Tytiana

by Marc Secchia

  Hanzaki said, “Son, how do you –”

  “I know! I just … do. Where’s the Ball, Dad? Where’s the freaking dance?”

  Isimi snapped, “Jakani! Don’t speak to your –”

  But his father cried at once, “House Alagar, on the Western road! Go!”

  His frantic grab ripped the entire front door out of its frame. Jakani stared stupidly at the wood for a second, before he set it to one side. “Sorry. Dad, Mom – have to go. Tytiana needs me.” He took one backward step, and then shot out into the night.

  How he knew was not even a question. The terror that gripped his heart was a bonfire of rage and need and certainty. She was in mortal peril. He hurled himself along well-known trails for several minutes before reason percolated through the urgency. Alagar was a ways. He did not know the lamko trails out there. The main road took a long curve along the westerly peninsula, but that would be the quickest route, wouldn’t it? Illegal. But what better could he do?

  Bursting through a screen of young fenturi trees, he hurdled a stream in a single long bound and flew on. At this speed the leaves and low-hanging branches struck his face and shoulders like whips. Go! Faster! Every second counted. Cutting down to the main road that led out of the Cyraxana estate, he picked up speed on the hard paving stones. Feet slapping down like a herd of nenko carriage-men running riot. Thank Fra’anior for bright starlight in a season that was usually overcast. Screaming into a turn, he found the big road, and now he could pin back his ears and for the first time, run without stinting. The wind crowded down his throat into his labouring lungs as he picked up speed. How long could he keep up this pace?

  He must.

  Jakani ran for her life.

  * * * *

  Tytiana stirred groggily. Something was not right. There was a terrible roaring and crackling sound nearby, and the heat was ferocious. Was she lying upon a lava flow? In bed? Why could she not move her hands? Why was her head so muzzy?

  Burning. She had to shift positions. Struggling over onto her side, Tytiana discovered that she was tied up – trussed like mutton upon a spit, in fact. Her head jerked this way and that. Hexagonal room. Floor as hot as an oven. That roaring … the building was on fire! Flames thundered up past the window to her left. This was terror on a scale she had never known before. Heated sweat broke out all over her body as she jerked frantically at the ropes, tearing her skin in dread. Another window ahead of her seemed to be clear, but that meant finding her feet, or rolling, or … she rolled rapidly, over and over, fighting the tough cords that bit into her wrists and elbows. Her captors had trussed her knees and ankles too, leaving nothing to chance. A fat rag sat in her mouth, held in place by further hanks of rope that stretched her mouth painfully sideways, as if she was trying to smile the widest smile in the world.

  Going nowhere fast. There wasn’t a fraction of an inch of give in her bonds.

  She rolled until she thumped against the wall. Lever up. Wriggle. Bridge the body! Cursing, snuffling through her nose, starting to cough at the heat and the smoke, Tytiana finally managed to push herself half upright. She peered over the windowsill. Was she in a tower room? Aye, high up, perhaps on the topmost floor.

  The party down below had come to a standstill. By the light of the leaping flames she saw hundreds of faces peering upward, but none of them appeared to see her. She screamed and screamed into the filthy gag. She banged her head against the metal bars that criss-crossed the window in an ornamental diamond pattern, perhaps built for safety. No hope of attracting attention that way. Filthy bandits! Who wanted to kill her? Father? This kidnapping had been organised. Someone must have set a fire on the floors below. Who wanted her dead so badly they would go to such lengths; why not simply have one of those ruffians slit her throat? No. Instead they had tied her with great skill and far too much rope, and left her up here to burn alive.

  Perhaps it was meant to look like suicide?

  “Murgh! Murgh!” was all she could scream. Tytiana looked around frantically again. The door would be locked, of course. No way out of here but a door or a window – and the drop would kill her if the fire didn’t.

  Which death would be quicker? Less painful?

  Please, oh please. If she had ever needed to be a Dragoness, now was the time. Please let Adazara be right!

  She could not even summon so much as her own spark – Jakani! JAKANI!

  All that was within her cried out for him. They had a connection. Was it beyond reason to hope that he might hear her, and come? Her eyes searched the night. Where was he? The stone floor was becoming so hot she could barely stand the burning through her right slipper. The guests stood around and pointed at the leaping flames. There was her father, talking animatedly with High Master Faran. He did not even know she was missing.

  Then, she saw something streaking through the darkness beyond the grounds like a comet. Orange fire. A flaming blur that moved far faster than any mortal man could run, but it seemed to Tytiana in that instant that her vision leaped across that space, and she saw or imagined Jakani’s face smudged with flame, contorted with effort as he darted through the lines of soldiers and past them long before they could react, and then he was slowing, searching, seeking her with the powerful senses of … his heart? Magic? She did not know what she felt, only that the consuming terror she had felt began to recede.

  Hope had come.

  * * * *

  Jakani’s dash led him amidst the guests of the Annual Choices’ Ball more quickly than he could credit. He still thought he was slowing down when he found himself across an ornamental lawn, crashing through a pond and a small screen of bushes thereafter, and approaching a horde of the extravagantly dressed elites of Helyon. Thankfully, they were much more preoccupied with the roaring fire than with the presence of a lamko in their midst.

  Tytiana. Where was she? He sensed her nearness, yet when he gazed around at that sea of heads, not one was the colour of the flame that enveloped one whole segment of the hexagonal orange House, and sprouted in ferocious tongues out of the lower windows of one of the towers.

  He grabbed the person nearest him. “Tytiana. Where’s Tytiana?”

  The man looked scandalised. “Lamko? What’s a monkey doing here?”

  He tried another. Much the same response.

  Another.

  Another, and another. He was starting to create a stir now, his filthy rags amongst all these silk suits and dresses, his black hair and tan Eastern skin tone standing out starkly against their fair skins. Zihaeri! At last. Pushing through the crowd, using his forearms to break the grip of two pairs of hands that tried to stop him, Jakani forced his way to her side.

  “Zihaeri! Where’s Tytiana?”

  She stared at him. “Jakani? What are you doing here?”

  “What? You know this lamko?” growled the tall High Master next to her. “Guards. Guard –”

  “Stop, Faran,” said Zihaeri, growing paler than her fine blonde hair. “What’s the matter with Tytiana? Why are you here?”

  The Master looked incensed, as well he might be, because Zihaeri grabbed his hand as she spoke. Jakani spluttered, “I – she’s in trouble. That’s all I know. I felt it, and came. Where’s your sister?”

  “Well, I don’t – the cloakroom. She went … in there.”

  Zihaeri pointed directly at the blaze.

  The man called Faran said, “Your sister? She’ll have been on the first floor. Hope she got out in time.” He cupped his hands around his mouth and started to bellow around him, “Tytiana! Has anyone seen Choice Tytiana of Cyraxana, the redhead girl? Anyone seen a redhead?”

  Huge billows of smoke poured upward from a blaze that had truly taken hold. Jakani knew there would be no stopping it until that part of the building, at least, was gutted. Yet he did not sense her down at the first floor level, nor anywhere nearby. Jakani shut his eyes, focussing only on the awareness of her, ignoring a heavy hand that had a hold of his collar, now. Juzzakarr. This was the beginning of the end, u
nless … his gaze turned upward, forcing that hand to rotate until the owner cried out in pain.

  “There! In the window!”

  A glint of light played off long, corkscrew red-gold hair. Hair that belonged to only one person they knew.

  Zihaeri screamed, “Tytiana! She’s in the tower!”

  Chapter 16: Firestorm

  VOICES SURROUNDED HIM, crying out in shock, begging Fra’anior for mercy, shouting at the girl to jump. Jakani knew that window was barred. He also knew he had to go to her before the tower was engulfed in flame and she was lost forever.

  Pushing past the Masters, he tried to run toward the house, only to have Faran’s hand stop him. “What are you doing, boy? You’ll be burned alive.”

  “I won’t.”

  Wouldn’t he? Jakani swayed. Tytiana’s fire had not burned him, but this was different. This was a real blaze, far hotter than any hearth fire. Nothing and nobody could survive in that heat, except that – could he be fast enough? Strong enough? Those things did not matter when it came to a building ablaze, his skin blackening and peeling off of him … no. What mattered was that she had called to him, and when her fire entered him, Jakani became more. Her fire had not consumed him, had it?

  He threw off Faran’s hand. “If I can’t make it, I’ll come back.”

  Every sense screamed at him that he was throwing his life away. The hallway was filled with billowing black smoke, almost impossible to navigate. Tearing off his shirt, he wadded it against his nose and mouth, and tried to feel his way to the stairway. Quickly now. No good if he succumbed to the smoke before he even reached the fire. There! A banister. He took the stairs three at a time and came out in a wide corridor. The fire had licked a little along here, but not much. The main blaze was on the floor above, he sensed. Oh. Here was a woman, slumped unconscious next to a mirror. Had she run there thinking that was the way out?

  Snap decision. Picking her up, Jakani slung her over his shoulder and carried her out the way he had come.

  Faran met him at the entrance. “Who’s this?”

  “Someone. I’m going in again.”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “It’s too dangerous. Get these gawping idiots organised, man. Water! Fight the fire or the whole House will go. Has anyone checked all the rooms?”

  He left before Faran’s glowering at his tone could turn to violence. Back inside. The smoke, thicker yet. Jakani cast about for the upward-leading stairway and run up to the first floor, then had to make a second search before he found a narrower stairwell leading to the tower floors above. Heat rolled down upon his head and shoulders, stultifying. He could not breathe. Cover the mouth. Count to three. Hope not to burn alive.

  Run!

  Jakani plunged into thick, acrid white smoke and then billows of flame leaping at his left hand. Fighting the intense heat, he stumbled upstairs, barking his toes and shins against the steps, scrambling up with one hand held ahead of him and the other pressing his shirt against his face. Scorching. Blistering. Fire roaring all around with a sound like a feral Dragon’s thundering. He found himself inside the belly of a hellish firestorm, flames dancing everywhere and rolling toward him in successive crimson waves along a corridor roof, as if the world had turned upside down, and he saw stacks of wood stored beneath a stairwell that someone must have planted to ensure a blaze took hold with unnatural speed and vigour. Past that. Almost swimming through the waist-deep flames now, and still he did not fall, but his trousers were smouldering and his lungs burned and – thank Fra’anior! An urn of water for the use of residents at night! Had it been large enough, Jakani would have jumped right in. Instead, he had to lift the huge urn. He poured the water over his head, a lukewarm but welcome relief.

  He glanced back at a wall of swirling orange and gold that lapped at and along the ceiling above him, and shrouded doorways in impassable heat. The air shimmered. How the hells had he come through that?

  Flames were still pouring up the narrowing stairwell that must lead to the highest tower levels, an upward-flowing torrent of such blistering temperature, the colour was closer to white than yellow. Well, he had not expired thus far. Taking the deepest breath his parched lungs could endeavour, Jakani threw himself into the river of flame and climbed those stairs as if he could outrun the burning and blazing and hurting, and even though his nerves shrieked as though he danced upon white-hot coals, he did not shrivel. The corkscrew stairwell was an airless, orange and crimson hell hole. Endless. Nothing in him but the stubborn knowledge that he could not give up. Never. He must find her. Find a way out.

  Jakani burst up through three floors before the fire suddenly abated. It had not reached this level yet, but it would within minutes. Here, the stairwell ended in a small landing with but one door leading off of it. He slapped at his trousers. A few more holes. And the fabric had survived how, exactly?

  Crouch. Gather himself. “Haaai-yaah!”

  His flying drop-kick cracked the door back so sharply, it rebounded and took a second swipe at him. He smashed it out of his way with an iron-hard elbow. “Tytiana! What the …”

  Whatever he had expected, it was not to find a rope-trussed heiress wearing, well … not a great deal, and soundly gagged to boot. Suddenly the room felt a thousand degrees hotter than before. Meantime, the heiress squeaked something unintelligible. Where was her ball gown? Was she wearing underwear? Some kind of rich girl sleepwear?

  Of course, he was asking all the questions of a pure fool who would shortly be fried right along with all of his foolishness. Shaking half a measure of sense into himself, Jakani dashed across the small chamber to her side, where she stood propped against the window, her violet eyes huge with fright. “Tytiana. What happened? Who did this – here, aye, I’ve got you now.” He swung her off the floor. “A bit warm in here, right?”

  “Murghi,” she mumbled, her eyes crinkling at the corners.

  “Pleased to see you, too. Now, how’s about we – whatever are you staring at?”

  She blenched, staring fixedly over his shoulder. “Mmm-goon!”

  GRABOOM!!

  * * * *

  The sole of her foot burned! Tytiana tried to express her pain to her ralti-stupid would-be rescuer, who had evidently never seen a girl in underwear in his life before. Didn’t this nonsensical mud-head have sisters? Set aside how he had managed to navigate a stairwell burning so fiercely, she could feel the heat radiating up beneath her body, let alone see the air rippling through the door he had smashed open. He swung her trussed body into his arms, turning his back to the window, and to her immediate shock, she saw an immense bruiser of a Brown Dragon spearing through the air above the pavilion on a direct collision course with the tower.

  Rescuer?

  BOOM!! The entire tower trembled as the Dragon smashed his shoulder into its side at some considerable speed. Jakani stumbled to his knees. “Where are you, girl? Where?” thundered a huge voice, greater even than the fire. Blam-blam-blam! It was attacking the building! “Come to me!”

  “Mm-emm-mee,” she yelled at Jakani. Enemy!

  At once, she upended. Tytiana realised she was slung over his sturdy, bare shoulder like a bolt of silk being handled by a labourer. Jakani gathered his balance. He handled her weight so deftly. The tower rattled violently a second time, as if the Dragon had a caroli rat trapped between his fangs and was shaking it for sport. Part of the floor cracked away, revealing a scarred and calloused brown paw reaching up toward them. Dodge! Talons sweeping the floor like a quartet of swords! The attempted grab missed them by a rajal’s whisker.

  Just when she thought he had finally discovered a sensible bone in his body, Jakani leaped down through the hole after the disappearing paw! They landed with a thump that punched his shoulder into her sternum. Tytiana wheezed into her gag. Fire! There was fire … no, a cool breeze ruffled her hair now as he took several running steps and sailed through the air once more, and she momentarily glimpsed the pavilion where the band had long since abandoned their
instruments and fled, and a few white splodges that must be upturned faces. Her champion touched down more gently this time, on a slope. The roof. Tiles scattered before his precipitous descent as Jakani cleverly used the angle to his advantage to skate down the roof at a still-crazy speed, and then he was leaping again as if his thighs were thick springs, out to a tree. How could one person even do that with another slung over their shoulder?

  Krack! The branch he had aimed for gave way beneath their combined weight, but he rode it down like a man balancing atop a runaway cart, and at the very last instant, leaped free.

  They alighted within touching distance of her surly-lipped father.

  Heavens! How agile was he?

  The High Master began to snarl, “Get your hands off my daughter, filth! How dare you!”

  Jakani promptly whipped her off his shoulder, turned her upright, and slapped her cheek! “Breathe. Come on, Choice. You can – oh no.”

  Twisting around despite the ropes, Tytiana was just in time to see the Brown Dragon pouring down off the blazing roof with terrible, lithe purpose, like a prodigious python descending from a tree. He crushed several people beneath his paws upon landing, but seemed not to notice. Two pounding steps, and he loomed over them in all his fearful bulk and menace, all sleek, muddy brown scales and two rows of cracked white fangs filling his thuggish jaw.

  The Dragon’s breath was every bit as heated as the fire behind him as he hissed, “By my wings, what a pretty catch! The redhead heiress with an appetising price upon her head, and a boy who walks through fire. Fascinating.”

  The eyes were pitiless, burning pools that fixated upon them both, and by Jakani’s trembling against her, she realised he was every bit as terrified as she was.

  Nonetheless, he said, “Noble Dragon –”

  “Fortune favours the swift-winged,” snarled the Dragon, overriding Jakani effortlessly. One stalwart paw swooped down to wrap around the pair of them before they could move a muscle. The Brown’s grip was like a vice, squeezing them together with terrifying strength – not enough to crush bones, but enough to restrict their breathing. “I think I’ll take you both. More gold for my treasury.”