found it to be a most amazing transgression. Men, in my experience, generally had no qualms about using falsehoods for their personal gain. But with Flame, I knew he would not lie. He could not lie. That made me feel so unbelievably safe. And to me, feeling safe was the most important thing in my life.
The cabin was dark. I knew that hours and hours must have passed. I wondered if AK and Viking remained outside, keeping watch. I suspected that they were. I knew I should tell them that Flame seemed to have subdued whatever had held him in its clutches. But I refused to move. Flame was still not back. Right now he was broken down by dehydration and his inner demons. His skin was still raw and he needed lots of care.
And, selfishly, I wanted to be left alone with him. I did not know how long we could stay in this existence—just the two of us—however I did not want it to end for a while.
Feeling my eyelids flutter down, the last thing I saw before I drifted to sleep was my hand, just a fraction from touching his.
*****
The sound of birds outside the cabin called me from sleep. Opening my eyes, my body jerked at the sight of an unfamiliar room, then clashed with a familiar face. Intense dark eyes stared at mine.
We stayed that way, laying in silence, until I took a deep breath and spoke a nerv
ous, “Hello.”
Flame’s eyes blinked; once, twice, three times. Then his dry lips parted and he replied, “You stayed.”
The expression on his face had not changed but the tone of his voice expressed disbelief. “I told you I would.”
A sigh slipped from between his lips.
“How did you sleep?” I asked, glad to see that beneath the dried blood and dirt on his face, color had returned to his cheeks.
“I slept?” he asked. I frowned at his question. He waited patiently for my answer.
“Yes, Flame. You slept.”
“For how long?” This time his already broken voice was raspy.
I glanced up out of the covered window of kitchen, letting in the beginnings of the day. “Hours. Maybe seven or eight? I do not know precisely.”
Flame’s breathing increased and his nostrils flared. I quickly sat up as his muscles tensed. I feared he was slipping back into the darkness, back into the pit of hell he was in when strapped to the bed. Instead his lost eyes sought out mine, and he whispered, “I never sleep. I always want to. But I never can. There’s always too much in my head.” Flame’s weak hand lifted and tapped at his head.
I feared my heart had torn straight down the center when I heard these gutting words. Flame swallowed. When he was still the same Flame from last night, the Flame who talked to me so sweetly, I relaxed and lay back on the floor. Flame’s tense body relaxed too.
“You never sleep? At night, you do not sleep?”
Flame exhaled. He held out a bruised arm for me to inspect. He pointed to his wrist. “The flames. They keep me awake. They run though my blood. And they burn. When I sleep, they wake me and he is always here to release them. So I stay awake.”
Flame’s eyebrows pulled down. “I don’t feel the flames now.” He dropped his hovering arm near my leg. “I don’t feel the flames when you’re near. Somehow, you calm the flames.”
My throat closed up. I swore I could feel my heart aching. I shuffled to lie on my front, mere inches from where he lay. I saw Flame’s body tense, but he did not protest our proximity. His hands balled into fists, but he did not speak.
When I saw his fingers lose their rigidity, I said, “I rarely sleep either. Yet, here, on this cold hard floor…” I ducked my head feeling my cheeks heat searching for words, then whispered, “with you. Beside you, I did not wake once.”
Flame searched my face. “Your cheeks are blushing again. That means you liked it. You told me you blushed when you liked something. That I’d just made you feel special.” His lips rubbed together, and I could see his mind turning over. “You liked sleeping next to me. Because it made you feel special.”
A smile crept on my lips. I fought the need to shy away. “Yes.”
Flame hissed through his teeth and, releasing a long breath, said. “I liked it too.”
On hearing his answer, my finger traced along the wood patterns on the floor, but inside my feelings were joyful. Warm and… happy…
Silence ensued for several minutes. My hands remained tracing the wood on the floor, but I could feel Flame watching me. When I eventually lifted my eyes, my cheeks heated anew.
As the light grew brighter outside, I noticed that Flame’s blanket had bunched at his legs. And in this light, I saw the true extent of his injuries, the open gashes on his skin, the dried blood and dirt that he needed to remove.
“Flame?”
Flame, still fighting his exhaustion, struggled to look up at me. For a moment I had to stop myself from reaching out my hand and touching his face. His expression, as he stared up at me from his place on the floor, was so innocent, so lost, I wanted nothing more than to wrap him in my arms and tell him he was safe. Safe with me.
Flame waited for me to speak, his large dark eyes blinking slowly. Clearing my throat, I pointed to the bathroom. “You need to cleanse. You will heal better if you are free from the blood covering your skin.”
Flame looked down at his arms and frowned.
“I shall run a bath for you,” I said, as I got to my feet.
“It has to be cold,” he stated firmly.
I stopped dead and I looked back over my shoulder. “Okay.”
I went to move again, when he instructed, “The coldest it can be. No hot water.”
I dropped my head, fighting sadness and wonderment at why it had to be that way. “Flame—”
“I need it to cool the flames, Maddie. I can’t fucking have it any other way.”
“As you wish,” I replied, and entered the bathroom. When I had cleaned the day before it had taken me a while to find the towels. They were in a closet that I knew had never been opened. I suspected he did not use them.
Moving to the large tub, I began running the faucet: cold tap only. I ran my hand under the flowing water and flinched at the icy coldness. I did not know how he could stand it. I did not know how sitting in this temperature would feel good. But then my heart dropped when I knew that was the very reason.
It would inflict pain. He would suffer more pain. My eyes squeezed shut at the thought of him sitting here nightly, forcing his body to sustain such a frigid temperature, to calm the flames he believed so desperately tormented him.
Out of nowhere, a fierce anger surged through me. I was angry at the man who made Flame think this way. And I was angry at how no one had ever told him he was not evil. That he was so much more.
Leaving the tub to fill, I made my way back to the main room. Flame had turned over, his front now facing the direction of the bathroom. My heart swelled when those black eyes landed on me and he exhaled in relief.
“It is filling up.” I pointed to the kitchen and said, “I am going to make us some food. You have to eat to restore your strength.”
Flame's blank expression gave nothing of his feelings away, then he said, “I am so tired. My body feels weak. I fucking hate feeling like this.”
“I know. But we will get you better. We will make you strong again.”
“We?” he questioned.
I edged in the kitchen, but looked back to say. “Yes. We. I am here to care for you. I am here to help you feel better.” I watched him watch me and asked, “Do you understand?”
Flame nodded, his bearded cheek rubbing against the hardwood, and he said, “You’re to stay here with me. Until I’m well.” I smiled as I made to prepare food, when he added, “My Maddie.” My heart soared at the reverence in his rough voice, and hot tears stung my eyes.
He was calling me his. Claiming my heart as I had already claimed his.
The silence was heavy as it clung in the air, and without turning back, I whispered, “My Flame.”
I caught his sharp inhale of breath. But I kept my eyes fixed forward. I did not have the courage to face him. I feared I would break if I did.
I quickly busied myself with chopping the vegetables I had not reached yesterday and brought the water in the pan to a boil.
Cooking helped me keep my head clear. It helped me focus.
As the vegetables began to boil, I walked into the bathroom and stopped the faucet. Dipping my hand in the tub, I automatically wrenched it straight back out. It was freezing.
Suddenly, a sound from behind me made me flinch. I reared back to see Flame gripping the doorframe. His huge body was staggering forward, his teeth gritting together as he forced his weakened legs to walk, one slow step at a time.
And he was naked. Naked but for the dried blood coating his body.
I focused on his eyes, but when he stumbled forward, his legs giving out, I reached out to catch him. Flame’s eyes widened as I rushed forward.
“NO!” he shouted harshly, the force of his bellow freezing me mid-movement.
Flame panted with exertion, until he reached the bath and his hands gripped the edge. I moved to run past when he said brokenly, “I can’t… I can’t be touched. I can’t stand it, Maddie.”
My heart broke. “I know,” I replied, and promptly left the room.
Entering the small kitchen I p
ressed both hands on the countertop and took a deep breath. My hands trembled at the shock of Flame’s resistance to my touch. Then I shook my head in disbelief. I was going to touch him. And it had not repulsed me. He had need of my help, and my body had reacted accordingly.
Taking in a deep breath, I moved back from the counter. I heard a pained groan coming from the bathroom. Heart still trembling, I stepped backwards and looked inside. Flame was inside the tub. His body was arched and he was shaking profusely. But he was bathing. He was forcing himself to endure the pain.
I could not watch.
Checking the soup was fine, I let my gaze wander around the small cabin, my eyes landing on the large open fire at the end of the room. There were logs and a flint at the side, and a box of matches on the mantle.
The room was cold, the winter’s day chilling the air. But more than that, Flame’s body was already suffering with fatigue, persevering with the ice cold bath would only make things worse.
In minutes the fire was lit, flames beginning to climb. The sound of the firewood crackling, and the smell of soup boiling on the stove, immediately made me feel calm. Then I glanced behind me to the hatch in the floor. The one stained with Flame’s dried blood and seed. I wondered why he had to sleep there? Why it was so important to him?
The sound of sloshing water pulled me from my thoughts. Flame would be coming out soon. My cheeks heated when I thought of his naked body. And that if I was correct, he would reject the towel I had left out for him.
I thought of how he normally dressed and found myself in front a small closet near his bedroom. Opening the door, the only things hanging in there were a few pairs of leathers. Choosing one, I headed back to the bathroom and, still seeing Flame in the bath, placed them on the floor.
I then moved back to the fire, and sank to the floor.
And I patiently waited for Flame to appear.
Chapter Thirteen
