Burnt and Beautiful Things

By Mia Rumi

Detective Caspian cupped the brittle gray blossom in his hands. That it had once been a rose was hardly believable. As he handled it, the petals crumbled to ash.

The ocelot beside him nudged his elbow, and he held the mess of gray dust out to the wild cat.

“Leslie, what do you think?”

The ocelot drew her pink nose to his hand and huffed. Leslie only liked pretty things. The bitter flakes fluttered to the earth like corrupted snow.

“Well, detective?” Ferdie asked, peering over Caspian’s shoulder. “What do you think?”

Caspian examined the garden, which was strewn with similarly charred blossoms. Strangely, the soil was damp and the surrounding plants untouched.

“This was a targeted act,” Caspian said. “Whoever—or whatever—did this focused on this particular rosebush. Was there anything special about it?”

“Well, those were Aurelius roses, they were. Paid a pretty penny for them—very rare.” Ferdie stroked his golden fox pelt coat. “I didn’t have any regrets, though. I like pretty things. And they were the prettiest golden blossoms I’d ever seen. That is, until I found them this morning.”

“And who did you buy the roses from?”

“That’ll be Midas—young guy, golden hair. He lives in that thatch-roofed cottage at the edge of this forest.”

“All right, thank you, sir,” Caspian said. “I’ll be back with an update. C’mon, Leslie.”

It took longer than Caspian would have liked to reach Midas’s house; Leslie kept stopping to sniff pretty primroses at the side of the road or chase birds with sky-blue feathers through the brush.

When Caspian finally knocked on Midas’s door, it flung open and revealed a wild-eyed youth.

“They’re gone!” he cried, pulling at his golden hair.

“What’s gone?”

“My experiment! My butterflies! When I woke up, they were gone!” Midas cried.

“You were experimenting with butterflies?”

“I create many unique specimens and sell them.” Midas wailed. “Months of work! Gone!”

“May I see where you had them?”

Midas hesitated, then nodded.

Caspian followed Midas into his house—if you could call it a house. Cages and vines hung from the ceiling. Iridescent beetle shells, fox pelts, and tufts of golden sheep wool littered the floor. The table was covered in books, instruments, and live mice that glowed like moonlight. It was a laboratory gone wild.

Midas led Caspian to a backyard no less haphazard than his laboratory. He gestured toward an empty iron cage hanging beside the door. The lock had been burned away.

Midas pointed to a smoking patch of what once may have been marigolds. “Those were like that when I woke up too.” Only one blossom remained, and though it was partially charred, Caspian could see that it was no ordinary marigold—it looked as if it was actual gold.

Caspian asked Midas a series of questions, trying to put the mysterious pieces together. “What’s your goal, Midas? Why do you experiment?”

“I’m in pursuit of beauty.” Midas fingered the empty cage. “People love beautiful things and spend more money than is reasonable on them. But that’s only part of it. Though nature is beautiful on its own, I wish to amplify it.” The youth looked up from the cage, and Caspian noticed a glint in his eyes: one of ambition and excitement that reminded him of a mad scientist who didn’t know when to stop. “What greater feat is there than enhancing the already exquisite?”

That night, Caspian lay awake, as if the gatekeeper of the world of sleep demanded a solution to the mystery as an entrance fee. The roses, the butterflies, the marigolds. They must be connected. The crimes had all occurred the same night, targeted unusual and beautiful objects, and all involved burning…

When Caspian went outside the next morning to feed Leslie, he was shocked to see that she was limping. Her left front leg was bent and charred. He rushed to her side. As he combed through her golden fur, his hand caught on something solid. It fell to the ground.

He scooped the lifeless winged thing into his gloved hands. It was electric blue and beautiful, with intricate patterns on its wings—almost too perfect. Leslie hissed. Caspian removed his gloves and stroked her straw-colored head.

“It’s okay, Leslie. It’s just a butterf—ouch!” Fire bloomed from the insect’s wing, and he jerked away instinctively, dropping the delicate specimen. A bright red burn blossomed on his finger.

Slowly, Caspian rose from Leslie’s side and began to follow the irregular, limping paw prints she had left on her way to his house. They led him to the edge of the forest that grew nearby.

There, through a curtain of foliage, was a meadow of pink roses. Burning pink roses. Above them were twenty electric-blue butterflies with wings that looked as white-hot and jewel-bright as those of their kin—the butterfly Caspian had found in Leslie’s fur. Midas’s experimental butterflies.

Occasionally, one would land on a blossom, but before it could drink its nectar, the blossom would burst into flame, ignited by fire that bloomed from the butterfly’s wings. The butterflies’ electric glow flickered and waned, and one by one they fell lifeless among the very flowers they had set fire to.

At last, the culprits behind the mysteries. They’d burned themselves out of their own cage. They’d tried to drink from Ferdie’s Aurelius roses and Midas’s golden marigolds and set the blossoms on fire in the process. And they’d hurt an innocent ocelot just for being attracted to their beauty.

Yet, ironically, beauty—such as the beauty of nectar-giving flowers—had been elusive to the butterflies. And ultimately, their own unnatural beauty had been their downfall.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mia Rumi is a lover of stories and their power to comfort and inspire. She enjoys writing fiction, particularly fantasy. One of her first memories as a writer involves sitting on the floor and writing a story about two pandas with her older sister. She loves tea, Irish moss, and the smell of old books.

---

More Stories