Page 269 of Emylia

His blood soaked the earth, pooling thick and glistening beneath him. His body was twisted—limbs at unnatural angles, neck askew—like his body had been bent backward by a force that didn’t care he was human.

A sound tore out of me—raw, feral, not entirely human.

He should’ve been telling stories. Not bleeding into the soil. Not staring blankly at nothing while the smoke swallowed his last breath.

“No—no, no, no?—”

The words tumbled out of me in a breathless stammer. I scrambled back, hands sinking into the ash, slipping, sliding.

This couldn’t be real.

This wasn’t real.

Olag told bedtime stories in the square. He snuck sweets to the little kids. He smiled when he spoke.

He wasn’t?—

“Emylia.” Maalikai’s voice tried to stablize me.

But I was already on my feet, moving without thought or purpose.

The smoke swirled. Shifted.

I spun in a haze.

And that’s when I saw them.

Shapes. Dozens of them.

Small.

Too small.

“No—” My voice cracked. “No, no, no?—”

I ran. I tripped. I crawled.

I couldn’t stop.

Ash clung to their bodies. Hair matted, limbs limp, fingers curled around shattered trinkets. Dolls. Ribbons. Candy sticks, half-melted in tiny hands.

The first child I reached was still warm.

A girl. Maybe seven. Her dress scorched black. Her legs curled up like she’d tried to make herself small. Her hand still clutched a burnt doll, its little body still cindering.

I dropped to my knees, hands scrabbling. Ash clouded around me, but I didn’t care. I pressed my fingers to her neck. Her wrist. Her lips. Anywhere.

Nothing.

No heartbeat.

No breath.

No pulse.

Yet she was still warm, like her body clung to the ghost of something that could almost be alive.

I screamed.

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