Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Reid
Panic uncurls inside of me. The fire in the room is spreading like nothing I’ve seen in my life. It’s like the room is made of paper. It’s curling along the ceiling, billowing black smoke; it’s devouring the chairs and climbing the walls like the fire is a hungry beast.
“We need to get out of here. Now!” I order.
Everyone turns to me, and I glimpse surprised faces, parted mouths and wide eyes. If I wasn’t so panicked, I’d be surprised too. It isn’t often I can even be heard in this group.
Aiden grabs Izzy by the arm. “That’s what I was just telling her.”
She shakes him off. “I need my film first!”
“Film?”
And then, suddenly, she turns and races back into the billowing smoke. Aiden’s face fills with rage, and he takes off after her.
My jaw drops. What the hell are they doing? I’d expect this kind of recklessness from my brother, but from Izzy? They’re going to get us all killed.
I take a step into the room, shocked by the wave of pain that streaks through me. Images of my life flash through my mind of my siblings and I. Of laughter. Of moments that are burned into my memories forever. And then I imagine Aiden fading away, lost to me forever.
I think of Izzy. She’d come into our lives like the changing of the seasons. One moment she wasn’t there, and the next she was just a part of us and our lives.
What if she doesn’t make it out?
Fear burns through my veins,and I grit my teeth until they ache. Taking another step forward, I know that I’d die before I let anything happen to Izzy and my twin.
But where are they? I ask myself, squinting through the flames.
Someone beside me is coughing. He grabs my shoulder, and I’m suddenly face-to-face with Mr. Crist, our chem teacher. “Head for the fire exit!”
“Not without them,” I say.
He shakes his head, coughing hard, putting his hand in front of his eyes to shield himself from the smoke. I think he’ll say more, but he turns and runs out into the hall.
I take a step forward and the smoke presses around me, but it doesn’t make me choke like everyone else. I take a deep breath, aware of the smoke, but not struggling in the least to breathe. Weird.
I squint into the flames. Where the hell are Izzy and Aiden? I keep going forward, and suddenly, Izzy crashes into my chest. Aiden is right behind her. He should be terrified--he should be half-dead--but he just looks as pissy as ever. Which is kind of a relief, because it means he’s okay.
“You shouldn’t have waited for us!” he shouts at me, his eyes wild.
“I’m not leaving you!” I call over the sound of the crackling flames.
A look of pain flashes across his face. If things were different between us, I’d tell him not to worry. That he won’t lose me like we lost her. But the words stick in my throat. Instead, we turn away from the flames, facing toward our escape, keeping the words left unspoken.
We rush out into the hallway. We’re at the back of the school, and there are hundreds of milling kids and teachers between us and the exits. In front of us, all the doors are open and students and teachers alike pour out into the hall. They’re rushing, but everyone seems calm.
Good. We don’t need anyone getting trampled.
“Come on!” Aiden yells at Izzy.
She jerks back, and I see a look on her face that I’ve never seen before. “I’m tired of this shit! You’re all acting like it’s your personal responsibility to make sure I get out safely. Well, guess what, it’s not. I can take care of myself. Just like I have been for years.”
“Is that what you think?” Aiden’s voice holds a challenge. ‘Maybe you weren’t there in the Chem lab, but it didn’t exactly seem like you had your life together. And--”
“Not now,” Van tells him, but Aiden doesn’t seem to hear him.
“Oh, it started this morning. We need to talk, Izzy.” She does a pretty good imitation of Aiden’s low, rough voice. “All of a sudden, you want to act like you care about me?”
“I’m sorry if we haven’t been falling over ourselves for you. That’s what you want, right?” Aiden’s face is tight with fury. “We were friends before we met you, and you came along and made everything so goddamn complicated, and it still wasn’t enough—“
I glance at the door of the science lab. The fire is licking along the walls at a furious pace. Smoke races ahead of it, rushing out into the hall.
We need to have this conversation. But not now. Definitely not now. “Guys—“
Izzy cuts me off. “Yeah, sure, I’m that girl. The one who needs guys falling over her!”
Aiden advances on her, towering over her smaller form. “You are that girl. Look at you today! How many guys did you flirt with?”
Suddenly, lightning explodes from around us, crackling out in all directions, but not touching us. I stare in shock as the impossible unfolds before me. At the storm that seems to be unleashing inside the building.
Everywhere the lightning lands, the walls burn. Ahead of us, people scream, staring back. I see a sea of pale, frightened faces, and then they’re running away from us. No longer calm, just terrified out of their minds.
And not at the fire, but at us. Our little group.
My heart races. The lightning…it’s impossible. Inside a building. And seems to be coming from us.
Again, impossible.
Like last night, a voice nudges in the back of my thoughts.
But Aiden and Izzy aren’t done.
“What’s it to you what I do?” Izzy screams.
“Nothing!” he shouts back. “I don’t care!”
Hs eyes are wild, his face taut with frustration. It sure looks like Aiden cares.
I swear, it’s the most alive I’ve seen my twin look in four years.
More lightning explodes, hitting the walls in new places. But still, none of it touches us. Nor does the smoke affect us. In fact, even the heat of the fire barely registers in the back of my mind.
My heart starts racing. Something about this feels off. Like a dream...or a nightmare.
“Guys.” I push my way between them. “We’re about to die here.”
“No we aren’t!” Izzy glares at me.
I look at my brother, willing him to hear my words for once. “Aiden, look around us.”
At last, he does look around us. The flames dance in the green of his eyes, and his anger fades away. When he looks back at me, I see a soul-deep pain, a misery I know is always with him.
“You’re right,” he says, his voice no louder than a whisper.
Then it’s like something falls inside of Izzy. I see her expression change, and she glances around us, eyes wide.
“Oh my God, the building’s burning!”
“No shit!” Aiden says, but the anger is gone from his voice.
Not wanting them to start up again, I take her arm lightly and lead us toward the exit. On both sides of us, the walls are burning. Above us, the roof is consumed by flames. It all happened so fast. So fast that I feel my heart racing. Can we even get out of here in time?
And then as I’m about to start running, something strange happens.
Out of the walls come shadows. People that I know in my heart are dead.
They’re moving in the smoke, and I can almost convince myself it’s a trick of the smoke.
Then I glimpse faces, and the shadows seem to solidify as they melt out of the wall.
They gain color, life, solidity, as they move toward me.
“You guys see that, right?” I’m breathless.
“See what?” Izzy asks.
One of the dead, shadowy people smiles at me. “Hel, we’ve waited for you so long.”
“I’m seeing things,” I say, sweat dripping down my spine.
Suddenly, I feel Izzy pulling me along.
We’re all at a dead run, but the spirits keep up. Their laughter is all around me. They dance playfully in the flames, their movements graceful and strange.
We explode out onto the steps of the school. Soot-covered and frightened, students and teachers alike are knotted on the front lawn.
Behind us, the building groans. A second later, it crumbles.
Our little group turns as one and stares at the burning remains of the building. But my gaze is pulled to the shadowy spirits dancing in the smoke.
One of them approaches again. She bows before me, then rises. Gently, she places a silver crown on my head. “Hel, you were the queen of our Underworld. But this lifetime, you are a king. And you’ll rule us well.”
When she steps back from me, I reach up slowly. The crown is still there.
“Do I have a crown on my head?” I ask the others, my voice soft.
Izzy is the one to answer. “Yes.”
I turn slowly. All of them are wearing crowns.
“So do you.”
They reach up and touch theirs with the same look of shock on their faces.
“How is this possible?” Van asks.
“Last night,” I say.
My words quiet us all, and there’s nothing but the crackling of the flames.
A minute later, the sound of sirens come. Police and firetrucks pull up, and the firemen go to work, battling the flames as the crowd looks on in silence.
Suddenly, I feel Izzy at my side. Unable to help myself, I wrap an arm around her shoulders and feel an overwhelming measure of relief when she curls into me. Over her head, my gaze catches with Aiden.
I expect him to look jealous, maybe even angry, but instead he just looks…
content. And that’s a word I’d never use to describe my brother.
So, for once, I don’t feel the pressure of his emotions raging around me, which is strangely freeing.
I release a breath I didn’t even realize I was holding and let myself enjoy this moment.
It’s been years since I touched Izzy. Years of having a wall between us that I was too afraid to try to break through. And even though this day has been one of the scariest of my life, it’s worth it just to touch her again.
“Are you okay?” she asks me.
It’s strange, because I am okay.
This isn’t like the last time. Then, I was younger. I’d never known loss or pain like that before, and the experience had changed me as a person. Probably in the worst possible way, other than that I’d learned to appreciate people, because you never knew when they might be gone.
This fire. These strange, unexplainable things…. I could handle them as long as I didn’t lose the people I loved. I could handle anything as long as they were safe.
“Reid?”
I look down at Izzy and wipe some of the soot from her face, gazing into her soft brown eyes.
Those eyes have haunted me every night in my sleep.
Izzy is the only woman I’ve ever loved. She was the only one for me from the time we were young.
If I’d lost her today…I could never have forgiven myself.
Especially because I’d never told her how I’d felt.
“I’m fine as long as you are.”
It wasn’t what I wanted to say, but it was the closest that I could get.
She reaches up and touches the crown on my head. The gesture feels strangely intimate.
“It suits you,” she says.
I feel an unexpected smile tug my lips and run fingertips along her crown, then down her hair. “You should wear yours every day.”
She gives a snort-laugh that I find adorable. “Yeah, like a freaking princess.”
“Guys.” Van’s voice holds an edge of steel.
I look at my friend. It’s got to be one of the few times in my life I’ve seen him look dirty and ragged. Even as a kid, he was expected to look perfect at all times.
And yet it isn’t just his disheveled appearance that makes me stiffen; it’s that the unshakable Van looks worried. So, I follow his gaze to where the students and teachers have begun to gather around a handful of policemen. Suddenly, dozens of fingers are pointing at us.
Fuck.
It’s hard to swallow as the police look in our direction.
“This isn’t good,” Izzy whispers.
It isn’t at all.
“You think?” Aiden says, but even he fails to sound sarcastic.
I don’t know what the hell is happening to us. Maybe we’re losing our minds. But the last thing we need is police right now.
“No one mention any of this weird stuff,” I say, already desperately forming a plan in my mind. “We didn’t do anything. There was a fire in the lab. That’s it.”
Everyone nods in agreement.
But somehow, I don’t think it’ll be that easy.