Jean Rabe - The Silver Stair

"No!" Goldmoon shouted.

"Orvago, don't!" Gair's words were lost in the crackling of the flames.

The gnoll leapt through a smoky doorway, growling and disappearing behind a wall of flames. The building groaned, seemingly in response to the hairy intruder. Sections of the roof tumbled down, burning and sending stinging ashes into the crowd.

There was a gasp from the other side of the citadel, followed by something like a moan. The noise grew, and there were cries of "Run!" There was a loud crash. Gair didn't need to be there to know that one of the walls had collapsed.

"Orvago is searching for them," Goldmoon's voice was soft. "He can't see them. They're in the basement. No, he's looking up."

Black smoke was billowing into the air now, thick and choking and forcing the crowd back. Over the sound of gasps and groaning beams, the elf heard the sizzling splash of water being uselessly thrown on the citadel.

His eyes were watering from the heat and the ashes, and he rubbed at them.

Sentimental, his father observed. Are they tears for your dwarven friend, or for the animal that shares your tent?

"Can you see inside?" Gair knew he was inches from Goldmoon, that the healer might realize he was talking to a spirit. "Like you saw through the snow?"

"I can't see anything," Roeland answered, thinking the elf was talking to him. "Just fire and smoke. Goldmoon wouldn't let us go in after them. She said it would be suicide, but she would've gone if I had let her."

A stalemate of wills. Fire and smoke and a foolish hairy beast who has given up on the upper levels and is heading for the basement.

"The basement?" Gair repeated.

"As far as we can tell, the fire started on the top floor," Roeland said. "Maybe the roof. Can't see how, though."

The basement, the spirit said. The dwarves fell through to the basement. I think the beast can smell them somehow.

Inside the inferno, Orvago blinked furiously. Water streamed from his eyes, and his breath came in ragged gasps. He couldn't smell the dwarves. All he could smell was the thick smoke and the overpowering acrid scent of burning wood and resin. Through the smoke and the flames, he saw a gaping hole in the floor. He was rapidly running out of places left standing on this level, so he leapt through it.

The smoke was thick in the basement as well, though the heat wasn't quite as bad. The cold of the earth offered a little protection. The gnoll flailed about with his arms, finding broken and burning beams and yowling when the flames caught at his tunic. He batted them out and shuffled forward, peering into the smoke and shadows, using the light from the fire to see bits and snatches of things.

Pots and pans were strewn on the floor, scattered by the people who'd managed to escape. He saw burning blankets and smoldering chests that held someone's cherished possessions. He felt a broken doll beneath his foot.

Above him, he heard the crackling grow louder, then heard a thunderous whoosh. Wood was groaning far above, sounding almost like the timbers on the ship on which he'd been enslaved. He found a wall and pressed himself against it, held his breath, and cringed when the groaning grew in intensity, punctuated by a great crash. Just as the ship's mast had broken through the deck, support beams from above came hurtling down. The flames licking along them leapt out to catch more dry tinder ablaze in the basement.

The gnoll coughed, then found he could scarcely draw in another breath. He fought for air, taking in smoke instead. He fell to his knees, cutting himself on shattered glass and pottery, and tried to inhale more deeply. There… a breath. His face close to the floor now, he crawled forward, arms still out and paws searching.

The gnoll had almost given up when the tips of his fingers brushed coarse hair. He groped about, finding a beard, short and singed, a broad face. He felt the dwarf's chest, barely moving-but it was moving. His paws fumbled about and found the dwarf's belt, and he locked his hairy fingers under it.

Continuing to crawl, Orvago dragged the dwarf's body with him. The gnoll was searching for the stairs now, remembered where they were from his many trips bringing lumber inside. His free paw continued to grope about, pausing only when coughs racked his body. The gnoll was breathing so shallowly now that he felt faint, but he pushed himself onward. He was nearly there when something barred his way.

His fingers moved across a lumpy shape. He felt tattered clothes, thick, short limbs. He put his head to the lump's chest and sniffed. Another dwarf. This one he cradled to his chest as he nudged himself forward, finding the stairs at last and not bothering to see if this second body still breathed. The steps were hot to the touch, brittle like summer twigs, and smoke was pouring down them so thick he couldn't see through it.

The gnoll slammed his eyes shut, took a last gulp of air against the basement floor, and drove himself upward.

"No magic," Goldmoon sobbed. "Not one enchantment to stop such a blaze."

Gair held her close.

"Someone set this fire," she said. "In my heart, I know it. Why? Who?"

The elf opened his mouth to say something but was cut off by words dancing in his head.

You mean you'll tell her it was the Que-Nal?

The elf nodded.

And that you discovered this by talking to the spirit of a man long buried? Misusing the magic she taught you so you could talk to me?

"I have to," Gair whispered.

And that you've known it was the Que-Nal for quite some time? That you could have said something to her weeks ago and possibly prevented this?

The elf stopped and pulled Goldmoon farther away from the flames. The building was groaning more loudly. Great gouts of smoke poured out. Suddenly there was a shape darker than the smoke, large and moving erratically.

"It's the gnoll!" Roeland cried. "He's got the dwarves!" The big man rushed forward, others following closely at his heels.

The gnoll fell, his tunic and hair in flames, the clothing of the dwarves burning, too. Roeland tugged his coat off and batted at the flames even as more pairs of hands were darting in and tugging the gnoll and dwarves away from the building.

"Jasper's alive!" someone cried.

"Redstone, too!"

Roeland continued to slap at the flames, discarding his coat when it caught fire and ripping off his shirt to use that. The former miller persisted until the last of the flames had been snuffed out. Someone else started beating his cloak against the gnoll as the creature continued to be tugged away from the building.

Goldmoon was on her feet, pushing away from Gair and hurrying to the dwarves' side. "Help Orvago," she said, her voice so soft Gair could hardly hear it above the constant crackling of the fire. The elf was quick to oblige, turning the gnoll onto his back and cringing when he saw how badly the hair on his body was burned and how raw the split and bubbling skin underneath looked.

Gair splayed his fingers wide over the gnoll's chest, which was still painfully warm from the fire. He concentrated on his heart, calling forth the mystical energy he'd so recently been using to communicate with the dead. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Goldmoon, and his breath caught in his throat.

The aged healer had one hand on Jasper, the other on Redstone, and she was using her magic to heal two individuals at the same time. The elf had never seen such a feat but did not doubt Goldmoon's ability to handle it.

He returned his attention to his own patient, working hard to find the healing spark and coaxing it to grow like the flames grew behind him. For an instant, he wondered if he possessed the ability to heal the gnoll, the creature being so different from a man. Then he recalled Goldmoon healing Orvago after the incident with the boars. He focused on that memory, pictured it in the back of his mind as the warmth radiated from his chest and down his arms into the gnoll. At the same time, the air grew warmer still from the fire.