KINGDOM OF THE STONE -- a Wattpad featured novel

Chapter Forty Three

Theris knelt, picked up his son, cradled him and wept.

At sun set, not knowing what else to do, he took Garick inside and stretched him out on his bed. Then he picked up baby Dorea, trying not to look at her crushed head. He couldn't help but notice her small face, eyes screwed shut and mouth open in an unfinished cry. He wrapped her in her blanket, stiff with dried blood and laid her in her crib. He tried to wash the blood from the doorpost and, as the moons rose, spent the night scrubbing at the stain with handfuls of sand.

As dawn neared, the men of the village, who had run off in pursuit of the attackers, returned. Theris first heard the wails of the women. When Iyanni, his eldest daughter saw him, she ran into his arms. She told him, between convulsive sobs and shrieks of anguish, how the men of Korion-Harpagae had attacked, how Dorea and Garick were killed, how she, Thysia and their mother were taken away and raped, how Thysia bit her attacker and had her throat slashed....

Their neighbor, Georgos, followed carrying Thysia's body, wrapped in a cloak taken from one of the attackers. Asophra accompanied them, looking like a sleepwalker, staring blankly into the distance. Georgos took Thysia's body inside, while Theris held Iyanni stroking her hair and telling her "I'm sorry," over and over as if everything were his fault. He was their protector. He should have at least gone out to rescue them. He couldn't help but feel as if he'd failed them.

When Iyanni had cried herself into exhaustion, Theris led her and Asophra inside. He had just got Iyanni to lie down when he heard a sharp gasp and saw Asophra standing before Garick's bed. She quivered from head to toe, trembling as she sucked in an enormous breath.

Theris put a hand on her shoulder.

She turned, eyes wide, mouth open and teeth bared. She locked eyes with him, but he saw no recognition there. He saw nothing of his wife in her gaze.

Asophra screamed.

She emptied her lungs and filled them up again, hurling blast after blast as if she could with her voice alone, batter him to the ground.

Iyanni bolted upright from her pallet. Theris put his arms around his wife, trying to comfort her. She did not resist, merely stood in his arms, face turned upwards toward his and screamed.

Iyanni led her away, sat her down on his bed and closed her eyes, cradling her head in her lap. It took Iyanni nearly an hour to calm Asophra down while Theris paced the small circuit of the main room. When peace finally, returned he waited outside their bedchamber, reluctant to disturb it.

From the other room, he heard Iyanni ask, "How do you feel?"

"Fine," Asophra replied.

"You're home now. You're safe."

Theris stepped into the room. Asophra glanced at him over her shoulder and stiffened. She rose to her feet, eyes and mouth growing wide as she fixed her eyes on him and inhaled.

She screamed.

Theris ran from the house. The rest of the evening passed in a blur. At one point, Theris' stood at the edge of the wheat fields staring at the stands of uncut wheat. His foot struck the handle of his scythe lying in the straw. He picked it up, remembering the simple joy of that afternoon.

Hearing the rustle of leaves, he turned and saw the shadows of a strange man standing behind him. He struck out with the scythe, cutting down a young tree where he thought the man had stood. Its trunk as thick as his arm, it offered no resistance to the dwerka-fashioned blade which passed through the trunk like smoke.

He eyed another tree, imagined the man who ran the spear through his son and cut it down. He killed the man who smashed out Dorea's brains and the man who slit Thysia's throat. He cut down an even bigger tree, killing the man who raped Iyanni and cut it in half as it fell.