The Witness Series Bundle

by Rebecca Forster

"I got him," she hollered. Her eyes went to Josie who was starting for the third floor. "Josie! We've got to go."

  Josie looked behind her. The fire was spreading fast. The old wallpaper was licked with flames and the threadbare rug had caught cinders and was starting to burn. Andre shoved Nell ahead of him. She stumbled but kept her feet, holding the little boy close to her chest as she hurried down the stairs to the first floor. Outside, she put him on the ground and fell on her knees beside him. She pressed on his little chest; she put her mouth over his and tried not to look at the house that was half engulfed in flames.

  "I got it, Miss Nell." Suddenly, Stu was there. Without missing a beat, his hands replaced hers on the boy's chest. "By the shed. There's a pump-a ladder–”

  Before he could finish his direction, the shutters on the third floor window cracked and Nell saw someone clawing at the boards.

  ***

  Billy had been staring at the wall where the door of Duncan's house was for so long that it took a while for him to realize that he could actually see the door. It took him another minute to realize that the outside was bright. For the craziest second, Billy thought the sun was shining. He scrambled off the bed and looked outside and that's when he saw two things: the main house was burning like an inferno and Duncan Thoth was headed his way.

  CHAPTER 34

  There is nothing to think about except surviving, and you can't really think much about that. You either do it, or you don't.

  "Teresa, help me. Help me."

  Hannah pulled the lace curtains off the rods. One was already burning and Hannah stomped on it, blessing the heavy knitted socks that Teresa had made. She tossed that panel away and went for the next one but Teresa was already there. She pulled and pulled. It took two of them to get the last one off. Teresa threw it in the corner of the room. Hannah looked up. It sounded like rain on the roof and she knew the fire had gotten into the attic.

  "Hurry. Teresa, Hurry! Come help me!"

  But Teresa didn't go to the window to help Hannah. Instead, she ran to the bed, grabbed the quilt, threw it over Pea who knelt as she always knelt, unaware and unconcerned. Hannah attacked the shutters again while Teresa went for the water pitcher on the dresser. Hannah dropped her whole weight onto the metal bar while behind her Teresa doused her daughter with water. It would do nothing to save the woman so Hannah pulled harder against the wood.

  From outside and the floor below she could hear voices calling out. One board broke in half and Hannah fell back when it snapped. Above her, a piece of the ceiling fell in. Teresa screamed. Hannah rushed to it and kicked it out of the way. She ran back to the window and through the grimy pane she caught sight of Josie rushing toward the house only to be driven back by the flames.

  "Josie!" Hannah cried.

  She tried to pull out the metal rod, but it was stuck on the splintered wood. With nothing left to loose, Hannah drew back her fist and put it through the small square of exposed glass. It shattered. She didn't even feel the pain. She tried to push the shards out with her fingers.

  "Josie! Josie!" She screamed but didn't wait to see if Josie saw her. Instead, Hannah pulled on the metal bar, putting all her weight on it. She heard the wood crack again. She felt it splinter. She clawed at it with her hands and called Josie's name over and over and over again until her voice was hoarse with smoke and terror.

  Hannah threw herself up against the shutter. She put her face against the part of the window she had been able to break. The hell if she was going to die without Josie Bates looking her in the eye just one more time.

  ***

  Billy crouched by the door, but Duncan didn't come through it. Billy ripped it open in time to see Duncan running toward the store. With one last look at the burning house, one moment of mourning for Hannah who surely must already be dead, Billy Zuni ran after Duncan Thoth.

  When he reached the store, he slowed down and held the knife high and close. Duncan's footprints veered off the path and stopped at the low rock wall. Billy followed them, pushed through the bushes, saw a thin line of light through a crack in the back door, opened it, and went inside. Boxes were piled in the middle of it. Behind those Billy could see another room. Light spilled out of the doorway and he could hear a hiss and a crackle.

  Billy Zuni stepped around the boxes. His hand was beginning to sweat and the knife felt heavy. He pushed the door open wide. Duncan Thoth looked up. He looked like he was seeing a ghost. Billy Zuni saw something even worse than that. He saw the headphones Duncan was wearing. He saw the radio. Then he looked at Duncan and his hand tightened around his very sharp knife.

  ***

  Hannah worked harder and faster. Teresa had taken a pillow and was trying to beat out the patches of flame on the rug, but it was a loosing battle. Soon the rug would catch in earnest. Pea had to move or she would burn to death.

  "Get her over here. Further back," Hannah screamed as she finally yanked the metal rod out of the wood and smashed it against the window, breaking out even more. She gulped in the raw fresh air but that same air fueled the fire and the smoke thickened. Hannah got low and called: "Drag her if you have to. Teresa. Her hair. Drag her."

  Hannah shot up again and put her face out the window, not caring that the shards of glass cut her cheeks and sliced through her fingers.

  "Josie!" she screamed, but the name was lost in a fit of coughing.

  Hannah took the rod to the planks again and this time the bottom half broke off. She punched at the glass. Putting her face up to the broken window, she gulped the air. The smoke stung her eyes, but through it all she saw a miracle. Josie was looking at her, calling her name, rushing toward the fire. That was all Hannah needed. If Josie was willing to die trying to save Hannah, then dying trying to save herself was the least Hannah could do. Staggering to her feet, she grasped the metal bar and attacked the window with all that she had left.

  ***

  Nell moved as close to the burning house as she could get and tossed a pitiful bucket of water on the flames before running back to the pump by the shed. She was on her third run when Andre stumbled out the front door, his beautiful face black with soot and singed by fire. Nell dropped her bucket, ran to him, and took him around the waist. They only got a few feet before he collapsed in the snow and Nell fell with him.

  "Lay back," she said. "There's nothing you can do now."

  "They're still up there. Still alive," Andre insisted as he tried to roll onto his side. Nell pushed him back.

  "Stop. Stop. Archer and Josie have a ladder. Look!"

  Andre put his hand up to guard his face from the heat as he looked where she was pointing. Archer had an aluminum extension ladder and was trying to figure out where to put it. Finally, he made a choice. Josie rushed to hold it and Archer started to climb. On the ground, Nell and Andre watched the girl with the blond hair reach out of the window as if she believed Archer would get to her in time.

  ***

  "You have a radio." Billy's voice was flat and cold. "A god damn radio."

  Slowly, Duncan took off the headphones and set them aside.

  "I only listen."

  "You could have called for help. You could have called when you found us," Billy said.

  Duncan stood up slowly, eyeing the knife. The room was so small it was barely big enough for the both of them.

  "No. I couldn't. I speak only to Pea who talks to God–”

  "Cut the crap, Duncan. You are a worthless piece of–” Billy's voice caught. The terror of the last weeks fell in on him, the loss of Hannah was like a sword in his side. His shoulders fell, the hand holding the knife dropped and his eyes filled with tears. "You murdered Hannah, you tried to murder me, and you still talk about God?"

  Duncan reached for his notebook and Bible.

  "It is here. I did what I was told to do. See? There? All the prophesies. See the notes? Drive out your enemy it says. Destroy him. That's what it says. You were my enemy."

  "No, dude, I was n
ever your enemy. None of us were."

  "Okay. Okay, you're right." Duncan moved again. He had almost managed to turn Billy Zuni full circle. He was close to the door. In another second he would have the advantage. He would also have a gun. He always thought he would have to use it against an animal. As he looked at Billy Zuni, he decided maybe that was exactly what he was doing.

  "You weren't my enemy, Billy, but you weren't my friend."

  "You're right. I wasn't your friend. But you're wrong about the other."

  "What other?" Duncan asked.

  "The part about being your enemy. I am now. I am your enemy now, dude."

  With that, Duncan bolted and Billy Zuni lunged. It was a battle of the spirits and had Oki been there he would have been hard pressed to decide who would win the spirit war: Duncan who fought for his life or Billy Zuni who fought to avenge his love.

  ***

  Hannah watched Archer climb the ladder. The heat was agonizing, the smoke searing her lungs, unbearable. Still she kept her eyes on Archer. The ladder was old and Archer was a big man. It didn't go as far as the third floor window and the fire on the roof was advancing fast. Hannah dropped to the floor, fumbling with the thick hemp and eventually tied it around the legs of the dresser. She yanked it tight, pulled herself up to the window and threw the rope onto the roof. Behind her she heard the crash of the ceiling falling in the hallway. Hannah ducked instinctively. Behind her, Teresa cowered with Pea. Hannah scrambled up again. She threw herself at the window and saw Archer had missed the rope. She pulled it back and tried again. Archer lunged for it. The ladder wobbled but he had it. He held on with both hands and Hannah rushed to Teresa.

  "Come on. Come on. He caught it."

  Teresa shook her head, her arm tightened around Pea. The doorway was now blocked by flame; fire was skittering over the ceiling. Hannah threw her arms around Teresa and tried to raise her. Tears poured down Hannah's cheeks.

  "You go first."

  "I'm not going," Teresa said.

  "You'll die," Hannah screamed.

  "I died a long time ago."

  "What about her?" Hannah screamed.

  "She never lived."

  Teresa turned her head and tightened her hold on her daughter. Hannah stood up. The heat was intense, the light blinding, and there was no time left. Teresa had made her choice; Hannah had to make hers.

  "I'm going," she sobbed. "I am. I'm going, Teresa."

  The older woman nodded and in that split second, the marigold quilt slipped and Hannah found herself looking into a face more beautiful than any she had ever seen. Pea's skin was porcelain, her eyes were black and bright and they were looking straight at her mother without seeing her.

  Hannah dashed for the window, took hold of the rope and climbed over the broken glass. The dresser slid across the room as she put her weight on the rope. It crashed against the wall at the window but it held. The last thing Hannah heard was a trill. God was close to Pea. When Archer grabbed her leg, Hannah knew God was close to her, too.

  CHAPTER 35

  I am looking at this girl in the mirror and I remember her. I remember me.

  Tiny gold earrings stuttering around my ears, the small diamond stud in my nose, hair that is chin length, black save for the golden tips. Josie asked if I was going to cut the dyed ends now that it's grown out, but I'm not ready. The gold reminds me of so many things, but mostly it reminds me of Billy. I wonder what he would say now. I wonder whether I look like a black chick or a girl from India. I think I look like neither. I think I look like Hannah.

  I lean forward and draw a cat eye with black eyeliner and green shadow. I pluck at the wavy curls that cascade across my brow and down my cheeks. I twirl them into corkscrews and still I am dissatisfied. Then I realize why I'm not happy with my hair. It's not the length or the gold tips, it is that I'm trying to use it to hide the crescent scar that starts high on my brow and ends at the edge of my eye. I take my hair and pull it back, fasten it with a comb made of rhinestones and shells, and let it show. It is the ugliest scar ever, a stair step of raised places where Teresa's unschooled hand stitched me up, and yet I don't think it makes me look ugly. It is simply a part of me like the scars on my arms and in my heart. Those scars are reminders of how I survived my mother; this one is my homage to Teresa and Pea and Melody. I am done with hiding and there is more to life than worrying about what I look like. I learned all that from living with people who so longed to be made whole that they put their faith in a man who was fractured himself. I'm not sure what I think about God, but I learned a little. I learned that you don't have to do religion to have faith. I think faith is a thing you choose to have and you can have it in whoever or whatever you want. If you believe it, it is so. Like believing that Archer could get hold of me, that Josie was holding the ladder, and that I would survive. That was my faith. Someday I will ask Archer if his faith was in God that night. I have a feeling he'll say it was in the lady holding the ladder. Then I will have to ask her if God was behind her. I think I will be asking questions about that night and about God for a long time.

  I stand up to put my clothes on, but I see the report Josie brought me lying on the bed next to my dress. I push it aside and pick up my dress. Then I put down the dress, sit on the bed and pick up the report. I've read it three times now, but I want to read it again.

  Peter has survived, but everyone else is gone. Most of them were poisoned by Duncan. Glenn burned up. They say he stood in the flame. I am glad I didn't see that. Pea and Teresa died of smoke inhalation. I will always wonder if Pea was Within as death came for her. In my dreams she spoke to Teresa. She told Teresa that she loved her and she spoke the word mother. That is my dream, and I'm sticking to it.

  Duncan is dead. Stabbed to death. Only his blood was at the scene, but there were fibers under his nails and on the floor of the storage room. Yellow fibers determined to be fleece and consistent with the jacket I bought Billy at a truck stop. No hair was collected except for Duncan's. No bodily fluids except for Duncan's. Investigators could not be definitive about the manner of death. They couldn't tell if the wounds were a result of someone killing him deliberately or made by someone fighting Duncan in self-defense. Billy's name, of course, was brought up but there was a snag in the theory that he had killed Duncan. The clothes Billy had been wearing when he left the compound with Duncan were found in the saddlebag of the snowmobile. If Billy had been left in the wilderness without clothes, he was surely dead. Of course, the authorities had been sure that we were dead before, so I kind of found it interesting they went to that place again.

  There was another theory. They wanted to speak to a recluse named Stu who had disappeared during the course of events. They would like to know if he had a fleece jacket or if there was someone out in the wilds of Alaska who had possibly found the jacket Billy Zuni was wearing since it wasn't in the saddlebag with the other clothes.

  It was, they all agreed, a mystery. Except to me but no one asked me about Duncan's death so I didn't volunteer anything. I know Billy killed Duncan. When I was clinging to that rope, shimmying down a melting roof, crying to Archer, I turned my head. I saw the flash of yellow disappearing into the forest. What I saw wasn't moonlight. It wasn't fire. It was Billy Zuni walking to where he would be safe and hopefully happy. He was walking away in the yellow jacket that was as precious to him as the Golden Fleece and would always remind him of me.

  I knew he had come back for me, and I knew that he could see the inferno from the store, and I knew the way Billy thought. If the house was engulfed in flames that meant I was gone. If he didn't think that, he never would have left. I also know that whatever happened in that store was righteous. Maybe not by the law's standards but certainly by Duncan's own. I didn't have Pea to guide me, but I knew what Duncan's thing was. I looked up the bible verse about an eye for an eye.

  Matthew 5:38

  You have heard that it was said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth

 
; I believe that was what happened. Duncan had tried to do something awful to Billy, Duncan had done something awful to me, and Billy had come back and done something awful to him. But then I read the rest.

  Mathew 5:39

  But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.…

  The old Billy would have turned his cheek; the Billy who came out of the truck with me, who saw me almost die from poison, who believed me dead in a fire, that Billy couldn't turn the other cheek. He did what he had to. Since I'm done with what happened in that house, I set the report aside, pick up my dress, and put it on.

  I pull up the zipper and as I look in the mirror to make sure everything looks right, I realize that we came full circle. Gjergy Isai came to kill Billy because someone he loved had been killed at the hands of Billy's grandfather. Billy had taken a life for my life. I guess he was more Albanian than even he knew. Blood feud was his to embrace and all the innate goodness that was in him could not resist the burn of vengeance. And that brings me to another thing I heard from the Bible. Vengeance is mine sayeth the lord. It's a bummer people keep forgetting that. If only the lord had done his thing, Billy and I would never have had to run from this place we love, his sister would be alive. 'If only' are huge words, but they don't belong in my head today.

  I smooth my dress. It looks good. I am home. I am safe and today I am happy. I open the door of my bedroom and there are Archer and Josie waiting for me. Archer is smiling. I want to tell him to stop. I don't recognize him when he does that. Then I can't help it. I smile, too.

  "Ready?" Josie asks.

  I nod. I am ready. Archer takes Josie's hand and they go out the door while I take the flowers off the hall table and tie them to Max's old pink leash. I put my cheek against his head and feel his tongue flick out to lick my cheek.

  "Go for a walk?" I whisper and he gets to his feet. He is so old. It is so hard for him to stand, but he does it for all of us. I think he is smiling, too.