“Why?”
“Because that’s who he is. People can present themselves as being one way, and once you’re sure you know them, once you’re sure you’ve found what you’re looking for, they reveal themselves for who they really are. He used me, I think. To get him what he wanted. Where he wanted.” Arthur rubbed his hands together. “I was younger, then. Enamored. Foolish, though you wouldn’t have been able to convince me. I thought it was love. I can see now it wasn’t.”
“He said this was an experiment,” Linus blurted. “To see if—if someone like you could—”
Arthur arched an eyebrow. “Someone like me?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Then why can’t you say it?”
Linus’s chest hitched. “A magical creature.”
“Yes.”
“Perhaps the rarest of them all.”
“So it would seem.”
“You’re.…”
“Say it. Please. Let me hear you say it. I want to hear it from you.”
You knew a phoenix, then?
I did. He was … inquisitive. Many things happened to him, but he still kept his head held high. I often think about the man he became.
Linus Baker said, “You’re a phoenix.”
“I am,” Arthur said simply. “And I believe I’m the last of my kind. I never knew my parents. I’ve never met anyone else like me.”
Linus could barely breathe.
“I couldn’t control it,” Arthur said, looking down at his hands. “Not when I was a child. The master then wasn’t someone I like to think about if I can help it. He was cruel and harsh, more likely to beat you than look at you. He hated us for what we were. I never knew why. Perhaps something had happened to him or his family before he came to this place. Or maybe he had just listened to the words of the people of the world, and let it fill him like poison. Things were different, then, if you can believe it. Worse for people like us. There are certain laws in place now that didn’t exist back then that are meant to prevent … well. The village wasn’t so bad, but … it was only a tiny place in the big, wide world. It was cherry ice cream from a pretty girl. It made me think that perhaps this island wasn’t the be-all and end-all. And so I made a grave mistake.”
“You asked for help.”
Arthur nodded. “I sent a letter to DICOMY, or at least I tried to. I told them how horribly we were being treated. The abuse we suffered at the hands of this man. There were other children here, though he seemed to have a specific vendetta against me, and I took the brunt of it. But I was okay with that, because the more he focused on me, the less he concerned himself with the others. But even I had a breaking point. I knew that if I didn’t do something, and soon, I was going to hurt someone.”
The more you beat down on a dog, the more it cowers when a hand is raised. If pushed hard enough, a dog might bite and snap, if only to protect itself.
“I thought I was being clever with my letter. I smuggled it out, folded into the top waistband of my pants. But somehow, he found out about it while we were in the village. I snuck off, trying to make it to the post office, but he found me. He took the letter from me.” Arthur looked away. “That night was the first night I spent in here. I burned after that. I burned brightly.”
Linus thought he was going to be sick. “That’s not—that’s not fair. He should have never been in a position to do that to you. He should have never been allowed to lay a hand on you.”
“Oh, I know that now. But then? I was a child.” Arthur held out his hand, palm up. His fingers flexed slightly, and fire bloomed like a flower. Linus, who had seen so many strange and wonderful things in his lifetime, was entranced. “Back then, I thought it was what I deserved for being what I was. He beat that into me enough until I had no choice but to believe him.” The fire began to move then, crawling up his wrist. It wound its way around his arm. When it reached his shirt, Linus was sure it would start to burn.
It didn’t.
Instead, the fire grew until it began to snap and crackle. It rose in the air behind him, spreading out until Linus couldn’t deny what he was seeing.
Wings.
Arthur Parnassus had wings of fire.
They were beautiful. Linus could see burning feathers in the red and orange, and he remembered the night he’d seen the flash outside the guest house after Arthur had left. The wings stretched as much as they could in the small room, and Linus thought they were at least ten feet long from tip to tip. And though he could feel the heat from them, it didn’t feel scorching. The wings fluttered, leaving trails of golden fire. Above his head, Linus thought he could make out the outline of a bird’s head, the beak sharp and pointed.
Arthur closed his hand.
The phoenix curled back down toward the top of his head, wings folding in. The fire snuffed out, leaving thick wisps of smoke, the afterimages of a great bird dancing in Linus’s eyes.
“I tried to burn my way out,” Arthur whispered. “But the master had prepared for that. The metal slats against the door. The walls made of stone. Stone, I learned, can withstand intense heat. It became obvious rather quickly I would choke on the smoke before I ever escaped. So I did the only thing I could. I stayed. He was smart. He himself never brought me food or changed the bucket I used as a toilet. He made one of the other children do it, knowing I would never harm them.”
Though Linus didn’t want to know, he asked, “How long were you down here?” He couldn’t bear to look at the tick marks scratched into the wall.
Arthur looked pained. “By the time I left, I had thought it’d been a few weeks. It turned out to be six months. When you’re constantly in the dark, time gets … slippery.”
Linus hung his head.
“Eventually, someone came. Either because they suspected something was off, or because they decided an inspection was necessary. I was told the master tried to explain away my absence, but one of the other children was brave enough to speak up. I was found, and the orphanage was shut down. I was sent to one of DICOMY’s schools which was better, though not by much. At least there, I could go outside and spread my wings.”
“I don’t understand,” Linus admitted. “Why would you ever return to this place? After everything that happened to you?”
Arthur closed his eyes. “Because this was my hell. And I couldn’t allow it to stay that way. This house had never been a home, and I thought I could change that. When I went to DICOMY with the idea of reopening the Marsyas Orphanage, I could see the greed in their eyes. Here, they could keep track of me. Here, they could send others who they thought were the most dangerous. They assigned Charles to me, telling me he would help get things in order. He did, but to his own end. Zoe tried to warn me, though I chose not to believe her.”
Anger swelled within Linus. “And where was she? How in God’s name did she not help you?”
He shrugged. “She didn’t know. She hid herself away, fearing reprisal. She was the great secret of this island, and one they would have tried to harness back then. I only met her once before I went into the cellar. I stumbled upon her in the woods, and she nearly killed me until she saw me for what I was. She fled instead. After I returned to the island, she came to me and told me that she was sorry for all that I had endured. That she would allow me to stay, and that she would help if needed.”