The very core of me said, No.

Inside me, something tore. In front of me, something exploded. A roaring sound deafened me, and a wave of superheated air threw me back into the river’s deeper channel. Disoriented, I struggled for the surface, panicked and flailing.

When my head came up, I saw fire. Not just a little fire — flames everywhere. The air scorched my lungs. I ducked back beneath the surface and swam for the shallows. When I reached the sandbar, I crawled out onto it.

The far bank of the river was untouched, but the side where I’d walked was a work in devastation. The ferns near the river were gone — only blackened earth remained.

Unsteadily, I stood.

A wall of flame hundreds of feet long was marching away from me across the valley, toward the mountain. The bank was littered with bones. The smaller ones were burned almost to ash. The larger ones were still burning.

The wind kicked up from behind me and, in the space of a minute, rose to a gale that almost knocked me down. It howled past me, plastering my wet hair across my face. The fire accelerated and grew. As I watched, it reached the tree line and began sweeping up through the canopy.

I’d done this. I didn’t know how, but I had.

Exultation coursed through me.

Those things had tried to kill me, and I’d killed them instead.

I started shaking. It took several long seconds to realize why — I was laughing. I sat down in the water and let it take me, the weird, crazy laughter.

Finally, the laughing stopped, and I just sat there, too exhausted to move.

Eventually I realized I was quite cold, so I waded back to the bank and pulled myself out onto the warm, blackened ground. I had no idea where my clothes had gone, and there was no sign of the ’pus, so I just sat there, shivering, as late afternoon became night.

Chapter 22

In the wee hours of the morning, Ghosteater padded across the burned plain, the fine ash and crunchy cinders not quite shifting beneath his once-paws. He had almost reached the valley the evening before, but the firestorm had sent him racing back up the mountain. The soft creatures’ rainforest had protected him from the flames, but reaching it in time had been a near thing. His only other hope would’ve been to shelter in the silence, and that might not have worked out so well.

He saw the pup from far off, huddled on the bank, shuddering with cold. He noted her lack of garments and thought it strange. Then, ever cautious — or usually cautious, at any rate — he sat down and considered her.