"Let it be cleansed, let it be reborn anew. Let creation come from destruction, as all life must come from death. Let it burn."

“Fire Devils,” a short story from my new collection The Knife and the Wound It Deals, was inspired by a friend of mine who was in an accident that paralyzed him from the waist down. When a person loses something so monumental, a dangerous question whispers out of the abyss—how far would you be willing to go to get that something back? Would you trade our soul? Your integrity—or perhaps something even worse?
Zach, the story's protagonist, is a paraplegic fire watcher in the Arizona desert (this is an actual job whereby people sit in fire stations and scan the desert for signs of wildfires). The devils that spark to life within fire’s blazing whirl have been whispering the Phoenix-tale of rising up from the ashes of one’s own immolation…but Zach must be careful about what else may burn down in the process…

To read more about "Fire Devils" and other thoughts and scribblings, visit my web site at the link below:

http://www.bescully.com/2012/12/fire-...