Almost there. Another three yards to reach the far side of Broadway, and his ears were ringing with the shouts and noise, the unceasing din of the panic-stricken city. They fought their way through the throng, traveling faster and more recklessly than they had earlier tonight, now that there was no longer a small body to protect, no longer a child's strides to accommodate.

He could hear David's strained breathing behind him. Knew that if he looked back, he'd find David's eyes still red and swollen, even though David had pulled himself together long ago, shoulders drawn painfully straight by urgency and duty.

They had a deathgrip on each other's shirts now. The turbulence of the crowds threatened at any moment to tear them apart. They both had the same destination, knew the routes to get there alone if they needed to, but the thought of being cast adrift in this chaos was too awful to contemplate.

Even from here, more than half a dozen blocks north of where they had last unsuccessfully attempted to cross Broadway, the column of smoke was still visible, though the dragon that had caused it no longer was. The dragons seemed to torch only sites here and there, animals hunting not for sport but only for enough to feed upon. There must have been enough on that single block of the huge street, packed end to end with people, to satisfy the beast. All those people, all that screaming...

But whether the dragons burned one block or ten, the fires would continue to spread. The dense forest of buildings—their timber dry from the heat of summer, their stairwells and elevator shafts waiting like open paths to channel the leaping flames upwards—would only stand for so long.

It would be the Great Fire of Thirty-Five all over again. The papes, despite Fire Chief Croker's protests about maintaining calm, had been swift to bring it up again and again these last few months: prophecies of doom spelled out in sensationalistic reminders. The city back then, younger, less teeming, had burned out of control from a single warehouse fire. Fifty buildings, the papes blared, had succumbed in quick succession in the first half hour. There were no high winds tonight as there had been back in that disastrous winter sixty-five years ago, but it was only a matter of time. It had been two weeks before the last of the extensive blaze had been finally stamped out, and it had taken the combined efforts of firemen from nearby and as far away as Philadelphia, plus the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, to do so.

What chance did the city, brought to its knees by attacks, have now?

Near Jack, an elderly man let out a guttural cry as his cane slipped, sending him sprawling into the path of an oncoming carriage.

"Stop!" Jack shouted, knowing it was no use. There was no time to lift the man to his feet; Jack could only haul him from the middle of the lane one-handed as the pair of horses bore down on them with only inches to spare. A clattering sound and a glance out of the corner of his eye told him David had kicked the cane from under their hooves and snatched it up. Jack dragged the old man upright, grabbed the cane and pressed it into the man's frail grasp.

"Out of the way, rat!" the carriage-driver bellowed at Jack, drawing back his horse-whip. On any other day Jack would have effortlessly sprung back to the curb, out of reach. With the wall of people pressed close around them now, there was nowhere for him to dodge and he turned so the blow wouldn't fall on his face, bracing himself for the inevitable. The whip cracked—he heard the grunt of pain, not comprehending for a moment that the sound hadn't come from himself, and he looked up to see the tip of the rawhide lash wrapped around David's upraised forearm.

Impervious to the curses Jack hurled after him, the driver yanked the whip free as the carriage rumbled past and Jack wrenched his attention away from the man, turning to clamp both hands around the bloody welt on David's arm. "You...dumbass," Jack choked in disbelief. "What'd you go and do that for?"

David looked a little dazed, and Jack pushed and pulled and elbowed pedestrians aside until he got them both at last to the sidewalk, leaned David against the front marble column of the nearest building. When he loosened his grip, he could see crimson still oozing sluggishly through the torn blue-striped sleeve. He ripped the kerchief from around his neck, bound it tightly about the gash.

There was still dried blood on David's palms and fingers, from the stairwell, from the pipe. Jack wiped them on his own gray shirt, knowing he couldn't erase the stains entirely from David's hands, knowing he couldn't just leave them there.

"I had to," David said softly.

"I know." Jack caught him in a brief, fierce hug. "But you'se still a dumbass."

By the time they finally rounded the turn onto King from Varick Street, Jack's lungs were heaving painfully. Without warning, dark spots swam before his vision; he stumbled, throwing out a hand to catch himself against the side of the nearest building. The granite corner bit into his forearm, but he hardly felt it, staring down the length of King.

Somehow, despite all that they had seen tonight, he hadn't pictured this. Not this street, this one street where mother and father and safe haven waited at the end of their desperate journey uptown. Hadn't pictured the buildings on either side cloaked in such deep shadows, hadn't pictured crumbled masonry and what looked like smouldering beams. Next to him, David made a low, wordless sound of despair.

Two blocks. Just two blocks left to go on King, straight west, and maybe things would be all right there. There wasn't much fire to be seen, just the haze of smoke that seemed to hang over the entire city, pervasive and choking.

It was David who got them moving again. He pulled on Jack's arm, and together they staggered their way past deserted storefronts and lodgings. Here and there a structure had collapsed, the remnants of flames within, sometimes marked by long streaks of ash that trailed out onto the cobblestones. Every street-corner fire alarm box they passed had been thrown open in a vain call for help that had never come.

A pair of smashed wagons, obviously victims of a collision, blocked the middle of the roadway. Jack felt tell-tale stickiness on the sole of his boot, grabbed David out of the path of a spreading pool of blood. A lone horse lay unmoving between the shafts of one of the wagons; moonlight revealed a thick wooden spar driven deep into its ribcage.

A booted leg protruded from under one huge wheel. Jack dropped to one knee to peer beneath, reaching to pull the trapped man free. He quickly rose again, breathing hard, a hand over his mouth. Oh christ, there—there wasn't anything left to pull—

"Hashkiveinu Adonai Elokeinu l'shalom," David was murmuring almost inaudibly, words spilling from his lips unlike any Jack had heard from him before. It sounded like a prayer, a supplication. "V'ha'amideynu malkeinu..." He faltered, voice cracking. "Malkeinu..."

Four women ran past, hysterical in their fear, heedless of the terrible viscous puddle. It splashed obscene patterns over the hems of their long skirts, glistening on the dark fabric. Jack pushed his partner behind him, blocking him from the spray out of sheer reflex.

The two of them slid around the wreck, picking up their pace, passing darkened doorways and ruins strewn on the cobbles. By now, he knew this street almost as well as he knew Duane. How many trips had he made here over the last year? How many slow walks, loitering because the day's selling had been good, because they wanted just one more minute to pretend the jingling coins in their pockets could be blown whole-hog on Western dime novels and trips to the theatre? How many races home with Les, because Esther had laughingly threatened not to leave them any dumplings if they were late for supper yet again?

They were racing home, now, and there wouldn't be supper waiting, and Les...

Oh god, there! The tenement block rose into sight out of the night, its walls still standing, no snapping flickering orange glow in its windows. Their boots pounded on the roadway. Four doorways to go, now, three doorways—

Abruptly, he was dragged to a halt. He turned to find David staring at him, petrified, white-faced.

"Dave, what is it?"

Nothing. David's fingers only tightened on Jack's sleeve.

Jack took a step forward. "You hurt—?"

David shook his head, then backed up a few paces, to the large pile of blackened debris they'd just passed on the sidewalk. They'd passed countless others just like it, had ignored them all, but Jack's breath caught in his throat as he recognized the shape as barely human. Half...a human.

David dropped to his knees beside it, shaking hands reaching out to turn it over.

Underneath, where it had been pressed to the ground, the figure wasn't burned. Jack lurched backwards at the familiar sight of the strong, straight nose, the full salt and pepper mustache, the firm chin.

The blackened shape had meant nothing to Jack, but the son knew. He knew. David was doubled over, his fist in his mouth, strangled cries sounding like they were being torn from his chest. Jack fell to the cobbles beside him, worked a thumb into the corner of David's jaw and pried his fist loose before he could rend it to shreds. Kept his own face averted from the body, from what was left of the body.

Think. He had to think. If Mayer was here, then—

He ran his palm helplessly over the back of David's neck, bent to his ear. "Stay here, David, please." Don't you dare go away, don't you dare. Don't you dare.

Jack leaped to his feet and sprinted for the tenement door.