Chapter 1
CHAPTER
The fire was a monster. For days it had been prowling around the gullies, devouring the dry brown grass and glowing red as it ate into fallen timber baked white by the sun.
Now, driven by the wind, it had come out of hiding and was roaring across the landscape.
Bright orange and red flames soared into and above the treetops and sprinted through the dry grass.
The fire created its own winds, spirals of flame that danced like devils.
The air was thick with whirling smoke, blinding and choking, and the heat was a furnace.
Justin Turner blinked the grit and sweat out of his eyes and tried to judge the monster’s speed.
It would reach the road in minutes. Another firefighter was holding a long line of cars on the side of the road, uncertain which way to send them.
Justin’s radio crackled.
‘It’s at the road here. It’s gonna jump it.’ His twin brother Ben was leading the firefighters trying to contain the blaze a couple of kilometres further down the road. ‘Turn them all back.’
‘Already on it. Be safe.’
‘You too, brother.’
Justin had to get those cars out of here before they were trapped between two arms of the fire.
He signalled the firefighter on the road, waving a hand to indicate it was time to get the cars moving, then pointing back the way they had come.
The smoke was so thick he wasn’t sure if he’d been seen.
A flash of heat and fire almost knocked him off his feet as, behind him, the uppermost branches of a tree exploded in flames.
He started running awkwardly in his heavy boots and protective gear.
‘Turn them around and get them out of here,’ he shouted over the roar of the fire.
The other firefighter must have heard, or seen the danger and understood.
He raised an arm to acknowledge Justin’s instruction and darted towards the cars at the back of the line, signalling for them to turn and go back the way they had come.
Justin did the same to those cars at the head of the line, closest to the flames.
About halfway along the line, a woman was desperately trying to start her car. The engine coughed and kicked and failed. She tried again. And again. Tears were streaming down her face as Justin reached her and her hands were shaking so badly she could barely grip the steering wheel.
‘Leave it,’ he commanded as he pulled her door open. ‘Come with me.’
The woman didn’t move. She sat staring with wild eyes at the leaping flames drawing closer with every second.
Justin reached into the car and grabbed her arm.
As quickly as he could, he pulled her from behind the wheel.
The frozen terror on her face remained, but she followed his directions as he urged her towards the next vehicle, which was starting to pull away.
He flagged the car down and opened a rear door. ‘Take her and get out of here as fast as you can.’
‘Right.’ The man in the driver’s seat barely waited for the woman to get in before hitting the accelerator. The car leaped forward and vanished into the smoke, others following close behind.
The rest of the vehicles were all turning to leave—except for one. An ageing red station wagon was pulled off the side of the road. As Justin watched, the driver leaped out, paused to grab something out of the back of the car, then ran towards the fire.
‘What the—’ For a second, Justin was too shocked to move.
The woman zigzagged through the patches of burning grass and Justin lost sight of her in the thick smoke. Was the woman mad? Why would anyone risk their life running into a bushfire like that? He ran after her.
A few metres into the fire, he spotted her again.
She was trying to lift something wrapped in a blanket.
The creature inside was struggling. It gave an agonised wail that sounded almost like a child’s scream.
She wasn’t a large woman and she was struggling with the weight.
Just as Justin reached her, she heaved the bundle into her arms, lost her balance and staggered.
He grabbed her with both hands to stop her falling.
The blanket fell open, and he saw a koala.
Its fur was black and singed and the blanket was already marked with dark red blood.
‘You’ve got to get out of here.’ Justin put his arms around the woman’s shoulders to help her.
She looked up at him and they both froze.
‘Mum?’
‘Justin …’ His mother was the only person in the world who’d never confused Justin and Ben. She’d always known which twin was which.
‘How … What—’ His words were cut off by a firm voice tinged with panic coming from the radio attached to his jacket.
‘Pull back. We’ve lost it. Everyone pull back.’
If his mother recognised Ben’s voice, distorted by the radio, she gave no sign.
‘Come on. We’ve got to go.’ Justin almost pushed her towards her car. They stumbled through the thick smoke, flames all around them.
Coughing badly, they reached the car. Justin’s mother tried to open the wagon’s tailgate but couldn’t manage it while still holding the injured koala.
Cursing under his breath, Justin reached for the handle.
There was a large, blanket-lined box inside the station wagon.
Without asking, he took the injured animal from his mother’s arms and placed it in the box, but before he could slam the tailgate down, his mother was reaching inside for a water bottle, which she poured over the koala’s fur, which was still smouldering.
Justin cursed. ‘There’s no time.’
The flames had jumped the road behind them and were on both sides of them now. The other firefighters were climbing aboard a big red and yellow truck parked a few yards ahead of the flames.
‘Go. Get out of here.’ Justin almost threw his mother into the driver’s seat.
She started the engine and looked back over her shoulder at him. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but he shook his head.
‘Drive.’
This time the urgency in his voice seemed to strike home and she threw the car into gear. All the other vehicles had vanished. Her car was lost in the smoke in seconds.
Justin stood looking after her for what seemed an eternity until the blast of a horn caused him to jump back to reality. The truck was behind him.
‘Justin. Come on.’ The words were drowned out by a huge crash as a tree fell somewhere behind the vehicle.
The passenger door swung open and Justin leaped inside as the truck began moving.
It gained speed quickly. He looked out the window.
All he could see was the shifting smoke and the glow of the flames. His mother’s car was safely away.
‘We’re needed up the Jack’s Creek Road. The wind is shifting,’ the man next to him said. ‘We’ll meet the others there.’
Justin nodded, his mind racing. How many years was it since he had last seen his mother?
Fourteen? Fifteen? Something like that. He and Ben had left that old wooden cottage in Tamworth and not looked back.
In the first couple of years, he had called her once or twice, without telling Ben.
Christmas usually. Never birthdays. That subject was too sensitive to risk.
But as the months and eventually years passed, he stopped.
When he’d last tried, her phone had been disconnected.
That was years ago. Nothing since. If asked yesterday, he would have said he didn’t know where his mother was.
Or even if she was still alive, although he had always assumed she was. There was no need to assume any more.
Somewhere ahead of their fast-moving truck, his twin brother was also preparing to fight this monster of a fire on its new front.
There was no way Justin could casually say that he’d seen their mother.
Not after all these years and all the hurt.
That could wait until the beast was beaten. Then he’d tell Ben. And after that …?
He had no idea.