“Yeah, I think so. Shit.” Rosie turned in a full circle, searching for another way out, her light exploring every inch of the barred window.

“Has someone set the house on fire?” Ava whispered. Her fingers dug into Jem’s arm with bruising force.

“I don’t know,” Jem said, but she could smell the smoke now, an insidious hint drifting down and getting stronger by the second. “We’ll have to go up,” she said to Rosie. “We don’t have a choice. Go on, go!”

Rosie didn’t argue. Jem followed on her heels, crawling into the cubbyhole and practically dragging Ava off the top rung. The tiny room was full of smoke, the violent crackle of the fire close by and growing in intensity. Still on her hands and knees, Jem could barely see Rosie, but she could hear Chloe crying. She reached out, finding Rosie’s ankle and squeezing it. “Right behind you,” she said.

It was worse in the hallway, the smoke thick and noxious, with eager flames eating along the carpet and the front door. A small explosion in the kitchen confirmed both exits were blocked.

“Up,” Jem said between bouts of coughing. “Top floor. There’s a balcony.”

“All together,” Rosie said. “Stay as low as you can.”

Jem did her best to keep up, forcing one foot in front of the other, one arm tucked around Ava, and the weight of the bag almost dragging her back to the bottom. Her lungs ached, and she felt dizzy and sick and more scared than she had ever been. She heard Rosie yelling into her comms, but she didn’t have the breath to do likewise.

There was less smoke on the first floor, and they spent a moment gulping in the cleaner air before Rosie forced them on again like a drill sergeant. Six steps, seven, eight. Jem took to counting them: fifteen between each floor, then a further two as the landing split.

“Left,” she gasped at the top of the second flight. “There were patio doors.”

Rosie took her word for it, ushering them all inside the first bedroom. She set Chloe down and used her jacket to plug the gap at the bottom of the door before trying to open the patio. It was locked. Jem threw off the bag and dragged the oxygen cylinder out.

“For the window,” she said, but when she tried to raise it, she found it too heavy. Rosie plucked it from her hands.

“Should be using this for you,” she said.

“Yeah, maybe later,” Jem conceded. Her lungs felt like stone, dull and unresponsive, and it was getting harder to make them work. “Just get us out of here.”