Chapter 17 – Out of the Flames
Rick and Nadhir had managed to chop away half of the door when the American suddenly faltered. His eyes glazed and he swayed slightly. Nadhir grasped his shoulder and shook him.
"O'Connell! O'Connell, what is it?"
"Ardeth..." Rick whispered. "He's ... "Suddenly, he gasped and his body went rigid. "Oh my God! Ardeth!" Rick threw himself against the door with a fury in the same instant Khayriyyah's cry echoed up the stairs. He hacked away at the wood like a man possessed, his former fear turning to terror at the anguish in the Med-jai queen's voice. When enough of the wood had been turned to splinters, Rick threw aside his axe and began to pull at the timbers with his hands. Other hands reached in to help, but he was unaware of them, unaware of the splinters that were driven deep into his fingers and palms. He was aware only of the need to reach his brother before it was too late, for he knew that if Ardeth died this time, there would be no bringing him back.
After what seemed like an eternity, the opening was big enough to allow him to pass and he dove into the inferno with Nadhir and several of the Med-jai behind him. Abandoning care for fear-fueled concern, they surged down the stairs, ignoring the thick smoke that blinded them and choked them.
"Khay!" Rick screamed. "Where are you?"
"Here! We are here! Hurry!"
The voice was ahead of him, not too far. Rick ducked his head, trying to get below the smoke that obscured his vision. "Keep talking!" he yelled. "I can't see you!"
"Over... here!" Khay yelled, her voice breaking as she coughed. "Here!"
As Rick stumbled forward, a shape began to emerge. He could make out a black shadow among the gray smoke and orange glow, a black shadow that formed into Med-jai robes. Khay was on kneeling the floor, Ardeth lying next to her, his head in her lap. Rick was on his knees before his feet had stopped moving, and his mind reeled at the sight of his brother.
Lying on the floor in the shifting orange and yellow light of the dancing flames, Ardeth looked like a nightmare spectre felled by some violent force. His face was bruised and swollen, his handsome features distorted by the blows that had fallen. His chest was also bruised and Rick could see angry red lines that could only be burns. His eyes rose to Khay's and she could see the horror in them.
"We have to get him out of here," she whispered in a choked voice that barely carried above the sound of the fire.
"Are you hurt?" Rick asked her.
Khay shook her head got to her feet. Rick turned to his left, knowing that Nadhir would be there. Together, they lifted Ardeth up far enough for Rick to get under the warrior's midsection. He stood up, Ardeth draped over his shoulders and headed for the stairs. He could hear the wooden support beams giving way behind him. With a strength he had no idea he even possessed, Rick climbed the stairs as if he carried nothing. He emerged into the light of the upstairs as the electric lamps began to flicker, responding to the beast that ate away at the wires. With several of the waiting Med-jai leading the way, he ran through the house, the rest of the rescuing party and Khay following close behind.
As they made to enter the great room and make for the front door, the floor in the middle of the room gave way and giant flames leapt up into the grand space.
"We have to go another way!" Nadhir yelled as they stopped short. "Marcus, where is the closest way out of here?" He asked one of the Med-jai near him.
The one called pointed back behind them. "The library! Follow me!"
The group followed Marcus as he sprinted back into the hallway and away from the center of the house. He pushed open the library doors with enough force to send the doorknobs breaking through the plaster walls. "There are no doors," he informed them as they filtered in, "but there are plenty of windows."
He took one of the leather reading chairs and sent it flying into the huge picture windows; windows Sidney Black had been looking out only a short time before. Glass splintered and rained down in shards as the heavy chair flew out into the garden. Another Med-jai followed suit and a second chair forged a path through the glass wall. Still, the crashing glass could not cover the sound of the growing fire. Nadhir looked out into the hallway and saw that the floor there was beginning to give way.
"We are running out of time!" he yelled to the room.
Marcus grabbed a tall hook, designed to open and close the venting windows, and cleared away the hanging shards, making it safe to pass. The group ran from the house and into the cool, clean air of the evening, just as the floor in front of the library doors fell into the burning cellar. They slowed only when they had put a great expanse of lawn between themselves and the flaming house.
They were a terrible sight in the moonlight. The robes of those who'd been in the basement had holes burned into them and their faces, where they had not been covered by their face cloths were covered with soot. Rick's white shirt was black and his khaki trousers were now a dull gray. Most of them were coughing, trying to force the smoke from their lungs. Marcus laid his singed outer robe on the ground and Nadhir helped Rick lower Ardeth into Khay's waiting arms.
"How is he?" Nadhir asked softly
"Not good." Khay chafed one of Ardeth's hands in hers. "We must get him to a healer."
"I'll get the car," Marcus volunteered.
"Make it fast, we don't wanna be around when the authorities show up. Come on, brother. Don't do this to me." Rick grabbed Ardeth's other hand and began rubbing that as well. His eyes did not miss the glaring red sores that ringed the strong wrists. After a moment, Ardeth began to cough.
"Help me turn him," Khay commanded, "it will be easier for him to breathe if he's not on his back." Gently the Med-jai king was turned onto his side. The coughing became more intense and Ardeth let out a strangled moan.
"That's it," Rick coaxed, still holding onto to his hand. He could see the warrior struggling to regain consciousness and reached out his other hand to rub Ardeth's shoulder. He felt something sticky beneath his fingers and in the pale moonlight he saw dark smudges that carried the unmistakable smell of blood. Unable to stop himself, he slowly pulled away the cloak that shielded Ardeth's back.
Rick had not felt such anger in a very long time. His whole body clenched with fury and the hands that had worked to soothe his brother were now fisted on his knees. He could feel the anger of those around him as well. It was radiating off the watching Med-jai warriors in waves. He closed his eyes for a moment, knowing that the image of Ardeth's mangled back would be imprinted on his memory forever.
Ardeth's back was crisscrossed with long red slashes, the tattoos that had been so painstakingly imprinted along his spine irreparably damaged. Long red welts rose up along Ardeth's sides in places, welts that were clearly the result of torture by burning.
The Med-jai's torso was bruised in so many places it was unclear if there was any unmarked skin left. Rick felt certain that the swollen areas around Ardeth's ribcage were indicative of broken, or at the very least cracked, bones. Ardeth continued to cough, and his body pulled itself inward, trying to ease the pain that wracked him. When he moved his legs, Rick could see that more burns had been dealt to the insides of his brother's thighs.
"He's mine," Rick ground out through teeth that were clenched so tightly he felt his jaw might crack.
Nadhir, beside him, gave him a startled look. "What?" he asked, not quite sure what the tall American could possibly mean.
"Whoever did this. He's mine."
To their complete shock, Khay barked out a short, curt laugh. "You're too late," she informed them.
"He's dead?" Rick asked her, sounding very unhappy about that fact.
"How?" her father wanted to know.
"I killed him," Khay told them with blazing eyes and a feral sneer that seemed completely out of sync with her pretty face. "I took the dog's life at the end of my blade. I would that he had faced our justice but there was no time. So I gutted his heart and left him to bleed."
There was silence for a moment while the words took hold. Then, one by one, the Med-jai knelt. Rick watched, slightly dazed, as the silent warriors took out their knives and he thought for a moment they meant to kill her for denying them their prize, but to his amazement, they ran the sharp blades over their hands and drew blood. Then each of them rose and in a grim procession they laid their bloodied hands upon her head.
"What are they doing?" Rick wondered aloud in a whisper.
"They are anointing her," Nadhir told him, his voice thick with pride and another emotion Rick couldn't quite identify.
"As what?"
"As a warrior. They have named her one of their own."
"All Med-jai women are warriors ... aren't they?"
"They are all trained to fight, yes. But to honor one as a blood brother, as one of the sacred, that has not been done in five hundred years."
Having said this, Nadhir slowly rose and sliced his own hand. Tears rolled down his face as he placed it on his daughter's head. Then he leaned over and kissed her cheek. Khay looked up at her father but she shed no tears. Instead, her eyes were bright and determined and they held a strength of character Nadhir knew he had never seen before. The emotion betrayed a moment ago in his voice clamped down hard on his heart and Nadhir recognized it immediately. It was the despair of farewell. As of tonight, the girl he'd raised was gone forever and he would never have her back. In her stead was a woman, fierce and proud. He held her eyes for a moment longer, all the love and pride he felt for her plain for her to see. Nadhir then studied his daughter's soot-black face, wanting to imprint this moment in his mind for, as much as it pained him, it made him prouder than he could ever have words to express. After looking his fill, he left her side and knelt with his clansmen. Then, as one, they bowed their heads to Khayriyyah Bey, Queen of the Med-jai.