Verity woke with her hands at her throat, gasping. With her eyes open she saw thick darkness. With her eyes shut she still saw the shapes of her nightmare, the spitting flames of the fire that had eaten half Blackburn Settlement, started by her own hearth-fire. Either way she smelled smoke and decay. Knowing that the smell was in her mind only did nothing to lessen it.

She stared toward the hearth, holding her breath so as not to be distracted by the plume it made in the frozen air. She couldn’t see the pulsing of the embers under the ashes. Had she let the fire go out again? Already she’d had to borrow fire from her neighbors six times that month; Goody Berowne had sour words for her, and more sour words about her...

Verity pushed back the quilts, rolled off her straw mattress onto the floor, felt for the poker, and stirred the ashes. The embers glowed. She wouldn’t have to go fire-borrowing again.

Her chilled hands were clumsy. One glowing bit of wood rolled from the hearth and across the earth floor in the direction of her mattress. She beat at it with the poker until it was completely extinguished. Then she raked the ashes back over the coals, crawled back under the quilts, and breathed out hard, trying to make a warm place with her breath. Slowly her body relaxed toward sleep...

And stiffened. The mattress was warm again. Was it too warm? That ember had rolled toward it. What if a spark had flown into it when she wasn’t looking was smoldering in the coarse cloth, about to ignite the dry straw inside?

She’d wake when the mattress caught fire, and she’d put it out.

With what? The water in the pail was frozen.

There was a clear foot of snow on the ground. She would throw snow on the mattress... if she woke in time. But such a fire might smoke heavily. What if the smoke choked her in her sleep, and the fire devoured first her cabin and then the whole settlement?

That was hardly likely, she told herself. A woman in her right mind would not think of such a thing.

A woman not in her right mind may be more of a danger to her neighbors than she knows, she answered herself. Best take precautions.

Sorry. Stories are free on our website for a period of time and are moved to Amazon.com. The Amazon kindle app is available for smart phones, computers, tablets, and e-readers.