Shandi Mitchell - Under This Unbroken Sky

They feel its devouring heat. Partridges explode from the bush; flames lick up the branches. The fire converges in a muskeg knoll and ignites the tops of the trees. A burst of wind drives the sparks toward the firebreak. They watch them float to the ground like fireworks, a gentle rain extinguishing itself. The few that make it to the earth alive pulse red on the ground. Teodor stomps them dead.

“Myron, water!” Myron grabs a bucket and drenches the throbbing embers.

“Over there, there’s more,” Lesya shouts.

“Stay in the firebreak,” Teodor hollers as he rushes to the next threat. It is the southeast corner that might get hit.

“Water it down!” Teodor yells to Anna. She pushes against the barrel, a sharp pain stabs her side. She pushes harder and the barrel slowly tips and topples over, drenching the ground. The fire catches in the thick underbrush and smothers low. A rabbit bursts from the trees, zigzags madly across the firebreak, and charges past Anna into the wheat. The flames roll across the spruce trees and wrap away from the field.

“Keep going, keep going…” Teodor wills it onward.

A snake of flame shoots up the trunk of a hollow, dead tamarack. It flares alive, writhing to the upper limbs. The wood pops and snaps, a burning torch illuminating the upturned faces. The trunk cracks and branches crash to the ground, shattering into fire. Teodor grabs a bucket and races toward the tongue flickering through the weeds. He hurls water on the beast, cutting off its head. Around him dry grass erupts into halos of flame. He jumps on one, crushing it back. Another erupts to his right. A gust of wind swirls around him and a trail like spilled gasoline whooshes past. The wind slams Teodor in the face, directly from the east.

“Get back!” he screams to Myron. “Get back!” The fire rears its head behind him. They scramble for the firebreak with flames biting at their heels.

“Drop the water!” Teodor orders.

Lesya and Dania push their barrel over and run for the next. Anna strains to topple the third. The barrel groans over and slams against the earth. The ground is so dry that the water skims the surface and spills into the cracks disappearing instantly. Sofia struggles to overturn her barrel, but she can barely jostle the water. She leans against it. The fire rolls toward her, floating low across the prairie, a cascade of iridescent orange. Myron slams against her barrel. Water splashes over her shoes, soaking her stockings. “Get more water!” Myron yells at her as he runs to the next barrel.

The horse tugs and snorts against its restraints as Sofia climbs aboard the cart, tossing her onto the floor. She struggles to fill the bucket, slipping on the boards, as she is jostled by the horse’s fear. “Hurry!” Myron screams. She is running back with the bucket clanging against her knees, water slopping down her legs, when the flames reach the firebreak. The fire roars upward, screaming against the impasse. It climbs straight up, twenty feet, howling its rage. She can see its eyes, looking straight at her. Sofia falls to her knees, unable to move. Teodor hurls water at the demon; it sputters and groans, before opening its mouth wider. Dania tears the bucket from Sofia: “Get up!” Sofia buries her face into the dirt and covers her head.

A deer, its coat singed, leaps through a hoop of flames, its hooves crash into the ground beside Sofia. Its eyes wide, its sides heaving, it bolts sideways and plunges through the wheat.

Lesya passes a full bucket to Anna and runs back for another. Sparks spit across the dirt barrier, igniting half-buried, tangled, dried roots. Anna’s cloak trails through sparks. They grab the fabric and flare up her leg. She watches mesmerized as a blue-yellow flame circles her. “Mama!” Lesya screams, the word sounding foreign to her ears. Teodor reacts instantaneously, smothering the flames with a blanket.

“It’s cold,” Anna marvels. But he doesn’t have time to ponder her words.

“Take her to the cart,” and Lesya leads her through the wheat, not understanding the smile on her mother’s lips.

The fire licks along the firebreak, rushes to the southeast corner, and surges around the rock wall. Dozens of snakes slither from their hiding place. They writhe across the ground, coiling over Teodor’s boots. Wild daisies curl and shrivel in the heat. The ground steams and hisses, grows hot underfoot. The fire twists upward and slams down, stretching across the barren ground, its fingers groping for the wheat. Teodor beats it back with wet blankets. With each waft of the cloth, sparks rage upward. His face wears the fire’s reflection, red and twisted, filled with hate, two demons dancing in the screaming light. Teodor pummels back the flames.

The children rush to his aid, hurling buckets of water, tripping and falling, sparks raining down on their arms and hair, stinging them. They stumble over one another. Myron grabs a bundle of soaking burlap and unfurls it over the southeast corner. The wheat collapses under the weight. The smoke blinds them. They choke on the heat.

“More water!” Teodor yells, losing ground, his back pressed up against the wheat.

Lesya and Dania reach the cart simultaneously. They jump onboard. Lesya rams her knees against the sidewall but doesn’t feel the pain. They force their buckets into the barrels and yank them out full.

“More water!” he screams as the fire rears up behind him. Dania jumps over the side, her foot rolls in a gopher hole, and she crashes to the ground. The bucket slops over, emptying its contents. She looks to her father, knowing she has failed. The fire howls and spirals downward, a crashing wave of flame. It barely licks the tips of the grain… and the wheat ignites. With blinding white intensity, the stalks explode.

“Go to the lake!” Teodor tramps down the wheat to intercept the flames. “Now, goddamn it! Now!”

And they run. Dania grabs Sofia and hoists her into the cart. Lesya drags Anna, who is riveted by the fire’s wild beauty. As far as the night reaches, the flames rage. The entire world is on fire.

“Cut the barrels,” Teodor yells as he unrolls wet burlap behind him. Myron rushes in with another wet blanket to carpet the wheat.

Teodor tears the blanket from his hands. “Go with your sisters!”

“I’m staying here.” Teodor shoves him, knocking him to the ground. “Get the hell out of here!” He kicks him in the ass. “Go!” In that moment, Myron hopes his father fucking burns to death. He runs blindly to the wagon and wrenches the reins from Dania. The horse bolts even before Myron whips it. Lesya and Dania throw themselves on the barrels to keep them upright.

“Let them go!” Teodor calls after them. “Drop them!” Dania pushes over the first barrel. Water floods the cart and pours off the back, soaking the crushed wheat flattened by the horse and wheels. The cart cuts a swath through the grain. Fire crashes against the firebreak. Only the southeast corner has been breached. Dania looks back at her father, beating down the grain, shrinking against the backdrop of flames.

The water trickles to a drizzle. The empty barrel bangs and rolls against the cart. Dania clings to the side as the horse gallops madly through the night. “Drop it!” she yells. Lesya squeezes between the barrel and the side and heaves. The wagon slams into a hole and jolts upward, driving the loose, empty barrel against her crippled leg. The pain explodes white in her head.

“Drop it!” Dania screams.

Lesya strains against the weight pinning her leg, she throws her body against the full barrel. Again and again she slams into it, until slowly it teeters and falls, releasing a stream of wetness that slicks a glistening trail behind them through the flattened grain.

“GET UP!” MARIA SHAKES KATYA, CURLED UP ASLEEP IN a blanket on the ground, and pulls her to her feet. Katya groggily looks up at the night sky turning into day and the stars falling from the sky like angels. She feels the ball of Christ warm and sticky in her clenched hand.