The enormous pyre looked to me, seeming to recognize me for the first time, his eyes growing wide with terror. He turned his bulky frame to run back down the narrow stairwell.

It was then I noticed that Alexander, his golden eyes narrowed and locked on Milieu, wore on his bloodied mouth the slightest of smiles.

Episode 76: The Pyre Who Did Not Stand A Chance

Poor Milieu.

<<Look away, if you wish>>, Alexander meant to me. <<But only if you wish>>.

I should have reached my hand to Alexander’s shoulder in an effort to prevent the events which I predicted would follow, but instead, I stood very still in the dark stairwell, my hand on the sticky stone wall for support.

<<I…did not know>>. Milieu’s intentions came like a pebble skipping across water, halting and nearly foreign to me. Hardly could I perceive them, as if they were already fading away. <<I did not  know . I did not know she was yours>>.

Alexander stretched an elegant arm out, and Milieu’s body stiffened before Alexander's hand could tighten around his large throat.

<<She is more than mine>>, he meant to the half-wild pyre. <<She is her own>>. And with that, he squeezed, the muscles of his neck and shoulders and arm rippling with power and glowing with a subtle, undeniable light I could not describe.

Milieu gurgled, his eyes bulging and his mouth gaping open. Alexander brought him down to his knees, standing over him with his hands still around the pyre’s throat until Milieu no longer moved. One final squeeze and the neck of the rigid pyre crumbled in Alexander's fingers. Releasing him at last, Alexander paused to lick his fingers, a sound of satisfaction leaving him. He then dusted his palms as Milieu tipped slowly backward and, when the sleeping pyre collided with the stairs, exploded into a variety of stony pieces, his nose going hither  and his leg thither.

Alexander rolled his shoulders and turned back to me, nodding his head toward the way we’d come. <<Shall we>>?

I did not know what to say to the pyre who had only just dusted the powdered blood of another from his hands. Then I recalled that I would not be saying anything to Alexander, no matter if I could think of what words I might have used.

He studied me with those impossible eyes of his. <<Enough then, for one evening>>. And then, without warning or further explanation, he reversed his direction a final time and disappeared down the stairs and into the whispering dark of the Cranley dungeons.

It was not but a few moments later when Rosemary met me on the staircase, free from the dismal abyss beneath my feet. She smirked as she stepped deftly over the remains of Milieu and took my hand in hers.