Chapter 1 - THE FLAMES OF PREMEDITATION
The smoke inside the west wing was so thick it tasted like melted copper and burning velvet.
Clara pressed her wet wool shawl tightly over her mouth, crouching low as orange flames licked across the hand-carved mahogany ceiling beams. The heat was relentless, radiating off the hardwood floors like an oven. All around her, crystal chandeliers exploded into rainfalls of shattered glass under the thermal shock.
"Leo!" Clara screamed into the roaring furnace, her voice tearing in her throat. "Leo! Where are you?!"
A weak, muffled cough echoed from behind a heavy set of reinforced oak double doors at the end of the corridor.
"Clara..." a small, trembling voice cried out. "The doors won't open! They locked it from the outside!"
Clara’s heart stopped. She lunged forward, scrambling down the blazing hallway.
When she reached the doors to Leo’s quarters, she saw it: a heavy brass security bar—one that had never been installed on any guest room in the chateau—had been dropped into place across the outer iron brackets.
Someone hadn't just forgotten the boy in the panic of the fire. Someone had physically bolted his door shut before fleeing the mansion.
"Hold on, sweetheart! Stand back from the door!" Clara yelled, her eyes burning from the acrid smoke.
She looked around frantically and grabbed a heavy wrought-iron antique floor vase from a marble pedestal. Using every ounce of strength in her body, she slammed the iron base against the brass security bar once, twice, three times until the rusted bracket gave way with a deafening screech.
She shoved the heavy oak doors open and threw herself inside.
The room was filling with black smoke, but eleven-year-old Leo was lying on the floor beside his bed, his useless leg braces lying on the rug three feet out of his reach. He was holding a small wooden box pressed against his chest, tears leaving clear tracks through the soot on his pale face.
"Clara!" Leo sobbed as she dropped to her knees and pulled him into a tight, desperate embrace.
"I’ve got you, Leo. I’ve got you," she whispered, shielding his small body with her coat. But as she reached down to grab his specialized mechanical leg braces from the floor, she froze.
The locking pins on both steel braces had been removed. The straps were sliced clean through with a sharp blade.
Even if Leo had managed to break the door, he could never have walked out. His mobility devices had been deliberately sabotaged.
"They took my keys, Clara," Leo choked out, his chest heaving as he pointed to his nightstand. "Aunt Eleanor came in ten minutes before the fire alarms started. She took my phone, locked my braces, and said... she said the family was finally going to be free of Arthur's mistake."
A cold, terrifying realization washed over Clara that was hotter than the flames consuming the roof.
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This wasn't an accidental house fire caused by faulty wiring. This was an execution.
With a beam crashing down behind them, showering the rug in sparks, Clara lifted eleven-year-old Leo onto her back, wrapping his legs securely around her waist. She grabbed his small wooden box, wrapped her wet shawl over both of their heads, and charged back into the inferno.
