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Sinking his great head into his hands he began to sob, and only pulled back after realizing that they stank of burnt flesh. Fish scattered as he dipped his hands into the water and began to scrub furiously. Cleanliness is akin to godliness, he told himself. Not that you would know anything about godliness.


He felt that everything around him was angry with him, scolding him. As well they should. Dark whispers between shadowy trees rebuked him and laid curses on his name. The rocks glared at him between ripples from the bottom of the pond. Even the great round moon was angry, larger and more menacing then he had ever seen before, lancing legions of beams at him with such ferocity that the skin on his back glowed white. He went back to scrubbing.


It all flashed in front of him again. The burning rage. Claws, teeth, and blinding fire. Mountains of smoke and flame exploding out of buildings like lava from a volcano. Men, women, and children... screaming... burning... dying.


He closed his eyes to escape the vision. His hands were now clean and he dried them with his breath. Lifting his right hand, he captured the the tears from his eyes in his palm. The salty tears had sunk deep into the crevices in his hand, but they were only water. I wish they had been blood. I wish to die. But no such offer was immediately forthcoming. I must live with my regret.


How did this even happen? Why was I so angry? He was cleaning his face now. The vein running up the right side of his neck was still throbbing and he became aware of a dull pain in the back of his head. It was funny, he thought, how he could remember both so much and so little of what had transpired only a few minutes earlier.


It was enough; he was clean. His enormous legs propelled him into the air and his great wings lifted him higher into the black sky. With the trees below him he again had full view of his handiwork.


The city burned on the far away hill. It glowed even brighter now, even at this distance, where the city would be invisible even on a bright day. The regret gripped him by the throat and slit into his heart, expelling a thundering cry of grief and agony and curling flames. The flames lit the night air and his cry shook leaves from the trees, screaming to take this from him, commanding the forest to tell him he had not truly done this.


To his cry, there was no answer.

Knocking

This seems more like the beginning of a novel than a short story. What is he? What did he do? It seems to be a dragon who set fire to a city...but dragons don't have hands. Nice bit of writing, though. I enjoyed it and wanted to read more. Keep writing!

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"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for."

--John Keating, Dead Poets Society

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Thanks for the feedback!

This story describes how I personally feel after I lose my cool, blow up, rip and tear and destroy, and then calm down a bit. I won't admit to this happening very often, but when it does, I metaphorically burn cities to the ground and feel like crap afterwards. About hands... I would think that from a dragon's perspective their front appendages could be considered arms and hands.