Guardian of the Night

5

No sooner had she thought it than she regretted it. As she turned back toward the door, supporting the man, her hand gripping his belt to keep him upright, than an entire section of the ceiling came crashing down, sending sparks and splinters flying. A gap remained. Tiny. Far too close to flames that seemed to have a life of their own, but a gap, nonetheless, and she had no other option remaining to her. She dragged the man that way, wrapping his arm about her shoulders as she side-stepped burning materials.

A cracking sound brought horror to Bilain. Despite the intensity of the heat, her skin turned ice-cold as she looked upward. A beam had broken. It trembled as the weight of the burning upper floors continued to fall upon it and Bilain realised she hadn't wished her husband 'good morning'. Nor had she told him any number of dozens of times how much she loved him and felt gladdened they had met. As the beam cracked once more, she shoved the man as far as she could toward the doorway and closed her eyes, awaiting the end.

The end did not come, however. Not the flaming end, burning to a crisp in the act of saving one man, nor the end of the beam and the entirety of the weight of the upper floors falling upon her, breaking her, crushing her. She lived! How she still lived, she could not imagine, but the Patrons had given her this opportunity and she could not waste it. She need only open her eyes, collect the man and escape to safety.

The figure stared at her. Shadows flowed and swelled across them, blackening any and all features, save for the eyes and those eyes held Bilain's eyes even as the figure's hands held up the burning beam above their head. They were in pain, Bilain could see that, the flames snaking across their hands but not burning the skin. It still hurt them, even if it didn't damage them. Bilain didn't know why she hesitated, but she did, staring at the mysterious creature of shadow that had terrorised the criminals of The Sprawl over the last two nights.

"Run." The figure spoke, a rasping, hissing voice that hid the pain they felt.

Bilain could do nothing but do as the figure ordered. She ran for the door, collecting the man as she came near him, lifting him, dragging him out into the less smoke-filled air. As she fell to her knees, turning to look back at the building, she heard a crashing sound, sparks and flames billowing out of the door and the entire building collapsed in upon itself.

-+-

A fit of coughing wracked her body and she tore the dried scarf from her face, gladly accepting the bucket of water dropped in front of her. As she scooped water into her mouth, she looked for the man she had dragged from the building. He looked unconscious, but his chest rose and fell, halting, but alive. All about her, people continued to fight the remainder of the fire but, this time, they appeared to have contained it. Only dark, smouldering smudges marked the other buildings.

"Did they get out?" She grabbed the first person near to her hand, pulling them close. "Do they live?"

"Who?" The woman frowned as she looked toward the man to the side. "You saved him, Watch Captain."

"No! Not him!" She struggled to her feet, assisted by the woman, and stepped nearer the flaming remains of the building. "The shadow. They ... they gave us time. They ..."

Her legs collapsed from beneath her and she began to cough once more. She would suffer for this for days, if not longer. Too much of that black, choking smoke had made its way into her lungs, but she could not have stood by as a man burned to death. Neither, it seemed, could the mysterious person of the shadows.

Visions of that stranger flashed through her mind as others laid her upon her back. Those shadows that appeared to crawl across their body, as though alive, hiding features, body. She remembered those eyes, though. Piercing dark eyes akin to those of Larissans, or of those from the Orususk region. Perhaps the Steppes. Nothing else gave her any idea who the stranger was, or where they came from.