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Chapter Sixty-Four

RAIN

I ran harder, wondering if there was anything Wild magic could do to put out a fire. Sadly, I couldn't think of anything, but that was my zez's place. The fire alarm was going off, so someone would help, wouldn't they? They'd save our gym. They had to!

Yet as I ran, Aspen and Shadow kept pace.

Jack streaked ahead, slicing through the trees as he cawed at the top of his lungs.

Behind us, the school's fire alarm squealed so loudly it made my brain throb.

From the side, I could see students starting to file out of the main building like this was an ordinary drill.

I couldn't stop. I didn't dare slow down. I was supposed to be the Morrigan, so I had to fix this somehow, but how? Never mind that I didn't know what had started the fire in the first place. And Sheba! What about Bracken's cat?

Then I heard Torian. "Move! Get the fuck out of my way!" It sounded like he was too far away.

But Jack said it again. "Dad!" he cawed before diving straight at the door of the gym. Thankfully, it wasn't the burning part, but the back now had flames reaching for the sky. Wood was crackling loudly as it caught, and I had a feeling this place wouldn't last long at this rate.

"Rain! Dad!" Jack yelled, darting in to flap at the door, using his feet to scratch at it. "Dad!"

Shit. He didn't mean Dad's place. He meant Bracken was actually in there! But he didn't have classes before lunch. Why was he in there?

"Bracken's inside!" I roared, rushing in to grab the door, trying to make it open.

Nothing happened. The latch didn't click. The handle didn't act like it was locked. It simply did nothing, as if there was no mechanism in it at all.

Magic.

As panic began to take over, I held the handle, hoping my own Wild magic would negate it, but nothing was changing. I rattled. I yanked. I even pounded on the door with my open fist.

"Zez!" I begged. "Are you in there?"

"It's enchanted on the inside!" Bracken yelled, his voice barely audible over the snapping and crackling, never mind my own frantic shrieking.

He also sounded like he wasn't close. Maybe trying to find another exit? I didn't know, so I slammed my shoulder into the door. I just had to get in there somehow. I had to reach the fucking magic so I could break it. I had to figure out something that would get Bracken out!

"Is there another door?" Aspen asked, trying to keep me from throwing myself against it again.

"Back there!" I said, stabbing my entire arm to where it was burning.

"Window?" she tried next.

"Rain!" This time it was Keir's voice.

I looked over to see him and the rest of the court running across the lawn.

In the distance, the entire student body was clustered up by all the exterior doors of the main building, but I was pretty sure they were looking our way - yet none of them were coming.

No wait, some were. Two over there. Three on that side.

"Bracken's inside!" I yelled.

"What window will get us in there?" Aspen demanded.

"On the side," I said, remembering the one in his office. "That should be low enough. We can break it."

"Show me," she ordered.

So I grabbed her hand and pulled, racing around the building and the evergreen trees that grew so close to it.

Overhead, crows screamed their defiance.

Their dark shapes were darting in and out of the smoke coating the sky above us, but there was nothing they could do.

Thankfully, the court was angling to follow us.

"There!" I said, pointing at the one window I knew Bracken wouldn't be locked away from.

Aspen slashed her hand at it like she was trying to break out the glass. Even from a few feet away, it somehow worked. I didn't see any color to her magic, but the window shattered. Unfortunately, the metal frame stayed, creating nine little rectangles I wouldn't be able to fit through.

Then Aspen pushed. A wave of ice appeared out of nowhere, slamming into the building, breaking out the window frame and sizzling as it melted in the ever-increasing heat.

"That should cool it a little," Aspen said as she hurried forward.

This time I followed, but I had no intention of stopping. Evidently, neither did she. When we reached the wall, the ice shifted, forming stairs, and the two of us climbed them as fast as we could. She paused at the window, flinching from the heat, then shouldered her way in.

With each step, Aspen cooled the air, but the flames were much too close.

Red light twisted everything I knew inside, and the smoke hit the rest. It was like some bad training film, meant to remind us to crawl out of a burning house.

The smoke was so thick, it rolled like water as it rippled across the ceiling, but a bubble had appeared around both of us, vaporizing where it met the temperature in this room.

"I need you to lead," Aspen told me. "I don't know my way around."

"Zez!" I screamed, moving ahead of her. "Bracken, where are you?"

"Rain, stay back!" Bracken yelled.

"We're coming to save you," I called back, aware the flames were actually roaring around me.

It sounded like some monstrous beast growling.

Everything I could see was charred and colored all wrong, but I'd heard him, and I was pretty sure I was heading the right way.

Crouching low, I tried to blink through the fumes and soot.

Burning embers turned dark when they hit Aspen's bubble, so I just kept going.

That was the stairs to the upper deck where the training dummies were, but why would he be back here?

With every step, the flames got brighter until the wood around us had them licking off it.

The stack of mats was melting into some toxic ooze at the side.

The windows, however, hadn't shattered. Granted, that was probably a good thing, because I knew more air meant faster burning.

"Zez?!" I begged.

"Rain, go!" Bracken yelled back.

But that was close. Turning, I dropped to my knees, trying to peer through the haze that was quickly getting thicker and lower as smoke filled this part of the building. Aspen reached up, placing her hand on my back so she wouldn't lose me. Together, we moved a little more - and I saw something.

It was just darkness in a scene that was so chaotic it shouldn't matter, but that one speck was too dark. Black, even. It also moved.

"Zez!" I gasped. "Aspen, I need more room!"

I heard her grunt and then the smoke was forced back for one single second.

It was enough, though. I caught a glimpse of my zez sprawled on the floor with his leg angled back toward the flames.

The thing I'd seen? His other boot. The one he was trying to use to drag himself toward us and away from all the burning.

"No!" Aspen yelled, jerking back and letting go of me in the process. "Rain, I feel iron!"

"I'm pinned," Bracken said.

"I can't go closer," Aspen yelled. "If I try, we'll lose the bubble!"

But I had to. This was my father. He was half of my family, and I would not simply leave him in this fire when I was so fucking close. So, taking a deep breath, I dropped my head and pushed myself toward him, braced for the pain I knew was about to come.

It didn't.

The moment I crossed the edge of Aspen's shield, another bloomed around me.

It turned everything green, making the burning building look sick in a way I hadn't expected, but it allowed me to see.

And there, my zez had his hands up, trying to hold back the fire with his own magic, but it was sputtering and failing.

I moved even faster. Sadly, the bubble didn't move with me, but when I left the green one, a white one formed, then an iridescent one after that, and it surrounded all of us. I noticed, but I didn't slow down, rushing over to grab my father and try to drag him.

"I'm pinned to the floor," Bracken told me.

And I saw it. Pinned was the wrong word.

It made me think something had fallen on him.

No, this was a U-shaped band of metal that was nailed into the wooden boards.

I didn't know if it was steel, iron, or something else, but from the way my zez's leg was singeing against it, I knew why he hadn't freed himself.

"Oh, fuck this," I growled, grabbing the metal with both hands.

It was hot. My skin should've burned, but ice formed as soon as I touched it.

Not having time to think about any of this, I pulled once.

The nails shifted. Using all of my body weight, I heaved even harder.

I could feel it loosening, and fear was driving me now.

Leaning far in, I paused for one second, then threw every ounce of muscle I'd built this year against the metal, trying to make it just let go.

And I tumbled back onto my ass, holding the frozen bracket in my hands.

"No!" Aspen screamed, reminding me she was too close.

I flung the metal away, and both of us rushed in to grab Bracken on either side. "Can you walk?" I asked.

"I will," he replied, making it clear he had no other option.

"We got you," Aspen said, hooking her arm around his waist on one side.

I took the other, and this time we didn't move slowly.

Even better, the smoke swirled out of our way like someone had pointed a fan at it, letting us move even faster.

The floorboards here were crisping quickly.

Over there, the handrail was burning. None of that mattered because Bracken's office was just ahead.

And that was when I heard Torian screaming his sister's name. Keir, Wilder, Hawke, and more voices were yelling at us as well, but their words were all jumbled. Torian's cut through clearly.

"Aspen Fox!" he cried. "Aspen! Aspen Fox!"

"We need a slide!" Aspen yelled back. "Healing." She paused to cough. "We've got Bracken. I'll need help getting him out."

But instead of a slide, arms thrust through the window. "Pass him to us!" That was Hawke.

Aspen and I shoved Bracken forward. Hawke and someone else grabbed him, hauling my zez out by force. The moment they were out of the way, Wilder was leaning in, so I shoved Aspen at him. He pulled, she climbed, but the heat was increasing quickly now that I was away from her.

Then something dark stood up beside me. The air cooled, the smoke cleared, but that form just kept growing.

This was not an accident. I will save yours if you will save mine.

The words sounded like dry leaves on hard rocks. They weren't like a person at all, and I couldn't pick a gender for the voice. The form before me only gave me one single hint. It was dark. It was also huge and no longer shaped anything like me, but I was sure this was Shadow.

"You can fucking talk?!"

Fire is power. Stop this before this stops me.

I was about to ask what it meant by "this" when arms wrapped around my waist and pulled hard. My feet slipped out from under me. My head cracked into the side of that metal window frame, and I grabbed for anything to help me keep my balance.

My arms found a neck, but we were moving. Dark hair. Strong arms. My eyes were watering from all the smoke in the air, but when too-bright green eyes looked over at me, I knew who'd just pulled me from that burning building: Torian.

"Don't you fucking do that again!" he snarled. "I can't lose you, Rain. None of you, do you hear me?"

And I let my head flop down on his shoulder. "Thank you," I breathed, knowing he hated it but hoping he could feel just how much I meant those words.

"Always," he whispered. "No matter how stupid, I will always follow you into it, Rain. Every single time."