The Forest of Sleepers (Nowhere Book 2)

t w e n t y - s e v e n : f i r e

The farmhouse was on fire.

By the time Wyatt and the Penny's got there, it was really on fire.

Townspeople were already coming out of the woodwork like ants, materializing out of nowhere with buckets of water, creating a line from the pump to the house, handing off the buckets to one another.

The firemen were busily hooking up their equipment, though it was a long process since the hydrant was near the road.

Wyatt saw none of this.

His eyes were trained on one window in particular that had flames bursting out of it.

The window belonged to his mother, but the moment of horror lasted only a second.

Oscar could already tell what he was thinking. He clasped Wyatt's shoulder and said, "Son, don't--"

But Wyatt was already off.

Before he reached the door, however, he heard Birdie scream. He glanced back to see Oscar holding her back as she lunged and kicked to get away from him.

"Wyatt!" she cried, her eyes wild with panic. He had never seen such emotion on her face before.

Next to her, Marigold and Ophelia were holding each other, burying their faces in each other's shoulders.

He went into the fire.

Smoke hung like a thick fog around the dining room and kitchen, barely visible from the gray haze.

Above, he could hear the crackles of the fire and the creaking of the roof.

"Mother!" he called, praying she'd had time to get down to ground level. When it became evident that she hadn't, he took off his sweater vest and doused it with water from the basin in the kitchen, holding it over his nose and mouth as he climbed the stairs.

The hallway was consumed with flames.

Wyatt's eyes stung and his breath caught in his throat.

His heart pounded in his ears as he gritted his teeth and began making his way toward Evelyn's bedroom.

The noise around him was alive, like electricity or wind or a rushing waterfall.

The heat around him pricked at his skin until his body felt like it was on fire as well.

"Mother!" he managed to yell.

Of course, there was no answer.

Wyatt made his way to her door and kicked it open, only to find that she wasn't in her bedroom.

Bewildered, Wyatt went to check Hal's room next door. If she wasn't here, then he didn't know what to do.

When he kicked open the door, a whoosh of smoke nearly knocked him back into the blaze behind him.

Wyatt coughed, shielding his eyes to squint through the ash and flames.

He got on his belly to see below the debris and began elbowing his way across the floor, his lungs burning in protest.

Above him, the roof was beginning to splinter.

Where is she? he wondered desperately.

Through the din of the fire, Wyatt heard voices outside the window as they attached a ladder to the sill and began dumping buckets of water inside.

It did little to stop the fire but made the immediate area more visible.

In the corner, beside the closet, Wyatt saw her.