Page 2 of Between Life and Death

Another raw, horrible scream. I gritted my teeth. Something had to be done. My fingers twitched, itching to try. I widened my stance and locked my gaze on the scar-faced man.

A rough, calloused palm gently grasped my wrist.

I tilted my chin up, my eyes meeting a familiar gaze—Kaleb. Around six feet tall, blond-haired and blue-eyed and good-hearted. He wore an off-white tunic, black pants, and knee-high leather boots. A leather belt was cinched around his narrow waist, the excess fabric of his shirt falling over top of it in some places.

Although we did not share a drop of blood, he was my brother in every other sense of the word. Kaleb was older than me by two years, making him twenty-four.

“You shouldn’t be here, Sage,” he whispered, his eyes darting desperately between mine—a silent plea to leave. He gave my arm a gentle tug. “Come on, let’s go.”

“I’m staying.” I planted my feet firmly, a tree rooted to the ground.

He squinted at me, his gray-blue eyes mirroring the fight within my own—two unyielding forces locked in a silent battle of wills. But this was one he had never won before. And he knew it. His shoulders dropped as he exhaled, and he offered an understanding, yet slightly annoyed nod and turned his attention to the pyre, his hand never retreating from mine.

Void of sanity, the girl started to laugh as the fire ravaged her. The flames snaked their way up her spine, burning away her curly blonde hair. When there was no more hair to burn, it gnawed at her scalp before laying claim to the rest of her face.

After the gods-awful laughter ceased, her body was chewed up and spit into ash.

I had never seen a body burn so quickly before—was it something to do with the male’s magic I felt?

After the flames died out and the crowd began to disperse, the soldiers doused the heated pile with buckets of water taken from the village well, causing a billow of smoke and a hiss of steam. One of the soldiers unsheathed his sword and used it to sift through the embers and remaining bits of charred bone. He retrieved the barbaric collar made of iron and nail, swept it up with the tip of his sword, and dropped it into a metal bucket, an audibletangringing in my ears long after the sound was gone.

The soldiers mounted their horses, and the clopping of hooves pounding against cobblestone sounded off into the hushed night. When the crowd was gone, all that remained were Kaleb, the unconscious woman, a pile of ash and charred bits of bone, and me.

A raven, sleek and small for its breed, stretched out its talons and landed gracefully on the ground. It walked over to the muddy ashes and began searching through the pile with its beak, occasionally using its talons. It reminded me of the soldier from before, searching through the ash with his sword, looking for the collar so he could take it back to his king. I wondered what the raven was searching for.

Perhaps it, too, is searching for something to take to its king.

The thought was an odd one, its origins foreign. Animals bowed to no king. It was probably hungry and looking for something to eat, but it wouldn’t find anything there, not when the fire had already consumed everything.

Suddenly, it bobbed. And when it came back up, it had something shiny in its beak.

“Do you see that?” I squinted at the shiny thing—it looked like a marble but slightly larger. How could it be so clean when it had been birthed from a soggy pile of wet ash?

Kaleb followed my gaze. “The raven?”

I shook my head. “No. There is something in its beak.”

“Sage . . .” Kaleb paused for added emphasis. “No, there isn’t.”

I blinked, watching as the raven flapped it wings and lifted from the ground with the glass orb locked in its beak.

Why couldn’t he see it?

Then again, this was not the first time I had seen something that Kaleb could not—he had not been able see the feathers either.

The bird disappeared beyond the varied rooftops, their steep peaks reminding me of miniature mountains.

I nodded towards the unconscious woman. “We can’t just leave her like that.”

His gaze levelled mine, as he knew all too well what I was thinking. “What are we going to do with her?”

I shrugged.

He sighed. “We don’t even know where she lives.” He crossed his arms over his chest, his body language emphasizing his stance on the topic.

“Then we’ll take her home,” I offered as I walked over to the woman.

“Ezra is going to kill you.” Kaleb said before he followed.

---