The Last Red Year

FOURTEEN: Ashes to Ashes

CONTENT WARNING: This chapter contains references to child and animal death, as well as mild emetophobia triggers. Tread with caution.

♡   ♡   ♡

The air is still.

The ruins of Callocast curve like a dragon's grave, skull and spine and tail twisting in a settle of wintry ash. No birds perch on the leafless tree where the village once began. No fuzzy winter stragglers dare to forage through the fallen stones and charred wood for hints of plants left unburnt. There is no life in what's left of the village. None but a lone green mage, standing where the town's single dirt road begins, looking on at the desolation.

Kas can't bring themself to step forward. They can't bring themself to disturb the ash that coats the town. Can't bring themself to make this any more real than it already is.

Neither Mauragan nor Sorine move to comfort them. There's nothing either of them could say. They're both equally in shock.

Kas can't understand. Why would the mages hide this from them? Who did this? Was Isri right all along? Was this the work of monsters? It doesn't make any sense. Nobody in Callocast deserved this. Nobody in the tiny, impoverished fishing town could have done anything to merit this destruction.

Tallin escaped, they tell themself, afraid to step forward until they've convinced themself that nobody was harmed. Fisher Mannecky. Tascko. Bassian. They're all okay. The town is gone, but maybe they can convince themself nobody was hurt. Their worlds were destroyed, their lives uprooted, but nobody was hurt. They say it to themself over and over and over, trying to make themself believe it.

They finally manage a step, cringing at the way the ash feels underfoot. The ruins are untouched, yet cold. The ash is thicker than they realized. It clumps beneath their boots. The destruction isn't fresh. The village must have stood like this for weeks. They don't understand how the ash hasn't all blown away. Usually the winds are high in December this far north, but they seem far too quiet today. Like even the sky itself stands in mourning.

They pass what's left of Bassian's goat shed--the young kids of their new herd must not have made it out. Charred goat bones litter the floor. The heavy, metal lock lies in the blackened ruins of the door, still locked. Kas feels bile rise in their throat at the sight, but they swallow it down.

Bassian's house is a ways away from their shed, far closer to Callocast proper. It was built mostly of stones--the wooden accents have burned, along with the door. The inside is gutted. All that remains is the shape of the fireplace, their metal cooking implements. There are no bones inside--Kas breathes a sigh of relief, glad to have some evidence that Bassian escaped. It's premature, though. A pile of distinctly human bones, soot-blackened and heat-cracked, lies just outside the back window. Bassian's gilded ear-piece, probably the most valuable piece of jewelry in the entirety of Callocast, lies in the graying dirt next to an ash-covered skull.

Kas sinks to their knees and vomits until there's nothing left in their stomach.

They feel Mauragan's hand on their shoulder, Sorine holding back their hair. Neither of them talk. There's nothing to say. No words to describe this atrocity.

They push themself to their feet only what seems like hours later, shaken to their core. Their hands tremble. Their eyes burn with tears they can't bring themself to shed. They keep telling themself that Tascko must have had the sense to flee, that Fisher Mannecky would have kept their wits about them. That Tallin must still be alive.