Saving the Princess

by Helena Newbury

  Another long whistle. Another whump above us, then another. “Some sort of incendiary rounds.” The roof of the barn was on fire, above us, and the hay in the hayloft was going up fast. “Come on!”

  I grabbed her hand and ran with her to the ladder, then pushed her down ahead of me. By the time we were down, the hayloft was a roaring inferno. And now the lower level was starting to catch. The ceiling above us wouldn’t hold for long: everything was tinder-dry, this time of year, and the barn was old and rickety. We only had minutes.

  We raced towards the door...and stumbled to a stop as we saw the scene outside.

  The incendiary rounds were barely visible, black against the night sky as they fell in long arcs from somewhere near the road. But wherever they hit, they exploded in a blinding flash, long trails of flaming liquid spraying out to start countless new fires. It wasn’t just the barn they were aiming at. The fields were on fire in several places and every few seconds another fire would erupt. They were tracking back and forth across our ranch, making sure they hit everything.

  Out by the side of the road, the assassins had a mortar. Just a simple metal tube, like something you’d launch fireworks from, but absolutely devastating in the wrong hands. One guy would be kneeling beside it, dropping in a round every few seconds, and another one would be watching the ranch with binoculars, helping him adjust the aim.

  The ceiling creaked. We had to get out of there now. I grabbed the Princess’s hand and ran through the door—

  There was a feeling. Call it the ground pounder’s instinct, the one you get from being cannon fodder for so many years. I hurled myself down, pulling the Princess down too—

  A bullet hissed over my head, so close I could feel its heat.

  We hit the ground and I grabbed her and dragged her back inside the blazing barn. “Sniper,” I panted. Suddenly, I understood the assassin’s plan. There was a third guy out there with a rifle. They were smart. They knew we’d have guns, on a Texas ranch. So instead of storming the house, they were going to burn all the buildings and shoot us as the fire forced us outside.

  We stared at each other, panting in fear. The air was scorching our lungs, now, and even with the open door the barn was filling up with choking clouds of smoke. “What do we do?” coughed the Princess.

  There was a creak and then a splintering crash: something falling, up in the hayloft. I shoved the Princess away from me, then fell back the other way. A roof timber crashed through the ceiling and slammed into the floor with a ground-shaking thud, right where we’d been standing. Liquid fire rained down all around it and the Princess screamed as her nightdress burst into flames.

  I was on her in seconds, slapping at the flames with my hands. She tried to grab my wrists to stop me but I knocked her hands out of the way and smothered the flames, flattening my palms over her stomach even though it made me wince. Then I grabbed hold of her nightdress and hauled it up, baring her. The pale skin of her stomach was flawless, untouched. Thank God. She took hold of my wrists, looking at my burned palms but I shook my head. I’m fine.

  There was a creak above us, loud enough to drown out the roaring flames. It went on and on: the building’s death rattle. Now that one of the big roof timbers was gone, the whole place was collapsing in on itself. The air singed the little hairs in my nose and scorched my throat. “We can’t stay here,” I rasped between coughs. “How fast can you run?”

  She followed my gaze to the door. I saw her go pale as she realized what I was suggesting. “Quite fast,” she said weakly.

  “You gotta run faster than that. Faster than you’ve ever run in your life. And you gotta run random, not in a straight line.”

  She shook her head. “No.” There was real fear on her face: she’d probably seen snipers at work in the war. She knew what they could do. “I can’t!”

  There was another creak from above. Another timber fell, and liquid fire trickled down after it. I could hear the whole building moving, now, boards cracking and splintering as they bore loads they were never meant to. We had seconds. “It’s sixty yards to the house. You can sprint that in ten seconds. He’ll have time for maybe three shots. We can do it.”

  She shook her head, terrified.

  I took her face between my hands. God, she was so beautiful. So special. “You can do this,” I told her. “I know how brave you are. And you’re not alone anymore.”

  She stared back at me...and nodded. I took her hand.

  The barn creaked...and this time, the noise didn’t stop. I didn’t dare look up.

  “One,” I said, bending my legs. “Two. Three!”

  We ran.

  The night air was shockingly cold after the fire, like jumping into a lake. And the night was black, after the blinding brightness of the fire: the only light was from the blooms of fire as mortar rounds hit the fields around us. We ran flat out, legs pumping, lungs heaving, and we covered ground fast. For a glorious few seconds, I thought maybe I’d been wrong. Maybe the sniper wasn’t watching, maybe he’d changed position—

  There was a tug on my shirt as a bullet passed through the flapping fabric. I cut left for two steps, then right—

  The Princess screamed. I looked at her in panic: was she hit? But she was still running: the bullet had just passed so close, she’d heard it. Twenty yards to the house. I jinked right, then left. Ten yards—

  The bullet was meant for her but it passed between us, clipping my left thigh. I grunted and sprawled on my face, my leg exploding into pain. My hand was torn from hers and she ran on a few steps...then slowed.

  “No!” I yelled. “Keep going!” I was scrambling to my feet but my leg didn’t want to cooperate. “Keep going!”

  She was nearly safe. But she turned and ran back to me.

  I imagined the sniper lining up his next shot. But before I could stop her, she’d hauled my arm over her shoulder and was helping me heave myself to my feet. I couldn’t speak: I was too scared for her, too focused on the bullet I knew was coming—

  It hit the ground an inch from her right foot. We stumbled the last few yards….

  And then we were hidden by the house. We fell heavily against its wall, panting. I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to kill her for putting herself at risk for me. In the end, I just said, “Thank you.”

  I felt my leg, wincing. The bullet had just clipped the flesh: it would slow me down, but it would be okay as long as I got a dressing on it.

  There was a subtle change in the whistle of the mortar rounds. I glimpsed one arcing overhead, followed it down….

  It hit the roof of the house and erupted into flames. I froze, staring up at it in horror. A few seconds later, another one hit the end wall. Flaming liquid bathed the house from roof to ground and the flames roared as they took hold. Oh Jesus...Dad is in there! I took a step towards the door, then stopped.

  I couldn’t leave her alone. But I couldn’t leave them to die in there.

  I turned to the Princess. “Stay here,” I ordered. “Stay right here! I have to help them.” Then I remembered Jakov. Shit! This might all be part of the plan: the assassins attack and their man on the inside kills her while everyone’s looking outward. “If you see Jakov, don’t trust him!” I told her. “Don’t let him near you!”

  She nodded.

  And I ran.

  26

  Kristina

  He ran to the door, stumbling a little each time he put his weight on his wounded leg. Then he was inside, the screen door swinging closed behind him. Another mortar round hit the house and I heard one of the upstairs windows shatter as another room erupted into flames. No!

  I looked around me, tears flooding my eyes. It looked like hell had come to the ranch. The barn was just a seething mass of flame, only a few skeletal timbers still standing. The fields were rolling seas of orange. Even the trees were burning. Now the Buchanan’s family home was on fire. And this is all my fault. I brought this down on them!

  Another mortar round flew overhead, but this one didn’t hit
the house. It went further, arcing down to hit a distant building that had been unscathed until now. Flaming liquid spread along the roof, letting me see the shape of it. Long and low. The stables.

  A sound carried on the wind: snorts and desperate hooves, whinnies of fear. My chest contracted. Oh my God: the horses!

  The stables was in the lee of the house, hidden from the sniper. I looked once towards the house, remembering Garrett’s order to stay put….

  And then I ran.

  27

  Garrett

  I burst into the house. Down on the first floor, everything looked almost normal. But I could hear the roar of flames from upstairs and white smoke was billowing down the stairs. I pounded up them, gritting my teeth at the pain in my leg. “Dad!”

  No reply. The second floor was filling up with smoke, lit up orange by the flames. One whole end of the house was ablaze and it was spreading fast. Worse, the whole roof was creaking and once it came down, nowhere would be safe. “Dad!”

  I heard a curse from one of the bedrooms, then he stumbled into me, coughing. Both of us bent over, trying to suck in the cleaner air down near the floor. “Princess safe?” he managed between coughs.

  I nodded.

  “Jakov…not in room,” he croaked, nodding at the room he’d come from.

  Shit. I’d have to worry about that later. First, I had to get everyone out. I stumbled forward, hunched low, trying to see through the smoke. This was worse than the barn: the smoke couldn’t escape and we were upstairs, where it was concentrated. “Emerik!” I yelled.

  The first roof timber fell, slamming into the floor a few feet in front of us. Flames spread outward and the floor bowed and creaked worryingly under its weight. “Emerik! Where are you?”

  He emerged out of the smoke on the far side of the fallen timber, a limp, blonde-haired bundle in his arms. Caroline! She wasn’t moving. Unconscious, or…God, no.

  Emerik looked to be in a bad way, wheezing and choking, but he marched on determinedly. He was halfway to us when the timber crashed through the floor leaving a splintered hole ten feet wide. I pointed him towards the back of the house. “Go around!”

  Dad and I circled around to meet him. That meant going through the worst of the fire and it was an inferno, flames creeping up the walls and meeting in the ceiling. Framed photos on the walls made popping noises as their glass shattered and the precious pictures inside curled and blackened. My mom’s needlework poem about Home was on fire, dripping hunks of burning thread as it was consumed. We went past my mom and dad’s room and I saw his medal case fall from the wall. Our whole history was being destroyed. Those bastards!

  I was worried Emerik wouldn’t make it but when we reached the landing he was there, coughing and choking but still clutching Caroline. His beloved suit was charred and smoking from where he’d protected her from the flames. He might be uptight but he was a brave son of a bitch when it counted.

  We started down the stairs. We were on the third step when the staircase gave way in front of us. Shit! It was really bad, now: the air was filled with embers and it was so hot, it felt like we were breathing the fire itself. More timbers were falling from the roof. The whole house was collapsing and we were trapped upstairs.

  Dad was coughing too badly to speak but he pulled me over to a window and hauled it open. We were just above the rear porch. He pushed me out first and I helped Emerik get Caroline down to the porch. Then I climbed down to the ground and he passed her down to me. “Dad!” I yelled, looking back at the blazing house.

  He barely made it out in time. Tiles and flaming boards were falling from the roof, raining down around him as his ass hit the porch. He didn’t waste time trying to climb, just slid off the roof and tumbled to the floor. I grabbed him and hauled him to his feet. “Dad?”

  He was fine. A rush of relief went through me. If anything had happened to him….

  Emerik was kneeling over Caroline. The fresh air had brought her around and she seemed to be okay. But—

  “Where’s the Princess?” I asked, panic rising in my chest.

  Everyone looked around but there was no one in sight. Emerik clambered to his feet. “I’ll help you look,” he wheezed. Then he started coughing and couldn’t stop. He’d inhaled a lot more smoke than the rest of us, saving Caroline.

  “You stay here,” I told him. “You did good.” I looked at Dad. “There’s a sniper, somewhere in the trees, that way.” I pointed.

  He nodded and raised his shotgun. “I’ll circle around and take care of him. You save your princess.”

  He ran off into the darkness. I spun around and around, searching for her...and finally saw a figure in the distance, silhouetted by the burning stable. I put my assault rifle up to my face and used its scope. Yes! It was her.

  But just as I lowered my rifle to run, I saw someone else. A big, squat shape, running towards the stables. Jakov.

  I ran. But he had a big head start and the wound in my leg would slow me.

  I knew he’d get there first.

  28

  Kristina

  I skidded to a halt outside the stable door. The whole roof was on fire and the interior was a solid mass of white smoke: I wouldn’t be able to see more than a foot ahead of me.

  A terrified whinny came from inside. I plunged in.

  I had to shuffle through the hay with my hands out in front of me. It was even worse than I’d thought: flaming liquid and bits of timber were raining down from above, threatening to set my nightgown on fire again, and the moving horses cast confusing shadows everywhere. I couldn’t see where I was—

  A horse suddenly reared in front of me, its front hooves almost hitting me in the head. It had broken out of its stall but it was as lost as I was and it was liable to kill me in its panic if I wasn’t careful. “Shh,” I told it. “Shh, shh, it’s okay.” I’d slipped in through the side door but the stable had big double doors, too: if I could open those, the horse could get out. But getting to them meant getting past it. “Shh.” It reared again and I had to fall back against the wall. The back of my neck lit up in scalding agony and I screamed and slapped at it, smelling burning hair. I approached the horse again. “Shh. Trust me, please!”

  I reached out...and managed to pet it. It snorted at me, uncertain...but it stopped rearing for a second. Heart pounding, I slid past it, lifted the bar that held the doors shut and pushed them wide.

  Immediately, the horse shot past: I barely darted out of the way in time. Clouds of smoke followed it and the stable cleared a little: I could see the other horses now, still trapped in their stalls. I ran to the nearest one and started along the line, opening door after door. One by one, the horses ran to freedom. But I could see the roof sagging dangerously. The whole place was going to come down.

  I freed the last horse, looked up...and Jakov was standing in the doorway. “Your Highness!” he panted. “Come on!”

  I looked around. There was no one else there. He could say anything happened. Hit me over the head and leave me to die in the fire.

  The roof groaned. “Your Highness!” yelled Jakov. “Please!” He held out his hand.

  What if Garrett was wrong?

  What if Garrett was right? I searched around for another way out, one that didn’t involve going through him. But he was between me and both of the doors. “Back off,” I told him, my voice shaking. “Just back away.”

  “It’s not safe here!” he yelled over the flames. “Come with me! Now!” And he raced forward and grabbed my wrist.

  There was a splintering crack from above us.

  We looked up just as the roof collapsed.

  29

  Garrett

  I gave a strangled cry as the stable roof collapsed. I was running flat out, but my wounded leg kept making me stumble and I had to keep dodging the horses as they galloped towards me out of the smoke.

  When I reached the stables, the walls were still standing but inside it was just a pile of burning debris. “Kristina!” I howled. A bur
ning timber had fallen diagonally across the door, blocking it. I grabbed it, snarling in loss and fury. I could feel my already-burned palms blistering as I gripped the wood but I didn’t care. I heaved it aside and staggered through the door.

  Nothing. Just a sea of tiles and timber, all of it burning. The heat scorched my face. “Kristina!”

  Then movement. Tiles sliding down from a pile that was slightly higher than the rest. Something big started to shift….

  I watched as a timber as thick around as my waist started to inch into the air. Jakov was crouched beneath it: he had it on his shoulders and he was heaving it into the air like Atlas lifting the earth.

  And lying between his straining legs was Kristina.

  Jakov pushed all the way up to standing. He had both hands on the timber, steadying it, and he was using every ounce of strength he had to bear its weight. “Take...her,” he spat through gritted teeth. “I can’t move.”

  I raced forward, flames licking at the cuffs of my jeans. Kristina was semi-conscious and groaning. I grabbed her and threw her over my shoulder, then looked up at Jakov. The timber was alight in several places, the flames licking at his clothes. He was dripping with sweat, his face contorted with effort. “Go!” he grunted. “I can’t hold it!”

  I ran outside. Emerik was just arriving, still coughing and wheezing but pushing through it. Caroline was following behind him, weak and shaky. I handed Kristina to Emerik.

  And then I ran back inside.

  Jakov glared when he saw me. “Get out of here!”

  But I wasn’t going to leave him to die. Not after being so wrong about him. I ran forward, stood next to him and got my shoulders under the timber, too. If I could just lift it off him….