Plop.
At last, Brown’s head melted and fell off. Oh well. Outside, I held him in my arms; inside, I flowed through him, melting him. I carefully picked up the head and this time hugged all of it to me, piercing the skull, tearing through the membrane, melting into the soft, grayish brain. Maybe I melted too much. I temporarily increased my volume and came spilling out his eye sockets, mouth, nostrils, and ear holes.
His heart had stopped beating. Green light surrounded the faeries in the barn hatch, who watched me with interest.
At last all the warmth was gone, fragments of his body and the bloodstain all that remained. I wiped some of it up, thinking if I dug a hole I could maybe hide some more; but not all. There was no way to avoid questions entirely.
Oh well. At least I’d been able to savor all his warmth before his weakening heart had stopped.
Gray and White huddled together in the corner, frightened and bleating. Oh, some day I would have to say goodbye to them as well. I’d lose their warmth, too. If that happened, what would I do?
✦ ✦ ✦
Oh. I was…something else entirely.
✦ ✦ ✦
When I woke up, I saw hell.
A sea of blood and guts lay before me. The Ferris wheel, the moon, the smell on the wind, and my own rotten scent blended in harmony, all combining to make this place look like the lid to hell had blown off.
Funfair customers sobbed, as did the orphanage children. Yolanda pulled Cathy away. Poor things. Poor, poor things. My heart ached. I thought it strange I had a heart that could ache.
“If you could understand that, then…” I muttered.
Perhaps these emotions were the answer that old woman had been after. In which case, perhaps I might have had a slightly different future. I wasn’t sure. It was too late now. Forget milk; I’d spilled deep crimson that sprayed all around, filling my insides.
The air smelled of smoke and cold. A heavy fog covered us, like this was London.
I looked around. I saw half of Sister Abigail’s face lying in the mud next to Julian. Her eyes, wide open, glared uselessly into the air. More pieces of her had been scattered far and wide, mauled beyond recognition. The other nuns had met the same fate, along with some of the children. The pieces were mixed together, all half-melted. Cold. But they didn’t fill me. They couldn’t fill me. They could never warm me.
“Georgie.”
I tried whispering his name but wasn’t sure I’d made a sound at all. I could feel precious warmth moving in me, as if in answer.
Crybaby Georgie no longer had the power to struggle. He’d melted in my belly, dreaming of his Mum and Dad.
Who was that old woman anyway? My thoughts connected my dream to reality. Had it really been a dream? Probably not. That may have been a real mage, so that “dream” was probably second sight. I was no saint—I wasn’t even human—but I’d given those nuns a great revelation.
My throat rattled at the irony. Did I even have a throat anymore? Didn’t matter anyway. What mattered was that I was here. I was here. Now we were both Agnella, and that was good. I shook my head and sighed. Sticky drops rained upon the earth with a squelching sound.
It was cold. I needed warmth. I needed Cathy and Yolanda. With them and Georgie, that would make three. I needed them to fill me, warm the inside of me, occlude, unify, mate, meld, mix. Melt together. Become one. Then I would understand a little better, a little more than now. About humans. About something. Mmm. I was sure.
Then I sang a little song, leaving a sticky trail behind me as I slithered toward them.
The End