Neil White - Beyond Evil

He felt them give way, but still the hole wasn’t big enough, and so he kicked again, knowing that time was running out. Then he felt the clean fresh air on his ankle and heard the rattle of a roof tile as it slid down the roof towards the gutter.

The smoke rushed for the new exit. He moved to one side, his head down, spluttering through the cloth, becoming dizzy. Then he punched out some more tiles, the sound of them clattering towards the guttering like loud cracks. Once the space was big enough to get his shoulders through, he ripped off the cloth and took a lungful of night air, let his vision clear, the opaque light of the smoke-filled loft space replaced by the twinkle of the stars, beautiful and bright. Then he felt hands tugging at his leg.

He dropped back down into the loft and shuffled along the roof beams, making the way clear for Donia. Arni was still banging on the loft hatch, jumping up and trying to dislodge it. He grabbed Donia by her jumper and pulled her towards the hole. The chain around her wrist dragged along the beam.

‘Be careful getting down,’ Charlie whispered. ‘Don’t stop. Get to the corner and find a drainpipe. Jump if you have to, but just get off the roof.’

She nodded and paused for a moment, but then there was another bang at the ceiling hatch, and this time it flew to one side, bringing light and then smoke back into the roof space. And Arni.

‘Go,’ he said, and shoved Donia towards the hole in the roof. As she wriggled through, he grabbed the other woman. ‘This is for my conscience only. Don’t let me down.’

‘I’m Gemma,’ she said.

‘I don’t care,’ he said, and once Donia’s feet were through and she was skidding down the roof, Gemma followed. She was agile, and soon he heard them talking on the corner, shouting for the best way down.

Charlie looked around, and he saw Arni climbing into the space, his head appearing slowly, hauling himself up, except that he had the muscles to climb up unaided.

Charlie got his shoulders through the roof again and used his hands against the tiles to clamber up, waiting for one of the rows to give way and make him falter. Arni was screeching with effort behind him. With a grunt of effort, Charlie found himself on the roof, the tiles cold against his back, taking deep breaths as the stars swirled and swam above him.

The sound of Arni’s footsteps on the roof beams in the loft space made him move. Arni was moving quicker than Charlie had, because Arni had the light from the moon to give him a target, half the work done for him already. Charlie looked towards the corner of the roof and saw Donia easing herself over the edge, her hands on the gutter, the young woman holding on to Donia’s jumper, still on the roof. They were not going to get down before Arni made it up there.

Charlie gestured towards them to keep going and then he scrambled to the ridge, sliding slowly to the other side.

He peered over the top, finding a groove between two ridge tiles. Donia was out of sight now, just Gemma following. He could hear noises coming from the roof space. Coughs and grunts of pain.

Charlie put his head to the tiles and tried to suck in some more air. His lungs felt dirty. He could taste the smoke and could feel the fire on the redness of his skin. He turned over for a moment and let the fresh air cool his brow. The stars still seemed to be moving, but they were glowing at him too, small pulses of light. He could hear the crackle of the fire. There were no more screams though. He glanced down and saw the orange glow as the flames burst through the windows. Someone must see it soon. The view ahead was all darkness, no other buildings visible, so the cottage would stand out like a beacon.

There was a crash from inside, and he wondered about the walls. He couldn’t stay up there all night. The house would collapse in on itself soon.

He turned back around and looked down the roof. Gemma was still clambering over the edge. Then Arni’s head appeared, and her fear turned to terror. She wanted to rush but Donia was below her, edging down the wall on the drainpipe.

Arni started to scramble out of the hole in the roof, snarling, knocking more tiles off so that they slid down towards the gutter, rattles in the night. Some flew right off, and the smash on the floor below seemed to take a long time.

Charlie got to his knees and then stayed poised, cat-like, his fingers splayed on the ridge tiles, just waiting for Arni to appear fully onto the roof.

Gemma disappeared over the edge as Arni scrambled onto the roof, up on his haunches, not fazed by the height.

Charlie shouted, to give himself courage, to create a distraction. Arni turned towards him. Charlie leaped over the ridge tiles and ran down the other side, not thinking about himself, focused only on one thing; hitting Arni.

Charlie jumped over the hole in the roof, his feet high and forward. Arni had no time to react as he was hit square in the chest by Charlie’s feet, his breath rushing out as Charlie’s momentum carried him forward. Arni’s feet slid on the roof tiles, and then he was falling backwards, his arms flailing. He hit the tiles hard when he fell. Some of them cracked and joined him in his fall, momentum making him slide towards the edge.

Charlie couldn’t stop his own slide. The stars rushed past him now, his head filled with the crack and rattle of the tiles, his feet pushing against Arni. The field ahead accelerated towards him, and Charlie’s arms were out, palms pressed against the roof, but it didn’t seem to slow him. Arni looked shocked, and as he went, Charlie saw something else in his eyes; fear. He didn’t know when the roof was going to end.

Arni’s mouth opened to scream as the noise of the tiles under him stopped, and there was a second of silence as he seemed to hang there, realisation in his eyes that he was falling to the ground. As he disappeared out of sight, the only sound was that of Charlie’s fight to stop his own slide, until there was the sound of the melon smash, the crack of Arni’s skull on the ground.

Charlie slapped at the tiles, but he was still going, had hit Arni with too much force. He could see where the black sheen of the roof stopped, more of the silvery-green of the grass coming at him, the standing stones coming into view. There was silence as Charlie’s feet stopped kicking out at the tiles and flailed in the air, just the sheer drop beneath him.

Chapter Sixty-Six

Charlie’s hands found the guttering as he slid down the roof, his feet swinging in the air.

‘Dad!’

It was Donia, from below. The word seemed alien, but he didn’t have time to take it in. He glanced down. All he could see were his legs bathed in a flickering orange light as his body swung in front of one of the upstairs windows. The fire must have taken hold upstairs.

He grimaced as the aches in his arms got worse. It was too far to drop but he couldn’t fight the urge to let go, because he wasn’t strong enough to hold on. He looked across to the drainpipe. Donia wasn’t there anymore. She must be on the ground, looking up at him. Gemma was scrambling down. He had to make it across to the drainpipe.

His arms felt like they were being pulled out of his shoulders. He knew he couldn’t hold on much longer, but he tried to shuffle along the gutter.

Then there was the crack of glass, and a shatter, and unbearable heat ripped across his legs. The window had broken, flames roaring out in a rush. His fingers let go of the gutter, from instinct, to get away from the heat. He was falling swiftly, to the sound of a scream from Donia.

His feet hit the ground, hard, and then his body kept on travelling, so that his knees twisted and his shoulder slammed against the grass. Shards of pain shot up his leg and then the night fell still.