Naihabi Ridge

Chapter One - Night Raid

I turned my head and got up out of bed, slowly at first, then, with realization ringing in my ears, I raced toward the window in my humble home.

"Night raid!" Someone screamed from out in the street, and after the distant explosion afterward, I realized why.

Fear tore at my chest and my eyes widened as I swiveled around to find my parents' room. Fire danced on the rooftops of the houses down the street, eating its way inside like an animal might eat its prey, and I tried to push the thought from my mind, but couldn't stop thinking about what could happen to the people inside those houses. I darted out into the hallway past the kitchen, my sisters trailing behind me in a frenzy of curls and nightgowns. I ran up to the door and flung it open, revealing my father as he shook my deaf mother awake.

"Dad—" I started, but he hushed me, helping my mother up and out of bed.

"I know," he began digging hurriedly through his dresser. "Get the girls onto the porch and we'll meet you there."

I ran from the room, leaving my mother digging through drawers with my father, and went back down the hall to my older sister, who was holding onto my younger sister's hand and waiting at the end of the hallway near the back door. Hannah, my older sister, ran up to meet me, nearly picking Lillian up as she dragged her across the hallway. The little eight-year-old was bawling, and neither me nor Hannah did anything to stop her. It was best she just let it out.

"Dad says he wants us on the back porch," I said quickly, picking Lillian up and turning around, but before I could start back down the hallway, Hannah put a firm hand on my shoulder, not turning me around, but not letting me go, either.

"Avi, listen, I was told not to tell you this"—I stopped squirming under her grip and my breath caught in my throat—"but there's a chance we might not make it out of this, so I thought you should know." She took in a deep breath and for a moment her grip softened on my shoulder. My chest throbbed. We never kept secrets from each other. "Do you know the way Mom lost her hearing? Well, it wasn't from disease, like you probably thought. It happened because she and Dad were once... were once..." her speech faded to a halt, and when I finally turned around to face her, her eyes were glossy and her grip loosened so much her hand fell to her side, and she just stood, and I stood watching her with Lillian in my arms doing the same. My attention snapped back to it when I heard another explosion, accompanied by the cries of villagers and Lillian's gasp. I let Lillian down and took Hannah's hand instead. I tried to pull her toward the back door, but she stood as still—and as strong—as a statue, ensuring that I would not be able to move her without some serious strength, which I didn't happen to have with me.

Then I heard a loud explosion from just outside our house, shaking the front door on its hinges and rippling the picture frames hanging on the walls. I struggled to keep balanced and panic ran through me when I spotted Hannah tipping over like a stiff board. I stepped forward to try to catch her, but the floor shook and I fell to my knees instead, Lillian letting go and stumbling over my leg to the floor. I heard, faintly, her cries as I searched my blurring, panicked vision for where Hannah had fallen, but I couldn't make out my own hand as I clutched the floor to keep consciousness. I removed a hand from the floor and flailed about to find Hannah, but only a voice met my efforts. I had to listen to hear it, and even then it was a weak, meager, soprano voice, failing to cut into the air with confidence as she normally did.

"I'm... not who you need to worry about anymore." Hannah whispered weakly, and I heard her cough through the smoke and debris. "Mother and Father, they were in the attack a long time ago, and they... said... and y-you—you were... you are..." the smoke cleared enough for me to make out her face, her long blond locks falling around her pale complexion, now covered in soot and the light in her eyes retreating. "Take Lilli..." her eyes slid up and met mine, the last life she had meeting my gaze with a certainty I had never seen before, and I caught a streak of blood run down her forehead before I turned around and took Lillian's hand, making my way back down the hallway and toward the door, leaving her behind in the attack. "And run."