Emini convince her to wear the scroll of cities. They will visit things on me that they won’t on you, she say. Sogolon think it is a big thing carrying something for the princess, bigger than the small bother of living with the itch. The itch come through in the dream jungle. And with it heat, first faint, then like ten summers all at once, and the sound, crackling, rumbling, then roaring. And smell, a sharp, stinking, burning odor that make her frown, and smoke that make her choke. Sogolon cough herself out of sleep to see that she wasn’t sleeping.
Not sleeping or dreaming, but burning. Fire racing up the side of the wagon, gnashing teeth and eating away the roof leaving a rib cage, gobbling the floor leaving bones, sweeping up and around, and under, and above her. Sogolon jump up, right as part of the roof tear away and fall right on top of her sleeping pile. Smoke blinding her as she try to run to the front of the wagon, burning her eyes, grating her throat, and masking fire that rush at her and pull back like wild dogs. She dash but trip on something, falling hard onto burning wood, but feeling the wood, not the burn. This fire is going to get to her hair, get to the oils in it, get to the perfume she steal from Emini to rub under her nose. The flames crackle and Sogolon scream but it fall into a cough. Then she see what trip her.
A leg right beside another, a burning leg attached to burning hips, to a belly black as coal, bursting woman juice and popping off skin and fat. Like a fallen torch. Emini. The fire burst her open and there it is, the little one that is already growing in Emini’s belly, a ball of flame and a black husk. Sogolon yell her name, and the yell attract a laugh from the front of the wagon. She look up to see the boy at the reins, an unmoving clump of ash. Bright hands yellow like the sun let him go, hands belonging to the young shoulders of that boy from the palace who is all light, the one the twin prince used to pull on a leash. Now not light but fire rolling inside his body like storm clouds. Bald yellow head, yellow eyes, yellow teeth that switch from smile to a sneer when he see her. Run, girl, run now. Jump out and land on ground, or sand, or stone, or a nest of ants, anything is better than fire. Fireboy let go of the wagon driver and he crumble. Fireboy hop back into the wagon just as the axles break and the whole thing crash to the ground. Sogolon fall, and the wagon fall upon her, but nothing touching her skin, not even her hair, and this boy is a breath from her face. He reach for her neck and Sogolon feel the heat wrapping around her neck, but he try to grab her throat and his hand slip off. The more he grab, the more it slip, but slip off air, for he not touching her. Air slip between her and him, but it don’t feel like wind. The boy hiss and crackle. Sogolon work her fury into one wicked look, not even thinking, when the wind (not wind) kick him in the chest and hurl him up in the sky, tumbling him head over feet until the wind (not wind) let him go and he slam into the wreck. The King Sister burn to nothing and Sogolon mind go red. The fireboy come at her with a leopard leap, but ram into a shield of nothing and they both hear a crack. The wind (not wind) seize him again, fling him up in the air, then slam him down again, and again, again, beating breath out of him like washerwomen beating out clothes. It slam the fire out of him, the light out of him, the breath out of him, the blood out of him, and the flesh, leaving nothing. It, meaning her. She do it. She who is beyond words. She, Sogolon.
Two voices scream for the fireboy. A brown blur like a hand flashing across her face zip over the burning wagon, then stop for blink, then blur again. Sogolon could swear she see eyes, mouth, and hands. The blur dash to the fireboy’s body and snarl until it form two heads on one body. They shout at the fireboy, then turn and growl at Sogolon. She scramble, try to run, but this two-headed boy blur into nothing. Then the blur rush straight at her, knocking her down. This boy with two heads is upon her, oxen-strong, one breath fouler than the other, speaking a tongue she don’t know, but as one head talk, the other head nod. Then they both glare at her. Sogolon summoning wind in her mind, saying, Wind I summon you, then saying, Wind I demand you, then Wind I beg you, but it don’t come. She would curse it and its fickle ways, but their hands are on her throat, two hands feeling like four and she can’t breathe. She can’t cough. Sogolon fumble for the dagger in her arm, but she already going dark. Her arm flailing as they shove her in the wreckage. The dagger finally slip into her palm and she press it against his neck. “A stick, she come at us with a stick,” they say. They still laughing when she touch the pommel and the knifepoint burst through to the other side of the left one’s neck. The right one look and scream and his body die on him.
Words flee from her. She look around and see only fire and destruction. Nobody watching the no name woman, easy picking for the fireboy. The wagon in front burning too, the horses, mules, and donkeys fallen, some on fire. Most of the white women dead and the few left trying swordplay against the Sangomin, but they count themselves as nun, not warrior. She is just a girl. She should run. Terror beat into her heart, pound against her temples, and make her hands and legs tremble. Run, girl, Sogolon tell herself. This is not your fight, these women are not your friend, and whoever fighting them doing you kindness. But the King Sister is burning. They kill Emini and the baby inside her.