The Fire Children by Lauren Roy Read Free Book Online

She’d have a rainbow of bruises, but those would fade soon enough.
    Yulla picked herself up gingerly and side-shuffled to her right until her fingers brushed the tunnel wall. The rope guide on this side was still attached, its length taut where it disappeared back into the rocks. She made a circle with her thumb and forefinger, closing them around the rope. That way she could follow where it led without its coarse length brushing against her still-stinging palms.
    No more voices came from up ahead, but the breeze remained, carrying odd scents to her: cinnamon, she knew, and maybe sage, but they were overwhelmed by something else—metallic and earthy and... hot . Like clay being fired in a kiln.
    Yulla lifted her nose for a sniff. Up ahead ( quick-there-and-gone ), a light flickered.
     
     
    A T FIRST, SHE wasn’t even sure it was real. When they were little, Kell had shown her how closing her eyes and pressing the heels of her palms against her closed lids created starry patterns. They’d done it only briefly, until Amma happened upon them and declared they’d ruin their sight if they kept it up. She remembered the flashes that had come the longer she kept her palms pressed. Was that what she’d seen? Some reaction to the extended darkness?
    It came again, though, the first thing she’d seen—truly seen —since the flames had fled: a sliver-slash of brightness on the floor of the cavern ahead. It hurt to look at, so much that she threw her hands up to shield her eyes and was startled at the silhouettes of her own fingers. The light disappeared again, leaving its afterimage floating in the air before her. Yulla pressed forward carefully, narrowing her eyelids to slits in case it came again.
    Another twenty steps on, and the rope guide ended. The walls widened away from her, and she was at the entrance of the room where the light had come from. There she waited, hardly daring to breathe, straining as hard as she could to hear the murmur of conversation or the tinkle of bells once more.
    For a long time, nothing happened.
    She couldn’t hear anyone there with her in the dark. No one had spoken up asking her to identify herself. She’d woken at one point this morning and noticed that, even when the cellar was quiet and everyone slept, you could hear sounds that told you you weren’t alone: Aunt Mouse’s slow, deep, breaths; the whisper of sheets as Kell turned over in her bed; sometimes even the insistent grinding of Amma’s teeth as her daytime worries carried over into her dreams.
    Or there might be faint echoes travelling along the tunnels, as someone still awake stifled a laugh, or the tail end of a curse as someone got up to make water and barked their shin on a table in another house.
    In this cavern, though, all was silent. She might have been the only person left in the tunnels.
    She might have been the only person left in the world.
    Remembering her manners kept her from pursuing that bit of nonsense. “Hello?” she called out. “It’s Yulla, Zara’s daughter. Is anyone here?” Her voice came back to her, echoing but oddly muffled.
    No answer but the wind.
    The wind!
    The breeze still blew, warm against her exposed skin. She turned to face it, following it to its source with her arms outstretched. There didn’t seem to be any furniture down here. No couches and low tables like her own family had for comfort, nor the pews and benches she might have expected in a below-ground version of the Worship Hall. She did find a set of steps, though, leading up towards whatever building she was currently beneath.
    Her sense of direction was all jumbled. She thought she was somewhere in the northern part of Kaladim, but that was assuming she’d been headed toward the Worship Hall. Now, she wasn’t so sure. Maybe one of the tunnels had curved slightly east or west—a light enough curve could feel like a straight line, especially when you couldn’t see. Still, she had to be on the outskirts somewhere,