Disclaimer: All recognisable bits of this belong to Diana Wynne Jones (and a very small part belongs to John Donne), I am merely playing with them.
A/N An eternal bit of thanks must go to Shelby and Emily who encourage me and make sure that I don't appear foolish. If only my inner talent didn't shine through.
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Calcifer saw many things from his hearth. There was a time when it was his entire world view, a state of affairs understandably frustrating for a being whose previous world view had indeed been the world. He knew every intimate detail of the main room in the castle. From the small cracks in the floorboards to the dapples of light each door cast as they were opened. The only different things he had seen were the glimpses out of the castle door and the customers that had come to the door. And even they wore thin. True the customers were often new, but to a fire demon one human is much like another until one gets to know one.
When the girl had entered the room, Calcifer hid. Her appearance was startling. No, not the guise of the old woman, which Calcifer could see through as if it were merely gauze, but her being there at all and her talent, her sheer overwhelming talent. Her presence seemed to stab at their shared heart.
Calcifer watched and concealed and played all sides for whatthey were worth. What fire demon would act any differently? He watched them fall in love. Oh, they had hidden it cleverly; Sophie, unruly old fool, didn't even let herself know until the very last days, even Michael worked it out before her. Howl never let himself hope, he had to hide from the feeling, the useless facades of love he had run into all those years couldn't stop the overwhelming fear he had of giving himself to her. They were both so afraid of rejection.
Before Sophie had set him free, Calcifer had thought it would mean that he would die. That somehow it would save Howl but destroy him. Buried in his dreams the wild, ecstatic hope that it may save him too led him to dream of travelling the world, of seeing what he had seen from so high up before. He dreamed that he'd be unattached, free to do as he pleased with no obligations anywhere.
He felt that wild, happy freedom. She pinched him off Howl's heart and with a stuttering step off the precipice: he floated. Limitless, flying, joy! And a tug backward, tumbling, somersaulting into a new understanding. Life, real life, didn't work like that. Just because he didn't have a heart did not mean he was going to stop feeling that warm glow for Sophie or that happy resignation for Howl or even that paternal affection for Michael. His hearth didn't limit him any more, but it was his home.