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Fire, Moonlight, and Shadow
Written for the 'Fire' Drabble Challenge

by Jack E. Nunya
June 8, 2005

It felt strange, being snuggled back into the squishy comfort of her own bed; no swaying, no creaking– just the silence of the moon and the crackle of the flame that Estella had started up in an act of benevolence.

‘I know it will get a bit warm in here, miss, but we’ll just crack open a window or two. There’s just something about a warm fire in the hearth that’s good for the soul. It’ll help you get some sleep…’

Elizabeth hadn’t said much since re-entering her slowly repairing home. In fact, she hadn’t said anything at all. The night deep into progression when the Dauntless docked in the stilled harbor, she had been sent straight home for supper and bed.

After Estella had tucked her in, she stepped out silently, pausing only for a moment to stroke the younger woman’s soft hair consolingly. Lost in a trance of the dancing flames and the deep waters of thought, Elizabeth had seemed barely aware of the action, her eyes wide and glazed with distance. Indeed, the bright glow and fluid motions of the fire had taken hold of her gaze and cast strange illusions before her mind.

She thought she saw eyes, dark as a rich concoction of ground coffee beans and as deep as an endless abyss. They were unlined and unguarded, bright with an echo of naivete and mournful with a gossamer veil of wisdom earned only through hardships. And from deep within their cavernous obscurity there echoed a plaintive ballad; she could not fully hear or understand the tale emanating from their tune, but, somehow, it felt as though her own heart sang with it. And she wandered into those eyes. Even after the loving hand maid stood and silently made her way to the door, she appeared detached, lost in distant lands of thought and memory.

'I had a dream about you last night.... About the day we met, do you
remember?'

'How could I forget, Miss Swann?'

'Will, how many times must I ask you to call me Elizabeth?'

'At least once more, as always, Miss Swann, as always.'

Though the flames consumed her attention as assuredly as they consumed their fare, Elizabeth pulled her gaze away from the hearth and attempted to find interest in the book in her hand. But the flames still danced in collages of light and shadow upon the cream paper pages and the words could do little to compete with the fiery spell for her concentration. Snapping her little book shut, she placed it upon the night stand at her bedside and lowered herself into the cool embrace of her fluffy feather pillows, willing herself to close her eyes and sleep.

'But we’ve got to save Will.'

'No. You’re safe now. We will return to Port Royal immediately not go gallivanting after pirates!'

'Then we condemn him to death.'

'The boy’s fate is regrettable but then so is his decision to engage in piracy.'

'To rescue me, to prevent anything from happening to me.'

She saw eyes–deep and dark and hurting–and let out a swift breath of frustration with her rampant mind’s will to escape her control this night. To her surprise, the moon had climbed high into the sky, full for the last time in several days to come with blue silver beams that stretched through her open window and mingled with golden oranges and yellows of the conflagrations in the fireplace.

‘I’m concerned that your answer was, perhaps, less than sincere.'

'I would not give my word lightly.'

'Yes, I understand. But it is so wrong that I want it given unconditionally?’

The young Swann’s eyes snapped back open from a drooping sleepiness, and she frowned with impatience at the voices that refused to forsake her to the rebounding crackles of the flame. She wanted nothing more than to be left alone, without thoughts or shadows of any part of the past following her, taunting her. She sat herself up, ignoring the taunting cackles emitting from the consuming heated light she turned her face away, into lonesome shadow and moonlight.

But the moon held nothing no warmth or comfort and the shadows no measure of friends or peace. Tears began to burn in the springs of her eyes and her throat began to ache with its forced restraint and constriction. Crystal cold and disguising darkness were all that faintly greeted her, and she felt helpless and very alone.

'We should return to the Dauntless.'

'Your fiancé will be wanting to know you're safe'

Elizabeth’s anger flared and burned suddenly, her fingers entangling themselves with her sheets and blankets in fists of heated emotion submitting to the echos in her mind. Her heart pulsed sorely as she thrust herself back into her pillows and turned to face the glowing ashes that had diminished from flames in the darkening hearth.

She saw eyes–gentle and piercing as the lament for a broken bosom and throe-worn breast singing for hope and finding naught but an empty sea with no end to its
immortal horizon. She would never again look into those eyes she saw in dreams and fantasy–even as she dreamed, they were being torn away from her presence and
future.

She saw eyes, and she despised them with all her ruptured heart; for their incessantly haunting nature; for their wicked stirring of memories that she craved to abandoned and yet cherished too much to let go; for their impudent daring to bend her way and ruthlessly capture her forbidden heart.

She saw eyes… and within her own eyes a flame flickered as a solitary, spouseless tear scorched its way down her soft flushing cheek. Although the embers in the hearth were ardent still, the blankets warm about her body without draft, the fire in her eyes ablaze and the salt upon her cheek scorching, inside Miss Swann felt as chill and empty as black shadow and blue moonlight. And because they haunted her despite all the stubbornness in her being, in the lonely darkness of her room, Elizabeth solemnly questioned whether she would ever be free from the phantom of lowly chocolate eyes. For she saw them even in fire, shadow and moonlight.

~.~

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