“Fire!”
The deep tone could only belong to either Joe or Sean, but he would bet it was Joe. His brother and Jenna slept down the hall and Cole would have heard something from inside the house. Not that it mattered who sounded the alarm. Cole tossed back the covers and leaped from the bed, grabbing his jeans from the chair in the corner when he’d left them before going to sleep. Shoving one leg in, he hobbled around the bed, getting his other leg in as he went, and, with a —quick hop—tugged the jeans all the way up and fastened them.
He shook Hunter’s shoulder. “Wake up!”
Hunter rolled towards him, mumbling something Cole couldn’t understand. With another harder shake, Cole shouted, “Hunter!”
This time, Hunter leaped out of bed as if someone had lit a firecracker beneath the mattress. “Huh? What happened?”
The orange glow poured through the window and Cole pushed aside the curtain, but it wasn’t until he pressed the side of his head against the glass that he spotted flames shooting into the sky from somewhere behind the house. At least, he hoped it was outside the house. It was too close to say for certain from his angle. A stab of fear pierced his chest. Piper and Sophie’s room was at the very end of the hall.
He darted across the room and felt the door. Cool. The scent of smoke was less prominent here. Another good sign. “Hurry up! Get dressed. There’s a fire… ” He calculated what was in the direction of the fire. The work shed or the small boathouse. Right now it only had a few kayaks and canoes in it. They hadn’t pulled the boats from the water yet, but they would have to soon. Already, ice lined the shore some mornings.
Hunter threw on jeans and a sweatshirt. “Where?” At least the glow made it easy to find their clothes.
“I don’t—”
A door slammed down the hall and a second later, someone pounded on the door. “Uncle Cole! There’s a fire in the shed!”
Piper. Thank God. And he was pretty sure that Sophie owned the other set of footsteps that raced down the corridor. “Come on.” He grabbed a t-shirt from the floor and shoved his feet into his shoes—no time for socks.
With Hunter on his heels, Cole flung open the door and almost crashed into Sean as his brother ran down the hallway. Jenna stopped to let them out, and they all raced out of the house and around to the back.
The work shed was almost entirely engulfed, but what worried Cole was its proximity to the food storage building beside it. The cabinets in the kitchen were full, but everything else was out here except for the flour. Wary of rodents and dampness, they stored that in the pantry in the house. Almost everything they had harvested was in the shed.
It was too late to save the work shed, but Cole hoped they could save the food. “Everyone! Listen up! We need to form a bucket brigade!” He pointed to Hunter and Piper. “Piper, get the buckets from the house, and Hunter, get the buckets from the fish house, dump them and get to the edge of the lake.” He glanced around. Where was Elly, Jake and the kids? And Joe wasn’t in sight either. Hadn’t he heard Joe sound the initial alarm? Elly and Jake’s cabin was further down, the bedrooms on the sides opposite the shed. “Sophie, go alert Elly and Jake and the kids, then meet Hunter down at the lake.”
The girl took off like she was shot out of a cannon.
“Jenna, find all of the towels and take them to the lake and soak them.” Cole turned to Sean. “Do we have any shovels that weren’t in there?” He pointed at the fully engulfed shed. He prayed Sean had enough equipment out by the windmill to finish it. His brother had just announced at dinner that it was almost ready to go. Dammit. If it had been working now, they’d have had water pressure for the hoses to fight the fire.
Sean paused and looked around as if trying to remember where he’d last used one, then nodded. “The goat pen should have a couple.”
“Get them. We can shovel dirt on the flames. I’ll get the bucket line formed.” It would take a few minutes for him to get to the goat pen and back. Tree roots jutted through the sandy soil and running was out of the question in the dark.
Cole turned to head for the lake to help get the line formed, but paused when he noticed burning embers on top of the food storage shed. They needed that food. He had to save as much as he could while he had the chance. He dashed in, dodging floating embers and ash. Ignoring the tug of his half-healed shoulder, he scooped up bags of potatoes, throwing one over each shoulder and dashed out, dropped one sack and emptied the other on top of it. They could gather them again later. Right now, he needed the sack to gather more items. He made two more trips, stuffing the sack with sugar, precious oil, and canned goods. The cans were hot to the touch. On the fourth trip, he doubled over as a deep, racking cough hit him. The embers on the roof had ignited the roof and flames devoured the dry wood. He tried to swear but it ended in a cough. The heat felt like it was melting his skin even though the building wasn’t in flames yet. The wall closest to the work shed radiated heat. Did he have enough time to get another load?
“Cole!” Jake grabbed the sack from him, dumped the contents in the pile Cole had started and, ran into the shed before Cole could stop him.
Cole darted after him. With the two of them, maybe they could save enough to get through the winter. He grabbed a braid of onions hanging from the rafters and gave it a tug. He threw it on top of a basket of sweet potatoes. Jake had filled the sack, but threw it on top of another basket filled with carrots. They staggered out under their loads and Cole went to his knees as another bout of coughing hit him.
The bucket brigade worked as well as they could expect given the distance from the lake to the shed and their lack of people to form the line. Each had to carry the heavy bucket about twenty feet to the next person, get the empty bucket and carry it back to the person on the other side.
It took over an hour, and afterward, they turned to the main house, dousing the back of it with water while Jake and Hunter climbed on the roof to beat any smoldering embers with wet sacks.
Jake had found Joe unconscious behind the work shed. It looked like he’d managed to haul out some of the tools before collapsing on the edge of the clearing. Jenna examined him and said he would be okay, that he’d been mostly overcome by the heat, not the smoke, so that was a relief. The old guy might have saved all of their lives with his warning and getting at least some of their tools out.
Cole leaned on the shovel handle and stared at the blackened remains of the still smoldering food storage shed. The scent of burnt potatoes, sugar, and tomatoes mingled with the acrid stench of wet ash. His stomach growled even as he was repulsed at the ash scent.
Elly came up and handed him a cup of water. “At least you saved some of it.” She rubbed a circle between his shoulder blades. Any other time, he’d welcome the touch, but right now he was too tired and angry at himself for not saving more. He merely grunted a response and threw the shovel to the side before he stalked back to the house.
Now what?
“What are we going to do? We don’t have enough to get through the winter.” Sean slumped in his seat across the kitchen table from Cole, his face as dirty and soot streaked as Cole imagined his own was. What he wouldn’t give for a hot shower to ease the ache in his muscles, especially his shoulder.
Cole sipped from his cup of coffee. Already, they were down to a weak, pale brew that barely passed as coffee. Soon they’d have to find something else to drink until they could scavenge some more. “There’s still hunting. There should be a lot of fat deer out there who filled up on the corn in fields that were never harvested.”
Sean brightened at that. “Yeah, a few fat bucks would help—and it’ll be nice not to have to worry about all the red tape.”
“Yeah, I guess.” He rubbed his shoulder.
“You should take some ibuprofen, Cole.” Jenna collapsed on a chair next to Sean, resting her hand on his forearm. Sean covered it with his hand, his thumb sliding over it.
“I’m good, but thanks.” He straightened and tried to push the ache away from his
mind. “We need to save what we have for real injuries, not minor aches.”
Jenna shrugged. “We’ll run out eventually, you know.”
“Yeah, but we can worry about that later—we’ve got bigger problems, now.” He looked at the sun rising over the bay. Frost glittered on the grass down to the beach. A tiny red plastic bucket sat half-buried in the sand. It had been found in one of the houses and was one of the few toys they had. “Little Zoe was pretty scared out there—did Elly get her calmed down?”
Piper lay sprawled on the bench near the woodstove, the top of her head just visible from where Cole sat. Hunter, Jake, and Sophie were raking through the coals for anything useful, and Piper had offered to make cinnamon rolls. It seemed extravagant in light of their loss, but Cole couldn’t object. They all needed something to look forward to.
He glanced at the covered pans sitting on a table near the stove, wondering how soon they would be ready. His mouth watered at the thought of them. “Elly took her back to the cabin and said she was going to lie down with her for a while.”
It had only been a few weeks, but already, he was getting attached to the little girl. Everyone loved her and Lucas. The boy had been wary at first, especially of Cole, but now he followed Cole around like a puppy, his constant stream of chatter almost making up for his sister’s lack of speech.
Cole stood and started a couple of pots of water heating. They’d taken to always having some sitting on the back of the stove, but with everyone covered in soot, they’d need more. When it was warm, he waited until everyone had what they needed, heated some more, then washed up.
A few hours later, Cole returned to the kitchen after a nap, drawn by the irresistible aroma of cinnamon and bread. His mouth watered as Piper iced the rolls.
“Where in the world did you get frosting?” He hadn’t expected the rolls to have any, just happy for a sweet roll, maybe with a sticky caramel and pecans. They still had plenty of nuts stashed, and like the flour, had kept them in the pantry due to rodent issues.
Piper grinned. “I made it out of a little goat’s milk and goat’s butter. And sugar. I really would have liked to use powdered sugar, but we don’t have any.”
“I’m sure what you have will be delicious.”
Zoe and Lucas were already at the table, their eyes practically bulging from their heads when Piper set a plate with a huge cinnamon roll in front of each of them. Cole grinned when Zoe got up on her knees and bent forward to smell the treat and ending up with a dot of icing on the tip of her nose.
The pall cast by the fire lifted briefly as everyone ate. “These are outstanding, Piper.” Cole ate his last bite. He’d been told he missed a batch of cookies when he’d been injured, so this was the first real sweet he’d had in months.
Once everyone was done, Sophie took the kids with her to take care of the animals.
Cole took a deep breath, then turned to Hunter. “So, were you able to salvage anything?”
15
Hunter straightened in his seat and opened his mouth to answer, but when he looked around at the hopeful expressions, he slumped and just shook his head, picking at the soot embedded around his cuticles. He’d washed his hands twice already.
“You mean nothing was salvageable?”
Hunter looked at his dad and wished he had something positive to say. “You saved a lot of potatoes and carrots, but most of the jars of canned stuff shattered. The heat did it, I guess. Even if the food was edible, it’s covered in glass shards.”
Jenna sat beside him, her hands pressed against her forehead, elbows propped on the table. She looked so dejected that Hunter gave her shoulder a couple of awkward pats. “It’s okay, Aunt Jenna. We’ll think of something. I’ll go back to the mainland and search for more food. I don’t mind.”
“I’ll go with him,” Jake volunteered.
“And I’ll step up the fishing. We still have a few weeks or so before the bay starts freezing.”
“What about the flour?” Sean looked at his daughter, an eyebrow raised.
“We still have about twenty pounds, but that won’t go far with so many people.” Piper bit her lip. “I guess I can make smaller loaves and we can limit everyone to one piece a day.”
His dad stood. “Listen, this isn’t the end of the world.” He paused for a second and Hunter had to bite his tongue from interjecting, ‘yes, in fact, it may very well be the end of the world’, but he remained silent as his father continued, “I expected we’d have to ration at some point, so I’ve been considering steps to take before that happens. I thought that it would come in the late spring when we started running out of stored food but before the garden had time to produce. It looks like we’ll have to start now—but that might be a good thing.” He spread his hands as if trying to convince them, but Hunter glanced at everyone and so far, they didn’t seem to be buying his dad’s suggestion that this was a good thing.
His dad sighed and let his hands drop to his sides. “Better to go out now and forage than in the dead of winter. Like Hunter said, we can make another trip to the mainland, we can hunt and we can fish. Two hundred years ago, that’s all anyone around here could do to survive.” His father’s gaze traveled around the table, briefly resting on each person in turn. “We can do it, too.”
Hunter nodded and sat forward. “Yeah, we’ll be okay. I know how to hunt.”
Jake grinned. “Hell, yeah, man. And I can learn how to hunt. That’ll be awesome!”
Sean shrugged. “It could be risky. We’ve already had several bad encounters with people on the mainland.”
“At this point, our main risk is starvation, Sean. Do you have any other suggestions?” His father’s tone was patient and calm.
Squirming in his seat, Sean rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, I just don’t like the idea of going to the mainland beyond the horse barn… and speaking of horses, you mentioned before that if we needed food at some point, the horses were always there.”
Hunter noted the slight narrowing of his dad’s eyes. “You’re right, Sean. I did say that, but I think it’s way too soon to think about slaughtering any of our animals.”
“Well, we wouldn’t have to think about it if there hadn’t been a fire. How did it start, anyway?” Sean cast a look around the table, his eye landing on Jake. “Was someone playing around with matches?”
Everyone knew that Jake was the one to go to if the fire went out in the stove. He had a knack for getting it going again without using too many of their precious store of matches.
Jake’s eyes widened. “I didn’t do anything!”
Sean scowled, but didn’t comment.
“Listen, we’re not going to slaughter the horses anytime soon. We may need them. If anything, we should search for more chickens—especially a rooster or two so we can build a flock. More goats would be nice, too. Sheep, and even a cow or two would be great additions, although we’ll have to figure out how to care for one. But those are things we’ll have to think about next year. We need to focus on what we can do right now.” He paused and his gaze swept the room, lingering on Hunter a little longer than the rest. “We don’t have time to point fingers.”
“We still need to find some hay for the horses for the winter, too,” Sophie broke in. Immediately, she clammed up when everyone turned to her. Hunter took her hand under the table and gave it a squeeze. Sophie rarely spoke up in conversations like this and had told Hunter that his dad intimidated her.
His dad turned to Sophie. “You’re right. Do we need some for the goats?”
Sophie nodded, her cheeks turning pink at the praise and the attention.
“How about the chickens? I imagine we need feed for them too?” His dad faced Elly and Lucas.
Elly said, “That’s right. They were eating bugs and seeds, but when it snows, we might need some cracked corn. That should be easy to find on a farm. Supplemental feed to get through the winter is a must, or we’ll end up with a few very scrawny chickens to throw into a soup pot soon.”
His dad chuckled at that. “Okay, we don’t want scrawny chickens so we all have a lot of work to do.” He paced a few steps through the kitchen, paused to look outside for a moment, then returned to the table. “We’ll have to go out in teams of three or four. Every team is going to be armed, and before we do that, everyone is going to have to learn how to handle firearms. So, for the next few days, we’ll work on that. Sean, since you’re the best shot here, could you take on that responsibility?”
Sean squared his shoulders. “Absolutely. We can’t waste too much ammunition, but we have enough for everyone to learn the basics on how to shoot. I think Joe can put the finishing touches on the windmill without me.”
“That I can. We have the windmill ready—we just have to connect it to the pipes in the holding tank, and finish the pipeline to the houses—which are just about ready, thanks to your hard work, Cole.”
His dad shrugged, ignoring the compliment. “And Joe, I want you to remain here at all times—” He raised a hand when Joe started to protest “—I realize that you are probably the second best shot here, maybe even the first, but that’s why I want you here. We need a marksman here to protect the island. Just because we haven’t had any more issues since Trent, doesn’t mean we won’t. This whole bay will freeze over at some point and that means we lose the safety of isolation.” His dad moved behind Joe’s seat and dropped a hand on his shoulder. “You know this bay better than anyone, and you’re at home in this area. I’d like to take you to the mainland, but I need you here to keep everything we’ve worked for safe. Especially the little ones.”
Joe nodded. “Understood.”
“Thank you.”
Hunter rose. “I can use the bow to hunt. We picked up some extra arrows on the mainland so we can save some ammo that way.” Holding his dad’s gaze, he added, “I think teams should have a mix, so in case something happens… ” He couldn’t articulate why. He just knew it would be bad if all of the older people were killed and just as bad if all of the younger people were killed. It would be better for everyone if the teams had a mix, so in case there was a catastrophe, the others had a better chance of survival. “Like, maybe me, Elly, and Sean, then you could go with Jake and Sophie, and Piper. And change out so that one person is back here with Joe at all times too, to take care of the kids.” He nodded at Lucas, who was watching with wide eyes, and at Zoe, who played with a small beanbag dog that Hunter recognized as having been Piper’s. “We can all take turns trading out groups too, so we all will be used to working with anyone on the island.”
Sympatico Syndrome Trilogy Box Set Page 39