THE GIRL WHO WAS MADE OF FLAMES

Fire-starter ocean-drowner destiny-stealer dream-taker

That was what they called her when they thought she was not listening.

Fire-starter ocean-drowner destiny-stealer dream-taker

They sang it when they thought she was asleep, it rhymed, the words were not a lie.

Her blood was gasoline and everything she touched caught fire. She touched things and they burned.

Her skin was woven from a flammable substance, and her words were what her skin was made of. She was fire and therefore insatiable, eating souls like fire eats grass and dry wooden things, hungrily, voraciously.

Fire-starter ocean-drowner destiny-stealer dream-taker

That was what they called her when they thought she was not listening.

She pulled fiery terrors from her dreams and sent them to the doorsteps of her enemies.

"Wreak havoc." She whispered to them, her little fiery terrors with sunset-orange skin. "Destroy their homes." They were the colour of naked flames, of unbridled fury. She fed them gasoline, gasoline and dry leaves from fallen trees. "Make them weep."

They did.