Judging from the position of the sun, there wasn't much time before the famous one-o'clock explosion tore the entire top of the mountain off. That explosion would send rock and poisonous gas belching twelve miles into the atmosphere.
Gotta get out of here, now... .
"Sibyl!"
The incongruous sound of her name startled her. She swung around, dazed and shaken. "Wha—"
Benigna. Clutching her child. Lucania wasn't crying. She clung to her mother's neck with a fierceness Sibyl had seen so often in Charlie.
"Please, sibyl, help us! You warned us, please, have pity—"
"Help me up..."
Benigna lifted Sibyl to her feet. Her clothing, torn in places, bloody in others, fell around her seminakedness. She hardly noticed, except to wince in pain at each step. Benigna put an arm around her, guiding her toward the nearest doorway.
"We have to get out of the house," Sibyl mumbled.
"There is no time! We must take shelter in the nearest gateway!"
Gateway?
Still dazed and uncertain, Sibyl stumbled across the garden toward the nearest doorway, guided by the trembling slave woman. The ground lurched sharply under their feet. Benigna screamed. Her daughter whimpered and clung more tightly to her neck. "Hurry, sibyl!"
Xanthus ran into the garden, making for the doorway that led to the front of the house, and literally ran them down. Sibyl sprawled, jarring her lower body painfully. The slave trader roared and kicked at her, then swore at Benigna, who had fallen at his feet.
"You!" He snatched Lucania from her mother's arms. "I'll just take what Bericus promised and cut my losses!"
"No!" Benigna tried to grapple him.
Xanthus slapped her to the shaking ground.
Lucania began to scream for her mother.
Sibyl searched for a weapon—any weapon—and found the broken remains of a fountain almost under her hand. She snatched up a heavy section of lead piping and lunged forward. Xanthus had already begun running for the far end of the garden again, with Lucania struggling over one shoulder.
Sibyl panted and ran after him, gaining ground fast.
"Stop!"
When he kept going, Sibyl swung the heavy water pipe in a vicious arc. It connected with the backs of his knees. Xanthus screamed and went down. Lucania was flung to the ground. The little girl wailed and rolled to a stop in a flower bed. Sibyl hit Xanthus again, across the small of the back, then felt the warning rumble in the ground.
Oh, God—
"Sibyl!"
Benigna's scream of terror distracted her. The woman was pointing to the mountain. Sibyl craned her neck around to see Vesuvius more clearly—
—and the whole sky exploded.
The top of the mountain blew apart. Vesuvius hurled itself toward the stratosphere. Almost simultaneously the sound smashed down across them. Benigna lost her footing and fell. Sibyl couldn't hear any screams, not even her own. The ground heaved like hurricane-maddened surf. Blackness the shape of an evil umbrella pine blotted out the sun, engulfing them in choking nightfall in an instant. Sibyl held her breath, terrified that hot ash and poisonous gas would envelop them. Rocks from what had been the top of the mountain smashed down within a few feet. Then the house wall above them cracked, began to go...
Someone shoved her violently forward, pushing the small of her back. Sibyl sprawled forward under a doorway. Little Lucania landed beside her, as though thrown by a supreme effort. Sibyl snatched the child close, looked back for Benigna—
The slave woman had fallen to all fours a few feet short of the doorway. Then masonry and wood crashed down. Benigna vanished under it. Sibyl screamed. Lucania clung to her, weeping hysterically now. Sibyl huddled over the toddler, trying to protect her with her own body. More masonry crashed down, burying them deeper. Something massive grazed her shoulder. Sibyl sobbed in pain. Lucania was screaming.
"Shh... Shh..." Oh, God, we're going to die....
An eternity later, the house stopped falling on them.
The ground still shook and Vesuvius still roared, but they were alive. It took Sibyl a long, long time to stop shaking as violently as the ground. Even more slowly, she risked a look. All she saw was brick and splintered wood.
"Oh, my God..."
She touched debris with a trembling hand, just to confirm the worst. Solid as stone, it didn't budge. They were alive. But utterly trapped under rubble.
And no one—no one—was going to stop long enough to dig them out again.
"Nnnhh..."
With painful slowness, Charlie moved his head. He swallowed, tasted dirt, spat. Charlie licked his lips and spat again. Hey, I'm still alive....
The ground lurched sickeningly. Then dropped three feet out from underneath him. He gave a startled yell and grabbed wildly at thin air, then landed heavily on his side.
"Nhh—"
Renewed pain from the broken rib sent a jolt through him. His arm felt bruised from wrist to shoulder. He couldn't hear his own groans. Couldn't hear anything, in fact, except a skull-splitting roar which smashed down from above and beat up through the very ground. There was nothing in his varied and colorful life with which he could even remotely compare this—"sound" seemed far too mild a word—this awesome noise.
He thought about rolling himself into a fetal ball and hugging both arms over his ears. Instead, Charlie dragged himself painfully to elbows and knees. Bit by bit, he hauled himself over to a section of ground that had remained at its old height and peered up over the lip of the fault. It was hard to see, as though night had fallen hours too early. Whistling impacts nearby raised the hair on the back of his neck. Charlie squinted. Red-hot stones, falling out of a black sky.... The oak tree to which he'd tied his horse was down, its shattered roots jutting obscenely toward the maddened sky.
Above the shoulder of Vesuvius, the heavens were black as hell for miles. Wild discharges of flame shot through that hellish darkness. Streaks and meteoric flashes marked the passage of rocky, half-molten missiles. Far too many were landing in his vicinity. Gotta get the hell outta here. Charlie groped across the trembling earth. He discovered his crutch lying miraculously near his hand. But relief was a bit premature. One step at a time.
He grabbed the crutch, got his bad leg under him, and hauled himself up over the edge of the thrust fault. Then Charlie rolled over to sit up. Through the volcanic murk, he caught a glimpse of motion and crawled closer to investigate. Silver was down, flat on his side, struggling to rise. The horse was covered with lather. Charlie found the reins, still tied securely to the fallen tree. Thank God the violent crack hadn't broken the animal's neck. At least, he didn't think it had. He'd better check for broken bones in Silver's legs, too.
Charlie couldn't make his shouts heard even to himself, so he just rubbed the animal's sweating neck and held on. The gelding surged once. Charlie felt, rather than heard, the rumble of a groan in the animal's throat beneath his hand. Then the poor horse lay back, eyes rolling white. Silver's whole body shivered. Charlie crawled around the fallen horse and ran exploratory hands across its legs. Nothing felt broken. Nor did Silver make any sudden protests.
Charlie crawled back to the horse's head. The animal whickered softly into his palm when he stroked the velvety nose. He groped for his crutch and, taking a calculated risk, tied it securely to the saddle. Then Charlie pulled himself awkwardly across Silver's side and positioned himself as best he could.
Then he cut the reins, close to the branch, and snatched them up. Charlie grabbed double handfuls of coarse mane hair, blessed whatever gods had prompted the Romans not to shave their horses' manes, and urged the animal up with legs, hands, and voice.