Astella
This world is rotten.
I wrinkle my nose at every turn, at the scent of decay. Plants, animals, humans, hope. All of it dead and gone.
Anyone can see the rotting in the forest and the desert, but they believe if they run fast enough, they’ll be free of death’s curse.
No one else sees the darkness that swirls in the air. It hisses at me. It chases us, sending new and worsening plagues to ensure no life remains.
Lina did not see the curse. She saw life in between the death. She made me believe it sometimes too. She saw life in me when I had given up.
She is the reason I haven’t given up again.
I did see it, that hope of our future life. Freedom. I meant it when I told her that. It was real. But what it will take to reach it?—
She won’t give up, though. So, neither will I.
I hold my chin high, knowing every moment I stand here is in defiance of that darkness. It wants to root out every ounce of humanity left in the world. Every drop of magic.
And I won’t let it.
Once, I’d been hopeless too. When I shook the lifeless corpses of my parents, I sobbed over their bodies for hours. That was the death of my old life, and I couldn’t see a new one.
I was in the pitch black. Dropped into an abyss that was impossible to escape.
Then, she found me and helped me see.
My lip trembles just thinking about her because now, she’s gone too. But she’s not gone-gone. She’ll be back. She’ll find me?—
There’s a shift in energy around me. A crow caws in the trees above.
No…
Anger rises into my throat. I want to scream at fate for being this terrible. Why does it have to be this hard all the time? I want to give up. I want to curl into a ball and rock back and forth until death takes me.
Tears well in my eyes as I realize it’s going to get so much worse before it gets better.
I thought Lina would come find me. Instead, it’ll be me that goes to her.
I wipe my tears from my cheeks before the warriors come, convinced that when they grab me, I won’t scream. I’ll protest in the form of silence.
But I can’t. Their boots shake my soul the same way they shake the ground. So, when I’m ripped from my hiding place and bound and gagged and taunted, I scream.
I scream for my parents. I scream for this world. I scream for everything I ever dared dream.
I scream and thrash and cry like I never have before.
Was I wrong? Are we doomed after all, Lina?