Red

by Richard P Rigoli

  Kendra screamed and wildly swung where Jade had been a moment before. Jade spun around and landed a kick into the center of Kendra’s back. The redhead doubled over, falling heavily onto the floor. Lights came on upstairs in two different rooms.

  Rai and Emma moved, rising from their positions, and heading to the door Jade used.

  Kendra scrambled across the floor toward the windows when she must have seen them coming. Emma gasped as Kendra’s eyes met hers, never having seen such an expression of rage before. Kendra’s eyes narrowed, and Emma felt an immense rush of heat flow over her as Rai shouted, “Oh, crap!”

  Emma felt Rai drive into her from the side, and they both hit the water of the pool as a wave of flame, molten glass, and debris flew over them.

  ***

  Jade could not hide her stunned expression. Most of the windows were broken, and the yard was in scattered ruins. The heavy red curtains fluttered in flames over the open gap in the wall. Kendra got to her feet and turned back toward her opponent. A thin wisp of gray smoke curled from the girl’s lips as she said, “Your friends can’t help you now.”

  Jade had known Kendra and her whole family were unclean and tainted by evil, but this was more than she was prepared for. She took an unconscious step back. “You’re not human! You freaking monster!”

  Kendra’s form flared in shimmering ripples of heat again, and Jade dove behind a large sofa only a moment before the wave would have struck her. The plush fabric of the couch blackened then ignited with choking smoke and flame. “You attack me at the dance and then break into my home with a sword, and I’m the monster?! What was your plan? Kill my family and me in our sleep?”

  Jade closed her eyes tightly and rolled away from the burning couch. She had been so focused on Kendra that she hadn’t even considered what else she was going to do beyond that. She wondered if she really would have killed the rest of the Radcliffs in their sleep. Jade had come so far and sacrificed so much to recover the sword. All to complete Its divine purpose. She had known from the moment she had overheard her parents talking about the Sword of the Gathering Clouds of Heaven hidden within the Aoi warehouse.

  The League had turned against her father who had been keeping it hidden and safe. They had planned to steal it away in the night, but Jade had heard the call somehow and understood, understood that monsters once more walked the world. The sword was needed again, and she would be the one to take it up.

  You will do what must be done, the thought flickered in her mind, and Jade was no longer certain where she ended, and the blade began. She realized in that moment, she no longer cared. Jade stood slowly and looked across the room at Kendra. She could barely make her out now, as flames spread across the ceiling. Smoke was everywhere, and she could hear a woman screaming upstairs— probably Mrs. Radcliff. Jade shook her head to clear her thoughts, feeling the reassuring presence of the sword and reached back over her shoulder to draw it forth. The familiar weight of it in her hands gave her clarity and resolve. Evil stood before her in the guise of a young girl. Evil needed to be purged, cut out like a cancerous tumor before it could spread like the fire flaring up and unchecked in this room. Raising the blade before her, she charged.

  ***

  Kendra peered into the choking smoke as Jade leaped out of it, blade descending in a killing stroke. It never landed. Both Kendra and Jade were lifted and hurled against the far wall of the ballroom by a tremendous blast of wind.

  “That’s enough!” Rai shouted. “Jade, back off before someone gets killed!”

  Kendra lay motionless against the wall, but Jade had landed better and was already getting back up. “Keep out of this, Rai! There is an evil inside her. It’s in you too! I’ll do what I can for you, but it’s too late for her.”

  “You’re going to have to deal with me now. I’m not letting you hurt anyone else,” he said.

  Jade raised the sword before her and started toward Rai. “If that’s how you want it,” she snarled, “I’ll cut the taint out of you.”

  Rai raised his hands before him and Emma heard the howling blast of wind he directed at Jade, but she held the sword before her in some sort of guard position and wasn’t even slowed. “It’s not working! Run, Em!” he shouted.

  “What about me, Jade?” Emma stepped out from behind Rai. Jade paused, looking from her to Rai and back again. “Am I tainted too? Don’t do this.”

  “Emma, get out of here!” Jade gritted her teeth. “You don’t understand what’s going on.”

  “I know you’re coming at Rai with a sword,” Emma said angrily. “It’s Rai, Jade! You’ve been protecting him from bullies for the last ten years, and now you’re going to stab him? Snap out of it!”

  “Evil has to be cut out, Emma.” Jade looked from Emma to the sword and for a brief moment, her eyes seemed to clear. Jade frowned and appeared to be speaking directly to the sword now. “They’re my friends. I can’t. I won’t!”

  Kendra appeared from behind Jade in that moment and struck. Jade half-turned, bringing the flat of the blade up to deflect the blow. There was a loud sound of impact, and Jade was sent hurling through the gap in the glass wall. She cleared the pool and hit the concrete path on the far side with a heavy bounce. The sword spiraled out of her hand into the dark before she landed in a boneless sprawl against a brick Bar-B-Que.

  The redhead looked down at her hands and back to the hole in the wall. “It’s getting loose,” she said, sinking to her knees. “My mom, my brother,” she said pleadingly, “get them away… away from me.”

  The fire was visibly out of control, swirling up and out the first and second-floor windows. The heat was intense. Emma looked at the crumpled form of Jade and then back to Kendra.

  “Emma, go see to Jade. I’ll get Kendra!” Rai’s voice cut through her paralysis, and Emma half stumbled, half ran back to the patio and made her way around large pieces of burning window frame and the pool to where Jade fell.

  Emma crouched low and made her way through the debris, stinging ash, and embers flying all over. Her eyes burned, and her throat felt like she had swallowed a charcoal briquette. But Emma kept moving and almost ran into a man cradling Jade’s limp form. She stumbled and fell back in surprise. Wearing a long coat with a thick scarf wound around his face, and even in the smoke, Emma recognized him. “Mr. Jones!”

  “Get out of here, Emma. Go home to your mother!” he shouted over the roar of the fire and screaming wind.

  Emma looked at her friend clutched tightly in her father’s arms. Jade looked like a broken toy, and she was terrifyingly still.

  “We just wanted to help her,” Emma wailed through the blazing ash, “Oh, please, is she okay?!”

  “I saw how you and the Aoi boy helped her,” Jason cried, his voice filled with anguish, but eyes hard. He shoved past Emma and headed out the back gate with Jade.

  34

  RED

  Rai stood up and faced the fire that filled the room between him and Kendra. He tried to rush in, but the scorching heat was incredible and drove him back. He paced back and forth for a moment, looking for a way to get to her through the swirling smoke and flame. Another scream could be heard from somewhere above. He was running out of time. If he didn’t think and act quickly, people were going to die. Smoke surrounded the house and grounds, billowing and flowing out from nearly every window now.

  He saw movement inside the ballroom. Kendra rose slowly to her feet amid the flames. Her hands were grasping her head tightly as she staggered forward a step.

  "Kendra!" Rai called out to her, "Get out of there!"

  "I can’t hold it anymore!" she cried. "Please, make it stop!" Kendra's fingers raked back her wild fiery mane, and with a terrible wail, the girl exploded in a torrent of flame.

  Rai stood his ground, his hand held before him. He felt the heated air and seized it with his will, visualizing a shield between the building and himself. The air before him responded to his call, flowing forward, and compressing. Wood, glass, and oth
er debris he couldn't identify deflected off the barrier and shot past him.

  The heat was intense, but his concentration held as did the protective shield. Beads of sweat dotted his brow as Rai peered forward into the churning firestorm before him as he desperately looked for any sign of Kendra.

  ***

  The slanted roof of the ruined ballroom below the second-floor windows burst outward, and Emma turned back toward the house. Rai was standing right outside when a large chunk of smoking roof landed on top of him. She felt her knees go weak at the sight of Rai being crushed, but a moment later, the mass of charred wood and Spanish tile shifted and fell to the side, revealing her friend. He was down on one knee with both arms raised above his head but looked otherwise unharmed.

  "Rai!" Emma called out as she edged closer to him. The heat from the fire was almost unbearable. He turned to regard her, his eyes shining brilliantly in the firelight. The effect was unnerving. "Rai?" Emma asked tentatively, "Are you, okay? I thought the roof got you. How?”

  The grin on his face was unmistakable Rai as he replied, "Windshield!" She figured he couldn’t be hurt too badly is he was still capable of puns. “Get it, Em? I made a windshield?”

  Her sense of relief was short-lived as her eyes followed the stream of flames spiraling up from the open roof. Before her, the fire writhed and twisted like a living thing. Her eyes trailed the rising flames into the night sky, and then she saw it.

  Enormous and ominous, it formed from blazing tendrils. Some primitive part of Emma’s mind screamed out in terror and recognition. It had to be some trick of the wind, Emma’s rational mind insisted as she gazed at it with wide eyes. But it only grew more distinct and substantial as the smoke ebbed away.

  The serpentine head reared back, and a terrible roar filled the night as the dragon spread giant fiery wings. Biting back her instinctive fear, she forced her gaze to Rai.

  “Look out!” she screamed.

  ***

  Rai had focused on the interior of the ballroom. The fire had grown impossibly powerful, and he could no longer see any sign of Kendra at all. Hearing Emma calling out again from behind him, Rai turned to look when a ground-shaking roar filled the night from above. He looked up and directly into the blazing, yellow eyes of an enraged fiery dragon.

  "Aw, crap!" he managed to mutter before a gout of flame erupted from the yawning mouth to engulf him.

  ***

  Emma scrambled away from Rai. The blast of flames from the beast's open maw filled the surrounding area and her friend with wave after wave of fiery destruction. The heat was so extreme, Emma’s skin prickled painfully, and her hands blistered. Hot tears came unbidden to her eyes. She wanted to get to Rai, but she couldn't stay as near as she was any longer, much less move any closer. She could only hope Rai's abilities would somehow protect him enough to survive.

  ***

  She burned. She flowed. But more importantly, she was free. Finally, free, and unfettered. The manifested elemental spirit cast its baleful gaze upon the landscape before it. It’s dragon form tasted the air and sensed a maddening taint to everything that it could not understand. There was movement below, and in response, it lashed out. Unguided and unfocused, it sought only to consume and grow, and to purge all with its cleansing fire.

  ***

  Kendra floated in a place of blinding whiteness. She was confused. Thoughts and memories not her own flooded through her violently, threatening to overwhelm her. It was something alien and strange, but somehow, also a part of her. She tried to make out details of her surroundings, but she felt so exhausted. Her head throbbed terribly, and her whole body ached. She wanted nothing more than to stop the pain and rest. She remembered Jade Jones. She had a sword with her. There was something about that sword, wasn't there? Something that had made her hurt, and then the burning started.

  Kendra shook her head and tried to sort out the conflicting thoughts and images of men in armor wielding long spears and swords. Pursuing, always pursuing. Kendra had always hated movies with knights. She didn't even like looking at the paintings her father kept of them around the house. They gave her bad dreams. They were more than dreams, though, some part of her had always known that. It had been a small part until recently, until this year, when everything started to go strange. The nightmares had returned worse than ever. She had tried to ignore them, but the damned red bird would come, showing her things she didn't want to see. Things about Jordan. Things about her father. Dark and terrible things.

  A wave of pain flowed over her, and she felt even more exhausted. Where was she now? Asleep again? She furrowed her brow and tried to open her eyes against the blinding white.

  ***

  Emma pressed forward as soon as the fiery blast ceased. The dragon had turned away and began blindly tearing at the edges of the roof. The ground was steaming and laced with large cracks where Rai had been standing. Emma choked down a moment of panic, thinking that her friend had been completely incinerated. Then, she heard a faint cough off to the side.

  ***

  Rai raised his head and tried again to take a breath of air, with similar results. Spots filled his vision as he hacked and coughed but it only took a few seconds for his throat to clear. The smell of burned hair and denim almost overwhelmed him. His jacket was going to be a complete loss. Then, out of nowhere, Emma was beside him, dumping dirt in his hair.

  "Hey, what the heck, Em?!"

  "You're still on fire!" she exclaimed, vigorously patting down smoldering bits of his clothes.

  "Oh, yeah, I thought so," he muttered, shaking his head to clear it, loosening clumps of dirt all about.

  "Kendra made a dragon," Emma said simply. He marveled at how calmly she managed to say it.

  "Yeah, that threw me for a moment," Rai said thoughtfully. "I get what she was trying to warn us about now."

  Emma helped him to his feet, and they turned back toward the house. The back end of the mansion was a gutted ruin. Rai watched for several heartbeats as the beast tore and consumed more of the massive home. Then he saw, at the heart of the angry dragon, the outline of a feminine form. She looked so frail, and Rai somehow knew that she was growing weaker by the minute.

  "Kendra. She's still in there."

  "Inside the dragon?" Emma shook her head. "Like it ate her?"

  "I think it's entirely made out of fire, Em. It's Kendra’s power run out of control." He took another step forward, but Emma grabbed him by the arm.

  "What are you thinking?"

  "I'm going to stop it, Em. She's going to burn herself out if I don't." He swallowed and then put on a forced smile. "It's what heroes do, right?"

  "Don't be stupid, Rai!" Emma cried. "You're just going to feed that thing if you start blasting it with air."

  He paused at that and looked thoughtful. "You're right. Anything I threw at it would just stoke the flames. But we have to do something! It's not just Kendra. There might still be people alive."

  They stared at each other in the ruined yard, and then Emma nodded resolutely. "Rai, I have an idea!"

  A minute later, Rai stepped past where the ballroom doors had once stood and considered Emma's wild plan. He’d never tried anything this big before. You wanted to be a hero, man!

  Rai held up his hand, a sudden flurry of wind swept around him. The fire had engulfed most of the large house by this time. Jaw clenched tightly, he strained and stared intently at the enormous, fiery dragon. He focused past the blazing shell, seeking some sign of the girl encased within.

  "She’s so damn beautiful," Rai whispered to himself and then redoubled his efforts. For several seconds, nothing seemed to happen. Then, thick smoke and flaring embers began pouring down from above in a great rush. A terrible ache was stabbing at his temples, but Rai balled his fists and ignored it. His awareness had expanded to nearly the entire mansion, and by sheer force of will, he began gathering the smoke.

  ***

  A swirling wall of darkness formed around Rai until he was lost from sight. Emma
scrambled further from the searing and choking cloud until she was backed against the garden wall. The dragon went immediately on the offensive. For something made of fire, it sure behaves like a living creature, she thought. Its wings flared out, and it exhaled another blast of flame toward Rai. But this time, the inferno-like breath was almost entirely deflected to the side by the swiftly swirling column of ash. Then, Emma saw the pulsing light, like a heart, beating within the breast of the beast—the slender form of Kendra Radcliff.

  "There you are," Emma muttered, hoping Rai was going to be able to pull off their plan.

  ***

  The light burned Kendra’s eyes, but she stubbornly forced them to stay open. She couldn't feel the ground and reached out with her hands to steady herself, but there was nothing to hold onto. It was all heat and light around her and nothing more. She shivered with cold and could barely stay conscious. What had happened to her clothes? She was about to succumb to sleep again when she noticed the destruction beyond the flames.

  "My house!" she tried to scream, but only a choking whisper escaped her lips. Reality came back to her tired mind like a slap. The fire. It had gotten out of her control, and her mother and brother had been in the house. She gasped and strained to reign it in, to call it back, but she only felt weaker for the effort.

  ***

  Rai held his breath and tried not to panic as the dragon loomed over him. He had managed to deflect the worst of the heat so far, but one wrong move and his superhero name would be changed to “The Amazing Charcoal Man.” His face was numb, and something warm and dark was running freely from his nose. Deep down, Rai knew he was pushing himself too far, but he was too busy trying not to die to give it much thought at the moment.