Falling Skyward

Chapter Seven: Phoenix Fire

The world seemed to shift as the stars made dizzying streaks across the sky. Lana suddenly felt chilled, vulnerable. She headed toward the house, where the fireplace's blaze seemed dim.

Lana opened the door gingerly, tiptoeing to the foot of the stairs, but as soon as she stepped into the main hall, she met Orrick's stares and smiles.

"So, my dear niece, how did you like the carnival?"

"It was fine." Lana's voice was thin and flat, like a piece of gauze ready to tear with the slightest pressure.

"Come now, is that all you have to say?" His eyes twinkled. "I expect we'll be seeing Direc in the morning."

"No Uncle, I wouldn't think so."

"And why in the Light Bringer's name not?"

Lana breathed deeply and steeled herself. "Because he asked me to marry him and I refused."

The cold darkness outside seemed to seep into the room. Orrick's voice dropped to a ragged whisper. "What am I going to do with you, child? I've done all I can to make your life better, to extinguish these crazy notions so you can survive. And now I hear from Talen that you disobeyed me and spent the entire night with that gypsy garbage."

"They are not garbage. I'm surprised that you could be so uncharitable, so callous. We only stayed to listen to a few harmless stories."

"Harmless. You call breaking your word and mixing with them harmless?"

Lana was about to retaliate but stopped. After a moment, she began again, her voice quiet.

"Why does it bother you when I speak with the gypsies and not the others? Why do they unnerve you so? Is there something about them, about me—about my past and parents you're not telling me?"

Orrick's face grew ashen, his eyes flicking to the intricate box on the mantle. "Lana, don't ask. Please, I beg of you; don't ask me to share something that could only cause pain, for all of us."

"Please, Uncle. I need to know." Lana could feel vitality and warmth spreading through her veins.

Orrick didn't respond.

Lana took advantage of the silence to forge ahead.

"Uncle, what could be harmful in old memories? Why do you keep it from me? Just tell me why?" Her eyes, those black eyes deepened by traces of night, turned to him in desperation.

"You remember enough about that day you came to live with us to know not all memories are good. I am only trying to save you pain." He looked away, unwilling to watch her disappointment. "That letter should have never been written. You should remember your parents as they lived, not as they died."

"Are you telling me no memory is better than those you can offer me?"

"Yes." The unhesitating response staggered Lana. Orrick sounded so unflinching in his resolution, yet there was an eerie uncertainty in his face.

*****

Lana frowned down at the yellowed grease stain in the sink, the fat streaked with rust and speckled with blackened bits. A voice forced her to hide her repulsion as she smiled and waved to Direc through the kitchen window. Direc wore his sweat-crusted working clothes that now fit snuggly around his plump stomach. Grabbing the splintered scrub brush and lye, Lana turned to the sink again.

She began scrubbing vigorously. She washed. She scrubbed. She scoured until thin rivulets of blood dripped from her knuckles and mixed with the grease. Stinging filled her nose and eyes, the fumes strangling her.

Behind her, the baby began to cry. Lana felt her tears spilling into the sink as she continued to scrub tears and blood.

But the stain didn't lessen. The color only deepened until the speckles of black and smears of scarlet seemed to fill the whole sink. And still, Lana scrubbed. Each movement became more frantic. With each pass of the brush, Lana felt little bits of her skin peel and chip away. She scrubbed faster until the skin on her hands peeled away, until the color in her eyes and hair drained into the sink, leaving her transparent.

The blackened drain began to expand, growing until Lana felt herself slip and spiral into its bottomless mouth.

The dream transitioned to pale, shifting embers in a marble fireplace. The birds and roses playing upon the stone mantle were familiar—old friends whose names had faded from her memory. Whispers from the hallway stirred the ash and their featherless wings. She pulled the phoenix-down quilt tight around her and crept toward the light edging the door.

"Dead? Are you sure? But how can that be, when the doctor said . . ."

"Now, it's not my place to judge, but alls I'm sayin' is it weren't no natural death, if you catch my meanin'," a gruff voice replied.

"Oh my. Well, I'd rather pretend I didn't. The poor little dear. How shall I break it to her? I doubt that father of hers would know what to say."

"I think ya got things a bit mixed. It's the king 'oose the poor 'n pitiful one, not the girl. From what I hear, she's the one who drove the queen to . . . well, you know."

"No, I don't know. To what exactly? What are you implying?" The woman's voice became clipped, biting.

"Well, the shame, the guilt an' all of having a girl like that caused her to . . . to do somethin' so unnatural as take her own li . . ."

"Now hush up. I won't hear another word from you."

"But, wha' about the prophecy?"

"What about it?"

"If it weren' for 'er, then we'd all 'ave a chance."

A hot sickness filled her stomach and she had to turn away. She curled up on the bed, feeling the swirling traces of phoenix fire soft on her cheek. Were they talking about her?

Her tiny hands wrapped around her knees as she felt her insides dry up and shrivel into dust and ash. A deep ache split down her chest, a hunger to hear her mother's voice.

Then, the warmth began fading from her cheek as the bed was replaced with spiky, deadened grass. Lana knew where and who she was now, having retraced this sickening memory nearly every night of her remembered life. She tried keeping her eyes closed against the sight, but her eyelids couldn't block the smell of burnt flesh or hide the hollow, echoing silence that surrounded and filled her. Her stomach clenched and churned. Tears leaked from Lana's eyes as she rolled to her hands and knees to vomit. And then she saw it. The field black as obsidian, skeletal trees with charred bark that shimmered in the snow. And the faces—the burnt faces of corpses staring at her with inky eyes.