Page 41 of Ringer
Could she... ?
It was risky. It was dangerous. She remembered how quickly the airport bathroom had filled with smoke, how quickly she’d felt she couldn’t breathe. She had no idea how far Lyra and Caelum had traveled already, and whether they’d evenseethe smoke.
On the other hand, she didn’t know how much longer she’d survive.
And what had Calliope said?
In all the stories, there’s always a fire.
Turn the page to continue reading Gemma’s story. Click here to read Chapter 25 of Lyra’s story.
TWENTY-SIX
AND THEN, WHILE SHE WAS still hesitating, still trying to decide,three gunshots cracked out in the silence.
That settled it. Three gunshots meant a gun and someone to fire it: someone was still near, and she would take her chances that it was someone who would help, and not Calliope or some psycho Amish guy with a rifle from the 1800s. Maybe Lyra and Caelum had even gotten hold of a gun. Maybe they were trying to signal to her.
She hoped and prayed that they weren’t on the wrong side of the bullet.
Either way, she would have to take her chance.
Gemma had never built a fire before—three of the four fireplaces at home were electric and functioned at the push of a button—but she’d watched her mom do it a few times, amused that Kristina had once been a tomboy and had spent her summers camping and hiking andhitchhiking between different beach towns, and amused, too, that Kristina always got so offended when Gemma said she couldn’t imagine it.
Quickly, quickly, before they went away.
She tore handfuls of paper from the old textbook, saying a silent apology to the Book Gods for ruining the binding—and was pleased to find many of the pages at the center very dry. They lit up easily, flaming quickly into little bright universes that soon shriveled and burned up to nothing.
The wood was harder. She discarded all the wettest pieces and wound up with a small pile that she layered on top of a pyramid of crumpled pieces of paper. It would have to do.
She was shocked by how much smoke there was right away: smoke curled off the wood as if being planed by an invisible machine. The chemical smell of ink made her cough. She crouched as low as she could, suddenly very afraid. What if the wooddidburn, so well, so quickly she couldn’t control it?
Smoke climbed up the well, rolling from one side to another, like someone rappelling down a cave but in reverse. Gemma tilted her head and gasped with relief: the smoke had sniffed its way to the open air, had begun to trickle through the narrow gaps in the wood and lift toward the trees.
Someone would have to see.
Please, God. Let someone see.
The wood was still smoldering, releasing long tendrils of blue smoke that reminded Gemma of dark hair, that felt like hair in her mouth and in her throat. Her eyes and head hurt. Already, the air was very bad.
Should she put out the fire? Her head hurt so badly, she had trouble thinking through the pain. One more minute. She would wait one more minute.
The wood burst into flame, at last.
Gemma began to cough.
Her head now hurt so badly she couldn’t think of anything at all.
She was very tired and thought, maybe, she should just lie down for a while, down in the mud, where it wasn’t so hot....
Turn the page to continue reading Gemma’s story. Click here to read Chapter 26 of Lyra’s story.
TWENTY-SEVEN
GEMMA DREAMED SHE WAS RIDING on the back of a giant bat, cupped in the soft leather of its wings. She dreamed that a veil had been placed over her face, to keep her from looking down and getting afraid, to keep her from crying out and startling out of the sky. But she couldn’t breathe. The cloth was wet from her breathing, and it flowed into her open mouth. It tasted like smoke.
Briefly she woke up to the sound of voices and lights—hands everywhere, leathery hands, unfamiliar, and faces she didn’t know—but she hovered there, on the edge of consciousness, for only a few seconds before the bat enfolded her in its wings and once again swept her up, this time loosing itself from the trees and hurtling across the clean, cool night air.
She could breathe again. The veil had come loose. Her sister had unhooked it, because she didn’t like how it looked.
