Chapter 2 #2
“Fenric.” Someone said his name as if it were already a prayer. He wasn’t inside. My stomach dropped. The tower groaned again. One of the upper beams shifted. Maia appeared in the open doorway.
“DOWN!” The tower broke. The sound swallowed the village.
I hit the floor. Burning cedar crashed into the square in an avalanche of sparks and splintered wood.
One of the upper supports tore free as it fell and struck the roof of Nara’s bakery.
Another landed across the festival awnings.
The ribbons caught instantly. Blue. Gold.
Red. Flames raced along the lines we had spent all afternoon stringing between rooftops, carrying fire from one building to the next.
The bakery roof ignited. Then the cooper’s.
Then the dry garlands along the meeting hall eaves.
A western gust tore across Edenlo. Embers lifted into the night and fell everywhere. On thatch. On shutters. On tables. On the old wooden arch at the village entrance. The things we had spent the day preparing became paths for the fire. Nara ran toward the door. Maia caught her.
“Don’t.”
“There are children in the bakery.” Nara’s voice broke on the last word. Tomas went white.
“I moved them.”
“All of them?” Tomas stared at her. Silence answered before he could. A child screamed from the bakery. Nara tore out of Maia’s grip.
“Nara!” She ran into the square. Tomas followed. I did too. Maia caught the back of my dress.
“Lyra.”
“There are children.”
“There are wraiths.”
“I know.” Maia looked at me. Then at the burning bakery.
She released my dress and ran with us. Heat hit before we reached it.
Half the roof was burning. Smoke poured from the windows.
Flames crawled along the awning where Irelia had been sitting only hours ago.
Nara was already inside. Tomas tried the front door.
A burning beam dropped across it and drove him backward.
“Back entrance!” We ran around the side.
A wraith stepped through the wall. Irelia screamed.
Maia shoved her aside before it could reach her.
Ferin’s words tore through my mind. Salt.
Sage. Anything marked. I ripped the remaining protection pouch from my right wrist and threw it.
The bundle struck the wraith. Gold light flared and the creature recoiled.
“Go!” Maia shouted. Irelia and I ran for the rear of the bakery while Tomas kicked the kitchen door open. Smoke rolled over us. I coughed until my eyes watered.
“Nara!” There was no answer.
“NARA!” A little boy appeared through the smoke. Tomas grabbed him.
“Who else is inside?” The boy sobbed against his chest and pointed toward the pantry. Irelia pulled her skirt over her mouth and moved toward it. I caught her arm.
“I’m going.”
“Lyra—”
“Take him outside.” Another section of the roof cracked overhead.
I ducked through the smoke before she could stop me.
The bakery I had known since I could walk had disappeared beneath fire.
The long preparation table was on its side.
Flour floated through the smoke. One of the ovens had cracked open along its side.
I could hear the roof shifting above me.
“Nara!” A cough answered. I followed it. The pantry door had jammed against a fallen shelf. Nara stood on the other side, shoulder braced against it while two children cried behind her.
“Lyra?”
“Move away from the door.” I shoved against the shelf. It barely moved. Nara pushed from the other side.
“Again.” We hit it together. The wood shifted less than an inch. The ceiling creaked. I looked up. A black line of smoke curled through the rafters. Not fire smoke. It moved against the draft.
“Nara.” She saw it too. The darkness began gathering.
“Get the children back.” Nara pulled them behind her.
The wraith unfolded from the smoke. I had no salt.
No sage. No weapon. I grabbed the wooden bread paddle leaning against the wall because it was the only thing within reach.
The creature moved. I swung. The paddle passed through its shoulder.
Cold tore up both my arms. I screamed and dropped it.
The wraith turned toward me. The hollow where its face should have been tilted.
It stopped. My ribs seemed to close around my lungs.
The darkness seemed to look at me. A pressure pushed behind my eyes.
The wraith leaned closer. I couldn’t move.
Heat flashed around my right wrist. The protection cord.
Silver-blue light threaded through the braid for the briefest moment. The wraith jerked backward.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know.” The shelf beside me cracked as it was struck on the other side. Tomas.
“LYRA!”
“We’re here!” He struck it again. The shelf shifted. I shoved. Nara pushed. It moved enough.
“Children first.” The little girl squeezed through. Then the boy. Tomas dragged them clear. The wraith shrieked. Nara shoved through the opening. I followed. A piece of burning ceiling crashed between us.
“Nara!” Flame rose between us. She disappeared behind it.
“NARA!”
“Go!”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“Take them out.” I tried to climb over the beam. Heat forced me back. Nara appeared through the smoke on the other side, one arm over her face. Then I saw the child behind her. Small. Pinned beneath part of the preparation table. Nara dropped beside him.
“No.”
“Get out, Lyra.”
“The roof is coming down.”
“I know.” Nara put both hands beneath the broken table and lifted. The child screamed.
“Nara, stop. Please.” She looked at me. There was fear in her face now. Not for herself. For me.
“Get out.”
“I can help you.”
“No.” The roof groaned above us.
“Nara, please.”
“Go.” She bent over the trapped child again. Smoke rolled between us.
“Please.” Nara looked back at me.
“Use what Maia taught you.” The ceiling cracked.
“Nara!” The roof fell. Tomas caught me from behind and pulled me backward.
The bakery disappeared beneath fire and timber.
Heat punched through the yard hard enough to throw both of us onto the ground.
For several seconds I heard nothing but a high ringing.
Then the world returned in pieces. Burning wood.
Screaming. Someone sobbing. I pushed myself upright.
“Nara.” Tomas still had one arm around my waist. I fought him.
“Let me go.”
“Lyra—”
“LET ME GO.” I tore free and ran toward the collapsed building. There was no back door anymore. No pantry. The stone ovens remained. Everything else had folded inward.
“Nara!” I climbed onto the fallen timber. Irelia caught my dress.
“Lyra.”
“She’s under there.”
“I know.”
“We have to get her out.” A hand lay beneath one of the beams. Still. Flour covered the fingers. A silver ring circled the thumb. I stopped. I knew that ring. I had seen it disappear into dough hundreds of mornings. I had watched Nara wipe flour from it against her apron.
“Nara.” The flames blurred. I took another step. Irelia grabbed me harder.
“No.”
“She’s right there.”
“I know.”
“Help me.” The beam was wider than my body. Half the roof rested on top of it. I reached for the timber. Pain tore through both palms. Tomas pulled me backward.
“She’s gone.”
“No.”
“Lyra.”
“No.” But her hand wasn’t moving. The fire climbed around it. A wraith shrieked behind us. The creature stepped through the burning wall. Tomas lifted the axe.
“Move.” We ran. Edenlo was burning. Not one building.
Not one road. All of it. Turning ribbons had become lines of fire overhead.
Embers fell through the village like red snow.
Roofs burned beside houses still untouched by flame, and every gust carried sparks farther east. The square I had spent the afternoon decorating was gone.
The fire tower lay broken across its center.
Ferin’s carving table had disappeared beneath one of its burning beams. Nara’s bakery collapsed further behind me.
Bodies lay between overturned tables. Some moved.
Some didn’t. My mind tried to count them.
I stopped. A man stumbled toward me carrying his wife. Blood drenched the side of her dress.
“Help her.” I stared at him. Nara’s last words moved through my head. Use what Maia taught you. I dropped to my knees.
“Lay her down.” He did. The wound was low beneath her ribs. Deep. Blood welled through his fingers. I pressed both hands against it. The woman screamed.
“Keep looking at me.” Her eyes found mine for half a second.
“Irelia, cloth.” Irelia tore the sash from her dress and gave it to me. I packed it against the wound and caught the husband’s hands.
“Hold here. Don’t let up.”
“She’s hurting.”
“I know. Keep pressing.” His face went white, but he pressed.
“Take her east. Get her away from the fire.”
“Where’s Maia?”
“I don’t know.” The answer nearly broke in my throat. Everyone looked for Maia when someone was hurt. She knew what to do. Now he was looking at me.
“Go.” He lifted his wife. Another person grabbed my sleeve before I could stand.
“My son.” A boy lay near the fountain with blood covering his forehead. He was breathing. I checked twice because my fingers shook too badly to trust the first pulse.
“Keep him on his side.” A girl came next with burns across one arm.
“Cool water. Nothing colder.” A man had glass buried deep in his cheek.
“Don’t pull that out.” Someone cradled a wrist bent at an impossible angle.
“Keep it still.” A woman could not stop shaking long enough to breathe.
“Look at me. Breathe in. Again.” Pressure.
Wrap. Move. Breathe. Again. Maia’s lessons came back in fragments.
Things she had made me repeat until I could do them without thinking.
Things I had imagined using for farm injuries and winter fevers.
Never this. Never bodies in the square. Never Nara beneath a burning roof.
A scream tore through the north road. I knew the voice.
“Maia.” I stood. Irelia caught my arm.
“That was her.”