by Lincoln Law
“Oh, Adabelle,” he whispered, stepping through the fire, cradling her in his arms. He felt his legs burning, heat blistering his skin, eating away the fabric of his clothes. It was hard to ignore heat like that, but if he was to survive this, he would have to. She was light, but her body sagged within his grasp. “Charlotte,” he said, turning to the girl. “I need you to be very brave,” he said. “Can you do that?”
She looked uncertain, horrified, but she nodded.
“Good girl,” he said. “Now I need you to hold onto my shirt and not let go. We’re going to run, and we have to run as quickly as we can, okay. Can you do that?”
Again, she nodded. “I’m scared,” she said quietly, her voice barely audible over the roaring of the flames.
“I know, so am I,” he said. “We have to be brave, though.”
She dipped her head, eyes determined.
“Good girl.” He turned to the door way, letting her hold onto the bottom of his shirt. “Ready?”
“Yes,” she said, sounding more certain than she had before.
“Let’s go. One, two, three,” and then they ran. He felt the weight of Charlotte holding onto his shirt, and kept his mind focused there, hoping she would not let go. For someone so small, she ran swiftly. Like a hare, he supposed, what she lacked in size she made up for in agility.
As they travelled through the halls of the dormitories, towards the nearest exit, they found not a single section of the University untouched by the fire. The Nhyxes, that had gone blistering past Rhene like a shadowy comet, had done the job Therron had required of them. They had spread chaos, as widely as they could manage. And now the place burned.
Someone had smashed a nearby window, and Rhene took the opportunity to go through it. They stepped out of the madness of the blaze into the cool night air. A gentle breeze blew down the street, but Rhene kept running. More and more people continued to pour out from the University, and Rhene had to make room on the cramped street.
“Where are we going?” asked Charlotte.
“I don’t know,” Rhene replied. “Somewhere safe. That’s all we need.”
They followed the crowd, gradually slowing as they no longer had to run. Exhaustion quickly caught up with Rhene, causing him to puff as he walked. He struggled to catch his breath, the air he drew in somehow not enough. Charlotte was coughing as she followed, and he quickly realised she would need to see a doctor.
His own lungs burned with the weight of the smoke, too, but he did his best to ignore it.
Glancing down at Adabelle, her eyes seemed to occasionally open, staring up at him. She was dazed, sweating, her nightgown singed in places.
They soon found where people were gathering. A nearby park was at a safe enough distance from the University to avoid any danger that could come from foundation collapses, and had enough space to hold the hundreds of people as well.
As Rhene and Charlotte arrived, they found people on the ground crying and coughing. Some people’s skin was blistered to a crimson red, while others seemed to have lost entire sections of skin from the flames. A person vomited in one corner of the park, while another screamed loudly for what Rhene assumed was a family member. In the chaos, people from the nearby houses had emerged, some carrying jugs of water, others carrying blankets, others bandages.
“How are you feeling, Charlotte?” asked Rhene.
“I’ll be all right,” Charlotte said, gripping her chest, wheezing all the while.
“We’ll see a doctor once they arrive. Let the people who need it more first though. I need to sit.”
He dropped right there, not meaning to let Adabelle hit the ground as hard as he did. He apologised, though she was surely too confused to hear him. Then, with a deep breath, he collapsed, darkness consuming his thoughts.
“Rhene!” cried Charlotte.
He felt a pair of arms close around him, and then he felt nothing.
Chapter Seventeen
Better This Way
Adabelle awoke shivering.
The scent of antiseptic, the sound of quiet chatter, the light of a golden morning sun. She thought for a time she had slept in a park—though why, she did not know—so she was confused for a moment. Her leg ached badly, stinging with something that felt…hot.
City hall had high ceilings, tall windows, and cold, wooden floors. Their beds were only simple, their blankets meagre, but sleeping here was a far suitable alternative to the ashes that had once been the University. Beside her, Charlotte slept silently.
She didn’t want to sleep. Now was not the time for rest. Somehow, Count Therron had lashed out from within the dream, and so the evidence continued to spread. She was the suspect in a murder case, and now she would surely be the key suspect in an arson inquiry. Investigation would reveal the fire had started in her room, that the Nhyxes had travelled from there. Her room had suffered the most damage, and her window had exploded when the Nhyx had burst from it. The evidence continued to pile; her situation grew more hopeless.
She shivered with the memory. The stench of fire, the choking smoke, the burning Nhyxes, running about like shadows aflame.
And then she remembered a strong pair of arms carrying her. She had thought it was the fire brigade, but it hadn’t been. There had been no uniform, no axe. Just a beautiful face, shimmering with sweat and ash as he pushed on through the flames.
Rhene, she thought. Rhene had saved her. Her mind paused in the memory. He’d been carrying her, and leading Charlotte along close behind through the ensuing chaos. He heard her sobs, heard her cries for help, but she also heard Rhene’s comforting voice guiding her sister. Behind that voice were the roaring flames and the smashing glass and the wretched screech of the beasts.
And then there was nothing else to the memory. Only darkness and heat.
I’m alive, she thought. I’m alive because of Rhene.
She sat up on the cot, finding Rhene asleep to her right and Charlotte sleeping to her left. People around them moved and spoke, but they didn’t stir. Occasionally, her sister coughed. It sounded ragged and smoky. The doctors present would have already tended to that.
Rhene on the other had had burns up his arm, his face shimmering red in the daylight. They didn’t look too serious, but he wouldn’t emerge entirely unscathed.
I’ve done this, she thought, a sickening feeling appearing in the pit of her stomach. She got up from the cot to walk, feeling strong enough to move.
She winced as she stepped down. Her leg had been burnt in the escape. Still only minor, but it would leave a scar. From her cot, she wandered about the room, looking about at the people affected. Some of them appeared quite healthy, and those people helped the doctors go about their rounds. Other were shaken, but had others to comfort them. There were a few, though—and thankfully only a few—who appeared in a horrid condition. Entire limbs burnt black, sections of hair sizzled off, leaving only blistered, raw skin. Some of them who had unfortunately been entirely consumed by flames, had red, moist skin, while others appeared black and leathery. Already doctors had set up a make-shift surgery so limbs could be removed if necessary to avoid infection and gangrene. It looked like a warzone, and yet Adabelle knew it had only been six Sturding Nhyxes. Nightmares, set aflame and then unleashed into the halls of the University.
And where they had gone, she did not know.
She heard doctors and nurses talking amongst themselves as she wandered about. They spoke about the severity of the burns in ‘degrees’, and though she knew not what each degree mean, she knew the higher it went the worse it was. They spoke of a young man with a third degree burn on his arm. It would have to be removed. They said a young woman had second degree burns, which were bad, and that she was in quite a bit of pain and would need some form of opiate for that.
She stopped herself where she stood, as the sights became more and more grisly. There, in a partitioned off section, she saw bodies, with blankets pulled up over their faces. These were the dead; these were the price of Adabell
e’s own inability to fight her father.
“She’s gone,” whispered a nurse somewhere behind her. Adabelle turned, slightly numb, unsure how she was meant to feel. The nurse pulled a blanket up over a red, ruined face of a woman. A woman, Adabelle realised, she recognised.
“Mrs. Abeth?” Adabelle whispered. She sounded so distant when she spoke. Everything sounded distant. Yet there she was, a silhouette pushing against the white of the sheet now covering her face.
The nurse turned. “I am very sorry,” the nurse said. “The doctor did all he could, but the burns were too severe. We could not save her.” She paused, glancing down for a moment, before placing a soft hand on Adabelle’s shoulder. “She did not feel any pain, in the end, if that makes things any easier.”
She then nodded, attempted a weak, comforting smile towards Adabelle, and was gone.
“Mrs. Abeth,” she whispered again, somewhat louder.
But Mrs. Abeth didn’t respond. She wouldn’t respond. Ever again.
What have I done? she thought, taking a few steps forward so she was out of the walkway.
There was only her and Mrs. Abeth for a time, and in that moment she found herself praying. She didn’t know why—she wasn’t particularly religious at all. The scriptures were usually lost on her. But there she was, praying. Praying that Mrs. Abeth found her peace in death, that Charlotte would awake safely, and that Rhene would heal without trouble. She prayed for them, and for everyone in the room. She wondered for a time who was listening. Whether anyone sat on the other end of the prayer, taking notes and names, or whether her words, however sincere, fell on deaf ears.
She wiped her tears away before she whispered a gentle goodbye to Mrs. Abeth. She left the injured where they lay and walked quietly, unseen, to where she had been resting. Charlotte and Rhene had still not woken.
Good, she thought. Until her father was gone, it was not safe for her to be around those she loved. Until he was dealt with, and her own mind free to Dream, there would be no safe haven. The University was gone; she had no home now, anyway.
She knelt down beside her sister, looking down upon her peaceful sleeping face.
“Be strong, Charlotte,” she whispered. “You’ll be safe.” And then she kissed her on the cheek.
Rhene was next. She sat on the edge of the cot and he did not stir. She assumed they had given him some form of painkiller to ease his rest.
“Thank you for saving me,” she whispered. “And for saving Charlotte. I’ll miss you.”
She leant down and kissed him on the cheek too. He stirred for a moment, muttering something, before returning to his soundless sleep.
I’m sorry, she thought. It’s just better this way.
She rose from the cot, looking about quickly to insure no one was watching. Then, with a quiet step, and ghostly movements, she left City Hall.
I can’t return until it’s safe. It’s time to go into hiding.
“I love you,” Rhene whispered, before he’d realised what he had said. He felt sick and sore and tired, but the soft wet touch of Adabelle’s kiss remained on his cheek.
He had a moment, where he felt like getting out of the bed. But he was far too tired, his mind far too blurry to contemplate movement at all. He calmed himself once more and drifted into painless and dark sleep.
PART THREE
The Distance of a Mind
Chapter Eighteen
A New Woman
Adabelle took a furtive step across the street, glancing up and down the road before she crossed. Now was the time when she could make the most movement freely. Now, before the police began their search for her, before they would hunt her down as the main suspect; before they locked her up away from her sister.
I can still watch her from afar, she thought, as she glanced up and down the street, keeping an eye out for the police’s uniform. So long as I am free out here, I can watch her closely.
Of very few things Adabelle was certain, especially now, but she knew for the time she had to avoid the Halls of the Oen’Aerei. She had to keep a distance from there, else risk being seen there by Lady Morphier or one of her people. She was to be a wanted woman; she had to keep to the shadows.
She paused on the roadside, stopping to take a look at the University building. The once brilliant square building on the corner of the street was now a blackened mess. The stone bricks were tarnished with ash, windows blasted out from the heat, the dead husk still billowing with smoke. The steps upon which her mother had left here were dusted with ash, the front doors broken from their hinges. That place, that once sacred spot, was now a ruin. As if Therron could take any more from her. She wiped aside a tear and raced up the street, gaining some distance between her and the shelter.
Adabelle ran towards the Odilla Bank, a tall sandstone building, with mighty pillars and friezes depicting ancient gods doing battle. One of the oldest buildings in the city, the bank building was two floors of stone and glass, ornately decorated with images of brilliance and grandeur.
When she entered through the huge open doors, she was greeted with the rabble of people discussing their funds. There were tellers sitting behind glass walls, checking ledgers, and reams upon reams of paper. Adabelle approached the nearest teller, who looked up from her desk as she approached.
“Hello, my name is Adabelle Blaise,” she said, a little quietly so as to avoid being heard. “I have lost my bank book. I was wondering if I’d be able to draw out some funds?”
“Of course,” the teller said. “Do you have some form of identification on you?”
“None, sadly,” she said. “I was in that fire at the university last night. I needed to get some money out to look after my sister, and I lost most everything.”
“Well in that case, I’ll go get the ledger. If you can provide me with some details, we should be fine.”
The woman left to collect the ledger, returning with a tome marked in gold on the spine, “BLA-BUL,” and began searching at the start of the ledger.
“Your name?”
“Adabelle Blaise.”
“Parent names?”
“Nynette Blaise and Therron Blaise.”
She hardly considered him a father now, except on paper.
The questions continued, piling one on another, until she said, “Those are all fine. Now,” she turned the page,” I’ll just check the current balance.” Her finger ran down the page. She paused, turning the page, looking somewhat concerned.
“I’m sorry, Adabelle, it appears there are no funds in that account. It was complete emptied this morning by…”she ran her finger across the page. “Your father Therron. He emptied it not an hour ago.”
Adabelle’s heart sunk deep into the pit of her stomach.
“But how is that possible. He’s dead. He’s been dead for years.”
The teller examined the book, checking a short list at the top. “Names are kept on accounts; they are permanently attached. On this account are Mr. Therron Blaise, Mrs. Nynette Blaise, Miss Adabelle Blaise and Miss Charlotte Blaise. That is your family, yes?”
Names on accounts even after death, Adabelle though, confused. That seems like an awfully odd flaw.
“Yes,” Adabelle said sharply. “What kind of security do you keep in order to insure transactions are done correctly?”
“Well we have signature samples, we check identification, papers, letters, handwriting. From the looks of things, Therron was checked with signature samples, paperwork, identification. He hasn’t dealt with this account for at least fifteen years…no…eighteen! In cases like that we require that form of identification.” She pulled out a file draw on the opposite wall, taking out a small card. “Here’s the signature.”
Sure enough, there was the name, Therron Blaise. How had he managed that?
“Does it say who dealt with him?”
“Yes, of course. I’ll go and ask.”
“Can you please just find out what he looked like?” Adabelle said. If there was an agent of some kind o
n her trail, she needed to know what to look out for.
“I’ll be back shortly.”
Adabelle’s mind reeled as she stood there, shocked. She wondered how he could have managed such a brave feat. It was dangerous, she realised, to even be here now. The police…detective Olin would surely begin his search soon for her. Once they knew she hadn’t just gone out for a short walk.
The teller returned. “He was a tall man. Thin, bald, pale skin, green eyes. Wore a suit.”
Well that’s not father at all.
“And you’re certain the account has been emptied?” she asked.
“Absolutely. The verifying signature here states that it has been emptied.”
“But it hasn’t been closed?”
“No, not closed. Just emptied. In order to close it he would need the verifying signatures of all account holder names.”
“Very well,” Adabelle said, containing her anger. She wanted to scream at the woman, at the bank itself for performing such a foolish action. She wanted to enter the Dream, chase her father down and kill him where he stood. But she couldn’t; those kinds of actions would go nowhere. She had to be a different kind of strong today. She had to be quietly strong, and stand tall where Therron wanted her to waver and break, like a tree in a storm. “Thank you,” she said, containing her anger boiling deep below. She left.
Stepping out onto the street, she glanced towards the setting sun. Night time would come shortly, and she still had nowhere to sleep. Quickly considering her options, she found a handful of coins in her pocket and bought herself a blanket for the night from one stall, and a loaf of bread from a bakery. The bread was dry, but a welcome addition to her stomach, and the blanket scratchy and thin, but it was all she could afford. She had a handful of coins left in her pocket for later on, when she would require more food.
Night fell and the street lamps illuminated themselves, basking the rues and avenues in a golden, electric glow. Within one of the many thin alleyways, she found a shadowed spot between some bins and settled down upon the hard, uneven surface to sleep. It wouldn’t be an easy night, but here, in the shadows, she might find some modicum of safety.