Broken City

402 16 15
                                    

All her life, the fire wall has been standing.

It is not so much a wall as a prison, surrounding her whole city, locking them in, cutting them off.

The flames are tall, so tall that there is no way to escape from them; many have tried, and many have died. She will not be the next to join their ranks.

She frowns, reaching out her hand towards the flames, her hand hovering inches away from the fire, submerged as much as is possible in the flickering, hazy heat. She turns her hand, her fingers closing into a fist as she grasps at the air, imagining she is pulling, tugging, wrenching at the flames, moving them aside and making a tunnel. And, for a second, she believes that something is happening; the flames seem to stutter a little, the world outside becoming clearer. She sees a land of towering buildings, much like the ones in her city, but these ones are whole and not decaying. Through the flames, this sparkling city looks as if it is on fire. That must be how they think it looks in here, she thinks. Because, of course, her city would look much more like it was on fire than theirs would, being on the outside of the fire wall.

"Trenna!" She hears someone call her name, and her concentration wavers. The flames shine bright again, the city falling out of view. She frowns, blinks. She must have been daydreaming.

She turns and runs towards the voice. "Sorry," she says, dropping into step beside her sister, tall and angry, with a slightly amused yet irritated smile on her face.

Kina rolls her eyes but smiles. Kina is beautiful. Her eyes are the same colour as Trenna's, eyes that change colours, are yellow in the morning and green-blue the rest of the time. This is the only trait they share, thinks Trenna. For where Kina is tall and thin as a willow, Trenna is small, her body curved. Where her sister is slim, her face holds traces of baby fat from childhood that stubbornly holds on for dear life. Where Kina is fair-haired, Trenna's own hair is almost muddy in comparison, a brown that she finds dull and hard to manage, as it is neither straight nor wavy but a mix of the two, where Kina's is perfectly straight. They are opposites, sharing nothing but eye colour, blood, and a strong disregard for eggplants. Once, their mother cooked the foul things for three weeks in a row; they had long ago gone off the purple vegetable, and refused to eat it.

"You're always dreaming, Trenna," Kina says, a little disapproving.

"To dream is to have something to believe in, and to have something to believe in is all we can ever wish for," Trenna says, and her sister huffs but says nothing. This is often her response to many things Trenna says, when she chooses to say them. Trenna doesn't speak much, and when she does, it is most likely to Kina.

"What were you doing, anyway, standing so close to the fire? One of these days, you'll burn yourself, and then mother will kill you." She brushes her hair over one shoulder, a sheet of silk, before shaking her head so it falls back to its place; she is agitated, clearly. And it isn't Trenna's penchant for the fire wall that has irritated her today; at least, not wholly.

"I think that would be a little counterproductive, don't you?" Trenna asks, and Kina rolls her eyes emphatically. Trenna sighs. "What's wrong this time?" she asks tiredly. "Joss again?" Kina does not respond, but there is a definite stiffening of her jaw. Patiently, Trenna walks with her sister through the outskirts of their city, towards the distant buildings. From this far, it looks dazzling, the fire a stunning backdrop that mingles with the red tinge the setting sun lends the sky. The few buildings that still have glass shine and spark madly with the flickering light of the flames. Here, it is beautiful. Most days, when she isn't trying to see through to the outside world, she sits in the red, dusty, dry dirt, the heat of the fiery border at her back, and just watches the city shimmer and glow.

FanfareWhere stories live. Discover now