“Aquaosis!”

Water shot out of Alek’s dad’s hand like a jet.

Sccchhhh.

Steam filled the room as the water evaporated on impact with the fire. But the fire kept raging and the stairway was now charred black.

It was hot. Alek’s dad, Robert, whole body felt like it was in an oven. His flesh hurt. Felt raw to the touch. He tried to cast another spell, but the smoke was now too thick to chant.

Coughing. Wheezing.

Robert dropped down to the floor. His lungs screaming for oxygen.

“Alek!!!”

He screamed for his son.

No answer.

The sound of the fire alarm now entered his ears for the first time.

Mana condensed in his body furiously as he tried to cast a stronger spell. His mana channels tore from the rapid infusion of mana. He could barely see anything now. Just fire and smoke.

“Frozen Tundra!”

Ice covered the hallway and spread towards the fire. The fire dimmed enough for Robert to now see Alek. He was pale, blood was still leaking out of him onto the carpet. But he could now see that Alek’s blood was feeding the fire.

Whoosh.

The fire roared. Alive. Ferocious. Clinging to the wall and ceiling. Spreading.

Alek’s mom Alyssan came running out into the hallway wheezing.

“Robert!?”

Alyssan barley croaked out Robert’s name through the smoke.

“Alyssan, get down! Go get Sarah and call 911!”

Robert pulled Alyssan down to the ground. The smoke swam above her head allowing her lungs a small respite.

“Alek? Where’s Alek? Sarah?”

“It’s alright, get Sarah. I’ll get Alek. Go!”

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

“Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!”

Alyssan crawled towards Sarah’s room at the other end of the hallway.

Her door was closed. Keeping the fire out. But smoke was flowing underneath.  Sarah was in her room coughing. Screaming for her parents who couldn’t hear her over the roaring fire.

Alyssan got to the door. Her eyes watering, vision hazy. She groped for the handle.

“Ahhh!”

The copper door handle burned her fingers.

“Bash!”...“Ahhhhhhhhhh!”

Alyssan's spell fizzled as the blood red flames dripped onto her back interrupting her cast.

“Truso!”

Robert saw Alyssan screaming as the fire touched her skin. She was rolling on the floor to snuff out the flames. His Truso spell pushed Alyssan through the door as it’s hinge’s burst from the pressure. The door & Alyssan crashed into Sarah’s bookshelf. Books and a Paper-Mache mask, that looked like an alligator with horns, fell onto the floor along with Alyssan.

“Mom! Help me I can’t breathe. I’m dying!”

“Sheyn, girl calm down!”

Sarah’s tears and shock made her words grown into incoherence. She stopped moving.

“Sheyn, get down! You can breathe there.”

Sarah responded, to her nickname, only with wails, tears and mumblings of death.

Alyssan slapped Sarah. And pulled her to the ground.

“Sarah, we have to go! Hurry up. Go. Go! Come on!”

Sarah finally got up and clung to Alyssan’s` waist. Digging her nails into Alyssan.

“Bash!”

The window in Alyssan’s room shattered outwards. Alyssan jumped out as mana pumped into her legs.

They landed hard on the concrete sidewalk. Painful. But, far enough from the shattered glass to be safe in their bare feet. The fire was still warm on their skin. It was now engulfing Sarah’s room and covering the left side of their house in flame. So hot the papery bark, from the birch tree that grew next to Sarah's room, was now on fire. Flaming barking floated down from the tree and fillled the air. To the right of Sarah's room was a circular window pane that, under normal circumstances, let their hallway be seen from the street. The window now oozed crimson as it melted. Flame’s blocked any sight of a main hallway. Nothing could be seen. But a firey red glow.

Alyssan started to run to her neighbor’s house to get a phone when the blue & red lights of a fire truck entered her vision. They lived less than a mile from a fire station.  

“Sarah, don’t move.”

Alyssan ran over to the firetrucks pleading for her husband and son to be saved.

Inside the house Robert was running low on mana. His mana channel’s felt like they were in rough glass shards. The heat was unrelenting. He’d cast Frozen Tundra a dozen time’s now. Each time the glimpse of his son was more fleeting. His son was gray chalk. No burn marks. Skin turned pallor from blood loss.

Robert could feel his heart beating. His breath faint, lungs heavy, kept alive only by a channeled dispel toxin. Do it. He couldn’t feel anything anymore. His body was numb with heat. Mind screaming to save his son. Pleading with himself. Accepting death. The joy of his tiny son lying on his belly as they watched TV together. That perfect warm summer glow as they drove home with Rocky Road Ice Cream for Alek's first time. The food his son had cooked for him as soon as he got home from school. The food that had kept him alive. He had so few of those memories. They were treasure. Happy picture's that he’d held tightly through death and cancer.

"Void Pain."

He exhaled. A quick pleading sigh.

"Amittere Memoriae."

A surge of mana rushed through his shattered channels. Crunching and breaking the channels down even finer as the mana flowed into his spell.

“Gelida. Magna Gelida!”

That joy disappeared forever.