Descending (The Rising Series) (37 page)

“She kills them. I’ve seen them. Their skeletons. Hundreds of them. Tiny babies, little toddlers, and young children.”

“You lie!” The woman collapsed forward, screaming.

Gretchen heard a whoosh and looked out the window. Orange flames licked the sky and spread up and over the window. Straton had given her more time, but it still wasn’t long enough. The house was surrounded by flames.

“I
’m telling the truth. This baby and I are the only ones left of her children. She’s been trying to kill me too.”

“You’re not Aella’s
.” The woman was rocking back and forth on her knees, sobbing.

“I am.” The flames were now licking the walls.

“What is your name?” The old woman clutched her head so hard that her fingernails pierced her skin. Blood dripped down her face.

“Gretchen.”

“Aella never had a child named Gretchen.”

“I changed my name. It used to be Ambrosia.”

“Ambrosia?” Her pained eyes held a spark of remembrance.

“Do I know you?”

“I took care of you until she took you away.”

“I don’t remember you.”

“You were just a baby, but you were mine.”

Gretchen nodded. Could this woman have been like a mother to her?

The old lady pulled herself off the floor and swayed as she moaned. If only Gretchen could take the pain away, but her throat was getting drier by the moment. The last of the moisture in the air was sucked up by the approaching flames.

The woman moaned, pressing her hands against her head until Gretchen thought she might crush her own
skull. “Will you take care of little Nikias? Don’t let Aella have him.”

Gretchen’s heart beat into her throat as the woman inched toward the window. She seemed to be waiting for Gretchen’s answer. “I will.”

With that, the old woman rushed into the flames, shrieking as she threw herself out the window. Gretchen gasped.

She was gone
. Dead.

The flames thickened and crawl
ed through the window, licking across a nearby rug. The heat became unbearable. Gretchen rushed to the crib and grabbed the crying infant. Taking a blanket, she draped it over the child’s head. The baby seemed so tiny—too tiny. The flames were on her heels as she ran out the bedroom door.

She flew down the stairs, looking for Kyros and the others. As she leapt to the floor, she looked around. To her right was a living
area, with blood smeared all over the floor. Aella lay at her feet. Her were eyes glassy, and her chest had a gaping hole in it. And her heart lay still, several feet away. Sadness tugged at her. This woman was the first face she’d ever laid eyes on. She’d laughed with her and bore her mother’s tears of loneliness. She remembered wanting more than anything for her to love her. True, Aella was a monster, but she was also her mother. And that kind of bond left a mark on one’s soul.

Gretchen blinked away her tears and looked back to where she’d come. The fire was making its way down the stairs. She heard a crack just before a chunk of the ceiling collapsed behind her. The baby whimper
ed.

“It’s okay, baby. I’ve got you.”

Gretchen raced to the front door and reached for the doorknob. It singed her fingertips, and she jerked her hand back. She went to the nearest window. Flames danced on the other side of the pane. Smoke billowed in the room. She dropped to her knees, coughing and sputtering.

“Kyros,”
she yelled. “Xanthus… anyone!”

Crawling on her knees, she ma
de her way to the back of the house. There was a door. She didn’t even try that one. The smoke billowed through the cracks. She looked up at the window. Through the smoke, she could see the flames. Fire completely surrounded the house. A few orange flames began to crawl their way through the crack in the door.

Gretchen coughed as she looked for a fire extinguisher. The baby began to cough through the blanket. There was no extinguisher, but there was a sink with a sprayer hose. She crawled over to the counter and placed the baby on the floor as she stood, grabbed the hose, and turned
on the water. She sprayed the fire as she sank back to the floor, picked up the brother she never got a chance to know, and pulled him against her chest.

T
his was how she would die—in a fire. At least she could take some solace in the fact that everyone else made it out. She wondered for a moment how she’d actually go. Would she succumb to the smoke? Would the house collapse on her? She didn’t even want to consider being burned alive.

She leaned down and kissed the lump under the blanket
as tears poured from her eyes. “I’m sorry, baby. I tried to save you. I’m so sorry.”

Kyros sighed and staggered to lean against a tree. They’d made it out just in time. The fire rushed the perimeter of the house, devouring the gasoline and overgrown grass. It made trails of flames up the side of the home, curling paint and climbing the porch posts. Several dry bushes caught so quickly that they roared and crackled. Black smoke billowed to the sky, dimming the sun from view.

His eyes searched for the only person who mattered—Gretchen. He wanted nothing more than to embrace her, to lose himself in her arms. He dreaded telling her they were unable to save her brother. Xanthus had tried to go back in after him, but a wall of flames blocked his path. There was no way in.

Where was she?
Through the roaring of the fire, he heard something that chilled him. A woman was screaming—from inside the house.

Forgetting his injuries, Kyros raced over to Sara
and Straton, who was treating Drakōn’s injuries.

“Where’s Gretchen?”

“I don’t know,” Sara said. “She disappeared while Straton was pouring the gas around the house.”

“Could she…?” Kyros looked at the burning house.

“She couldn’t be.” Sara shook her head, her eyes wide with fright. “She knew Straton was setting the fire.”

H
e heard it, his name. Gretchen was screaming his name from inside the inferno.

“Great gods, she
’s still in the house,” Straton said as Kyros raced toward the flames.

Just as he was about to reach them, Xanthus rushed him from the side, slamming
into him. The pain of the impact against his injuries caused his legs to buckle.

“Let go of
me, Xanthus. I
have
to go in there.”

“It’s suicide. There’s no way in.”

Kyros pounded Xanthus’s chest, pushed him off, and scrambled toward the house.

Xanthus pulled him back
. “Kyros, if you want to save Gretchen, you can’t just run in there. You won’t be able to help her if you’re dead.”

“How? How am I going to get in there?” Kyros looked up to the structure. It was
completely engulfed in flames—except for the upstairs window above the porch roof. At that sight, hope lit his heart. “There, I’m going in there.”

“How will you reach it? There’s fire burning below it.”

Kyros looked around and saw just what he needed—a tall tree standing in front of the house. He immediately began to climb. “Xanthus, get the others. You’ll need their strength.”

Xanthus looked from the tree to the house. “This plan is only slightly less crazy than rushing head on into the flames.”

“Just hurry,” Kyros shouted.

Kyros was just reaching the upper limbs when Xanthus came back with
Amar and Pallas. Dagonians are much stronger than humans. But still, the trunk was more than a foot in diameter. Xanthus, being the tallest at nearly seven feet, pushed from above while Pallas was below him and Amar was on the bottom.

“Okay, push!” Kyros shouted.

At first, the tree didn’t seem to budge. The Dagonians were pushing so hard, their faces bloomed red and their muscles bulged. A crack pierced the air, and the tree swayed. Another crack and the tree toppled forward. Kyros felt as if he were free falling just before he crashed against the porch roof. It buckled under the weight, sinking about a foot down, but it held.

Kyros scrambled onto the roof and dove through the window. He was met with a cloud of smoke.
Breathing in, he coughed out, sputtering. He wouldn’t last long in this. Rushing forward, he made his way to the door. Outside the room was even worse. Over the crackling roar of the fire, he could hear a baby crying. If he knew Gretchen, she’d be with the baby.

“Gretchen
… I’m coming. Stay… where you are.” He spoke through coughs.

He stepped forward
, toward the burning stairs. He had to go down. He took his first step and the stair cracked beneath his foot, sending him stumbling down and landing with flames on his back. He jumped up as the heat burned him. He moved so fast, his open wounds flared in pain. He looked down. Blood soaked through the bandages, seeping down his legs.

“Kyros, is that you?”
He’d never heard a more beautiful sound. Gretchen called him through the black clouds billowing from the kitchen.

“Yes
baby, I’m coming.”

He ran into the kitchen and slammed his knee into a c
hair. “Where are you?” he asked, and then hacked so hard he could barely take in a breath.

“Down here. You need to get down. The smoke is thinner down
low.”

He dropped down and was met with clear
er air. Looking up, he glanced across the floor. And there she was, holding a crying bundle in one arm and a sprayer hose in the other.

“Oh gods, Gretchen.” He crawled forward and wrapped his arms around her. “I found you.”

She threw her arms around him. His stomach lurched at the pain her embrace caused him, but it was so good to feel her. She felt so alive.

“
I’m so glad you’re alive,” she said.

“I was thinking the same about you.”

She pulled away, smiling. Then she looked at the inferno surrounding them. “Do you have any idea how we are going to get out?”

“I don’t know how, I just know we are.” Kyros’s foot heated, burning him as he pulled
it back. Gretchen turned the spray on the flames, and they retreated as steam rose and was immediately sucked up by the dry air.

There was a crash
from somewhere in the house, and it shook. This place was going to collapse around them. “We have to go,” he said.

“There’s no way out.”

“If we stay, we’ll die for sure. Let’s go.”

Gretchen let go of the sprayer hose and crawled forward. Kyros took position over her
and the baby as they crawled, blocking her from potential falling debris.

The flames moved
in, heating the air so hot that Kyros’s lungs burned.

Another
crack. Gretchen screamed as the upper floor landed in their path. Then more rumbling and the entire house shook.

“Kyros, Gretchen… are you there?” Xanthus’s voice called from the right. The clouds in that direction were different, grey
, not black. Kyros got sprayed with water. It felt so cool against his burned skin. As the grey clouds cleared, he could see Xanthus standing in a giant hole in the wall.

“Oh, thank the gods,
Xanthus. We need more water.”

“I’
m giving you as much as I can.”

Kyros
pulled Gretchen to her feet, and they raced toward Xanthus. Fresh, cool air hit him like a deep-sea current, cool, crisp and life giving. They continued to run until they were well away from the burning house.

He looked back in time to see the entire structure fall down behind him.
Then he collapsed to the ground.