[Gift] The 11th Hour | Bonfire

Waves crashed at the edges of the rocky shore. The night was brisk, biting, beaten back by the towering bonfire on the beach. The wood crackled and popped, smoke rising into the crystal-clear night. The wood they were burning smelled strangely sweet, a smell that only intensified with each pop and hiss as the fire cracked the wood open further, exposing damp pockets to be licked clean by the flames.

Meena was some distance away, a beacon in her own right, gleaming like a star. Orange and pink light glowed from her scales, spilling over the surface of the tidepools she’d come to peruse, to get some distance between herself and the all-encompassing heat.

Here, she could enjoy a kiss of it, a reminder that there was more than the cold and the dark, and she could look at the anemone and snails, barnacles and starfish, crabs and sea hares that made their lives here, in pockets of ocean, on the edge of the sea.

However, her attention was always drawn back to the bonfire, to the distant silhouette of those enjoying it, to the sense of companionship that came with it. Even at a distance, it was a comfort, calling to her.

And, eventually, she would make her way back, never close enough to be burned—either by the fire, or by those attending—but near enough to bask, eyes half-closed in sheer contentment, glowing all the brighter for her adoration until the fire ran out of fuel and became little more than ash, leaving nothing behind but the please sweet-burn smelling ash behind and smoldering charcoal.