A Peculiar Time in 1944 - A Millard Fanfic (Miss Peregrine's Home) #wattys2020

Chapter 67

"She went back for the baby." He said before he dashed back the way they'd came, Enoch shouting behind him that he'd never find the way back in the dark.

oOo oOo oOo

It hadn't been easy that was for sure but by some miracle he'd made it. He charged up the ladder, out of Wren's tomb and out the cathedral. He nearly stopped in shock when he left the building. It looked like the whole city had caught fire and somewhere in the ruin was Aurora. He had no idea where to start looking and ended up just running looking left and right so fast he thought his head would snap off. The sirens were still blaring, the street they had walked only hours ago was pelted with giant craters. He wasn't sure what stopped him maybe the idea that it was still the one place that would draw Aurora even during an air-raid: the library. It was a smoking ruin now snowing ash and burning pages but he knew it's where she would have gone, or at least it's where he hoped to find her.

The roof had been blown to bits but the four walls of the structure still stood, many were still lined with bookshelves, which Millard thought was an odd sight as he searched. The floor of the building was covered in what used to be the roof along with several books and broken pieces of furniture. Some of the beams were still resting across the top of the shelves while some had collapsed onto a slant. Then he saw her, a bookshelf had fallen forward and created a small triangle of space where she crouched with a bundle in her lap. Her braid was speckled with white ash along with her clothes but she otherwise looked alright.

"Aurora!" he called as he ran up to her. She immediately turned at the sound of his voice. He practically collapsed beside her and he pulled her to his chest.

"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I had to go back!"

"It's okay." He said holding her tighter, "You're safe that's what matters."

They sat like that for a long moment with him cradling her like she was an infant herself. Then the ground shook with another bomb making impact and they realized they had to find the others. Millard helped her up while she held the baby and they headed back for the cathedral. They ran into the group as they ran down the cathedral steps, Millard didn't have to guess what they were running from so he and Aurora bolted away from St. Paul's with them. They must have run all the way from the loop entrance because it didn't take long for them to start slowing down from exhaustion. Jake led them to a row of houses, they looked for one that was empty but with all the lights out and windows boarded it was impossible to tell. Then Jake grabbed Horace.

"Choose."

"What? Why me?"

"Because I trust your random guesses more than my own."

"But I never dreamed about this!"

"Maybe you did and don't remember. Choose!"

Horace closed his eyes for a second and pointed, "That one."

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The front door was locked but Bronwyn wrenched off the knob and they all filed into the dark hallway. Then Bronwyn closed the door and blocked it with a table she found. All the commotion caused the baby in Aurora's arms to start crying, it wasn't full sobbing, just tiny whimpers and Aurora started rocking the little girl trying to calm her down before she made too much noise.

"You really went back for that?" Enoch scolded her in a whisper. "Are you mad? Don't we have enough problems?"

"Leave her alone Enoch." Millard defended in a harsh whisper of his own as Aurora consoled the baby.

"Hush little one." She said softly as she rocked the child in her arms. She brushed the wisps of blonde hair out of the girl's face as she looked up at Aurora with bright blue eyes full on innocence.

"Who's there?" came a voice from deeper inside the house alerting them that they weren't alone.

"You were supposed to pick an empty house." Jake turned to Horace.

"I'm going to hit you very hard." Horace muttered.

"Who is there?!" The voice demanded again.

"We aren't thieves or Germans or anything like that!" Emma called back, "Just here to take cover!"

There was no response so Emma took Jake and they walked deeper into the house. When they'd diffused the tension they gave the rest of them the all clear. They ended up all huddled in a bathroom, one girl sitting on the toilet with a lantern and another girl in the tub.

"Where are your parents?" Olive was first to ask.

"Father's shooting bad people in the war. BANG!" the girl in the tub – Esme – said looking excited.

"And your mother? Where is she?" Bronwyn asked this time.

"A long time dead." The other girl – Sam – spoke up. "So when Father went to war they tried shipping us off to family elsewhere. Because Father's sister in Devon is terribly mean and would only take one of us, they tried shipping Esme and me off to different places. But we jumped off the train and came back."

"We won't be split up." Esme declared, "We're sisters."

"But why are you in the tub dear?" Aurora asked shifting the baby to her hip, luckily the infant was old enough to hold up her own head, and she rested it on Aurora's shoulder with a couple fingers in her tiny mouth. Aurora couldn't resist kissing the top of her head lovingly.

"It's safe in the tub. Maybe you should get in too. That way we'd all be safe. Bombs can't get you in the tub."

"Thank you, dear, but we'd never fit." Aurora smiled. Then another bomb fell somewhere and shook the house.

"What sort of madness have you led us into?" another girl asked and it was only then that Aurora noticed that the group had not only returned with Joel and Peter but a girl holding a pigeon too.

"I warned you Melina." Emma replied as the girl held her trembling pigeon. Aurora had several questions but knew they'd have to wait. Instead she held the baby tighter as she and Millard got comfortable on the bathroom floor. She leaned into his embrace and pretended they were living a completely different life. They weren't in the middle of a war, they were in their living room. They weren't running for their lives, they were listening to the radio after supper. The baby in her lap wasn't an orphan she was their daughter and when they tucked her into her crib Millard would stay and read her a Tale while Aurora made a pot of tea before bed.

For the library description I based it off a black and white picture I found when I searched 'bombed library' in google. There were even people browsing the shelves in the photo. I liked that even in war people still visited a ruined library for something to read.