#persistent whimsy

"You're alright!" he insists. "You're going to be fine, we're almost-"

His grip on you falters and you splash to the sidewalk at his feet. The scrape of the concrete against your delicate skin is the least of your concerns. The chilly water pouring down from the sky oppresses your spirit, not unlike a candle wick trapped under a running faucet. You would face a bed of nails, a field of razors, a barefoot mile of broken glass before you willingly subjected yourself to a torrential downpour like the one you find yourself languishing in now. You shiver helplessly, too weak to move of your own volition. As if the rain isn't bad enough, you can see scarlet rushing out to color the puddle where you lay. The crimson-black stain would be glorious under any other circumstances, faceted like a ruby, swirling like stardust and darker than your malevolent heart.

"Get up, come on!"

He hauls you up and the pain of movement almost kills you then and there. Still, you limp along cooperatively as he rushes you down an alley. It's the closest thing to shelter he can find for you between the storm raging above and the hounds of justice nipping at your heels. The rain is gentler here. The winds driving it sideways are blocked by the soaring, dripping brick walls. Your love deposits you on a doorstep, rattles the knob, but finds it locked. He pounds and shouts, but his efforts garner no response. You bleed at his feet, soaked and shaking. The familiar cold of the grave is reaching for you. The world is dimming around the edges. Piteously, you can feel that you're beyond help.

"Darling... darling!" you call him faintly. You tug the drenched fabric of his trouser leg, begging for his attention while your flame burns low.

"We have to get you dry!" he reasons, still planning even past the despair and adrenaline. "We just have to-"

"It's too late," you sigh.

You reach high enough to tug his hand plaintively and he follows your summons. Kneeling at your side, he's just as sodden as you, though the water doesn't weaken him the same way it does you. You grimace through the pain, gather your strength and cup his frigid cheek in your numb palm. You're even colder than he is and that fact isn't lost on your love. His expression contorts with agony, with the terrible knowledge that you're right. Even through the mask of rainwater streaming down his face in rivulets, you can tell there are tears mixed in by the red outlining the brooding whiskey eyes you so adore.

He reaches out tentatively, but stops short of touching the wound dead center in your torso. You shudder while he convulses with distress. He seizes your hand and a wretched, terse sob escapes him as he realizes how bad the cops really got you.

"No, don't be sad," you urge him softly. "It's fine."

Sirens wail down the street, closer every second. He clutches your hand in his like he can keep you there with him if he holds you tight enough.

"This can't be it, this can't be the end," he murmurs, devastated while thunder cracks insensitively overheard. Have the heavens no sympathy for your plight, nothing but tears of retribution to shed for your tragedy?

"It's not," you promise him with a pained smile. "I'll be back, remember? I'll always be back... look for me?"

"Look for-"

His laugh is a short, bitter thing.

"Look for you?" he demands. "How? How can I look for you from inside a cell, huh? We're cornered here. Nowhere left to run, and the police have enough evidence after that disaster in Jericho-"

"Then I'll find you again when I'm old enough," you reason. "If you can wait for me for thirteen, fifteen years... eighteen, twenty tops. I can break you out. We can-"

"After all the trouble you just went through the last three hundred years syncing our life cycles after I screwed it up the first time?" he scoffs.

It's true. This is the first lifetime in a long while that you've died and been reborn in the same year as your soulmate. The cycle can't run true if one of you outlives the other.

"No choice," you cough. Blood spatters your lips, only for the raindrops to wash it away in the next breath.

"There's always a choice," he insists.

"What choice?" you manage cynically. Your voice is fading fast, the edges of the world blurring as the ground starts to spin beneath you.

You see your love pull the gun from his pocket. All it takes is for you to meet his eyes to understand his intentions.

"You would do that for me?" you sigh, overjoyed and mournful in the same harrowed heartbeat.

"Of course," he scowls. "I would do anything for you... anyway, it's not forever, remember? Promise you'll find me again?"

"Always," you breathe.

He pulls you into one last kiss, searing and desperate. As your final breath leaves your body, you see him press the barrel to his temple. He hesitates while his violently shaking free hand cleaves to yours like a lifeline in the tempest, even as yours goes lax in his grasp. You wonder if he'll be able to do it. You don't have enough life left in you to know for sure if he does, but as the darkness of death calls you back irresistibly, you think you hear the echo of a single gunshot.

1990

Isaac left Sara behind with a hastily mumbled excuse so he could pursue you vengefully through Nevermore's time-worn corridors. Your smirk grew, ravenous and unchecked. Mischief simmered around you in a haze that was almost visible to the naked eye as you cheekily evaded him. You darted and crept, far enough ahead to wind his frustration tighter with every passing second.

"Hey! Stop, damn it!" Isaac called furiously.

Tired of the chase, Isaac cut your playful flight short with a curt clench of his right hand. You squealed with untoward delight, wearing an expression like a child caught in a misdeed as he dragged you closer to him. Your race had lured him far enough from the well-traversed hallways that there was no one else around to see it when he slammed you against the stone wall. He did it hard enough to drag a short cry from the mess of your breathless glee. Isaac closed the space between you, winded from the sprint, features twisted and hideous with rage.

"If you think I'm above hitting a girl, you're sorely mistaken!" he seethed. "Who the hell do you think you are, anyway?!"

He held you in place with his power, maintained a safe distance between you like he was shy of physically touching you. Ironic, given the unforgiving force he exerted with his telekinesis. You choked under his influence, but grinned through his wrath with perverse enjoyment.

"There's my darling," you wheezed. "Oh, how I missed you..."

"You're completely insane!" Isaac spat, only further perturbed by your apparent relish of his rough treatment. "Whatever's wrong with your head isn't my problem, you got that?! And I know it was you in my room last night! Leave me the hell alone!"

"Or else?" you taunted.

Anger compelled Isaac to close the distance separating you. His flesh and blood fingers around your throat left you panting, more with desire than oppression.

"I can get you expelled for what you did last night!" Isaac hissed.

"Last night, when you made passionate love to me?" you purred in blatant instigation. "Seemed like you needed it more than I did... doesn't she know how to touch you right, that sweet little distraction you've been carousing with while you waited for me to find you? Sweet little Sara-"

"You keep her name out of your filthy fucking mouth!" Isaac snapped.

His grip on your throat tightened and he drew his hand back high. It wasn't a threat. Isaac heaved with the effort of restraining himself. His gaze gleamed with mania, with the fevered strength of his animosity. The answering shine in your eyes while they tracked his hesitant fist helped him hold it together, but just barely. You licked your lips and yearned forward like you craved his violence. The need to deny you what you wanted was the only thing keeping Isaac from beating you senseless, chivalry and propriety be damned.

"I've never left you hungry," you rasped. It was a strain to voice the words past his abuse of your windpipe, but you pressed on willfully. "She can't care for you that much if she can walk away from you so easily when you're-"

The slap landed harshly, the sound loud as it ricocheted off stone walls. You moaned in response, wet your lips with a longing tongue and melted at the blissful depravity of Isaac's scorn. Your reaction shocked him less than it would have mere moments ago. Strangely, Isaac was already beginning to feel familiar with the boundaries that defined your exquisite dysfunction. To his dismay, he realized he found it enticing, the way you craved any passion he was willing to spare you. Love or hate, it didn't seem to matter, so long as you got to watch him unravel for you.

"You're sick!" he accused vehemently.

Your fingers stroked over his tenderly, curved over his wrists, danced along his arms until your hands were sliding up his chest while you strained against his hold. Not in an attempt to free yourself, he noted. As your fingers tangled, undeniably intimate, through Isaac's curls, he knew you were only trying to draw close enough to kiss him. He resisted, but your strength was nothing to bat an eye at and you were pulling him in faster than he could escape. He felt your leg hook around the back of his knee, yelped disconcertedly as your breath fanned across his face, eager and intense. His fingers abandoned your throat to brace against the wall.

"Don't touch me!" he panted, desperation pitching his voice high. "Let go!"

"You started it!" you pointed out wickedly. "Such a convenient, impersonal ability, and you still felt the need to get your hands on my skin. Even without any memory of who I am, you just can't help yourself, can you? My love..."

"Stop it! Stop!"

Despite his protests, the snare of your desire curled around Isaac's alarm while your heavy exhalations proved soporific to his distaste. His breath hitched in a way that had nothing to do with panic, nothing in common with the rationality urging him to break free of your embrace. Your lips were inviting, parted and pretty while your cheek glowed with the evidence of his brutality. A skittish excitement tempted him to stop fighting and let you have your way with him again. The memory of your body on his and the pleasure you could impart with a simple touch almost knocked his knees out from under him.

Sara, Sara, Sara!

Isaac meditated on her name like a prayer. Your hooded eyes leaked forbidden sensuality and your scent sang temptation. Your lips brushed along his jaw and his voice broke along with his brittle resolve.

"Fuck, pl-please!" he gasped.

Desperate and degenerate, Isaac didn't know anymore whether he was still begging you to leave him alone or encouraging you to take the rest of what you wanted from him.

You paused your indiscretions while he stopped pulling against your grasp. Your fiery eyes took him in, examined the unwilling spectacle of his indecisive dissent as shrewdly as a scientist inspecting a specimen.

Abruptly, unexpectedly, you released him. He stumbled back, found his footing and straightened obstinately. It took him a few seconds, but his wits returned once your skin wasn't burning against his anymore. He leveled a finger at you, quivering with disheveled fury.

"You leave me alone!" he demanded unsteadily. "Do you understand?! Don't you fucking dare come near me or-or my girlfriend, you psycho! Or you'll regret it!"

"Regret it more than letting you go for a final time?" you wondered mysteriously, too nonchalant given the circumstances. "I think not. But don't get yourself so worked up, darling."

You sauntered a little closer. Isaac stiffened defensively, but his pride kept him rooted in place. He wasn't going to back down. You gazed up at him like you were trying to solve a puzzle. Your eyes locked together in the shadowed corridor, his blazing with anger, yours with an ungodly, indecipherable fire that made you seem more beast than girl.

The smile you gave him in parting was pure mercy, the softest thing he'd ever seen from you. It made you look like a different person entirely, a new breed of stranger altogether.

"I've always given you everything you want," you sighed, apparently repentant. "Why should this be the exception?"

You strolled past him, but stopped one last time.

"You'll come around," you assured him in parting, unwaveringly confident. "I'll be waiting when you do."

You blew him a kiss before you disappeared around the corner. Isaac took a moment to measure his breathing, to run a hand through his hair over and over again. Despite his attempts to recover his cracked composure, he could still feel your fingerprints on his skin when he fled what felt like the scene of some clandestine crime.

"So? What do I do? I need to tell her, right?"

Isaac sat on the edge of his bed, head cradled between his hands in the wake of a detailed, conflicted confession.

"Uh... well..."

Gomez Addams sat by his side, smoothing over his thin mustache again and again with a troubled expression. A thoughtful gleam backlit his obsidian black eyes while Isaac awaited his verdict.

Though he'd come to his friend for advice, Isaac couldn't help but feel like he was submitting to a trial by unburdening himself of the developments of the last day or so. The weight of what had transpired kept him from Sara's side all day. Guilt chained his conscience and dread grew like an itching ivy, a slinking, irritating, inescapable thing that crept over his love for his girlfriend with the intention of smothering it straight to death.

"I have to tell her," Isaac groaned. He twisted his fingers through his hair, grimaced at the very idea. "It's the right thing to do."

"I'm not so convinced of that myself, old boy," Gomez mused.

Isaac's gaze snapped up, hope clawing rabidly as he waited for Gomez to go on.

"Just to clear a few things up," Gomez checked cautiously. "You definitely thought it was Sara when you were... well, last night, that is."

"It never even occurred to me that it might be someone else," Isaac insisted.

"Alright. That's good, that's the most important part, if you ask me."

"How?!"

"Look, do you want my opinion or not?!"

"I do!"

"Alright then! Look, if you feel bad about what happened, you'll have plenty of opportunities to make it up to Sara in the long run," Gomez reasoned. "But if you tell her and she dumps you over this mistake? How are you going to make it up to her then, huh?"

"I... but isn't it... shouldn't I..."

"It's not cheating," Gomez decided summarily. "You didn't know any better."

"If you're so sure, why shouldn't I tell Sara?" Isaac asked pointedly. "What, you don't think she'll see it the same way?"

"Women are not creatures of reason," Gomez scowled. "They're ruled by emotion, more possessive than a dragon of its hoard, more ruthless than-"

"Gomez, I'm hearing a lot of misogyny and unsubstantiated generalizations," Isaac frowned. "I'm not convinced-"

"Look, tell her if you want, but I wash my hands of your poor judgement," Gomez shrugged. "But before you make up your mind, let me ask you one last question. And think hard before you answer!"

"Fine."

"If your places were reversed, how would you feel? Put yourself in your girlfriend's shoes, Isaac. If Sara came to you with a story like this, how would you react?"

Isaac automatically wanted to claim he would believe her, but the words didn't make it far. He clamped his mouth shut, swallowed his reflexive defensiveness, and seriously considered the perspective Gomez proposed. Truthfully, he was forced to admit that he wasn't as good a person as he wanted to give himself credit for in this hypothetical scenario.

"I... I wouldn't believe that she could get that far without suspecting it wasn't me," he realized glumly. "I would think she was lying... that she- that she let it happen... fuck!"

"There you have it," Gomez sighed. "Look, my friend, it's a bad situation. This pyro you're dealing with, she's not a woman of honor or principles, that much is certain. She's a snake in the grass at best, or perhaps the devil herself in disguise. At the end of the day, where Sara's concerned, you have to follow your own heart, Isaac. I may have the benefit of a litigious mindset, but it's your relationship on the line. But whatever you decide to do, tell her or keep it to yourself, keep your guard up around the other woman. As a betting man, I'd go all in on the odds that she's not finished with you yet."

Isaac wrung his hands anxiously. Talking to his best friend usually made him feel better. This time, he left the conversation feeling even more confused and apprehensive than before he'd sought Gomez's sage advice.

You watched Isaac Night go about his day, all but blinded by the certainty that this life your love was living would be his last. Flashes of your shared past assaulted you unbidden, sweet memories that now seemed tainted by the events of the present.

"Why the heart, do you think?" you wonder as you lay in his arms.

Your palm rests over his bare chest, the vital pulse of every beat filling you with pleasure.

"I couldn't say," your love sighs. "I'm bringing science into a realm ruled by magic and superstition. Maybe the heart is where the soul resides? We could find a priest to ask."

"Good luck finding a priest who wouldn't lose his mind at the sight of me!" you giggle.

You would have been happy to linger in reminiscence, but your musing was interrupted by a brooding psychic. Your eyes flicked up and down her distinctive figure in appraisal, before you fixed your gaze back obstinately to the object of your obsession.

"Morticia Frump," she introduced herself brazenly. "We've met before, though briefly. At my bonfire."

"Charmed, I'm sure," you sighed drearily.

She settled down by your side in the quad. You were perched atop a low stone wall, one leg dangling, the other drawn up to your chest. Your chin rested on your knee while your glowing eyes followed Isaac's movements raptly.

"You know, I heard all about your visit to Caliban hall last night," Morticia purred, nosiness on full display.

You weren't impressed. By now, the whole school had heard of the brief, intense debacle.

"Yes, my darling Gomez recounted the entire dramatic scene to me, in all its titillating detail," Morticia went on. "According to him, you and Isaac Night were so deeply... involved... that you didn't even notice my poor, gobsmacked Gomez watching from his bed."

"Few things escape my notice," you snapped. "I had more pressing concerns than the scenery. Your poor, gobsmacked Gomez was wise to keep his head down. Had he seen fit to interrupt, who's to say he would have survived the firestorm of my wrath?"

"Yes, you're a regular firebrand, aren't you?" Morticia drawled, unfazed by the implication of violence. "In fact, I'd say you run a little too hot, darling... even for a pyro."

You afforded her your full attention. She was tugging at the edges of a truth you would prefer to keep hidden a while longer yet.

"Of course, your secret's safe with me," Morticia winked, reading your expression, or perhaps your aura. After all, she was a formidable mystic in her own right. Nevermore's queen bee was preceded by a reputation that lauded her as a psychic of impressive talent. "As a woman of unrestrained passion myself, I'm wise enough to know better than to get on the bad side of a fellow... well, we'll say 'hopeless romantic'."

You wondered what secret she thought she had divined. Your true nature? Or something less important? You regarded her with suspicion and disdain, silent while you waited for her to arrive at a point.

"A woman of passion... and of few words, I see," Morticia observed. "Very well. Far be it from me to interrupt your yearning. I'll leave you to ogle that dour Da Vinci in peace..."

You hummed your approval.

"But... I will leave you with a word of warning before I go," Morticia amended.

Your relief wilted. You grit your teeth while Morticia's expression grew grave with sincerity.

"You see, as a dove, there are few calamities that grace the threshold of my impressive foresight," Morticia explained. "But one thing I have always been able to see clearly? The brilliant red strings of fate that bind two hearts together across the capricious tides of destiny."

Your lips quirked up a little. She may have been annoying, but the seer understood the terrible nature of predestination well enough.

"I see the bond pulling you ever closer to Isaac Night," Morticia warned, tone grim as though she were delivering a death sentence. "And I don't begrudge you your campaign of seduction. Be that as it may, Sara Temple is my friend. Hurt her, and I'll make sure you regret it."

"Silly little dove," you sneered, unable to contain your ire at the paltry threat. "Fly away before I singe those meddling wings!"

"Consider yourself warned... firebird," Morticia shot back, unfaltering in the face of your contempt.

Her choice of words gave you pause. You crossed your arms unhappily over your chest while she swept away.

Did Morticia Frump know enough about you to pose any real danger? Or could you safely disregard her posturing?

You scoffed your indignation and abandoned your lookout in favor of solitude. You needed to think.

Isaac and Sara writhed and moaned together, fully dressed but inseparably entwined on his bed. Neither had a thought in their head aside from the other, deep in a make-out session that had begun sweetly enough, only to spiral uncontrollably as they stoked one another's passions mercilessly. Both out of breath, both frantic with longing, Sara was the first to break free of the spell. Isaac's hands had been under her clothes for a long time, but his long fingers were creeping too far, leaving her burning with a desire she knew better than to embrace.

"Is-Isaac! How long until Gomez comes back?" she demanded, practicality edging out raw licentiousness.

"He won't be back tonight," Isaac grinned. "Larissa's home for the weekend, so you know Gomez is basically camped out in Morticia's room... which means-"

"Isaac, I- mm!"

Sara let his lips have their way with hers again, but only until his hands started wandering again.

"We can't tonight!" she sighed.

"Why not?" he whined.

"Oh come on, all that drama with the other pyro has the staff watching Caliban hall like a flock of eagles!" Sara reminded him.

"Oh please, eagles don't even form flocks..."

"You nerd!" Sara giggled.

"We'll be fine, no one's going to-"

"Isaac, I need to be up early tomorrow."

"I won't keep you awake! Come on, stay the night and just lay here with me!" Isaac plead. "I promise to be good..."

He pouted, but Sara was still shaking her head. She extricated herself from his arms and straightened her clothes while he mourned the loss.

"No way I'll be able to control myself all night with you lying there teasing me!" she insisted.

"Then don't control yourself..." Isaac proposed suggestively, rolling over and reaching for her hand.

"We'll be up all night and neither of us can afford to sleep in."

She let him flex his fingers through hers, but the kiss she dipped to gift him was a gesture of farewell.

"See you tomorrow?" she murmured.

"See you tomorrow," Isaac sighed in surrender.

"Good night. I love you."

She whispered the words at his ear like a secret. Isaac smiled and spoke his reply aloud like a declaration.

"I love you too."

Sara darted from his side. She cracked his door open and glanced out surreptitiously before she made a break for it. Once the door clicked shut again, Isaac rolled over with a heavy, protracted sigh. He chose to look on the bright side. With Sara spurning his seductions, he could at least make the most of his newfound peace of mind.

Disturbing as his encounter with you had been, it left him with one comforting assurance. In light of the evidence of your infatuation, Isaac was certain that you were the one stalking him from the shadows. As problematic as he knew your apparent, unhinged obsession could prove to be, it was still better than the wild conspiracies he had feared previously.

No one suspects the true nature of my research in Iago tower. All my plans are safe.

For the first time in weeks, he closed his eyes and drifted seamlessly into a restful slumber.

He slept so soundly that the creak of his door opening didn't disturb him. Nor did the slow dip of his mattress beneath the added weight of an interloper. The heat of another body draping over his registered in his dreams as sunlight, welcome and pleasant. The sensuous grope of hands over his lax form was less easily interpreted by his unconscious mind. Admiring fingers, bold and gently reverent, played through his unkempt curls. Their pads traced the sharp lines, steep hollows and cruel peaks of his inert features. A comforting explanation wove through his respite.

Sara...

The soft sensation of lips against the column of Isaac's throat drew him gradually back to awareness. He was still so drowsy that he felt a little disgruntled at the interruption of his rest, but there was a hand sliding persuasively down the front of his body. Boldness and familiarity administered as instigation, bare flesh slipped beneath his loose pajamas to tease him. He gave a helpless little moan and pressed into the touch. Half asleep, his body still responded eagerly as fingers wrapped generously around his quickly firming length. The lips on his neck crept higher, chasing a kiss that he melted into easily.

The playful, wet flick of a tongue against his and nails scraping hungrily against his scalp woke Isaac up the rest of the way. He stirred to chase the contact, mouth pressing up to deepen the kiss, hips lifting to encourage the smooth strokes riling him up irresistibly. A thumb swiped high to tease his sensitive slit and slide torturously through the slick beading there. The soft, sleepy sounds of Isaac's enticement filled the darkness. A hum of satisfaction rose in reply.

"I'm so glad you changed your mind," he mumbled, listless but happy.

His late night visitor shifted and shuffled, displacing clothes at a pace that startled him a little, but he wasn't about to protest. His eyes blinked open, but the lightless black of his dorm afforded him only the barest impressions, presence distilled to blurry, shadowed outlines devoid of detail. He fell back to rely on physical sensation to bridge the gaps in his perception. His visitor moved to straddle him, lithe and sinuous under the cover of darkness. Wet heat overcame his arousal suddenly, unbearably tight and luxuriously soft. The overwhelming sensation wrenched a series of obscene moans from him that were muffled only by the kiss that grew more passionate by the second.

"S-Sar-"

He started to whisper her name in the dark, but her palm silenced him, pressed flat to his mouth while she settled into a steady rhythm. Isaac could only muffle his pleasure against the lines of her hand and chase the bliss encompassing him. His own shaking hands flew out blindly to caress her body, to return some of the ecstasy she was lavishing him with. Her palm left his lips in favor of grappling with his shirt, thrusts langouring as she dipped to mouth at the newly exposed flesh. She sucked and bit at his skin, leaving behind the promise of bruises with her vigor.

"Feels so... feels so good!" Isaac gasped, quiet as he could be to humor her demand for secrecy.

Though soft, his voice was high, thin with the threat of collapse. Her fingers tangled into his hair as if to comfort his fervor, only to tighten their grip in a blatant attempt to drive him out of his mind with passion. Enamored and steeped in physical bliss, with the vestiges of sleep dulling the finger edges of his perception and reason, Isaac obliged her unspoken demand.

His hands settled at her hips, fingers digging carelessly into pliant flesh while she matched his moans. Satisfaction tore through Isaac at the thought that it was as good for her as it was for him. He yearned up with every subdued, drowsy inch of his smoldering desire, spurred her to move faster in response. The intensification of their lovemaking was more than he could withstand. He didn't want to fall apart so quickly, but the ardence of her mouth on his neck and the relentless rhythm of her hips over his left him little choice in the matter.

Isaac shuddered and shook while she rode him faithfully through the tremors of a climax that had him panting and clutching at her burning figure. Sheets, blankets and half-discarded clothes tangled messily around the spent lovers like suffocating snares. The darkness seemed deeper than ever before while he demanded her lips again gratefully, obsessively.

"Why'd you have t-to make me finish so fast?" he whined tremulously, the breaks in his voice betraying selfish delight.

She replied with only the ghost of a chuckle, settled down atop him with an intimacy so devastating it almost sparked Isaac's suspicions. Wordless, comforting, she stroked his hair, lips soothing over his fluttering pulse, body flush to his in the obsidian black well of the midnight hour.

Isaac was too exhausted, too sated to humor anything approaching a question. He sighed and relaxed into her embrace, wrote off the intense heat emanating from the cradle of her body as a natural result of their vigors, an expected variable in the aftermath of their passions.

The next morning, Isaac was surprised and disappointed to wake alone.

"Huh. Guess she was still paranoid about being caught," he rationalized groggily.

He went through the motions of getting ready for his day, still floating from the high of the night before. Hesitating in front of his mirror, he considered the marks littered over his neck and almost chose a turtleneck to conceal them. Then he remembered that Sara faced presumptuous competition for his affections and decided to leave them exposed.

She might have left them on purpose, a claim on what's hers, Isaac thought to himself, glowing with smug satisfaction at the notion.

As he went about his day, Isaac kept his eyes peeled for Sara. He spotted her before she noticed him and grinned while he snuck up to wrap his arms around her from behind. She squealed, then giggled when she realized who was laying kisses along the elegant arch of her neck.

"Isaac! You're still frisky?" she chuckled.

Her friends rolled their eyes while the bustle of students coming and going ignored their antics.

"Anytime I'm around you, I can't help it," Isaac teased at her ear.

"Oh, ew! That's it, we'll catch you later, Sara!" Emery informed her.

"Oh come on, don't be a jerk!" Meredith scolded him. "They're so cute! Quil, when are you going to let me give you a hicky? I swear, Isaac is like, the model boyfriend..."

"Hicky?" Sara frowned. She turned to inspect Isaac's throat, her consternation deepening as she looked him over. He arched his neck for her proudly, hummed happily while her fingers traced over the marks. "My bad, babe, I didn't think I was that rough..."

"Hm? Don't apologize, it's fine," Isaac chuckled. He pulled her into a quick kiss, then whispered salaciously at her ear. "I guess you got a little carried away after you came back..."

Sara drew back with a puzzled quirk lifting her eyebrows.

"Came back?" she wondered. "What do you mean?"

"You know, you came back sometime after I fell asleep," Isaac reminded her.

"No I didn't, I went back to Ophelia hall and passed out," Sara insisted.

"You... you didn't sneak back into my room?" Isaac pressed. Dread curled in his gut while Sara shook her head.

"No... sounds like you had some sweet dreams without me," she cajoled him, teasing playfully. "Probably my fault for getting you so worked up..."

Isaac's mind raced. Suddenly, the lovebites aching across his neck seemed to hurt a little worse.

"Right," he frowned. "Sweet... sweet dreams. Sure."

Inhuman orange eyes caught his gaze from the end of the hall. Your smirk froze his blood in his veins and made his vision go red.

<== Previous Chapter

"So Sara, how long have you and Isaac been dating?"

"Oh, just since last semester," she sighed dreamily.

How you ached to sear that blissful expression from her fragile features. You smiled through your animosity and blinked past your rage while you waited for her to go on.

"Sara!"

As though summoned by the mere mention of his name, Isaac strode up with a smirk.

"Well, speak of the devil," noted Emery, one of Sara's fellow pyros.

A fitting allegory, you thought fondly. Adoration flared within you, even as you watched Isaac dip to claim a brief kiss from his girlfriend. You felt anger, certainly, but it was buried beneath the clamor of your helpless devotion.

The devil indeed, but how the blaze of hellfire worshipped its absent master.

"Hope you hotheads don't mind if I steal her," Isaac chuckled. "We've got... plans..."

He trailed off when he noticed you among the group. You waved at him coyly from across the table.

"Far be it from us to deprive you," you purred. "See you later, Sara."

While Sara said her good-byes, Isaac frowned at you like he was disturbed by your presence. He wrapped an arm possessively around his girlfriend and ushered her away. His backward glances filled you with melancholy that you buried.

He's always wary before he knows me. He's too smart for anything else.

"Those two are so cute they make me sick," Emery groaned.

Meredith, Quil and Dan were the other components of the Nevermore pyro clique. They nodded and giggled along while you watched the couple until they disappeared from view.

"You'd think a boy without a heart would be less of a hopeless romantic," Meredith sighed. "But I wish I had a boyfriend like Isaac..."

"Hey! I told you, I can set up picnics for us to go on if that's what you're into!" Quil bristled.

Your attention snapped fully back to your vapid classmates.

"This isn't the first time I've heard rumors that Isaac has something wrong with his heart," you frowned. Here was the source of your curiosity, the font of your anxiety, the only reason you were lowering yourself to associate with these juvenile fools. "Surely the stories are exaggerated."

"Not a bit!" Meredith assured you. "I didn't believe it at first either, but Sara confirmed it when I asked her. Isaac Night... replaced his heart with some ungodly clockwork contraption!"

"Oh Mer, you're being dramatic," Quil tutted. "Ungodly is a stretch-"

"How the hell could that be possible?!" you demanded.

The vehemence of your question caught all three of them off guard. They blinked at you, startled while you rationalized with a desperate edge behind your words.

"He can't have replaced his entire heart!" you went on. "Surely there's just... part of it that had to be modified, or- or-"

The consequences of such a drastic operation gripped you in a chokehold, forced a terrible, bleak slice of the future to flash before your eyes like a vision of doom.

"Hey, calm down!" Emery cried.

"Yeah, it's fine, it's barely even the weirdest-"

"Whoa!"

The children had no way of comprehending the unspeakable repercussions of the ugly rumor they were spreading. Your skin glowed with fiery wrath, hot as magma while you simmered in disbelief.

"I won't believe it unless I see it with my own two eyes!" you growled.

You stood abruptly, tongues of flame licking furiously from your fingertips, raging upward to follow the path of your wrath. The pyros cringed back, lashed by a heat intense enough to char the edge of the wooden table before you.

Restraint was the last thing on your mind, but their gaping, horrified stares seeded caution among the weeds of despair threatening to overtake you.

Breathe. It's not true.

"Chattering little pests!" you spat. "I tire of your insipid prattling!"

You swept away, burning a path through the quad as grass crackled and crumbled to ash beneath your feet.

"Fucking psycho-"

"Emery, don't-"

"Can't just-"

"- let her go, we can't-"

You stormed away without regard for their panicked babbling.

It's not true. He's too smart, he wouldn't have done something so foolish. So reckless... he couldn't have!

As badly as you wanted to believe it, doubts overshadowed your flimsy hopes. The blank slate of a new life was unkind to the wisdom of eternity and even someone as clever as your lover could fall victim to the pitfalls of mortality.

This rumor was the most urgent matter you'd encountered in several lifetimes. Caution would need to wait. You had to uncover the truth as soon as possible. Subtlety would need to take a backseat, for once, to expediency.

"... and Morticia wants to go to Jericho this weekend," Sara was saying. "I told her I would think about it. What about you, are you interested in coming along?"

She sat cross-legged on a checkered blanket with Isaac sprawled before her. His head rested in her lap and her fingers played absently through his curls while clouds drifted by lazily overhead.

"Absolutely not," Isaac scowled.

"Why not?"

"Lots of reasons. Homework, research, I'm tired, I'm-"

"You know, ever since we got back to Nevermore," Sara cut him off, "... I've been getting the weird feeling that you've got something against Morticia."

"No, Morticia Frump?!" Isaac gasped mockingly. "No, but she's so sweet and kind and would never, ever try to talk my girlfriend into breaking up with me..."

"You can't hold one conversation against her for the rest of your life," Sara said with a roll of her eyes. "Anyway, she was just being a good friend. You weren't blameless in what happened last summer, Isaac."

"I thought you said you forgave me," Isaac grumbled. He crossed his arms over his chest defensively.

"I do," Sara assured him. "You're the one still holding onto what happened."

"I'm not!"

"As long as you let things with Morticia stay rocky, you are!"

"It doesn't affect us."

"It does when you refuse to go places with me if she's going to be there! Isaac, I want you to smooth things over with her," Sara pressed.

"There's nothing to smooth over!"

"Isaac!"

"Ow!"

She pulled his hair hard enough to make him wince.

"Be difficult about it if you want," she acquiesced. "But I'm not going to stop being friends with her. And you're the only one missing out by excluding yourself."

"I'm not excluding myself, I just have things to do," Isaac argued.

"You're impossible."

Sara knew there was only one way Isaac would let her have the last word. She smothered him with kisses, drowned his grumbling beneath the lilting music of her muffled giggles. Isaac relaxed into her embrace, content in the calming radiance of her affection.

The feeling only lasted as long as her touch lingered on his skin. When she settled down on the blanket and demanded his arms around her, the scent of smoke drifted past on the breeze. Isaac glanced around, assaulted by the certainty, now familiar, that someone was watching him. He saw neither an audience, nor the origin of the suffocating smell.

Odd, he thought suspiciously, that he smelled singed feathers so often these days.

Another scan of the landscape, and Isaac saw nothing out of the ordinary, so he held Sara tighter and dreaded the encroaching evening that promised to tear her from his embrace.

1969

"This is it! I've done it! I've found it!"

Your love's exultant cries draw you to his side. The heart flayed apart on his examination table seems to glow eerily under the harsh glare of his lamps. He is more excited than you've ever seen him and your own elation leaps to match his before you even know what he's celebrating.

"I take it you haven't wasted my kiss?" you tease him.

"I would never dare!" he vows. "Look at this!"

He pulls you closer to the object of his investigations. Beneath a magnifying glass, you see a familiar mark.

"It looks like my spark," you comment.

"Precisely! Burned into his heart in six different places," your love informs you.

"So then... this is the source?" you wonder. "The site of the curse of immortality?"

"Curse... dramatic as ever," your love chastens you. "But yes! It's held within the heart. Imparted by your kiss, through some ancient outcast magic that I have yet to deconstruct to my satisfaction. We'll need to run a lot more tests... but I'm certain of it, darling! Whatever mysticism allows the miracle of reincarnation, the heart is crucial to its mechanisms. Oh, this is a breakthrough the likes of which..."

He continues and much of the dubious science upon which he has crafted his hypothesis escapes your understanding. Even so, you smile exultantly, nod along while you listen to his voice like it's a symphony of unmatched elegance.

1990

You may have found yourself confused by your lover's intellect more often than not, but the things you understood, you would carry with you until eternity burned out. In that way, you were like an indestructible time capsule, a shrine to the discoveries scattered throughout his prestigious, obscure lives. You watched Isaac from afar until night fell, wondering all the while if it could be possible. Such a terrible rumor... could he possibly have done something so awful to himself, something so ignorant?

To replace his own heart with something artificial, something cold and soulless, something the magic of your lineage couldn't touch...

You shuddered your revulsion, swallowed your fear. Tonight you would confirm it. You pinned every ounce of hope your bitter soul could muster on the idea that the stories were false. Or perhaps only partially rooted in truth.

You couldn't bear to consider the possibility that they were accurate.

You entered Caliban hall without a care for the impropriety of your ingress. Your eyes drifted disinterestedly over gob-smacked teenage boys. You searched for Isaac without regard for the petty academic rules that deemed your presence a trespass.

The proctor of the dormitory approached you, clad in the armor of fabricated sternness. He cleared his throat, gathered an authority that paled before the gauntlet of your indifference.

"No girls in the boys dorm after curfew," he informed you briskly.

Unamused, you fixed him with a scathing, imperious glare. He shrank like a violet in the path of a lava swell, but remained rooted in your path. You raised a single finger and pressed it sharply into the center of his chest to push him out of your way. The scent of burning fabric filled the common room, accompanied by the gasps of your audience and a startled, choked cry from boy you'd singed. He scrambled away, swatting at the embers trying hungrily to take hold in his shirt. You forged on to carve your way to Isaac's door, unimpeded by the meddling of his peers.

Your knock garnered an answer. Isaac's wariness was on full display while you drank in the sight of him. Even arriving with such a solemn task in mind, you couldn't help but stop to appreciate his beauty. Here in the privacy of his own room at the close of the day, he was more relaxed than you'd seen him in this lifetime. His standard Nevermore uniform had been discarded, replaced with an old t-shirt and comfortable sweatpants. His gaze raked up and down your silhouette, intrigue apparent behind his caution. Your heart thrilled at the hint hidden in his lingering gaze.

You had yet to encounter an iteration of Isaac who didn't think you were the most gorgeous creature to grace the earth. If the gleam of muted, reluctant admiration behind his amber eyes was any indication, this lifetime was no exception to the long-standing rule.

"Can I help you?" he wondered. His eyes darted over your shoulder, brow furrowing inquisitively at the commotion you'd left in your wake.

"Certainly," you told him with a smile. "Can I come in?"

"I'd rather you didn't. What can I help you with?" Isaac scowled.

"Oh, so inhospitable," you sighed sadly. "Straight to business then. I'm only here with questions. I heard you don't have a heart. Is that true?"

Isaac laughed at your bluntness.

"Who told you that? I have a heart," he countered.

"A flesh and blood heart?" you pressed.

Isaac's amusement withered beneath the intensity of your scrutiny.

"The composition of my heart is hardly any business of yours," he said pointedly. "Now... get lost."

Your heart is mine, Isaac Night, no matter what it's made of these days.

You almost choked with the effort of biting back the words. Isaac moved to close the door, but you surged forward, unwilling to be dismissed so easily.

"Hey, what are-"

"You will show me what you've done to my gift!" you hissed.

Passion got the better of you. You slammed his door shut behind you and reached for him with trepidatious, shaking fingers. The unmistakable tickle of telekinetic talent ensconced your wrist, pulled you back a foot before you countered the unseen force. Isaac had enough time to cry out in shock and dismay as an inferno rushed forward to engulf him. With his focus broken beyond any hope of recovery, you backed him against the wall and splayed your hands over his chest. He quivered in your grasp, eyes screwed shut against the blaze while you chuckled at the fear-stricken set of his features.

"Relax," you purred past the roar. "I would never burn you, darling."

Isaac took a chance and opened his eyes. The flames wreathing him were hot enough to char, but the pain that should have accompanied them never came.

"What in the..."

Awestruck, his mind raced while he struggled to formulate an explanation for the phenomenon. You took advantage of his momentary paralysis to hike his shirt up. You only got as far as his lowest ribs in the time it took him to react. His fingers caged your wrist, teeth bared in an aggravated scowl that you met with unyielding determination.

"Let me see what you've done!" you insisted stubbornly.

"You need to get out of my room!" Isaac snapped.

"Let me look, or I'll burn every inch of fabric off your body until I've seen all I want!" you growled back.

Isaac gulped at the vivid threat. The fingers of his right hand twitched, but nothing happened. Beyond breaking the continuity of his concentration, you had no hold over his ability. Isaac was hesitating, fascination holding him back from true resistance.

"Besides, I know you want to show it to me," you breathed, choosing temptation over brute force. You slid his shirt up another inch. He let it happen, eyes glued to yours through the glowing flames that tapered down gradually. "I know how you love to talk about your inventions... and I heard that this abomination is your own design. So, Isaac Night... let me see your heart. And I'll listen while you tell me all about it's workings."

"You don't know anything about me," Isaac protested weakly.

Your eyes were captivating, spell-binding. Great orange jewels, backlit by a red glow like bloody hellfire, they seared into his soul while you coerced his shirt higher still. Isaac couldn't help but feel, inexplicably, like he'd seen your eyes somewhere before. The emotion sparked on the heels of a heavier sentiment, something he resented the instant it crept into his head.

Attraction, animal and undeniable, simmered and crackled between you while the fire of your power dissipated entirely. Your hands on his body suddenly felt unacceptable and heavenly, your touch inescapable and welcome in the same heartbeat, just as familiar as it was unknown.

"I know everything about you," you claimed confidently. "Except, perhaps..."

You trailed off and your eyes dropped from his because you had finally bared the gaping wound around the exposed chassis of his metal heart. Your gasp was a ragged, wretched thing, dread realized, hope slaughtered, your worst fears confirmed. Despite the antagonism of your invasion, Isaac felt the strongest, strangest urge to console your desolation.

"How could you do this to us?" you whispered. Your voice trembled with grief. Isaac looked on, amazed by the spectacle of your devastation. "Why would... what could possibly drive you to do such a thing?!"

"The heart I was born with was too flawed," Isaac explained. You were right about one thing. He was never able to resist the opportunity to talk about himself. "It was killing me... so I designed a better one."

"A better one... better..."

Tears rolled down your cheeks. They steamed when they hit the floor, left Isaac cringing back to avoid the boiling droplets.

"It would have been better if you died with your heart still inside you!" you fumed, torn between fury and crippling sadness. "Better would have been... an unbroken cycle... this is just... this is... such a waste! What a waste of a kiss... waste of a life, waste of eternity!"

"Who the hell are you?!" Isaac demanded. "And what the fuck do you want with me?!"

Past the roiling mass of questions your intrusion inspired in him, indignation flared as well. He ripped free from your grasp, righted his shirt and shook himself like he could physically dislodge the memory of your touch. He threw the door open, breathing hard while you remained rooted in place, too shocked, too mired in despair to move.

"Get the hell out of my room!" Isaac seethed.

A flick of his right hand and you were stumbling through the door. This time, you offered no resistance. You let his ability evict you, let him bolt the door to keep you out.

Caliban hall boys gawked at you wordlessly.

"Eyes to yourselves, or I'll burn them from your pathetic skulls!" you sneered.

Did they have the nerve to keep watching you while you stormed from their dormitory? You had no way of knowing, because you refused them the satisfaction of a backward glance.

<== Previous Chapter

When your love smiles at you, eternity holds still. When he wraps you in his arms, time disappears. Life is a prison. It diminishes you to a bird in a cage, but your lover never fails to open the door for you. You are only free when your eyes meet his, only safe when his kisses captivate your wandering, tormented mind.

"Darling, are you done here yet?" you wonder.

You're accustomed to his experimentation running long, but his scalpels are more restless than usual this weekend. The home you've invaded and turned inside out for your own twisted purposes is beginning to feel like a prison. The blood pooling on the floor is tacking; the older of the two bodies is beginning to smell.

Your love looks up from the human heart he is taking apart one vein at a time. It rests on a desk, flesh sundered so he can sift through it, inspect it through lenses and run tests you can't wrap your head around. You know what he is looking for, but his methods are beyond your comprehension. As much as you adore his brutality, his brilliance is so endearing you could worship him for it.

"Eager to move on?" he asks you, a teasing edge cutting into his tone.

He rises from his work, takes the opportunity to stretch. His lab coat is sullied beyond any hope of salvage. Viscera stains it in patterns that are almost artful in their haphazard desecration. His curls are always slicked back carefully while he works, hands hidden behind gloves that he sheds now. You saunter up to him, ignoring the mess of his work in favor of basking in his beauty.

Your lover is the most handsome man in all the world, pale and striking, tall and dark, sharp as his blades and keen as your admiration. You pause with your lips close to his while he smirks. You know how much he adores the way you can never resist the opportunity to touch him. Your fingers caress his jaw, stroke sensually down the long arch of his throat, hook into the high collar of his jacket with distinct dissatisfaction.

"I'm being as patient as I can," you assure him. "You know it's torture to watch you without being allowed to feel you..."

"I need to concentrate while I'm working," he reminds you. His breath skims your face, cool in comparison to the preternatural heat emanating from your skin. "You know how important my research is..."

"Of course, of course, but let me have one kiss to make the wait more bearable!" you beg.

His lips quirk up in a smug smirk before he obliges you. The depth of his own desire is betrayed by the intensity of his arms when they encircle you. The rabid font of his passion rivals even your own. The only difference between you is discipline. Your love is a man in complete command of his wants. You have always been a slave to yours.

Your love affords you a taste, but pulls back while you still thirst.

"How much longer?" you demand impetuously.

"Careful darling, you're burning too hot," he warns you.

You breathe slowly and concentrate on containing your fervor. Your love licks his lips, eyes raking over you with a hunger that sends a shiver rippling down your feverish spine. He is always the most enticed by you when you are close to losing control entirely.

"I think I've gleaned all I can from this specimen," he sighs.

The corpse of the woman whose life has been sacrificed in service of his quest for knowledge lies, all but eviscerated and beginning to stink, on her own dining room table. You break out into an uncontainable grin of excitement at his words.

"How long will it take you to pack up?" you murmur. You are practically vibrating with anticipation.

"I won't, this time," your love informs you. He unbuttons his lab coat and lets it fall to the floor carelessly. "It's time for new implements, my darling. Sharper. More modern. You can destroy all of it, this time."

You squeal your inapt enthusiasm, steal another quick, zealous kiss. Your lover chuckles at your eagerness. Then he leaves you in the house. You wait a few moments, give him time to clear the threshold, time to put a little distance between himself and the catastrophic destruction you are about to unleash.

You set your flames free, allow them to devour the house along with all the evidence of your crimes. The inferno is a violent thing with a mind of its own, a beast of fire and shadow, possessed of a hunger that almost matches the appetite for carnage you harbor in your black soul. By the time anyone arrives on the scene, all within will be ash and soot. The licking inferno caresses your skin, soft as a pet, familiar as family, sensual as a lover.

1990

To be young was a gift you were never foolish enough to take for granted. Although in fairness, you could count the lifetimes which honored you with old age on one hand. More often than not, the world preferred to cut you down perfectly in your prime. You were content to bow to the whims of destiny. The aches of a long life were not among the treasures you coveted.

A bed of coals and smoldering cinders between your toes? Now that was a treat you could crave. You sighed your satisfaction and smushed a glowing red ember under your bare heel. The Ophelia hall common room was deserted. None of your fellow students were inclined to stick around while you made a smokehouse of their dormitory. Neither, you noted with exceptional pride, were there any among them with the courage to challenge your eccentric whims. The air around you crackled and popped with heat that was unbearable to any mere mortal.

Basking in a growling fireplace like a woman soaking her feet in a bubble bath brought you no small amount of pleasure, but you were only biding your time while you waited for night to cast its dark curtain over Nevermore. Once the sun cast its final, futile rays and gave up the ghost, you would go hunting.

The hidden passageways of Nevermore were a well-kept secret. It was a brutal truth, however, that even the most poisonous of flowers wilt quickly under the heat of an open flame. When you first enrolled at the school for outcasts, you imagined you would need to leash your savagery for the sake of discretion. To your delight, you discovered that the occasional missing student was not uncommon at the school. Especially among segment of outcast youths unfortunate enough to be orphaned or estranged from their families.

The boy you stalked now, however, was not to be counted among the victims of your bloody indulgences. Isaac Night was a treasure in his own right. A new name, but a face so familiar it left you sighing, wistful with reminiscence. No number of lifetimes would ever be enough to sate your craving for his lips, to fulfill the primal desire to feel his body pressed to yours. What horrendous torture, to watch him without the luxury of a touch.

Unfortunately, the fates dictating this lifetime had seen fit to place more obstacles in your path than you were accustomed to dealing with.

Your lips curled back over your teeth. You had to swallow a snarl of rage while you watched Sara Temple slobber all over your soulmate. You felt sick with jealousy, near mad with envy. You had to close your eyes and breathe slowly from the walls of Caliban hall while you waited for her to leave your prize well enough alone.

"Oh, Isaac..."

The way she moaned his name made you nauseous. You wanted to kill her more than your lungs craved oxygen, more than your heart needed to beat, more than your flames needed fuel to feed them.

The only thing holding you back from your vengeance was the knowledge that killing her would inevitably poison Isaac against you for the rest of his life. Granted, his life was a cycle without end, much like yours, but you longed for reunion with your beloved. You were unwilling to withstand the scourges of death, to weather the cruel tempest of time while you searched for him again and again and again.

You watched his hands on Sara's skin and you ached to feel his touch. You saw her hands lose themselves in his lush obsidian curls and you wanted nothing more than to trade places with her.

How ridiculous, for the flame itself to envy a child who carried only the barest of embers in her blood.

Still, hellfire was patient and you had waited through much longer storms. These rains would not be the downpour that doused your determination.

You watched Isaac Night. And you waited.

"Gomez, I think someone's following me."

Isaac glanced around the quad as he spoke the words. He was used to insomnia, but the circles that darkened his eyes these days were deeper than his friends were used to seeing.

"I can tell, old boy, you've been jumpier than a jackrabbit that's caught the scent of a chupacabra," Gomez quipped.

"I'm being serious!"

"So am I! Look, Isaac, who would be following you?" Gomez reasoned.

"I'm not sure," he grumbled. Exhaustion was heightening his paranoia, honing the edge of his anxiety into a point fine enough to slice through a dragon's hide. "All I'm sure of is that I'm being watched. If I had the slightest clue who was doing it, I would have dragged them out into the open and hung them upside down off Iago tower by now!"

"Well surely you must have some inkling," Gomez puzzled. "One of your academic rivals, perhaps?"

"No one at this school is nearly clever enough to qualify as as my academic rival," Isaac scoffed.

"Hm, then what about someone you've offended by condescending to them so harshly?" Gomez wondered.

"It's hardly condescension if it's accurate!"

"It's all in the eye of the beholder," Gomez pointed out. "Alright, not someone you've offended then... maybe you've got yourself a secret admirer!"

"Even I'm not vain enough to believe that," Isaac scowled. "No, I think... Gomez, lean in closer, old friend."

"Alright."

"Closer."

"Okay..."

"Closer! This is sensitive and the walls have ears!"

"Isaac, any closer and our girlfriends will tan our hides!" Gomez protested. "Out with it!"

Isaac breathed his next words directly into his friend's ear, close enough to mimic the basest intimacy while his eyes darted around to scan for approaching malefactors.

"... I'm beginning to wonder if Professor Orloff knows about my more personal research..."

"Ah, the super secret research Professor Stonehearst has been funding for you," Gomez expounded thoughtlessly.

His voice was low, but Isaac still jerked with dismay and shushed him harshly.

"I mean, the very discreet cure for your little sister that you don't want anyone else in the entire world to know you're developing," Gomez rephrased, still too loudly for Isaac's liking.

"Yes, Gomez, yes! That research!" Isaac hissed. "Be quiet!"

"I'm just not sure why you feel the need to keep it under such tight wraps," Gomez shrugged. "I don't see anything wrong with curing a fatal disorder."

"Of course you don't, and I wish more people were as open-minded as you," Isaac groaned. "But there are ethical concerns that would get my research confiscated in a heartbeat if the wrong people found out about it... people like Professor Orloff, for instance!"

"Orloff is so old though," Gomez mused. "If he was following you around, wouldn't you hear his joints creaking from the shadows?"

The image of Orloff lurking clumsily in a dark alcove raised goosebumps of disgusted horror along Isaac's arms.

"Oh Gomez, I don't know what I'm going to do," Isaac fretted, surrendering to ennui in the face of his troubles. "I'm not making any progress... I haven't dared set foot in Iago tower all week. I can't sleep, I can barely eat..."

"Yes, you know Sara's very worried about you," Gomez added. "'Tish was just trying to talk her into slipping you something to help you relax a little."

"Frump! How dare she!" Isaac fumed. "Well, Sara would never, anyway... still, the gumption!"

"She only means well, old boy. And clearly you realize that this is becoming a problem, or we wouldn't be discussing it."

"Sedatives are not the solution. Unless I can use them to catch whoever's lurking over my shoulder..."

"You have options, Isaac. 'Tish and I will help you," Gomez promised.

"How?" Isaac wondered suspiciously.

"Well, I know how you feel about the Nightshades, but-"

"Bah! A bunch of kids playing dress-up in the dark and pretending they have any altruism to offer the outcast community!" Isaac sneered outright.

"They do some good!" Gomez protested. "And 'Tish may be able to leverage some of their influence to the cause of rooting out your stalker."

"Gomez, if they're able to do that, I'll round them all up and kiss each and every one of them out of gratitude," Isaac groaned dramatically.

"There she is. Just the girl I've been looking for."

Your voice caught Sara's attention like a thundercrack. It startled her despite the amicability you forced as you approached. You took great satisfaction in her reaction. Were her instincts sharp enough to smell danger when it sauntered up to smile at her with well-disguised bloodlust?

"You've been looking for me? What for?" she wondered, on edge from the outset.

The pyros of Nevermore, you noticed, were perceptive. Alone among the students and faculty, the fiery subset of outcasts seemed to sense something was amiss when you walked by. Perhaps they were smart enough to know one of their own by sight- and smart enough to know when a predator was using their clique as camouflage.

You weren't truly a pyro, but no one at Nevermore suspected your true nature yet. The longer you could keep it that way, the better.

In the curling heat that always preceded you, Sara held herself like a housecat staring down a mountain lion, hoping it would decide she was too small to provide a decent snack.

"Well, we're a week into the semester and I've been too busy... settling in," you lied smoothly, "... to get to know anyone. A fellow pyro seemed like a good place to start."

You had been preoccupied with stalking Isaac Night. More than preoccupied. Since he was your entire reason for being here, anything that distracted you from your quest to reclaim him was the true distraction.

"Oh! Oh, sure, that's... sure, I suppose," Sara reasoned, though the panic behind her eyes was poorly disguised. "Well, I mean, I have to get to my next class, but... you could join me and my friends at lunch? I'm sure all the rest of the hotheads would be happy to have you!"

Hotheads? Was that what the kids were calling themselves these days?

"All the rest? What about you, Sara Temple?" you teased perniciously.

"Me too, of course," she smiled. The expression didn't reach her eyes and she was quick to excuse herself.

You let her escape, content to watch her scurry off with her books held tight.

You had no interest in pyros, friend circles or lunchtime get-togethers, but Nevermore was a gushing well of rumors and speculation. Isaac was the subject of more hearsay than most students and some of the things you heard about him were as concerning as they were fantastical.

Who better to wring for answers than his unfortunate girlfriend?

<== Previous Chapter

Isaac Night's senior year at Nevermore began with far more mingling than he was content to endure. The campfire soiree that welcomed the veteran class of outcast students back for their final year at school was a damnable contrivance, a conspiracy between Nevermore's imperious queen bee and faculty she had so endeared herself with over the course of her prestigious academic career. Morticia Frump had truly outdone herself this time. Isaac was only in attendance because the love of his life had dragged him along.

"I don't know why Sara was so keen on bringing me along if she was just going to abandon me anyway! She's spent the whole evening talking to anyone but me!" Isaac grumbled.

He tossed a stick into the great central bonfire, dissatisfied by the way the wood vanished into the blaze without so much as a spark to prove it had even been devoured. The flames were already blazing high and mighty, sending searing heat coursing out to stave off the chill of the great outdoors. Seated at his sullen friend's side on a log, Gomez Addams chuckled knowingly. The sun had already disappeared beneath the horizon, revealing brilliant stars overhead that sparkled like jewels scattered across a velvety void far above the Jericho woods.

"You have to let the girls have their fun, old boy," he replied. "When it comes to get-togethers like these, you ought to know by now... boyfriends are about the same as any other accessory. They can't show up without us on their arms."

"I'm not her handbag," Isaac protested.

"Aw, that's not what I mean and you know it. Come on, Isaac, you've been even grumpier than usual since we returned to campus," Gomez prodded. "What's going on? Trouble in paradise?"

His eyes found Sara Temple in the crowd, only to dart back to Isaac in the next breath. Isaac shook his head immediately, profuse in his denial.

"Of course not!" he snapped. "Sara's as perfect as ever. If a little more outgoing since she came back from that 'leadership' camp..."

"So then what's eating you?" Gomez pressed.

"It's nothing. You know I'd rather be inside," Isaac insisted.

Gomez narrowed his eyes. He didn't believe his best friend, but he also knew better than to pry too hard before Isaac was ready to talk about whatever was bothering him.

"Sure, that I can understand," Gomez caved. "All this fresh air is making me positively rancorous."

"How much longer is this thing going to wear on, anyway?" Isaac griped. "What happened to curfew, huh?"

"It's not that late yet, old boy."

"Yeah, well next time Morticia wants to plan such a-"

"Isaac!"

Sara interrupted his grumbling. She dashed over with a dazzling smile and a stolid Morticia Frump in tow. Isaac put on a smile to match while she settled down by his side, just a little out of breath. Morticia took her place beside Gomez, stately and elegant while her lover fawned as though she'd left him waiting for her an eternity and not a meager half hour.

"Having fun yet?" Sara teased, twining her fingers easily through Isaac's.

"Oh sure, I'm just having a ball," Isaac assured her sarcastically.

She rolled her eyes at him.

"Let me guess, you're going into bookworm withdrawal," she quipped.

"Withdrawal?" Isaac countered. "More like I'm suffering an overdose of socialization. You know, there was this gorgon talking my ear off for about ten minutes. I thought I was going to have to trick him into stoning himself to make my escape."

"Poor thing," Sara giggled. "Let me guess, Gomez rescued you?"

"Don't I always?" Gomez broke in proudly.

"He's a true friend," Isaac agreed.

"True blue," Sara sighed.

Isaac thought he heard the slightest edge of fatigue creeping into her tone. He leaped at it.

"Well, I don't know about you, but I'm getting tired. I'm just about ready to call it a night," he declared boldly.

Gomez and Morticia crooned cloyingly to one another by the violently quavering firelight. They paused when Isaac stood, fully prepared to take his leave early.

"So eager to make your escape," Morticia tutted. "But Sara wanted to stay for the storytellers circle, didn't you darling?"

Isaac pursed his lips unhappily while Sara quickly, insincerely insisted that she didn't want to hold her boyfriend up all night if the planned activities couldn't hold his interest. Gomez met his gaze with an urgent little frown while she spoke, eyes full of unvoiced meaning as they darted back and forth between Isaac and Sara. Isaac knew that expression well enough. Morticia, meanwhile, watched him raptly, as though anticipating a misstep on his part.

Ignore what the woman says, Isaac, if you leave her side now, you'll pay for your blunder tomorrow.

Isaac had gotten into enough trouble ignoring Gomez's infallible advice over the summer. He wasn't keen to repeat his mistakes. Morticia's shaded eyes challenged him, asked whether he really had the fortitude to withstand a petty test of time and patience for Sara's sake.

"Ghost stories might not hold my interest, but how could I leave without my sweetheart?" Isaac backtracked.

He hid his discontent well as he settled back down at Sara's side. She was clearly delighted. Gomez gave a subtle little nod of approval while Morticia turned her nose up at his strategic surrender.

Isaac Night and Sara Temple had been dating only a few months and Morticia Frump disapproved of the match from the start. Isaac didn't care for her haughty attempts at playing matchmaker. Especially since in her long career of romantic engineering, she had never tried to pair him up with anyone. Of all the outcasts in their eclectic friend group, Isaac was an obvious outlier in Frump's enthusiastic machinations. Not that he cared, except insofar as her biases whispered doubts into his girlfriend's ear when he wasn't around.

Isaac curled an arm possessively around Sara and glared overtly at Morticia in the brooding firelight. Morticia glared right back, uncompromising as ever.

If there's one thing in this world doves can see clearly, it is the bright, glowing string of fate that binds two hearts together. You, Isaac Night, are not meant to be with darling little Sara. At best, you are nothing more than a waste of her time. At worst? Imagine if you kept her from the soulmate she's truly destined for...

Morticia's unsolicited summertime sermon rang once again in Isaac's ears. The memory of her latest attempt to persuade him to break up with his girlfriend still made his blood boil. Her gall was as unbelievable as it was limitless.

"Isaac? Hey, is everything okay?" Sara wondered.

He tore his gaze from Morticia so he could smile down at the girl he was holding onto perhaps a bit too tightly.

"I'm fine," he assured her disingenuously. "Just a little chilly out here. I didn't squeeze you too hard, did I?"

"Not at all, you just looked like something was bothering you," Sara sighed.

Beneath the bubbly mask she wore in public, Sara carried a persistent, quiet melancholy with her. The ever-present malaise often left Isaac wondering if he'd done something to make her sad. By now, he knew better than to ask. She would only brush him off, paste on a convincing smile and insist nothing was wrong. Isaac hadn't completely given up on unraveling the mysteries of her bittersweet heart, but tonight was a celebration. He let it go, sighed with her and held her close while the stories commenced.

Isaac ignored Morticia's disapproval as the night grew darker and colder around the bonfire. He wasn't listening to the creepy stories being clumsily told by his peers. The occasional gasp tempted him to listen in, but none of the narratives captured his interest and he ended up staring senselessly into the crackling flames. The fire, he thought skeptically, seemed to burn too hot, blaze too bright, for the fact that no one had added any fuel to feed its inferno in all the time he'd been basking in its heat.

The longer he stared, the more the conflagration entranced him. The undeniable beauty of dancing flames and sparkling embers was mesmerizing. Isaac forgot his dissatisfaction with the outing, let his mind wander far under the savage guidance of the crackling orange light. The alluring warmth of the blaze reached for him with a hunger that almost felt sentient. His pupils contracted, burned with the strain of gazing so long into the light without blinking. It was as strenuous as staring into the sun and after a while, Isaac started to see strange things in the flickering tongues and roaring, cackling flames.

Isaac finally blinked because for a moment, he thought he saw eyes form within the inferno. Eyes that met his gaze, intense and unwavering, glowing orange as the flames where they floated eerily, shone twice as brightly.

Isaac rubbed his eyes, light flaring and flashing even behind his closed lids. When he looked again, all he saw was the bonfire.

Too bright to look at for so long, he scolded himself silently. Idiot... I've finally hung around Gomez enough that his bad habits have rubbed off on me.

"Oh Isaac, isn't that just the most romantic thing you've ever heard?" Sara finally sighed, successfully tearing her boyfriend back from whatever far off place the colorful bonfire had dragged his wandering mind.

"Hm? What's that now?" Isaac asked, startling a little as reality snapped back to slap him in the face.

"Isaac! You weren't listening to the story at all?!"

"I was too busy watching you listen to it," Isaac teased.

"Charmer. Well, I thought it was romantic," Sara laughed.

"What was it about?"

"Soulmates."

"A ghost story about soulmates?"

"Well, it was creepy as well as romantic," Sara admitted. "Professor Greeves told it so well, too..."

"That old windbag," Isaac yawned. "Bet you could tell it better, anyway."

"If you wanted to know, you should have paid attention."

"Oh come on, at least tell me the part you thought was so romantic," Isaac urged, nuzzling persuasively into the curve of her neck.

The flames seemed to growl and writhe, but Isaac was too absorbed to notice the change. Morticia, however, fixed her gaze to the bonfire with keen interest.

"I don't see anyone adding wood," she observed.

Meanwhile, Isaac succeeded in prying a recap out of his teasing girlfriend.

"It was an old outcast legend," she explained to Isaac.

He hummed, encouraging her to go on while he buried his face even deeper in her hair and latched his lips to the skin of her neck. She leaned into his affections, clutched him close while the bonfire flared like an angry beast. Neither of them noticed, but Morticia was alarmed enough to rise to her feet.

"A legend about soulmates?" Isaac murmured distractedly.

"Soulmates... and reincarnation. Greeves said that if two soulmates are buried together, they come back in their next life together too."

"That's silly," Isaac chuckled dismissively.

"It's not silly, it's cute!" Sara protested.

"Gomez!" Morticia gasped.

She threw herself into his arms, wrapped herself abruptly in his embrace like a woman seeking shelter from a storm.

"Cara mia!" Gomez exclaimed. "You're trembling, mi amore! What's the matter?!"

"Darling, I have the most incredible, haunting feeling that something absolutely terrible is about to happen!" she gasped.

"If you think it's cute, I think it's cute," Isaac crooned, ignoring his friend's dramatic antics in favor of fawning over Sara.

His lips almost met hers, but the envious, sputtering bonfire seemed to have reached the end of its patience with all the adolescent flirting. A pillar of flame flared skyward that sent outcasts scrambling back, blasted Isaac with a heat intense enough to leave him cringing away. Sara and the handful of other pyros in attendance were the only ones who seemed unaffected by the surging, smoldering wave.

"Cute... for a fairy tale."

The voice came from the flames, muted slightly beneath the roar of the burning golden radiance. While Isaac righted himself, Sara gaped wordlessly at the bonfire. Already a formless mass of movement and illumination, something more restless than the flames themselves stirred deep within its tumultuous heart. A humanoid figure rose within the blaze, glowing even brighter than the inferno from which it emerged.

Morticia and Gomez clung to one another, basking in the thrill of the terror that gripped them. Outcasts cried their surprise and stumbled back even farther, already tense and on edge from all the spooky stories. Sara's jaw dropped while Isaac's eyes adjusted to the sudden flare of light gradually, just in time to clearly see the girl who stepped from the bed of coals, casually as though the ground beneath her feet wasn't molten and charred.

Isaac froze, paralyzed by an emotion he couldn't quite quantify. While terror and apprehension gripped the other outcasts, he steadied himself in the presence of the radiant being emerging from the fire like a mirage coalescing into tangible physical form. The illusory haze of the heat gradually dispersed, making her seem more solid with every step she took forward. He wanted to swallow, but his mouth was too dry. He wanted to say something, but words escaped him and he didn't have the breath to put behind them anyway. Above the frenzied rush of half-formed impressions and all the questions he wanted to ask, one simple truth gripped Isaac like a fever in the explosive light of the disaster that approached, wreathed in flame and ash.

He'd never seen anything so beautiful in his life.

Your decision to emerge from your unorthodox hiding place sent an amazed murmur rippling through the assembled students. The sudden attention almost made you wish you would have stuck with skulking.

The way Isaac gazed up at you, wide-eyed with wonder, killed that wish in its cradle. You met his awestruck stare with eyes that blazed as brilliantly as the fire you'd left behind to interrupt his intimate moment. The entire world fell away when your eyes met. No one else at the gathering mattered in that fleeting, magical moment.

Only you and Isaac.

Behind you, the bonfire shrank dramatically. Your departure drained it of life, left it wanting for vigor without you lingering at its heart. You almost felt sorry for the bereft conflagration, but the life of a flame was worth even less in your estimations than the life of any other mortal. Whether composed of smoke or flesh, they were all disposable once they outlived their usefulness.

"I can tell you from firsthand experience that the legend is just that," you sneered.

You turned your attention to the girl with her hands all over what was yours. Anger flared from the depths of your dark soul and the air around you heated palpably under the strain of your resentment. Even so, you forced civility. You knew better than to cave to the savage impulses urging you to clear the competition like brush burned away by a wildfire.

"If you bury soulmates together, they rot together, sure enough," you went on.

Your eyes left Isaac's behind, the awful spotlight of your dreadful attention fixed on Sara. Her breath caught in her throat and her pupils dilated with instinctive fear that filled you with glee. Your elation had piercing claws, but when you reached out to tip Sara's chin higher condescendingly, you kept those claws to yourself.

"But reincarnation doesn't care how much you love your mate," you condescended to the girl.

She let you tilt her head slightly, trembled under your inspection while the disdainful twist of your features only grew more hideous as you memorized her face.

"Fate delights in parting lovers... in tormenting them!" you hissed.

You couldn't help the way your grip tightened on Sara's jaw. She winced, but held her ground defiantly. Your vitriol was finally too much. Isaac snapped out of his trance, a deep scowl marring his features as his telekinesis lashed out to pull your wrist away from his girlfriend. Your gaze flew back to him, burning with a passion that belied agitation.

The assembled outcasts held their breath while Isaac stood to put himself solidly between you and Sara.

"Back off!" he growled. "What's your problem, huh?!"

"So protective!" you chuckled. "What, can't your girl stand up for herself, little Da Vinci?"

"Isaac, it's... it's fine," Sara insisted, tugging his hand in an effort to make him settle at her side again. "She just startled me, that's all! No harm, no foul, right?"

"Indeed," you purred. "No harm... Isaac."

His name dripped like a lyric from your tongue, honeyed by fondness into something unsettling. Your hand crept up again, the urge to touch him curling off you like the wispy threads of smoke still emanating from your clothes. You thought better of it and clasped your hands together instead. You turned, sweeping to address the rest of the outcasts watching you warily. The dying firelight cast your features with deep shadows, painted your inspection with sinister intent as you surveyed the other students.

"What a warm welcome," you announced smugly. "Rousing stories, good food, better company. The charms of Nevermore academy truly live up to their reputation. Please, don't let me interrupt your party... go on. Make merry."

The fire lay dejected and dampened, sadder with every step you took away from its smoldering embrace. You left your new class of peers with a parting gift to make up for the oddity of your first impression. With form that seemed familiar to the pyrokinetic outcasts present, you sent a spark flying from your fingertip to the fizzling remains of the campfire. Gasps flared out anew as the bonfire ignited instantly, raged back up to the reach for the height of its former glory.

By the time the other students looked your way again, you were already gone, spirited away by the night like an ember snatched up on a stiff breeze.

Isaac let Sara drag him back down onto the log beside her. Gomez and Morticia gawked into the darkness while chatter erupted in the wake of the newcomer's dramatic appearance and swift exit.

"How long was she-"

"- just sitting in the bonfire, I've never heard of-"

"Pyros, man, all so theatrical and-"

"- new student, right? I mean, I've never seen her before."

While the others speculated, Isaac seethed. Sara knew him well enough to divine the source of his frustration.

"For a guy who hates surprises so much, that must have been like, your worst nightmare," she joked, trying to lighten his mood with humor.

"I don't care about the surprise, I just can't believe her nerve!" Isaac glowered. His fingers traced Sara's jaw, rubbed like he could erase your touch from her skin with his own presence. "Hiding in plain sight and listening in on people's conversations is weird enough..."

Weird, but not entirely uncommon in an academy full of vanishers and outcasts blessed with supernaturally good hearing.

"... but where the hell does she get off putting her hands all over you like- like-"

Isaac struggled to find the right words to describe the upset he felt watching you touch Sara. It felt like a violation, like a stranger carousing through a private journal. He couldn't articulate the disturbing sensation quickly enough. Sara was already rationalizing and de-escalating, two of her favorite pastimes.

"Whoever that was, she was a little on the, uh... the intense side, sure," Sara admitted. "But who at Nevermore isn't? I mean, that whole entrance was kind of Morticia-esque, and you like Morticia just fine, right?"

Isaac did not, fact, like Morticia all that well, but he wasn't about to say as much with her hovering curiously over his shoulder.

"I guess," he grumbled instead.

"Shown up at my own bonfire," Morticia lamented, shallow concerns delaying her consideration of more serious questions. "Admittedly, this isn't quite how I'd hoped to start senior year..."

"Shown up?! I think not, my intoxicating wildflower!" Gomez gasped, indignant that his lover would even consider such defeat. "What about your grand finale, hm? Maybe it's time to end this gathering with a bang, mi amore..."

"Oh that's right, the fireworks!" Morticia remembered with a delighted giggle. "My incendiary piece de resistance... oh, Gomez, would you do the honors?"

"With only the greatest pleasure, cara mia!" Gomez assured her.

While his friends prepared to end the night on a high note, Isaac glanced out at the darkness. It was chilling, the way he couldn't help but imagine you were still out there somewhere.

Unseen, but watching.