A Burning Village~

The battle cries have hushed a bit and the shooting and booming of guns and canons has stopped, but the fire they started is still at intense levels. 

It ripples through the trees like a wave, catching and taking down anything -and everything- in it's path with intensity. 

My home, the forest, is being slaughtered before my eyes. Stolen, by evil things of flame. I stand and watch by the lukewarm window. 

All I can do is watch as white clouds of ash fall like snow all around, counting the minutes, my heart dropping ever so low with each second. 

I can feel my eyes prickling with tears, ones that threaten to fall every time a tree does.

Not many of us made it out. The Bennett's, I can see their house now. I can see the way the flames enjoy the old, rotting wood and thin frail walls. 

The Smiths and their seven children, too, never entered the Cadres Building. 

Half the Village is probably dead by now. 

I let some tears fall, but only a few, because I know if I allow any more, I won't be able to stop them. I mourn silently for the ones I knew and loved so dear. The ones who I will never see again.  

And as I do, I recoil a bit, because someone has caught my hand. The touch is rough, but I don't look over to see who it belongs to, because I already know. 

"Where do you suppose they are now?" I ask as I wipe the tears from my face with my free hand. 

"Dead," his words are there, deep and truthful (just like everything he says). I knew what he'd say, but it still surprises me.
Finally I look to him, bracing myself for the beauty. 

The reflection of the fires, I can see them in his eyes. Hues of orange and yellow swallowing all the hazel they hold, but his gaze is still the same. 

Gently, and beautiful they stare into me, trying to capture as much information as they can possibly hold. 

"Dead, of course, but what about after death? What happens to them then?" My voice is faint as I ask.
"Nothing. Nothing happenes Annie," my heart lowers, because I know he'll never believe what I believe. "But maybe. Maybe there is something," he adds.
It's hauntingly impressive, the way he can read me like a book with just one look. 

It's touching, so delicate, how its so easy to feel absolutely safe with him (my vulnerability making it even easier). 

He mostly just finds pain though. Mostly from the past. 

But once in a great while he'll find something new. Something I won't even realize is there until he points it out. 

He'll find happiness. Just a smidgen of it. But that smidgen, the one I need so desperately right now, he won't find it for awhile. It's been burned down so deep into the gravel by the fire that has killed everything I'v ever loved. 

Except for him. I still have him. So I guess now we'll just run away, because there's nothing left for us here. 

"It's time to go," he says grabbing my other hand, "say goodbye," and I do.