Page 3 of My Scarred Laird
He stifled his cries, knowing deep inside that his mother was gone. He could only hope now that they wouldn’t be found.
Then he smelled the smoke. He watched as it slowly poured inside the wardrobe through the cracks in the door, and then the heat started coming through the wood, and Callum watched in horror as it around him started to burn.
He started coughing as the smoke came in more.
Culloden was deeper in the wardrobe than he and hadn’t been affected by the smoke yet.
He had to get out of here. He knew if they stayed put, they would burn to death.
He had to save him and his brother. He was the older twin; he was now responsible for them both.
He was crying out, coughing, needing to get them both out of the wardrobe.
He grabbed the handle, screaming in pain as his hand almost melted onto the metal, and tried to let it go, but the damage had been done. The skin of his hand came away burned where he had touched the metal.
His hand burned, and he wanted to cradle it to his chest because the pain was horrible, but he needed to get them out of the wardrobe, so he shoved the door again, but it was stuck, as if something blocked the door, but he pushed hard, and after one last hard shove, it finally came free.
They both rushed from the wardrobe, coughing, and Callum held his hand to his chest, cradling it, but when he looked around, what he saw on the floor made him fall to his knees and sob.
Culloden dropped to his knees beside him and together they stared down at their mother.
She had blood pooling out and around her chest, and it ran down the side of her mouth, and she wasn’t moving, her eyes opened, and unseeing.
He stayed kneeling beside her and shook her, calling out her name, but Culloden stood, anger filling his young face and he grabbed his sword and ran from the room, dodging the fire and jumping through some flames that blocked the door, before Callum could stop him.
The fire raged around him, and he knew he couldn’t stay, no matter how badly he wanted to mourn for his mother. Not with how hot the room was getting, and how big the fire grew around them, but he didn’t want to leave her body either.
With one last look at his mother, he stood, knowing he needed to find Culloden, and their father, but before he could take a step, a huge crack sounded through the room and he looked up as one of the huge beams above them fell free, swinging down, hitting him, causing him to fall to the floor as it fell on top of him, and the only thing that kept it from crushing him fully was the bed.
It landed right on his lower back and his legs, and his clothes caught on fire as he was trapped under the beam. He couldn’t move. Not pinned as he was under the heavy beam.
He couldn’t turn his head; he couldn’t do anything but scream for someone to come help him.
His screams changed though as the fire licked at his skin, burning through his clothes, and causing them to stick to his skin, and he knew he was going to die, trapped in this pit of hell, next to his dead mother.
Blackness overtook him and that was his last thought.
* * *
When he woke,he did it slowly, his eyes heavy, and hard to open. He knew it wasn’t heaven. He was in too much pain for it to be heaven. He was on a bed, and his body hurt. The pain so much that it was all encompassing.
He tried to scream out for his mother, but no sound came free.
He looked around the room and saw he was in a small cottage, not the keep.
And he wasn’t alone. His father was there, his head in his hands.
Callum reached out, but his arm didn’t reach as far as he thought and he cried out, his voice working this time.
His father looked up, his eyes wide, but he had a bruise under one eye and a large row of stitches down one cheek.
“Oh Callum. Oh, me boy. I thought we lost ye. That ye wouldn’t survive.”
A woman came up beside him, “He isna out of the woods yet, Laird.”
His father looked over, “What mean ye Fiona?”
Fiona gave him a grim look, “Forgive me Laird, but his burns are much, and they will be hard ta heal. He will be scarred for lifeifhe does live.”
