THE BOOK
Beatrice felt the heat beneath her, and then thick black smoke stung her eyes, clawed at her throat—she heard her sisters coughing—and then start to scream as the flames licked at their feet, catching their skirts and igniting them like the wick of a candle. The flames played and danced around their legs, up their bodies, until their hair was burning like the twisting tendrils of medusa-like snakes, hissing and fizzing, drowned out only by the pained screams of the women whose flesh was melting in the searing heat.
The bewigged man and the guards now shuffled awkwardly in their stance, knowing the time was lengthening, and the women had not yet perished. The man started to read bible passages again, but they were drowned out by screams from the crowd as the flames burst forward, as though being thrown out by the hands of the women who burned. Several bystanders caught fire, running into other onlookers, arms flailing, trying to outrun the flames. Others caught fire in an ever-increasing circle of destruction that had gripped the courtyard in a horrific scene.
