Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 151
151
The flames had grown too high to even think about climbing over the top (not unless she wanted to char the meat right off her bones), so she threw herself down onto her stomach and pressed her cheek flat against the ground.
Thank the gods the tree wasn't completely flush. A number of its own broken branches (as well as a couple of smashed beds) were propping it up a few palms off the ground. There was one spot in particular, off to the right, where the trunk made a bit of a bend. It would be a tight fit, but she didn't have any other choice.
Bethany sucked in her stomach and began to crawl underneath the trunk like some small, burrowing animal, curling her fingers into hooks and pulling herself along that way, keeping her head low. She felt long, slender claws of wood scraping across her back, snagging at her dress as if trying to pin her down. Somewhere above her, she could hear the loud crackling of the flames eating away at their meal - a million tiny sets of teeth. Taking short, quick breaths, she powered on through, not stopping until the trunk scraped painfully over the base of her tail. But no sooner had she done that than a thick branch loomed out of the haze of smoke. This one was too low to crawl under, so she had no choice but to grit her teeth and clamber over it, blistering her hands and knees on a red hot crust of burning coals. More branches whipped her face as she forced her way through, slithering from gap to gap like a snake. She tore off handfuls of smouldering leaves and twigs, her lungs screaming.
She risked a quick breath through her cupped hands, but inhaled more smoke than air. She doubled over, coughing against her bleeding palms. Her vision doubled, and the flames seemed to blur and distort in her eyes, breaking apart and reforming again as orange blades of light.
Have to get through, she thought feverishly. Have to... have to...
A flame split off from its brothers like a petal breaking free from a rose, and beyond that dying flame, through the spider web of blazing branches, she saw him. Rufio. He was...
Oh my dear, sweet gods...
He was pierced by broken branches from head to toe, sticking out of his body in jagged profusion, more than she could count. The sheets were drenched in blood. He reached for her, his broken arm impaled in at least a dozen places. Twigs snapped and crackled as he moved. He opened his mouth, but couldn't speak. One of the branches had pierced his cheek, and his mouth was filling up with blood and smoke. She could see him burning from the inside out, blood red light spilling through glassy, dead eyes. Demonic tongues of flame licked at his face, scorching his fur, making it blacken and curl. Blisters stood out on his bare skin; hideous, fleshy growths that exploded with hideous popping noises, leaving nothing but sunken, red craters behind, filling with boiling blood.
Rufio was already dead. He had to be dead. But he was still reaching for her, reaching for her with broken hands. He was trying to speak, pushing his tongue against the branch in his mouth, but even though no sound came out, she understood him just the same. He was begging for help, pleading for her to come and save him, to do her job, but she couldn't! He was screaming in silent agony and there was nothing she could do! It was just like the horror she had seen inside this tent a million lifetimes ago, but with smoking branches instead of arrows, and fire instead of blood! She -
The petal of fire disappeared into the ether, and Rufio was not there. It was just a burning strip of canvass, writhing in the updraft. An illusion born within the fleeting lifetime of a single, dying flame.
No, not an illusion, a warning_. Rufio is in there. Hezzi is in there. Sarah, Mateo, the twins, everyone!_
She held her breath and kept going, digging her way down to the ground, where the smoke wasn't as thick.
Rufie... Oh by the gods, Rufie... Please...
Flames were raining down all around her. Glowing chunks of bark, burning twigs, scorched leaves floating by like black butterflies. They landed on her back, on her arms, her legs, biting at her flesh.
Please...
There was a bed just a few strides ahead. She could just barely make out the whiteness of the sheets through the smoke. A great black bough had landed right on top of it, bowing the frame considerably, but if she could just reach it, maybe she could crawl underneath and get to the other side.
She grabbed hold of the sheets, intending to pull herself along the ground like a snail, and that's when the face dropped down right in front of her. A hideous, snarling face with giant yellow teeth, dripping blood, staring back at her with crimson, bloodshot eyes.
Bethany clapped a hand to her mouth to stifle a scream, but what escaped her instead was a soft moan.
This face did not belong to some monster, and neither was it a hallucination. She recognised this Wolfess. Her name was Lota, and...
I'm so sorry, Betani-Kai! I'm so, so sorry!
It's all right, dear. And it's 'Bethany', by the way. Does that arm still hurt?
No, not as much as it did before. I... I thank you. I just... I don't know what to say... By the Cora I came here to kill you! Wardo and Shekka made you sound like a bunch of- I don't even know! But now you're so nice to me and I just can't- I'm so sorry, Beteny-Kai! I'm so, so sorry!
There was blood in her hair, slowly trickling down her forehead and over her open eyes. Even more in the bedsheets. Great splashes of it, dripping down the side of the bed.
I never should have come here. My boys begged me not to. What was I thinking?
A single arm was dangling over the side, with a thin line of blood slowly winding its way down. It briefly pooled against a string of beads around her wrist, and then cascaded over her slender fingers.
Do you see this, Bet-Kai? My boys made it for me. I like to think that the red beads are from my eldest, because he's always so grumpy all the time, and the blue ones are from my youngest, because he's always so sweet and quiet, always able to calm his fiery big brother. They balance each other out, see?
The blood ran down the claw of her second finger, forming a single, crimson teardrop. It grew heavy, and in the instant before it fell, Bethany was able to see her own terrified reflection staring back from inside.
I hope I can see them again soon. I miss them so much. Oh, Bet-Kai... I never should have come to this place...
She was dead. She was dead, and there was nothing Bethany or anyone else could do about it. Her boys would never make their mother another bracelet ever again.
Bethany choked back her tears and wiped her eyes, telling herself that this was the worst possible time to get weepy. There would be plenty of time for that later. But right now -
Something landed on her head. She didn't know what it was, but it wound thin, spidery legs through her hair, and the next instant she was on fire. Flames shot up around her right ear, blazing heat unlike anything she had ever felt, eating through her hair and sinking its claws into her scalp in a matter of seconds. She could feel it growing, spreading across her temple and the back of her neck. She could hear her own fur crackling in her ear, could smell it burning.
Holding her breath, Bethany grabbed a double-fistful of sheets and tugged with all her might. It was stuck, and all she managed to do was make Lota's head nod grotesquely.
She could feel the fire starting to burn more than just her hair. She could feel the sharp sting of flaming teeth gnawing at her skin. The searing sensation of blisters rising.
With one last massive tug, she ripped the bedsheets out from underneath Lota's body and slapped the blood-soaked cloth over her head. The flames died with a belligerent hiss, but the heat remained, as if it had somehow injected a piece of itself into her scalp like venom.
Bethany bit her tongue against the pain, swathed in this warm, sodden cloth that reeked of iron. Every time she breathed, it stuck to her lips. Blood dribbled down her face and into her eyes, burning, stinging, clinging...
She pulled the bedsheet off her head, gasping for air, and saw a black, smoking piece of wood tangled amongst the bloody folds, with crooked twigs sticking straight up into the air like the legs of a dead spider. Such a little thing... such a painful thing...
She had to keep moving.
She flattened her body against the ground, turning her face away as she crawled over the line of blood that had accumulated underneath the edge, one spot at a time, like a grim starting line to some hellish race.
Keep going, just keep going...
Her back scraped against the bedframe, and an instant later she heard a very disconcerting crack rising out of the wood. She was in such a mental state that, for a split second, she actually foresaw the bed collapsing beneath the weight of the fallen bough, breaking her back and leaving her to burn to death beneath a ton of flaming debris, screaming and coughing, her paralysed legs sticking out from underneath like a useless pair of meat sausages...
JUST! KEEP! GOING!
Bethany reached ahead, stuck her claws into the ground, and pulled herself forward. At least the smoke wasn't as thick down here, and she used the opportunity to breathe long and deep, purging her lungs in preparation for what was about to come.
With one last pull, she wriggled out the other side, covered her mouth and nose, and got up.
It was worse than she ever could have imagined.
She was standing inside an actual throat of fire. The walls, the ceiling, even most of the floor. It was all on fire. The heat completely enfolded her, baking in from all sides. This wasn't some incorporeal feeling. It was a physical force, a giant fist slowly squeezing the breath right out of her. Light pierced her eyes from every direction, but despite this she could barely see more than two strides ahead because of the thick curtain of smoke. It was as if the air itself had turned into a swirling, muddy soup. Blinking back the tears, she tried to remember the layout of this place - just a big rectangle with beds lining the sides and one little path going down the middle. A floorplan so moronically simple that even a toddler could navigate it blindfolded.
But not anymore. It had all been crushed and twisted into a sprawling maze of burning tree branches, jutting spikes of wood as long as spears, blinding corridors of light and impassable walls of fire.
"Rufio!" she screamed against her palms, trying to keep the smoke out of her lungs. "Rufio, are you in here? Is anyone in here!?"
She strained her ears, but couldn't hear anything other than the roaring of the flames.
Bethany sucked in a meagre breath of bitter, stinging air through her fingers and went deeper into the tent, keeping her head as low to the ground as possible. Maybe, if she was quick, she could find Rufio and get out before -
Before the fire cuts off your only escape route and you all roast to death?
She didn't just push that thought away. She rebuked it. If Rufio was alive in here somewhere, she would find him and get him out, even if that meant clawing her way through a web of tangled branches and canvas walls with nothing but her bare hands. And that goes for Hezzi, too! That kid had become like a nephew to her in the short amount of time she's known him, and that made him just as much family as her other kids. She just had to find them...
She shuffled out into the narrow pathway like a blind woman, squinting her eyes down to slits and shielding her face. The beds on this side were going up like torches, an entire row of blazing fireballs. The smell of burning wool and goose down was surprisingly bitter and unpleasant.
She carefully made her way down the aisle, stepping around puddles of fire and occasionally clambering over empty beds. Random bits and pieces kept raining down from the ceiling, bright orange fireflies.
A quick ripping noise was the only warning she got. Bethany jumped back just as a long strip of canvass tore free from the ceiling and dropped down right in front of her like a blazing tongue, engulfed in rippling flames.
She swatted it out of the way and kept going, coughing into the crook of her elbow and fighting off wave after wave of dizziness. She tried to call Rufio's name, but could barely breathe without being beset by uncontrollable coughing fits. It felt like she had swallowed a sawblade whole.
She stumbled along, stepping through the remains of what used to be the little fire pit in the centre (ironically one of the few spots in this place that wasn't on fire), when something came looming out of the smoke just ahead. A huge, lumbering shape, much too big to be a Fox, but also too low and misshapen to be a Wolf. And then it took one more shambling step, emerging from the smoke just enough for the truth to be revealed.
It was the twins, huffing and groaning under Mellah's immense weight. They were trying to carry her like they must have carried their buddies out of Othello's on many an occasion; one under each arm. But that approach was not going very smoothly. For one, Mellah was so big compared to her helpers that her legs were simply dragging along the ground like a pair of brakes. For another, she easily outweighed them by at least two hundred pounds. The last time they tried something even remotely like this was the whole vegetable cart fiasco. Trying to accomplish the same thing with nothing but their liquor-fuelled muscles was next to impossible. Bethany was amazed they could even stand like that.
Bethany rushed forward and immediately pressed her fingers against Mellah's thick neck, not bothering with any niceties.
"Mrs Bethany!" one of the twins (Bartholomew? Nicholas? She could never tell them apart.) exclaimed. "Thank the gods!"
For one heart-stopping moment Bethany was sure that Mellah had gone the same way as Lota, but then she parted her thick coating of fur a little better and felt the steady beat of a pulse. Just some blood flowing through a vein and pushing gently against her probing fingers in a steady rhythm, but it changed everything. Everything.
Getting Aisa over that tree had been difficult enough, and she had been conscious! How on earth were they supposed to get Mellah out of here?
"Mellah! Wake up!" Bethany slapped her in the face. "Mellah!"
"Damn, Beth!" one of the twins -
(Lefty! From now on he's just Lefty!)
- croaked, the bloodstained bandages around his throat bobbing up and down with every syllable. "You can't just -"
"We're going to burn to death if she doesn't wake up!" Bethany slapped her again, but her head barely budged, and Bethany couldn't help but wonder if she was maybe doing more damage to her own hand than to Mellah's cheek.
"Mrs Bethany! For all the gods' sakes, you're not helping!"
Lefty was right. Even if they could somehow wake her up, they couldn't get out the same way Bethany came in. That whole path was quickly deteriorating into a crumbling inferno. That only left one option.
"Come on!" Bethany turned around and backed up against Mellah's ample body, as if about to give her a piggy-back ride.
"Mrs Beth!?" Righty exclaimed, completely taken aback.
"You two just do your part! If she flattens me, I swear there will be hell to pay! Now lift!"
With a grunt of effort, the twins lifted Mellah as high as they could manage and Bethany slid in underneath. The weight settled onto her back almost immediately, buckling her knees, but she refused to fall. If Rufio and Hezzi were still trapped in here somewhere, she couldn't afford to waste a single second.
"Now walk with me!"
"Where?"
"Just walk!"
They shuffled forward, the twins on either side and Bethany in the middle. Mellah's head rested against Bethany's shoulder, a steady line of blood constantly dribbling down the side of her face and seeping into the scorched and tattered remnants of her dress. The weight was unbearable. Even with Bartholomew and Nicholas taking up the slack, it felt like she was carrying a bag of rocks on her back. Every step sent a hot, burning wave of pain through her thighs. Every breath of air burned her throat and made her want to cough, something that would almost surely end up with all four of them collapsing to the ground in a helpless heap.
You have to hurry! You have to find Rufio! You have to find Hezzi! And Sarah! And Mateo! They're in here somewhere and you have to find them!
That internal voice was getting more and more panicky by the second, and panic was something she simply could not afford right now. Panic meant mistakes, and mistakes meant death. She couldn't go to pieces anymore, not when -
Rufio was lying on a bed, but instead of a blanket, he was covered in flames. A burning, melting husk, reaching for her with fleshless, skeletal hands...
Bethany blinked and it was just a jagged, splintery hunk of wood, slowly burning its way through the mattress.
All right, now she was getting angry.
"Stop here!" Bethany grabbed hold of one of the longer slivers of wood, right where it had broken free from the main body, and wiggled it back and forth, trying to pry it loose. The splinters were like tiny rows of teeth, eagerly sawing right through the burns in her palms, but Bethany just clenched her teeth against the pain and kept working it back and forth until it finally snapped off in her hand, a wooden tooth about ten inches in length, ending in a wickedly sharp point. "Okay, let's go!"
If they couldn't get out the way she came in, then they'd just have to make a new exit.
They sidled in between two beds and laboured into position right up against the wall of the tent. This section hadn't caught fire yet, but the flames were closing in from both sides.
She flipped the sliver of wood around like a dagger, so the tip was pointing down. She lifted it above her shoulder, taking care not to accidentally hit Mellah in the face, and thrust it at the brown canvas wall with all the strength she could muster. The tip went through easily enough, but when she tried to slice downwards, it simply scrunched up around the wood and stubbornly resisted any progress.
"Oh you stupid piece of -"
"Mrs Bethany!" Righty said. "I don't mean to rush you, but -"
The flames were growing at an alarming rate. The bed just to their left was already turning into a bonfire, and the one on the right wasn't far behind. The flames on the ceiling were rippling outward like molten pools, breathing scorching hot air down their necks.
Bethany ripped her improvised dagger free, opening up a tiny little hole in the side of the tent. She thought she could maybe wiggle her pinky through there, if she was lucky.
"Mrs Bethany!"
The fire was flaring up at their backs, too. Winding lines of flame. Blankets, bandages, branches, random strips of leather, all of them igniting one by one, spreading faster and faster, closing in on all sides.
Bethany stabbed the wall again and again, knowing that she could never hope to slice a hole big enough with such a primitive tool, but knowing also that she didn't have to.
Panic means mistakes, and mistakes mean death. Just keep calm, Beth... Just keep calm. That's what Layla's been trying to teach you, isn't it? Just... keep... calm...
"Bethany! We have to get out of here! Right now!"
This crappy stick wasn't good for anything other than punching tiny holes, but if she could make enough of them, and line them up just right...
Threading the needle...
"Bethany! We're going to burn at this rate!"
The flames were on them, climbing up the leathery walls like creeping vines, spreading their golden leaves across the holes she had made. Eating their fill.
It was now or never. If this failed, they would be roasted to death.
"Keep her up!" Bethany grabbed hold of the perforations, sticking her fingers through the holes. Tongues of fire licked at her wrists and jumped onto her forearms and the backs of her hands, feeding, growing, burning. She pulled with all her might, but the wall was just too tough. Thick layers of leather and animal hides stitched together specifically to combat the harsh winter temperatures. It stretched a little beneath her fingers, opening the holes just enough for her to see outside. Tiny glimpses of soil and melting clumps of snow, bathed in a hellish, orange light.
For a moment she wondered what it would be like to burn to death. To feel all the fur singed off her body. To watch her skin peel and crack. To smell her own charred flesh, sloughing off her bones. She wondered if she would pass out from the smoke, or if she would be awake for every excruciating moment. She hoped against hope that Rufio had somehow gotten out of this alive. She wondered where her daughters were right now. If they were safe. She hoped...
"Mother!!"
Layla?
The girl slammed into the opposite side of the tent so hard that Bethany almost got knocked back. Probably would have, if it hadn't for the solid anchor of flesh that was Mellah.
"Mother! Oh gods!"
From Bethany's point of view, the girl was no more than a single, badly swollen eye looking through a peephole, but it was enough. It was more than enough. "Help me!" she yelled, sticking her fingers back through the holes. "Help me, Layla!"
Without needing to be told twice, Layla stuck her fingers through the holes and began to pull, grunting like an animal.
The twins joined in as well, each of them contributing one hand so as not to drop Mellah to the ground. The fire had spread to Lefty's shoes and were greedily eating away at his laces, and Righty wasn't faring any better. Flames had appeared on his pants leg as if by magic, and were slowly crawling up towards his knee.
Bethany ground her teeth and kept pulling, willing the stretchy bands of leather between the holes to just snap and let them out, and suddenly a brand new set of fingers appeared, fingers she didn't even recognise. Thick, dark grey ones. These were followed immediately after by even more fingers, sliding in through every available hole she had punched. Four, then eight. Sixteen. Twenty-four.
"Pull! Come on, harder! Pull!"
Dark brown, light brown, light grey, yet more dark grey, all of them smeared with soot and ash. One set in the middle was covered in an alarming amount of blood, and didn't have any claws.
Wait, is that Dan on the other side?_And immediately on the heels of that thought: _What the hell did that fool do to his bandages!?
Bethany bit down on her tongue hard enough to draw blood, pulling with all her might, and the wall suddenly split right through the middle, almost all the way down to the ground. With flames licking at their backs and thick plumes of black smoke curling around their heads, they all went tumbling outside in a mess of tangled limbs and surging embers.
Up... Have to get up... Bethany scrambled up on her hands and knees, shaking all over from the shock, and summarily vomited all over her scorched hands.
Mother! Oh, gods, someone help me with her!
No, can't rest yet... gotta get back in there... gotta go now...
She tried to get back to her feet and lost her balance, dropping down to one knee with a painful thump. The whole world was spinning...
Can't...
Bet-Kai! Are you all right? Bet-Kai!
Was that a real voice, or just her imagination? Was this blur of colour in her face a pair of eyes?
By the Cora, it's Mellah! Don't just stand there, help me!
Many shapes. Many voices now.
Mother!
Real?
"Mother!"
Layla?
"Mother! Are you okay? Mother! Hey, can you hear me? Mother!"
Bethany blinked. It felt like she had gone from one hell to another in the space of a single second. The air here was clear, but all the screaming... so many horrible sounds... clubs smashing down on bare flesh, breaking bones... snarling and growling... No matter where she looked, she saw shapes in the distance, chasing each other down, faces locked together, blood streaming down rows of sharp teeth...
Someone was gently shaking her by the shoulders. Who was that? Layla? The girl looked awful. All kinds of beat up. Blood running down her face like that... branches protruding from her back like broken wings...
There were other faces, too. Danado, down on the ground, gasping for breath, all covered in the most godawful bites and scratches. The lean Wolf with the head wound, who shouldn't even be walking around right now. A little Wolf cub, looking decidedly out of place in this fiery hellhole. The twins, struggling to roll Mellah onto her back, and Aisa, still cradling Renna to her body. Bethany was glad they had made it out okay, but she couldn't rest yet. She had to...
Her mouth tasted of ash and vomit. She hawked back and spat something that was more grey than clear, and forced herself to get back up, pressing down on her knee.
I have to... I
"... have to...."
"Mother?"
"I have to go get your father..." she said, turning back to the blazing tent. Rufio was still in there, somewhere. She had to go get him. Hezzi, too. She had to...
"No, Bet-Kai!" Someone grabbed her shoulder. "You'll die if you go back in there!"
She shrugged him off and started towards the fire. Already she could feel the heat settling back into the bare patches of burnt skin on her face...
"Bet-Kai, stop!"
He tried to grab her again and Bethany swung around, smashing her elbow directly into his nose. He staggered back, screaming, blood pouring between his cupped hands. "Stop her! She's gonna get herself killed!"
No...
The flames had completely engulfed the tear she had made. It was like a snake's eye. One long, black, vertical slit surrounded by dancing flames.
But she could get through. She knew she could get through. She had to...
Hands on her shoulders. Hands around her waist. Hands... pulling her back...
No... No!
"No!"
She thrashed and flailed, swiping her claws randomly in all directions. Sometimes she would feel her blows connecting, would hear the resulting yelp of pain. Sometimes her hands would just swipe through empty air.
More hands grabbing on, curling around her wrists, holding them in place.
Let go of me... Let go! LET GO!!
"I can save him..." she whispered, her voice little more than a scorched croak. "I can still... I can still save him... I can save everyone..."
I can thread the needle...
The supports gave way with a tremendous snap, and what little of the medical tent was still upright collapsed in on itself in a wash of fire. Embers spewed straight up into the sky like floodwaters breaking upon jagged rocks, and the heat slapped Bethany in the face the same instant as the realisation that she had just witnessed her last and only hope go up in flames.
"Rufie...?"
The hands were still gripping her, but they had lost all strength. Their owners were just like her, staring up at this bonfire with their jaws agape. No one made a sound. No one even breathed. Until...
"Father?" Layla said, her voice slicing through Bethany's heart like a blade. "FATHER!!"
The flames burned on, completely indifferent to her screams.
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