The Village Fire

Raine shut her eyes and drew her quivering bundle closer to herself, attempting to savour what life and warmth there was left. 1

  The crackle and snap of hungry flames echoed dimly throughout the room, amidst the roar of much bigger flames outside. Rising faintly but visibly from the chaos came shrieks, agonised, terrified, and helpless, much like Raine and her bundle.2

  Smoke billowed outside the window, and already the stench of burning was heavy in the air. Raine could barely breathe, and see she could not for the tears from the smoke tore at her eyes. Closing them was much better…3

  She screamed involuntarily as the door fell in with a deafening roar, followed by a terrible crash. Orange flames licked hungrily at its remnants, charred blocks of wood and curling strips of paint. At least they would not get her sister… Raine hugged the soft bundle tightly, closing her burning eyes once again.4

  The crackling had grown louder so that now it merged seamlessly with the rest of the fiery sounds. A long, drawn-out dying scream punctuated the fire’s relentless quest to destroy, piercing Raine’s mind like an arrow. Would she scream like that when the tongues of fire finally reached her? Raine coughed and buried her face in the bundle’s cloth covering. There was no way out.5

  The neighbour’s house collapsed then, in a huge cloud of debris and smoke. For a moment the flames seemed to wane and die, then it was there again, - a fireball rising like an awoken dragon into the sky.6

  “Raine!” the bundle began to cry. “Raine! When will it stop?” The young girl saw her sister’s face peeping out the cloth sheets and despairingly wiped the soot of the tear-streaked skin. “Don’t worry, Mollie, I’m here.”7

  “Where’s …” The little bundled sister’s voice was lost in yet another crash as a portion of the wooden roof fell no more than two metres from the place Raine crouched. “Where are mama, and papa?8

  Raine shut her eyes yet again and covered her face. Smoke clouded her vision…they could see no more… “Mama and papa are…gone, Mollie,” Raine whispered chokingly. “They’re gone.”9

  Mollie could not seem to understand. “Will we go too?”10

  The innocent remark sparked a pang of overwhelming despair in Raine’s heart, and she stared helplessly back down at her sister. All she could do was reply, “I won’t let you go.” She meant it though; she would guard her precious little bundle with her own live body, and maybe even her dead one, if that was what it took…11

  Mollie screamed suddenly, and Raine followed thoughtlessly. This time the roof had collapsed just a foot away. Death was getting impatient just waiting, and Raine knew for whom it waited.12

  “Mollie,” she began, tears straining her voice. A kind of blind courage drove her now, for Mollie, whose life was yet a budding stem of life. “Mollie, get under the cloth sheets and don’t come out until the sounds have stopped, do you hear? If you feel the fire, roll over. Do you understand?”13

  Mollie gasped a reply, but it was lost in the roar of the blaze. Then she said again, louder this time. “R-Raine…”14

  Raine did not answer. So Mollie, young Mollie whose life was still fresh and hope-bearing, with more years left to go than Raine’s, knew…she knew what Raine was going to do.15

She threw away the part of her that screamed for her own survival and threw her own cloak over Mollie. “Don’t uncover yourself or look up, even if I …” Raine drew a shuddering breath, “even if I scream, or fall heavily on you. You hear?” Raine touched her sister’s wet face. “I will be here.”16

  “Raine!” Then there was a deafening boom, and the roof gave way completely above the two sisters. One of them threw her body selflessly over the other, disappearing under the caving wood and ash, aflame and blazing smoke into the night sky. A pervading darkness came in their place, the debris flying wildly downwards…17