Flames

Prologue

1775

“Stay back, Abigail!” the woman’s graying hair was flying loose from her high bun, altering her vision for a millisecond as she pushed the little girl behind her long skirt. She faced the cruel world, stone faced, standing her ground.  This is their home; nobody can take them away from it, nobody. Men in tattered white shirts and dirty brown breeches ran across the land with long rifles, shouting something she couldn’t make out. Red uniforms marched in lines, some falling but soon being replaced by other living red coats. The little girl behind her started to sob as the gunshots rang out; the last yells of the dead were heard as well as the shouts of the living, and cannons blew trees to kindling and they were getting closer.

 The woman stood still by her white house. Perhaps they should go, she thinks, but then remembers her husband, Al, storming out of the house, grabbing for the rifle as she put her hand on it to say no.  He shook is balding head and left them both behind, tearing out of the safety of the house and into the smoky, unpredictable world outside. “I must do this,” he said as he stood at the bottom of the porch stairs looking up at her lined face, “Jane, this will make a difference. We can beat them! I know we can! I promise this will make a better tomorrow!” then he was gone. Gone into the bloody, battered battlefield, before she could protest, before she could say she loved him. 

 The gunshots became louder and closer, “Gramama!” a little voice shouted into her petticoat.  The little one, she’d almost forgotten.  God knows where her parents were. Probably petitioning somewhere in Boston, or New York; she didn’t know anymore.  Jane took Abigail’s hand and took her down into the cellar where she told her that she’ll be back soon and to not move. 

 Jane closed the wooden cellar door and went into the kitchen where she could see the battle out of the small window.  She prayed for her husband to come back alive instead of her having to only see him in stone. How she longed to go out and fight alongside them, she was strong enough, she knew how to wield a gun and she had something no one else had.  But to use it, it would mean total destruction; everyone would be dead instead of just those awful red coats.  What to do, what to do.

 The idea formed fully in her brain.  She didn’t like it, but it was better than the other choices.  She tore out of the house, pulling up her skirt and petticoat to run faster. Damn society, nobody cares in a war. The grass had wet droplets of dew that attached to her feet and legs, making them damp and cold as the wind blew her untidy hair and skirt back as she ran.  The sky had begun to brighten, painting orange and pink clouds in the sky.  She must hurry. It must be done soon.  The shouts reached a climax, as each enemy tried to destroy the other.  Slaughter, comes to mind, she thinks as she nears the tall, green trees.  It’s now or never, Jane takes a deep breath and relaxes her muscles, which is hard to do from all of the sprinting she’d done.  She held out her hands in front of a wise, thick tree trunk and her shoulders began to tingle, and then started to burn.  The heated sensation made its way through her arms and into her fingertips then settling in her palms. Flames erupted from the central part of her hands, igniting the tree.  She moved to a second, smaller tree and did the same.  Jane did this until she saw the fire start to spread, catching on dried leaves, live bushes, random patches of grass connected to green veined trees. 

 Jane backed away, aware of the crunch of the leaves as she set each foot down.  She must get back home, they must get back home.  She started to hear shouts of warning and a stampede of feet flying, racing away from the fire and that’s when she ran; sprinting back to Abigail and maybe, hopefully Al.  The sun was now hidden by the thick black smoke that cut lives short itself.  She hoped the men had had some sense to them and ran, saving their lives before another could end it. Maybe Al, knowing her had gotten the message, telling him to come home.  Telling him to come home to her and Abigail.

 

 But he didn’t come home. She sat in the wooden rocking chair he had made for her when John was born, waiting for two days and nights for Al to make his way home, before she had to go in the forest and find him. If there were any remains. She searched up and down the charred black woods passing burned bodies for two more days before she found him.  

 His body was blackened, but not burned; wounded and killed by the deadly smoke. He lay propped up on a tree that was not charred by the fire, but thrived.  She made a choking sound as she brought her fingers to her mouth and whispered, “Al.”  Tears fell down her cheek and onto his body as she draped herself over him, to protect him even though she knew there was nothing to protect him from anymore.  She brought her warm hand to his cold head and stroked her thumb gently across his cheek like she’d done so many times before.  Jane held onto him, grieving until she was numb and her eyes were dry.  She released his frosty body, getting herself ready to transport his body back home.

 She dusted the dirt off of her skirt, Al would have told her to anyway.  She wiped her face free of the grime that had stuck to it as she lay on Al and that’s when she saw it.  His last note to her. 

In the dirt next to him, were the words, “I love you.”   

The last remaining tears in her body surfaced, cleaning strips off her ashy face.  “I love you, too,” she whispered to the wind. 

She brought her hands out in front of her, palms up, disgusted by what she had done.  This was all her doing; she made Al die when she only wanted him to be home with her.  She decided then and there; she no longer wanted these powers, they destroyed everything.  Making her think that she was invincible and that she was some sort of hero.  Heroes don’t do things like this.

She raised her hands over his body and a tingling sensation started in her shoulders, then it felt like her veins were becoming intertwined to form a rope.  Then it was as if an invisible rope was brought forth from her hands and entangled Al, lifting his body off of the ground.  Jane showed no sign of pain of lifting his heavy body off of the ground, because to her he was as light as a feather, just like his flying soul.  She carried him with her power back to the house where Abigail was skipping around the wildflowers in the field in front. 

A grave was dug and a stone was inscribed to say, “Alfred Lovett RIP.”  John and Martha had come down to pay their respects and Jane left them with Abigail while she trekked through the forest to an open field.  A medium sized tree stood alone on the rounded hill and she placed her hands on the cool tree.

She’d come back to the place she’d gotten the dreadful, deadly powers years ago and now she was asking the tree to take them back. “Give them to someone worthy of the power. Someone who will use it wisely.  Someone who doesn’t know the power they have. Choose well,” she whispered to the tree.  Blood pumped through her veins and fluid from her shoulders melted and was drained from her arms into the tree.