Prologue

'Fire! Fire! Alice, wake up! You have to wake up!'

Alice woke up to heat and the acrid smell of burning. She sat up in bed, coughing.

'Mother? Mother, what's happening?'

There was no answer. Her parents' bedroom was at the other end of the house, and so she hadn't really expected them to hear her. However, she could see the smoke beginning to curl underneath her bedroom door.

Father's still awake and he's put too many logs in the fireplace, she thought. That's all it is. He's reading late again and forgotten about it. That must be it.

She knew that wasn't true.

Alice got out of bed, clutching her stuffed rabbit. Rabbit was falling apart from being 'loved too much', as Nanny said. His left ear had been stitched back on, and his fur was rubbed away in several patches, making him look decidedly mangy. He had that look of all well loved toys, in that they looked battered, bruised and decidedly unsanitary, and had never spent a night away from Alice. She gripped him tightly as she opened her door.

The fire was downstairs somewhere, she could hear the flames raging and mutilating her home. The light flickered on the walls, the smoke trailing upstairs to choke her and make her eyes stream.

'Mother? Father!' She ran down the hallway to their door. As she neared it, she could see smoke curling under their door, too. It was coming from inside.

Alice leapt at the door and grasped the doorknob. However, she quickly let go and screamed, as the door was red hot and the metal of the doorknob had burned her hand. Mindless of the heat, she hammered on the door with her little fists. 'Mother! Father! Help me!'

She could hear them coughing inside. 'Come out! We have to get out!' she screamed.

'Alice?' her mother coughed. 'Alice, get out! We're trapped, get Lizzie and get out!'

Alice sobbed. 'Mother...'

'GO!' her mother yelled, then descended into a coughing fit.

She turned on her heel and fled. Lizzie's bedroom was around the corner. She'd wake her up and get out, then go fetch the police, fetch someone, anyone. Someone would save her parents, she was sure of it. She skidded outside Lizzie's door in her bare feet. The floor was getting warmer, the smoke thicker. Alice could barely see through it. Her lungs felt full of it, as if she were drowning in smoke.

'Lizzie!' She tried the door. Locked. Lizzie never locked the door, why had she done so tonight? She slammed her fists against this door too.

'Lizzie! Wake up! Fire! FIRE!'

There was no answer. Crying, Alice tried again. 'Lizzie! Please! We have to go!'

Still nothing. As she hammered, part of the floor gave way, flames licking their way towards her. She tried to scream, but when she inhaled her lungs filled with smoke and ash, and instead she choked. Before the long, the fire had her trapped, having spread between Alice and the stairs.

Sobbing, she tried again. 'Lizzie, please! LIZZIE!' Lizzie never locked her door. She hated locked doors, they made her nervous that she would become trapped. Suddenly, her worst fear had become true. 'LIZZIE!'

Flames began to lap round Alice's feet, burning them. She didn't even feel it. They singed what was left of Rabbit's fur, and began to eat up the hem of Alice's nightgown. Finally she noticed, and batted out the fire with her hands. What now? If she didn't leave, the fire would consume her too.

The window! She ran over and unlatched it, thankful it wasn't too locked. She climbed on the window ledge and looked down, taking a grateful gasp of the cold night air. Would she make it if she jumped? It looked an awfully long way down. There was a few inches of snow, but she thought they wouldn't break her fall.

Alice looked back. The hallway was an inferno now, and Lizzie's door was no longer visible through the smoke and ash.

She tried one last time. 'LIZZIE! WAKE UP!'

There was still no answer.

Fire began to spread below the window, licking it's way up the curtains. She had no other choice.

Alice turned, closed her eyes, and jumped.