All the evil he’s done comes back to him, fills him like smoke, and then . . .
It’s blown away.
He’s free. An empty vessel with only his soul—a new soul born of light—resting inside. He looks at the boy in astonishment. He doesn’t even remember letting the other one go, but he’s gone, and his arms are empty. They are his. His mind . . . is his.
Johnson wants to thank the boy. Tell him what he’s done. That he’s saved him. But he can only mumble three words, the most important words:
“No more flies.”
And, briefly, there is peace.
Then, chaos.
Johnson stands and turns, ready to defend the children he’s been hell-bent on destroying. He sees the doors pulled open, the distant light of the tossed lantern, the rush of flame and the waiting oil barrel. He turns and sees Peter dive down, away, grabbing children to bury beneath his own body.
The explosion rocks the room and a gust of burning air hits him.
He sets his feet, stands in front of the few remaining children. Wanting to make himself large as he can, he spreads his arms wide, lifts his head high, the black robe and the flesh of his body the only thing he can offer, the last thing he can offer.
His eye goes wide as the flames roll toward him, blasting the boys who stood closest to the entrance into bits, burning corpses and blowing the flimsy cots into the air as it crosses the room in seconds, a raging bull of fire, and slams into the shield of flesh that is Johnson’s body, who stays on his feet until he can think no more, and his body no longer has a master.
And, by doing so, saves the lives of the children huddled on the floor behind him.
57
THE TRAPDOOR OPENS SO EASILY BENEATH DAVID’S weight that he almost—almost—loses his grip on the coarse knot from which he dangles.
A rickety ladder spills out, almost clubbing him in the head. He manages to avoid it and grip the rungs. He climbs into the attic, flames licking at his heels.
He reaches the cool dark, the ladder already burning beneath him.
Now, he must decide.
And he has to do it quickly.
The high crawlspace goes two ways: south, toward the dormitory （where gray smoke is already filling the air of the attic space）， or east, over the chapel, which leads to another access door at the end of the residence hallway. If he drops down there, he’ll land directly in front of the orphanage’s rear doors, a service entrance used primarily by the staff. And through those doors . . .
Escape.
Freedom.
Life.
David looks one way, toward the smoke-filled attic, where death almost certainly awaits, and then the other, toward salvation.
They’re all dead, he thinks. There’s no way they could have lived through that explosion. Damn you, Poole.
He sighs heavily, having decided.
Then, hunching over to avoid the cross beams, he starts to run.
58
WHEN THE BLAST OF HEAT SUBSIDES, I OPEN MY EYES.
Two bodies squirm beneath mine, and I roll off them, take in my surroundings.
The dorm is ablaze. The beds roast like bonfires and flames carpet the floor, lick up the walls. Half the windows are blown out, and the circulating wind of the storm is twisting and curling the fire burning inside. Flames are dancing.
I see no way out.
I get to my knees, notice the bodies lying next to me. Everyone here seems intact and, for the most part, unharmed. I don’t know if there are others within the flames, but I think I see shadows moving in that forest of heat. I wonder if the blast killed them all, or if some remain to do us harm.
The bodies I landed atop are Timothy and Finnegan. Byron, it seems, had pushed Thomas to the ground and covered him, and they both seem well, if shaken. I look around and see Harry who, despite his servility to Bartholomew, didn’t survive after all. He’s sitting awkwardly, back braced against a wall. His face is blackened, his eyes emptied, leaking down his charred cheeks like cream. I imagine him standing in shock as the flames approached, watching as they tore his flesh and slapped his small body into the wall like a bug.
I want to cry, to scream. To mourn. But there are still five of us. I must save who I can.
But how?
I stand slowly. The heat is intense, but for now the fire seems to be staying away from us. There is only one exit, however, and traversing the room is impossible. We would be dead before we made it halfway, even with the greatest of luck.
Byron steps beside me. He speaks as quietly as he can, not wanting to alarm the others, but it’s hard to hear over the sound of the fire. “Any ideas?”
I shake my head.
I’m still working my tired brain for a solution when a loud thumping comes from above our heads. I look up toward the sound and see, in the corner, positioned near the far wall, a hatch in the ceiling.
Something is banging against it. Once. Twice.
And then it pops downward. A ladder unfolds from above like a miracle.
Then David’s head appears, upside down, from the ceiling. He’s smiling like a madman, and I can’t help but cry out in a rush of joy at seeing his face again.
“Peter!” he yells. “Bring them! Hurry!”
I grab the others by their sleeves, their collars, and begin pushing them toward the ladder.
“Go! Go!”
There isn’t much time.
I take one last look back at the dormitory, the room where I’ve spent a majority of the last ten years of my life. The flames have reached the ceiling. They ripple across it like water, blackening the white plaster.
Time to go.
I follow the others, all but pushing them along. “Hurry!” I yell.
One by one, they start up the rickety ladder.
At the top, David is grabbing hands, pulling them to what I hope is safety.
I try not to think of the flames on the ceiling.
Now Byron is climbing, and I’m right behind him, bringing up the rear. Everyone else, I have to assume, is dead.
I reach the top. The air turns immediately cooler, but is still dense with smoke. David has gathered the others, and they all look at me as I emerge and stand in the crawlspace. It’s dark, but the flames coming through the hatch offer just enough light to see our way.
I’ve only been in the attic once, a long-ago day when Andrew sent me up looking for candles. But that was on the other side of the building, by the chapel, and I have no idea where this will lead, if anywhere.
Thankfully, David seems confident, and the realization strikes me that he must have reached us from somewhere, so we simply need to get back to where he started, and pray it was free of fire.
“Is that . . . everyone?” he says. It takes me a moment to realize what he’s asking, and it hurts my heart to see the surprise in his eyes. When they first attacked, there were so many of us. He has no idea how many have been lost.
But I can’t think of that now, so I only nod. “I’m the last.”
“Okay,” he says, recovering. “Follow me. Stay close and try not to breathe too much of this smoke. Cover your mouth with your shirt or sleeve or something. Right, let’s go.”
We begin moving forward, but make it no more than a dozen steps when the floor in front of us snaps like a breaking tree, followed immediately by a loud, rustling noise. David stops, steps quickly backward, right into Thomas.
“What . . .” I say, but don’t have time to finish my thought before, only a few feet in front of us, the entire width of the attic floor collapses downward in a shower of sparks and black smoke. Flames immediately shoot up through the gap, gulping the new air, pressing toward the rooftop, hungry and deadly and unstoppable.