Wink Poppy Midnight(44)

I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stand one more second of it.

I pushed her away from me.

The blanket moved, and her foot knocked over the candle, and then flames, flames and fire.





I WAS ME again, and the blanket was on fire, and then the edge of Zoe’s dress.

Midnight jumped to his feet and started stomping out the flames and Zoe rolled on the ground and Buttercup screamed.

The fire flew across the floor and up the curtains and over the piano. Thomas and Briggs tore off their shirts and whacked at the burning orange waves, but the smoke just grew and grew, like magic beanstalks up into the sky. I couldn’t see, the smoke, tears running down my face. I stumbled, hit the piano stool, hands helped me up, I stumbled again, where was the window? I couldn’t see, couldn’t see, someone pulled on my arm, and then it was there, the bay window, right in front of me. I pushed through, coughing, coughing, and I fell down onto the dirt, right next to Buttercup. Zoe helped us up, my eyes burned and I blinked and blinked but still couldn’t see. I grabbed Zoe’s hand and Buttercup grabbed mine and we ran toward the forest.

I smelled pine and knew I’d reached the trees. I let go of the girls’ fingers and started rubbing my eyes, streaks of blood across my cheeks, palms cut by the jagged window glass. Buttercup and Zoe scattered in the dark. They didn’t wait. They ran like thieves, like the twelve girls in Between the Dragon and the Wrath, not even glancing over their shoulders as they disappeared in the dark. Briggs and Thomas ran past me next, scared white faces and panting open mouths.

I looked back, back at the Roman Luck house, the smoke crawling up and up like it was trying to touch the moon, it didn’t care about the rain, the storm couldn’t touch the fire at all . . .

Crash.

The roof caved in.

Crash, crash, crash.

I looked around, I wanted to take his hand . . .

But he wasn’t there.

Midnight wasn’t there.





THE SMOKE WAS everywhere, I coughed and coughed, I counted the shapes, one, two, three, four, five, they were all through the window, they were safe, I grabbed the sill, careful of the broken glass . . .

And then I heard it. Thunder.

Except it wasn’t thunder, it was the roof.

I saw the crack. The ceiling. I was conscious long enough to see it split in two . . . plaster loosening, falling . . . then dust . . . smoke . . . my lungs . . . dark.





I WAS THERE, watching. I hated hated hated the Roman Luck house, but I was there anyway. I moved with the shadows, and no one saw me. No one ever saw me anymore.

I watched it all, I laughed when Wink laughed and winced when Midnight winced.

Fire.

I was there when the roof caved in. I was there when everyone crawled out of the window, everyone but Midnight. I was there when he hit the floor. I grabbed him, I didn’t even think about it, I just grabbed him and pulled him down the hall and out the back door, wooden beams plummeting all around us.





I OPENED MY eyes. Forest floor. Earth and pine needles.

The sun was rising, I could see the light . . .

I turned my head. It wasn’t the sun. It was the fire. The Roman Luck fire. Fifty yards away, through the trees. I tried to sit up, but my bones felt so heavy, so damn heavy. My lungs burned. It hurt to breathe.

I smelled jasmine.

Smoke, and jasmine.

And then she was there, face in front of mine, blond hair tickling my throat.

“Midnight,” she said.

Her voice sounded different. Hollow, and sad.

“Poppy.”

I reached up to touch her, fingertips stretching toward her cheek . . .

But my hand hit air.

She was already gone.



I FOUND WINK in the forest. She gave a little cry when she saw me. I put my arms around her. We both reeked of smoke, but it smelled good on her.

“I couldn’t find you after we all crawled out the window,” Wink whispered into my neck. “What happened, Midnight? Where did you go?”

Sirens in the distance, sharp and shrill.

“I passed out from the smoke, just as the roof caved in.”

I felt her arms tighten around me, elbows locking in.

“Someone pulled me out the back door, Wink. Into the forest.”

“Who?” Soft breath on my neck.

But I didn’t answer her.



“DO YOU REMEMBER anything?” I asked, a half hour later in the hayloft. “Do you remember what you did? What happened, before the blanket caught on fire?”

Wink shook her head. “One second I was taking your hand, and the next I woke up to screaming, and flames.”

“You don’t remember the unforgivables?”

She shook her head again.

Dawn was coming. I could feel it more than see it. The air was snappy and crystal cold, and it smelled good, after all the smoke.

“You were her, Wink. Her voice, her gestures, her expressions, everything.”

She didn’t say anything for a while. We were leaning against a hay bale and her head was on my stomach. I ran my thumb down the inside of her skinny arm and stopped at her wrist, so I could feel her pulse. Tick, tick, tick. She’d cut her palms on the bay window glass, and there were jagged streaks of dried blood running across her hands. I kissed one of the cuts, and she flinched.