The Mayaware's reign must end.
In a world of demonic beings with a hunger for human flesh and thirst for blood, Hesi Renen knows it well. When her siblings are taken to the harvesting farms, she must do everything she can to get them out, even if it...
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If the Fields of Topt were filled with metal clanking, footsteps screeching, and sunlight streaming through her eyelids, perhaps Hesi shouldn't have sped up her leap to them. She turned her head away, but the burning rays didn't relent. Sheets rustled, their noise a loud thrum in her ears. Then, she sucked a breath in. Two.
"Hesi," a voice called. Familiar. Too much, in fact. What was he doing in the afterlife? Did the Mayaware catch him too? "Can you hear me?"
Her eyes cracked open in mere slits, letting more of the scalding light in. White haze threatened to consume her vision even though it was slow to return. Through the veil, a blob of brown and black edged from her periphery and blocked some of the brightness. A steady grip encircled her shoulders, rode down her arms, and stayed there. Wood creaked and clattered, jolting some of her focus back.
Slowly, the blob became more pronounced, showing her two eyes, a nose, and a chin. Lips...
"Hesi," the face said again. "Can you speak? Can you understand me?"
She knitted her eyebrows. What was up with those questions? It wasn't as though she was still in Tjarma. Or...wait.
The face. The noise. Could it mean...?
"Kharta." A name flew out of her mouth, flitting to the air with its weak timbre.
The ceiling became clearer than her vision sharpened and blurred one last time. Stone. Painted over with a mural depicting more atrocious Mayawarean mythology. The Fields of Topt would never have that. Which meant...
"I'm alive?" She breathed. Her chest clunked, pain shooting off her heart and gripping her muscles. Before she could speak more, a spasm rose from her stomach, climbing out of her throat in a rush of iron and ink. She hacked, curling in on herself to contain the stabbing pain, the liquid pouring off her pores, and the wretched state she was in. Clambers rose to a storm, drowning out the world. Someone shouted orders. Probably Kharta. What was he doing here, anyway? Didn't he have steward duties?
The pain spread from her stomach to her head. The coughs kept coming, wracking her whole body and bouncing it against the sheets. It was violent. It was hell. Her fingers clawed at her throat. She should wring it herself to get it to clam up. Her fingers turned rigid and melted into dust before her eyes. The ceiling caved in and crashed over her. The light flickered. Stars blossomed from the floor.
A deep, manic chuckle rose from her gut. She was seeing things. Great. A weight pressed on her, pinning her against a soft cushion. A warm current of bitterness rushed down her throat, flushing the rust back. She choked, a wretched sound coming out of her mouth.
The darkness crept in. At first, it clawed at the edges of her vision. Then, it caught her eyes. Next were her limbs. Her muscles. Brain. Her head tilted down, giving her a view of the white sheets thrown over her legs and what dripped down her fingers. It was red.
