A/N: Because Riah-chan needed a title for a fic I asked her to write, and the first word that popped into my head was "marshmallow". Then I realized there was a plotbunny dangling on the end of that title, so I changed my request and kept this one I love Isis so.

Soundtrack: "Always" by Saliva, and "The Final Countdown" from Rocky...no, they don't fit the story, but it's what I was listening to. Hehe, I don't know if there is a song that would really fit this fic.

Disclaimer: None of these characters are mine, and I neither spent nor earned any money while writing this. Though I bet I think about Malik a helluva lot more than Kazuki Takahashi does. It's not healthy the amount of time I spend worshiping Malik Ishtar.

Marshmallow

by Pachelbel

Powder sugar rubbed off on her fingertips as she pushed the white marshmallow ball onto a stick. The fire glowed and glimmered, sparked, shimmered. And poured smoke all over her dress, so thick it seemed to grind into her eyes.

Isis coughed once, trying to be polite by keeping the sound stifled in her throat. The children looked up at her and offered more marshmallows, which she declined with a shake of her head.

"Smoke follows beauty," Mrs. Amasta said with a soft laugh as she settled down next to the Egyptian woman. "Unfortunately for you."

Isis smiled and began to thank her for the compliment, but her voice hurt from trying not to cough.

"Look at the stars!" one of the children exclaimed, pointing up at the darkness and through the trees to a sky littered with points of light. "There's so many!"

The city blinded people to the stars. It was a strange thought; people gathered and made their own light and erased the nighttime. No wonder Malik loved the cities so much. During the day there were people, and at night...well, he could choose not to have a night. He could flood room after room with fake daylight and forget the darkness crouched outside the windows.

At least, that's what she hoped he might be doing right then. It was more likely that he was joined with the dark, dragging Rishid with him, out brainwashing more servants.

"Want to toast it now, Miss Ishtar?" the oldest of the children asked. "Like this."

Isis obediently pointed her marshmallow-topped stick into the flames and watched it until it began to smoke.

Malik would love this, even with how adult and superior he was trying to be. She knew he'd love it, being under so many stars with a warm fire in front of him and the wide clean air of the forest around him. And the marshmallows; they were fun to play with, though she didn't dare tear them apart in front of these people, her associates. Malik had to act superior, she had to act sophisticated; that meant that neither of them would have been comfortable dissecting fluffy treats where anyone could see them.

The marshmallow burst into flame, and she laughed along with the children, who kindly took it off the stick and tossed it into the fire. She plucked another from the half-full bag and started again.