‘He isn’t worth it,’ Liam grumbled when they had freed him, shaking his prickling hands.
‘He isn’t worth the price if we don’t.’
Liam nodded and grabbed hold of Mellors’s arms, dragging him away from the growing inferno the hall had become.
‘Together,’ Rebecca protested, when he moved to sling the Viscount over his shoulder.
He relented. Only because, loath as he was to admit it, he wasn’t at his best, and he knew that if he fell behind, Rebecca would stay.
They each threw one of Mellors’s arms around their necks, and dragged him through the house. Together they raced through to the conservatory, the smoke blinding and suffocating, the flames flickering at their clothes and hair, singeing them as they ran.
The rush of air from the conservatory fuelled the fire behind them as they burst in, the flames chasing them as they ran towards the doors to the park.
Just as they thought they might not make it, the doors were there before them. They flew out into the fresh, clean, cold air, gasping for breath, their eyes adjusting to the bright, smokeless surroundings. Onwards they ran still, distancing themselves quickly from the scorching blaze.
It was then that they heard the rumbling, ominous and louder than twenty thunderstorms. They stopped, turned and stared speechless, as the East Tower crumbled, falling in on itself and tumbling down with a mighty roar through the roof.
The blast of hot, smoky air that followed threw them back even further, and Rebecca felt more lost than she had ever before.
‘Rebecca,’ Liam croaked. ‘Are you hurt?’
‘No, I’m fine... Are you?’ she asked, slowly coming back from the daze she had sunk into.
She’d been so scared, terrified of losing him and the others... She’d done what she’d had to, without succumbing to her emotions, but now they all came crashing down on her.
I could’ve lost him. I could’ve lost them all.
‘Are you injured?’
‘A bump on the head, a bit singed and some sore ribs,’ he said, shrugging away as she reached for him. ‘Nothing to worry about.’
Rebecca nodded despondently and shifted Mellors’s weight on her shoulders, gripping the worm’s wrist tightly, lest he rouse and try to slither away. She couldn’t blame Liam for wanting nothing more to do with her. He’d just been attacked, kidnapped, nearly murdered, and now his home was burning brightly before their eyes.
All because of her.
‘The others will be out on the drive,’ she said, pushing away the utter despair which threatened yet again to overwhelm her. ‘Lizzie went to get help.’
‘Let us deal with this, then,’ Liam said fiercely. ‘Before the pond scum wakes.’
And so, they began to make their way around the house, keeping a very wide, safe distance, looking like strange demons, singed and sooty, born themselves of the blaze.
Though Rebecca tried her best not to look directly at the destruction she’d wrought upon Thornhallow Hall, she could do little to avoid it as they made their way around. The fire illuminated the landscape, the red-orange light dancing and multiplied tenfold by the frost. Gigantic shadows gesticulated across the land, and the roar of the crumbling house was deafening in the evening’s silence.
As for the setting sun, it only emphasised the whole terrible sight.
Perhaps I have died and this is hell... It surely looks, sounds and smells like it.
As best she could, with both her hands still supporting her tormentor, Rebecca furiously wiped away the tears that fell across her cheeks, quickening her pace so they could put an end to all this as soon as possible.
At least Liam was safe. At least she’d made it in time. He could rebuild. Start a new life. He may never forgive her for what she had inflicted upon him and his house, the wreck she’d made of his life. But at least she’d saved him and the others.
Shouts and screams brought her back harshly to reality, and through the cloud of smoke ahead she spotted Mrs Murray and Gregory, rushing towards her.
‘Thank the Lord above!’ the cook screamed, flapping like a mother hen. ‘Mrs Hardwicke! Master!’
Rebecca felt a pang as she watched Mrs Murray’s eyes scan them both, noting their injuries with winces of her own, barely able to restrain herself, it seemed, from pulling them into her embrace.
Her eyes narrowed, as did Gregory’s, when they realised who hung limply between Liam and Rebecca.
