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Felicia wasn’t sure how many hours had passed.
What had happened after breaking into the burning house and saving the child was half hidden behind a gauzy veil, lurking, but not reaching her. She remembered waking up to noise too loud and varied that had terrified her more than anything today. Firemen swarming the place. A shrieking ambulance siren. People coughing their lungs out. A child crying. Adults shouting, alternating between shock and authority.
How she had longed not to be a part of it! How she had hated that they extinguished the fire, and she had missed her chance to enjoy it!
Now, standing on the steps leading her out of the police station, a headache threatened, and she felt the echo of the previous tremors rocking her insides.
The care of the paramedics—which she hadn’t needed—the ride in the police car to the station, the endless questions, the mix of awe and praise and worry and suspicion wafting toward her… she couldn’t handle it anymore. Remembering the barrage of questions made her temples throb and her temper rise. It jarred her to the bone to be so closely examined when all she had done was to act on instinct and save a life. Where was their gratitude? Where was her happiness? And what had she answered? Already, the events were fading deeper into the haze behind the veil caused by shock.
The policemen had drilled her until she had slumped forward in her chair nearly unconscious, only then acknowledging that she had been through an ordeal, and that she wasn’t yet the suspect of an investigation. They had given her a glass of water—thankfully accepted and gulped down in record speed—and a granola bar—ungraciously rejected first, but pocketed on second thought—and wanted to know whom to notify to pick her up.
It had broken the daze momentarily. Her mind had jumped to Cindy and away. It had latched onto Joshua, and quivered with need. She had told them there was no one. They had ordered her a taxi for which she was now waiting in front of the police station. It was a towering, dark, weather-beaten, time-worn structure out of grimy bricks that was enough to strike terror in even an innocent citizen’s heart. And she wasn’t exactly innocent, was she?
When her gaze roamed the road in search for the taxi whose arrival meant salvation, movement to her left distracted her. She squinted at a black-and-white shape moving rapidly away from her into the throng of traffic. It looked like a tall, thin man with startlingly blond hair, but the person had vanished so fast she wasn’t sure whether her eyes had tricked her. An uneasy feeling lingered, like an unpleasant aftertaste. Something about the sight struck a familiar chord.
Felicia shook her head. This must be the shock kicking in; she was imagining things.
A breeze ruffled her hair and evoked the smell of smoke, burned clothes, and fear. She was wrapped in a gruff, brown blanket with various faded stains on it, provided by the police. Beneath it, her clothes were in singed tatters, and her feet were bare. Although her skin had once again been completely unaffected by the fire, her clothes hadn’t. For a moment, she wondered what the medics and the policemen would make of that, and it sent a spark of fear through her. The taxi drew up, and she walked toward it as if it were the Holy Grail.
Minutes later, she was standing under the shower, hot water gushing over her body and molding her curls to her scalp and shoulders.
For once, water had a cleansing feel to her and was welcome. She wasn’t keen on washing the fire’s traces from her body, but on washing away the memories. When she closed her eyes under the onslaught of scalding, hard drops, she saw the burning house, the cowering child and its lifeless, insignificantly small yet significant body being strapped onto a gurney. The police hadn’t told her much about anything, but they had at least revealed to her that the little girl would survive. It was severely depraved of oxygen and had suffered minor burns as well as a major shock, but it would live.
And that was what mattered, wasn’t it?
She wrapped herself in a towel, grabbed the hairdryer, frowned at it, dropped it and experimented with the heat within her. Miraculously, it was right there at the tip of her fingers. Within moments, her hair was dry, and the towel was a mere cover in lieu of clothes. A small smile crossed her lips. Ah, to control fire at the snap of a finger.
When she walked to her wardrobe and paused to examine herself in the mirror, her smile grew brighter.
Nobody would have been able to say she had escaped a raging fire and been the heroine of the day. In fact, she looked better than she did on most days. Glowing from within, radiating satisfaction and a calm sense of pride which was unlike her. There was a sublime sparkle of fiery yellow-orange-red to her brown eyes, entrancing her.
Her smile wavered.
How could this be?
What had happened?
Mechanically fishing for underwear, leggings and a loose T-shirt to wear, and getting into them, she let her thoughts linger on the way she felt and the picture she presented. Magically gone were the headache, the angst and the restriction that had dominated roughly an hour ago. And why wasn’t she exhausted from letting the dragon out and going through such a trauma? Where in the past a minor effort to control her inner flames had left her tired, now she felt…invigorated of sorts. Powerful.
Something had changed.
She sat down on her bed, although the desk with the computer beckoned from the other side of the room. Combing her hands through her long, red hair, she thought and thought, seeking to put her finger on the one reason for her present state. When she timidly sent her searching gaze into herself, half expecting the fire dragon to be missing, she gasped.
The dragon looked more beautiful than ever. It was huge, its wings having grown to twice their size, and its tail so long that it was wound around its body. From huge, snake-like, fire-glowing eyes, it stared back at her, its head tilted to one side, its mouth curved in what could have been a smile. Did dragons smile?
Why was it so big? And why was it as satisfied as she felt when she had thought it would be angry at the missed chance or frightened by the police?
An image manifested inside her mind.
A woman with fire-glowing hair around her head like a halo with a myriad tiny arms of flames, standing tall and pressing something against her body that quivered with energy and was bathed in a glowing aura.
Another gasp escaped her when she realized she was looking at herself and not at some fierce fire goddess or legendary warrior.
Another image popped up and made it clear this was indeed her, at the moment when she had commanded the flames to make way. The fire wall in front of her parted. The image was laced with meaning. A mix of pride and power on the one hand and… humility at the other hand.
Understanding dawned. Was the dragon accepting her as its mistress? Had they both grown in the decisive moment when she had taken the upper hand, when fire had bent to her will and not the other way round?
Was she the wielder of a special power, the witch of her own magic, after this 'baptism of fire'?
Chapter 13