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He allowed Cicilia to help him onto the sill, and then he jumped. Cicilia watched him fall and breathed a sigh of relief when Alexander caught him, too. She could see Nathair approaching with the Humphries and Katie, meaning she was the last one in the house.
Good. I dinnae have to worry about me family. Now I can worry about me.
She stepped up onto the windowsill just as the door exploded behind her, sending sharp wooden pieces flying everywhere.
“Jump, Cicilia!” Alexander urged.
She did.
She felt like she was falling for years, and then she was in his arms, her weight sending them both crashing back into the hay pile, their bodies pressed close together. He clutched her to him, his hand on the back of her head to prevent her from injury, and they finally rolled to a stop.
Breathing heavily, staring at his messy hair and soot-stained face, she whispered, “Ye saved me life.”
Alexander’s responding look was so intense that Cicilia almost forgot everything else, but then Nathair was helping her to her feet, then pulling Alexander up, too. The twins rushed to her side, both grabbing at her hands.
“What about me toys?” Annys said sadly.
“Me clothes!” Jamie sobbed.
Cicilia couldn’t answer. She stared in transfixed horror as her home, her parents’ house, shone like a terrifying beacon in the night. Alexander and Nathair led them all to stand a little further back, away from the danger. At some point, Alexander’s arms were around her in comfort, but she barely noticed.
Her siblings, her servants, and she were alive. But she’d lost the pigs, lost the goats, lost the sheep…and now the house, too.
Eventually, she turned into Alexander’s chest and dissolved into sobs so powerful they shook her whole body while he held her.
I failed. I failed.
The Humphries suggested that they all go to stay with Jeanie and Ewan, but it was impossible to do so tonight. The village was a long ride by horse—too long for the adults at night, never mind two sleep-deprived, terrified children.
In the end, all of them holed up in one of the huts on the property that were built for the farmhands. Joshua, the animal healer, lived on his own, so he offered the space. Nathair, Katie, and the Humphries all slept in other cabins. Still, even then, it was an uncomfortably tight fit for Cicilia, the twins, and Alexander.
Nobody slept well that night.
The next morning, Alexander took Cicilia to examine the damage of the house. He felt like his eyes must be deceiving him, where there had been a house, there was now a skeletal structure, burned black as coal. The half-standing walls were damaged, and smoke still rose from the ashes.
Nothing inside could have survived the inferno.
He glanced nervously at Cicilia to see her staring open-mouthed at the shell of her home.
I’m sorry. I should have done somethin’.
What could he have done? He didn’t have an answer for that, but he felt guilty nonetheless. “I…” he started.
“Me home,” Cicilia said softly, her voice cracking. “Nae body could live here. It’s destroyed. How could this happen? I dinnae…I cannae…Angela would never leave the stove burnin’. How…?”
“I’m sorry,” he said because there was nothing else to say. “Can I help ye salvage?”
She nodded quietly, and the two of them traversed into the smoldering remains of the house, picking up the little bits and pieces which had retained even part of their shape after the blaze. They found one or two of the twins’ more hardy toys and a slightly charred necklace that Cicilia had inherited from her mother.
An’ little else but a few tattered rags. How is she gonnae go on wi’ her whole life in flames?
Cicilia disappeared into the ruined kitchen and returned with a sack of money, which she told him had been protected in a cold stone hidey-hole, which gave Alexander some relief. At least she had some coin other than that which resided with the bankers.
They rooted around for around an hour before they gave it up, and their meager pile of possessions sat sadly on the ground before them.
Alexander had the nagging feeling, as he surveyed the pile, that he was forgetting something. He’d given up on his own belongings. It didn’t matter too much, he hadn’t brought anything particularly important along with him. But still, for some reason that he could not identify, looking at what they’d managed to save filled him with an aching sense of loss. It wasn’t the ache of empathy, either, it felt like something had been torn from his own heart.
But he couldn’t focus on that now, not when Cicilia looked so lost and distraught. His attention, all of it, must be on her, and how he could possibly help her out of this plight.
