The pyre withdrew his fangs and released my wrist. I stumbled backward as if he pushed me, though he could have done no such thing considering his elaborate restraints. My shoulder blades collided with the iron bars of the cell, and a clang rang through the dungeon.

“Hello?”

A small, frightened voice. From somewhere outside of the cell.

Peering through the bars, I could barely make out the silhouette of Chrysanthemum Tower.

“Hello? Is someone there?”

I did not answer her. I could never dream of speaking a word to someone so incapable of hearing me. But I admired her courageous stupidity. Coming into the dark alone. I could tell she had liberated her elaborate yellow dress and instead enlisted a slim, form-fitting nightgown. Satin, if I had to guess. And I imagined it with ridiculous and cumbersome trim.

She muttered under shaking breath, fumbling with something in her hands. Whatever it was jingled and clattered as she failed to keep it still. Then, with a firm stroke, she lit a match and attempted to place it in her lantern.

The pyres in their cages—how they wished they could drink the light of the moon. That was what they longed for. What made their bones ache and their blood freeze in their veins. But they could not have the glow, and so they settled for the low flicker of the match’s flame. The pyres lunged against the bars, trying to draw close to the warmth, to the light. It called them, but they could not reach it. Both the light and the pyres failed in their efforts.

I felt their desperation like I’d plunged feet-first beneath the ice sheets of a frozen lake. It shocked my body. Not a slow, creeping hunger like the sort that ravaged me if I wandered all day without a meal. No. This was brutal deprivation. Sharp and jagged and cruel.

I hurried to Chrysanthemum. Seeing me there without any explanation startled her, and she opened her large mouth, preparing to summon a scream from the depths of her belly. But I was quicker. I clamped my hand over her mouth. My fingers coated in my blood, my wrist throbbing where the pyre had inserted his fangs moments before. But it did the job. She could not scream, and I could not be found out.

Her bulging eyes flicked down, and upon noticing the scarlet blood on my hands, how it had trickled down my arm and soaked my nightdress, the girl tried to scream again. I kept my hand firmly placed until the breath from her nostrils no longer blasted into my face. She trembled, yes, but she did not scream.