"You!" I heard my uncle say behind me.
The first thing I thought of when I heard him was Henri, I wanted to yell for her to run. But I realized that would be a mistake. I shouldn't give her away. She was safe in the darkness. They would never know she had come with me.
I turned to see my uncle standing at the edge of the hole, staring down at the gravebox. Something inside it moved. I heard muffled screaming. I was right about Pearl. She was alive.
Ignoring Mazol standing above me and the pain ripping through my arm, I pushed the shovel in deeper and pried with all my strength, but before the lid moved an inch I felt Ballard's huge hands pluck me up from behind. He lifted me by the wet shirt on my back and dropped me to the ground, face to face with my uncle.
I expected Mazol to hit me, or bind my hands, or something. I tried to think of how I could stop them with sapience, but my mind was blank. When I looked him in the eyes I found he wasn't even watching me. He was staring at something behind me, a stunned look on his face, his neck bending back as whatever he was watching must have been getting higher.
I turned and almost fell over backwards. About ten feet off the ground was Pearl's gravebox, floating in the air. Pearl beat on the box from the inside, it shook from her thrashing.
With an enormous crack, the entire gravebox exploded. My heart caught in my ribs for fear of Pearl, but then I heard screaming. The debris cleared and she was still in one piece, hanging above us, straight as a pole. Her mouth was closed, but I could hear her voice cutting through the wind and rain and thunder like a knife through water. I wondered what was holding her in the air as she bobbed slowly for a few moments, covered in tangled black hair and filth and rash.
I realized it must be me. I was using sapience without even realizing it.
I tried to take over my instincts, but that was a mistake. Immediately, Pearl started to fall. Taking one painful step, I leaped over the grave hole, barely catching her in my outstretched arms and landed on the far side. My bad leg came down first, and we collapsed into the mud as I yelled in pain.
Before I could even rise to my elbow, huge iron bars slammed down around me. Ballard stood to the side, breathing heavy. I was in a cage.
Pearl was cradled in my arms, her eyes closed as if asleep and barely alive. But her chest was moving. She was still breathing. I wondered if I would be able to use sapience to get us out of the cage. Somehow we had to escape before they used the syringe on me again. I thought about Henri. Had she gotten away? A hundred thoughts went though my mind all at once and I felt like screaming to make them go away. I had to concentrate, take control of my sapience to bend the iron bars. Do something to save myself. But my mind was getting foggy. I couldn't think straight.
Then I remembered the last time Pearl and I were together. How she almost killed me.
At that moment, I didn't think about the cage or even what Mazol was going to do to us. Only the thought of what would happen when Pearl woke up. And whether or not I would have to kill her to keep myself alive.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Claire
Thursday
10:07 pm
24 hours, 42 minutes until the Falling
The entire bed and half the room was engulfed in flames licking up to the ceiling. Ani and I screamed as we ran towards the door, but it was on fire too. It was shut just moments ago, but now it was swinging open and filled with flames.
Smoke rolled through the air towards us as we started to choke on it. I grabbed Anastasia's hand and pulled her to the open window to find fresh air.
"Help!" I screamed out the window as Anastasia started sobbing. The front of our house was shaped like a big U with the courtyard in the middle; we could see the main entrance to our right as well as the east wing across the courtyard from us. Below us, every head turned up at the sound of our yells and Papa nearly dropped the woman he was dancing with. Someone screamed while others pointed at us and shouted. Papa dashed for the front door, tearing off his coat as he ran and disappeared inside. The whole courtyard burst into motion and noise.
Guests scrambled to save us, but the fire was spreading so quickly. In a matter of a minute it had engulfed several rooms to our right and left. Another minute later it reached the tallest of the house's steep peaks. By then, I saw fire and smoke in some of the windows of the wing across the courtyard.
For a moment, I wondered if I could put out the fire myself, but the thought seemed foolish. Starting a small fire was one thing. Putting out an entire house engulfed in flames was quite another. And I wasn't even sure I had started it. I thought again of the door to Ani's room, swinging open. Had someone come in while we were watching the party?
We were forced to crawl out onto the ledge below the window to avoid the spreading flames. The thick plastered stone walls were all that was now protecting us from the heat. A red beetle the size of my thumb scrambled out onto the wall inches from my face as if it too was trying to escape. Dark smoke poured from all the windows, but to our left it began to suck back inside.
Anastasia screamed again and again for help, her voice breaking more each time.
Two men ran over with a ladder and one of them scampered to the top, but he only reached as high as the third floor. That was more than 10 feet below us.
"Don't worry," he yelled. "More help is coming."
"Get a longer ladder idiot!" Anastasia yelled.
"They're bringing one right now."
"Well it had better be—"
Ani was interrupted when the room below us exploded with a huge ball of fire. The man blew backwards off the ladder as the flames licked up with scorching heat and nearly caught my dress on fire. I fought to keep my grip on the crumbling wall as I saw the man streaking through the air like he had been shot from a cannon. His body hit the ground on the far side of the courtyard, knocking three other men over who also caught on fire. I heard screaming and yelling while people in the crowd tried to beat the flames out. Nothing worked, and soon four bodies were all lying lifeless on the pavement. The crowd stepped back, making a wide circle around the dead men. Those who looked back at us had a terrible fear in their eyes I had never seen before.
It felt like the people below were starting to give up on us. They weren't running around anymore. Hardly anyone was talking. Then I heard two men shouting at Mother.
"Let me go!" I heard Mother yell above the erie quiet that had spread below us. "My family is in there!"
"We can't let you kill yourself Miss."
"They need me!"
Smoke stung my eyes, but I cracked them open enough to see Mother fighting with the men. She bit one man's hand and wriggled out of the other's grasp. Before they could catch her again, she disappeared into the flames below us.
I hoped Mother would find the knife before the shadow. Maybe she could bring it to Papa. He had already been in the house for several minutes but hadn't made it to our room yet.
Suddenly I wondered if he had even come for us at all. Now that I knew he was a murderer, I couldn't be sure if he even loved me. Maybe he wanted to save something else from the fire. Maybe he was just looking for the book, hoping I had returned it to the coat I found it in. I felt inside my dress pocket; the book was still there.
Without Mother and the men fighting, the silence below us had grown even thicker; all that could be heard was the roaring flames and Anastasia whimpering.
"Do something!" Anastasia yelled through desperate sobs. "Why are you all just standing there?"
I would have begged too, but I knew it wouldn't do any good. No one was going to answer. Even from the fourth floor, I could see it in their eyes.
A few people looked at their feet, as if they were embarrassed to watch us die. A huge explosion erupted, and the entire wing to the left of us began to fall. Each moment, more of the house crumbled away. I knew we had less than a minute before we were burned alive. Or we could fall to our deaths first. Which way of dying would be easier?
The building shook aga
in and I nearly lost my balance. Readjusting, I watched the room next to us shudder and plunge into the darkness below. We were next.
Papa had run into the house nearly five minutes earlier. Mother had been in the house for at least two. It was unlikely that either was still alive after such a long time.
I looked into Anastasia's eyes and wondered what it felt like to die. I felt suddenly sorry for all the times I'd fought with her. Even though she was a brat sometimes, she was still my sister.
I wasn't ready to die; I always imagined getting older. My wedding. Having children. Two boys; I was sure boys would be easier than girls to raise.
Then I had a thought. Maybe we didn't have to die. Maybe I could save us. I could fly away and carry my sister with me.
"Let's jump," I said.
"It's too far."
"Hold my hand. It will be alright." I reached for her arm, but she turned away so her hands were out of reach.
"Don't touch me."
"I'd rather jump than get burned alive."
"I can't do it."
"But what if..."
I didn't finish. She didn't believe. Anastasia would never jump, no matter what I said. But what if I really could fly?
I felt the wall start to shake. A piece of plaster broke off in my hand and crumbled into a coarse powder. The whole thing was about to give way. I closed my eyes and tried to think of a way to save us.
With a crack, the small ledge I was standing on disintegrated and I began to slip. Just when I was sure I was finished, I opened my eyes and saw my father appear in the window.
"Papa!" I screamed as I was just able to find another footing, clinging by my fingernails to a crack in the rock wall. He had come for us after all. Maybe I had been wrong about everything; maybe I had misunderstood the letter.
"Save me first!" Anastasia screamed as she tried to push past me, almost knocking me off.
"Stay where you are," he said, "I'll pull you in next."
He reached for me.
"Just give me your hand. I promise, everything is going to be alright."
"What about the fire?"
"Don't worry. A little fire like this isn't going to hurt me."
He smiled confidently. I thought of the knife. What about that? What about the shadow?
"And Ani?" I said, feeling, for some reason I can't explain, reluctant to accept his help. "She'll be all right?"
"Yes. Come on, you're almost in."
I released one hand from the crack I clung to and stretched out to him as he reached down. He looked down into my dress pocket, the book was sticking up above the stitching. His eyes narrowed. I had made a terrible mistake. He would try to take the book from me, then just let me fall to my death. What better way to get rid of the daughter who knew the truth than for her to die in a terrible accident?
I thought fast. He would have to get me into the window before he could reach the book. Maybe, if I was lucky, I could get inside and push him out before he knew what was happening. I shuddered at the thought of hurting him. Would it make me a bad person to kill my own father, if I knew he was a murderer? I knew I could do it if it came between that and surviving. It was my only choice.
There was fire and smoke all around him, but he didn't seem affected by it. My fingertips grasped his, but I couldn't get a better hold. Slipping, I began to think that I really might not make it. I remembered the shadow and was overcome with the urge to warn him about it.
"I saw something Papa! It came over the wall." I couldn't believe the words were mine as I heard them come out of my mouth. Here I was, planning to push him from the window and now I was trying to protect him? It didn't make any sense.
"Would you shut up and get inside," Anastasia yelled.
"But the knife," I yelled. "I think the shadow took it."
Why did I keep doing that? He was going to kill me and I was helping him. But I saw something in his eyes, like the look someone makes when they realize they've made a big mistake. My fingers reached their limit and I dropped back down to the ledge where I could grasp the crack in the stone.
"Just, grab on to my arm!" he said, shaking the look away.
I reached again, but he was too far away. "I can't do it."
"Yes you can, just reach!"
I made one last effort and as I did, felt my body get lighter, like I was floating up to him. Like he was lifting me up with some invisible force. As I put my hand in his, my foot slipped. I was dangling in midair, but Papa had a firm grip on me and began to lift me with a single arm like I weighed as little as a feather pillow. I was up to the window sill when he suddenly stopped pulling. A horrible blood-drained look came over his face; his eyes began to roll backwards as his fingers loosened.
"I'm slipping!" I yelled. Then I saw why he had stopped pulling. A small black blade tip covered in blood appeared in the center of his chest and was growing longer, like someone was pushing it through from the other side. It was the knife.
He turned to look behind him and said, "You? "How..."
"Papa!" I yelled. He turned back to me, blood soaking his torn shirt. Anastasia screamed. Suddenly I realized why I had been trying to warn Papa. I didn't care about the book anymore or what it said. I only wanted my Papa. I loved him and I wasn't going to stop just because of some book. I wanted us to be together forever.
"The book," he said through gasps, "I know you have it. You must..."
He coughed and blood dripped from his lips. Fire was all around him, but still he didn't seem effected by it. Only the blade was hurting him. I looked at my sister and through her sobbing I saw eyes that were filled with hatred. I thought she might kill me herself at that moment if she could.
"Make sure Mazol does what I told him," Papa said, and coughed up blood again. "If he doesn't, you have to finish it. You must trust me. I love you little Bell. It's for your own good. You must kill Evan Burl before it's too la—"
But he didn't finish his sentence. Just as I found a grip on the window sill, he collapsed to the floor. A moment later, Mother appeared. Her clothes and skin were burned, but somehow she had managed to get through the fire alive. She looked with stone-like eyes at Papa laying on the floor, but I couldn't tell if she was upset or not. Then I noticed blood on her hands, and I had the horrible thought that maybe it was Mother who had stabbed Papa. But what about the shadow? What if mother and the shadow were working together?
She stepped over Papa's body as she came to the window.
"Clairȩ, Ani!"
"I'm slipping," I said.
"Help me!" Anastasia screamed from the ledge below.
Mother reached both arms down and grabbed my hand. She started to pull me up, but her hand was slippery from the blood and I could barely grip it. I watched with horror as a burning beam broke free from the ceiling above Mother and landed on her back. As she crumpled beneath its weight, she too caught on fire. The flames raced through her flowing black dress and into her perfect golden hair. She let out an animal-like scream that might have shattered the windows if there was any glass left in their frames.
I was just able to keep my balance with one hand on what was left of the window sill. Beside me, Anastasia was sobbing worse than ever. As Mother disappeared into the room, the whole building began to shake. The last of the house was about to fall. But just as the beams supporting the remaining structure gave way—there was an explosion.
It started inside Papa.
Right where the knife had pierced his chest, something like an earthquake pulsed with the power of a hundred orchestras playing a the same note all at once. Yet there was no sound. Starting with his body, everything around him—walls, chest-of-drawers, carved stone statues, glass—even light, was sucked to that single point.
The area being pulled towards Papa was growing, like an exploding star in reverse. I saw it all as I blew backwards from the force, just outside the explosion's grasping fingers.
It almost felt like I was floating on a pillow of thin air.
I was
falling backwards, propelled by the explosion's force like a surfer riding the crest of a wave, down into the smoky fog that was rising up from the earth. What was left of our mansion disintegrated into dust as a shockwave blew out from my Papa's chest. The book lifted out of my pocket and floated away from me, just out of my grasp.
Right before I lost consciousness, I thought I saw something flying above me. It was my Papa, or a ghostly memory of him.
"Use the bracelet," he said, then disappeared. I felt the trinkets, dangling on my wrist. My hand found the one that was shaped like a glass vialus filled with black smoke. I don't know how I found the strength, but I squeezed it tight and it shattered inside my hand. I heard the sound of sucking wind and crackling lightning as smoke curled out in wisps around my clenched fingers and then burrowed into my skin.
As I fell the last few feet, the clear midnight sky, like a black sweater wrapped around the world, seemed to unzip itself, revealing a sunset colored red sky above it. The light from a setting sun pierced through the darkness like it was breaking through a storm's clouds.
I felt a rushing wind pulling me sideways. My body seemed to turn to vapor, I imagined being carried away on the breeze. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out.
I closed my eyes, unable to watch the final moment before my body hit the ground.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Evan
Friday
5:45 pm
5 hours, 4 minutes until the Falling
"You've been a bad boy," a voice said. The sound rang in my ears like someone had hit my head with a pry bar. Thick iron bars surrounded me on all sides. The room lurched as I sat up. I couldn't focus. Nothing made sense.
I tried to stand but hit my head and fell back to the floor. How long had I been out? How much time did I have left?
I saw a face leering down at me through the bars. I squinted my eyes and the features came into focus.
It was Yesler.
Evan Burl and the Falling Page 20
