A Beggar’s Kingdom. Paullina Simons

“But with it, there may be both. So hurry.”

      It’s difficult to run. With each panting breath, they swallow more smoke. They’re dripping wet. He gapes at her as they do their best to hurry. “Who are you?” he says. “This wasn’t you two days ago, a month ago.”

      “You are so wrong, dear dove.” Mallory yanks on him. “This was always me. Ruthless and resolute. What did Ivy call me?”

      “Wanton and cunning.”

      “You should’ve listened to her. The other Mallory you saw, you know what that was?” Stopping for a moment, the young panting woman sidles up to Julian, batting her eyelashes, rubbing against him, pitching her voice to a high shy purr. “That was an act, sire.” She kisses him deeply on the lips and tugs on him to get going. “I told you my life was my stage. Why do men never listen when women speak?”

      Julian is breathless with love and terror as she leads him deeper into the siege. “Without your life, there’s nothing else, Mallory. No acting, no cunning, no gold.”

      She shakes her head. “Gold over everything.”

      Julian shakes his head, even though he knows she is right.

      Because what you want most is what you have the least of.

      Josephine over everything.

      Hand in hand, they walk into the apocalypse.

      The church at Cripplegate is a long way away through a burning city. It’s nearly a mile away. In just the last few minutes, the smoke has grown higher, turned blacker, the smell of charred wood and linen has become more acrid. There’s screaming near them, the neighing of frightened horses. The flames rise in the streets, and the wind carries fire like airborne tumbleweeds. They’re almost at St. Paul’s.

      “Why couldn’t you have dug a hole in the ground at St. Paul’s?” Mallory says. “Would’ve been so much simpler.”

      “I didn’t do that,” Julian says, “because tomorrow, there isn’t going to be a St. Paul’s.”

      Mallory glances into his face to see if he’s joking. “You kept yammering about it.” She sounds mystified. “You wouldn’t shut up about a fire cleansing our city of Black Death. How did you know it was coming? How did you know the future?”

      “Oh, Mallory,” Julian says. “I wish to God I knew the future. I don’t. I know the past.”

      Their eyes catch for a moment. “Do you know what happens to you and me?” she asks, almost whispering, as if she wants to know, doesn’t want to know.

      “No,” Julian says, and can’t even tell if he’s lying.

      A vicar stands in the churchyard of St. Paul’s, shouting encouragement to the fleeing people. “We have a mayor who’s helpless before the conflagration!” the priest shouts. “Brothers and sisters, help yourselves! Do not be like our esteemed leader. Lord, what can I do, he cries. He says he’s out of solutions, though the fire has raged for barely a day! He’s like a fainting woman, and do you know why? Because his faith is faint! Do not be like Thomas Bludworth! Be unshakable! Straight is the gate and narrow is the way that leads unto life. Aldgate, Ludgate, Newgate, Bishopsgate, Cripplegate, Moorgate, Aldersgate! Seven gates out! Seven ways to save your life! Run, brothers and sisters, go find your gate!”

      Julian’s eyes are tearing, and it takes him a moment to recognize Reverend Anselmo from the Silver Cross. Weakened by inhaling the smoke, the holy man wobbles on the apple crate as he fortifies the misplaced with prayer. “Oh, it’s you two,” Anselmo says when they stop at his feet. “The whole world is looking for you.”

      Mallory holds on to Julian, weighing on him as she rests. “They’re not looking for us here,” she says.

      “Yes, hide in hell,” the vicar says. “That’ll teach them.”

      “All the parish churches inside the City will soon be cinders, Reverend,” Julian says. “Despite what you think of us over on Whitehall, you’re safer in the Silver Cross.”

      “I don’t go where it’s safe, my son,” Anselmo says. “I go where I’m needed. And today, it’s here.”

      “You don’t have any water, do you?” Julian asks. They desperately need something wet to breathe into.

      “Find your narrow gate out, and you will find living water there,” replies Anselmo.

      “Come on, Julian,” Mallory says. “No time to waste.”

      The wood houses crackle, timber bursting apart in venomous flames and falling in ruins. The smoke makes everything dark upon the streets, dark upon the steeples, smoke whirls like ghosts between the homes and the cathedrals.

      St. Martin’s Le Grand that leads to Cripplegate is impassable. The buildings have collapsed into the road. “Julian,” Mallory says, “in case we get separated, tell me where in the wall you hid my purse.”

      “It’s down the slope and straight across from the last window in the back of the nave. About three feet off the ground. The gray mortar should still be fresh. You can’t miss it. But we’re not going to get separated.”

      They walk in single file, she ahead of him. They’re drenched with sweat. The fire that swirls and fills the air with black satanic smoke slows them down. Her especially. “It’s not too far now,” Mallory says. She’s wheezing. “We’re close. Soon we’ll be out.” She stops walking. “Just let me catch my breath for a minute.”

      “We don’t have a minute, Mallory,” Julian says, throwing his arm around her and helping her forward. “You told me so yourself. It’s more true now than ever.” There’s no preparation for the plague. There’s no preparation for the fire. Not even when you know it’s coming. No oil in the lamp will protect them now. Nothing could have prepared them for this except staying away. The hot wind fans the flames just like the Santa Anas. Who travels faster, a young determined rasping beauty under his arm or a blaze blown out of all control by a stiff dry breeze?

      “Come on, just a little farther.” Who says that?

      It’s Julian. Mallory has stopped speaking.

      The smoke chokes him, shreds his throat, tears at the whites of his eyes. The plumes are heavy, a canopy of ash in the air. Mallory breaks into a coughing fit. She has pulled away from him and is staggering along the side of a building, trying to hide her face from the smoke. He barely makes her out, even though she’s right next to him. He searches for her like a blind man, his hands outstretched. Mallory, Mallory, is that you? She doesn’t answer.

      Julian stares into his empty palm. His right fingers are tingling.

      Mallory!

      He can’t find her. He can’t see her.

      People are hurrying past him, but none of them is her.

      One second she was by his side, and the next … Mallory! His arms ache.

      In the black trails, all women look like her. From the river upward, a flame tsunami rises higher and then falls. It’s raining fire. It’s light, but there is no sun. It’s day, but it looks like night.

      Julian finds her lying on the pavement, wedged into the side of a building, as if she’s trying to hide. Mallory, what happened?

      She is mouthing something, but he can’t hear. The smoke must have paralyzed her vocal cords. He kneels on the stones by her side.

      Can you get up? Julian wants to ask this. The problem is, he also can’t speak. It must be the smoke. Please let it be the smoke. Oh God, Mallory. How far are they from Cripplegate? How far are they from the gold, from the wall? How far from each other, from salvation? So close, so close! Julian’s legs, neck, chest feel as if they’re being stabbed with ice picks.

      Why did he let go of her hand! Or did she let go of his? She let go and fell noiselessly