Chapter Text
He made sure they’d all be there; he stood there watching as one by one they were lured into the dragon’s cave with the promise of glory. He made sure the rest had gone; he was cruel, but not so cruel as to set the school ablaze with more than these four occupants. He couldn’t have witnesses, could he?
The flames flickered at his feet; they didn’t touch him, for they knew their place. The smell of burning rubber and teenage sweat lingered in the air. The thumping of their helpless hands on the double glass pained window made Aerion’s lip split open in a smile.
There was no way they could get out, not even if they tried.
The flames ate at the bleachers in the gymnasium, tearing through seat after seat. He watched four sets of terrified eyes as they raked back and forth, back and forth to wear the flames last touched. It was closer now, and Aerion could taste their panic as they helplessly begged for their lives. He licked his blood-stained lips. This would be the last time they ever touched him.
“What are you going to do about it, faggot?” They screamed in his ear mere hours ago as their fists slammed into his pale body, matching the marks that were already starting to heal. But they were from another pair of hands, a pair larger and pailer than his own. He shook the idea out of his brain just in time to see the smoke waft in the baracaded room. He heard them cough; it tickled a part of him that had scales and teeth strong enough to bite clean through the metal bar he shoved through the slot outside the door… But he wouldn’t remove it, would he? No, dragons don’t aid their kill; they smother it until it’s gone, crush it against their claws.
The nails of the desperate clawed for a freedom they didn’t have. Aerion smiled as the flames crept under the door.
He heard their screams as he jumped from the second-floor window and straight into the night.
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“We’re here outside of Westorosie High, where a spontaneous gym fire has broken out!” The flames roared hugely over the screen, and a wide-eyed reporter stood in the incoming rain.
The TV in his room was on for this specific reason. To confirm what he knew to be true.
“This just in, the survivors have been airlifted! Say again, the survivors have been air lifted to Greyjoy General!”
He spat out his water. “What?”
A microphone was shoved into an old woman’s dark, smoke-covered face. “Ma’am! You're a hero! How did you save those kids?”
>> Four bodies came out of the flames last night. The school was supposed to be evacuated due to a gas leak warning<<
“Well, I wasn’t supposed to have been there, but I had forgotten my lunch bag, so’s I went in on the other side of the building.” The woman’s southern twang made Aerion’s skin crawl. “ Thats I heard the screams of the kids from the cafeteria—“
His plan was undone by a fucking lunch lady. He slammed his nose into his pillow and screamed.
The days slowed to a crawl waiting on news of the victims. Aerion paced, thoughts spinning, hoping that whatever damage they endured would be it for them.
Days turned into a week, and the school was partially opened back up. The west wing was still being rebuilt, so classes were doubled in size to keep up with the missing space.
People talked, and talked some more. “I heard their skin boiled off.”
“I heard their nails were clawed off trying to dig their way out!”
“Well, I heard—“ It just spun and spun and spun, a never-ending carousel of bullshit.
By week two, he thought he was golden, but he was wrong, oh so horribly wrong.
“This just in! All four are expected to pull through. Thank the Seven!” Another reporter boomed on the radio in the dead silence of the car he shared with his father.
Later that night, after a stale dinner, he threw his clay miniatures at the wall, screaming. “Fuck!” He kicked his bookshelves that housed his many additions of Dragonology volumes 1-10 and crashed to the floor.
“What in the name of the mother are you doing in here?” His father’s violet eyes were heavy with drink, as they were every weeknight. His head arched when he saw his son on his bedroom floor, shards of all his sculptures scattered about the room. His laundry basket toppled over to reveal his soot-covered clothes.
“Tell me you didn’t do this, Aerion.” His breath smelled of whiskey and rye. He pushed into the room, imposing, a giant in their castle. Aerion didn’t move, not until he was lifted mid-air by the fists that marked his body in drunken fits ever since his mother died.
His head slammed against the walls of his sanctuary, now twisted in his dismay. His face scrunched, waiting for a blow that always came. But he was simply held there, pinned against blood-red walls.
“Go on, boy, speak.” Maekar shook him by his collar. His feet dangled.
Tears welled in his eyes, and his mouth fell open. “I didn’t— I swear.”
The grip hardened.
“None of that, speak the truth, now.” He rattled his son like an unruly kitten. He twisted away just to be pulled back into the fray. “Look at me when I’m speaking to you.” His father’s speech was even this night, which was more than most; he’s probably only a third of the way through the bottle.
A slap to his right cheek made him bite his tongue, and he’d had it. “Fine, okay, it was me! Is that what you want to hear? I was sick of it! “ His body shook. “I didn’t want their hands on me; I didn’t want to hear their words in my head! I wanted silence, and I almost got it!”
“ You nearly burnt them to ash for words?” He wished it were just words.
>> There were four shoes in his ribs. The bathroom stall floor was colder each time his head dipped below the surface of the toilet bowl. “You'd better wash that fag mouth of yours.” A hand held him down in the yellow water until he needed to breathe. “Eat up, piss boy, next time it’s my fist in your ass!” Another shot to the groin, another lunch period lying gasping on the tile floor. <<
Aerion’s head twisted like a snake’s when he was enraged. “Anyone who puts their hands on me will burn.” He flipped them so his father’s back was to the door and pushed. The drunk stumbled and landed on his ass.
“I’m going to bed. Wake me up when you're sober.”