Searching For You

Chapter 22: Trusting the 'Enemy'

The pitch-black sky was glowing brightly with the raging fire.

The air was filled with heat, smoke, and screams of terror. A young girl was following her mother through the panicking crowd. She clung tight to her hand so as not to lose her grip.

The humans had come fast and powerful. Mercy was not on their minds.

They burned every house and killed anyone they could get their greedy hands on.

The young girl looked back at her home to see it burning to ash. She wasn't even thirteen years of age yet. Still barely able to completely care for herself; not that her parents would let her anyway. They had always protected her.

When she turned back around her mother had stopped.

"M-mom?" She asked wondering why they had stopped amongst the chaos.

Before her eyes, her mother fell to her knees before laying on her side. That's when she saw the problem.

A single arrow lodged deep into her chest. With that single shot, all life seemed to drain out of the older woman.

Blood began to dribble out of her mouth and she quickly turned deathly pale.

The little girl stared in shock. Tears began streaming down her face.

This couldn't be right.

Her mother couldn't be gone.

She had promised to always be there for her.

But it had happened. The girl collapsed to her knees right beside her now-deceased mother. Her mother's deep brown eyes still open with fear in them. The girl didn't dare look at them.

She seemed to forget all that was happening around her. She felt people run past her desperately trying to flee.

But she ignored them. Instead, she laid her head in her arms on the chest of her deceased mother. There was no controlling her emotions now. The tears seemed never-ending at that point. Nothing could stop the mighty waterfall of her emotions.

In the midst of her crying, she felt a pair of strong arms snake around her, catching her off guard. She clung to her mother, hoping she would protect her one last time.

But the person behind her lifted her off the ground and pulled her close to their chest.

She didn't know this person but now understood that they weren't a threat. It wasn't her father. She hadn't seen her father since he went to help when all hell broke loose that day.

She could only assume the worst.

Wherever she was being taken she only prayed it was someplace safe; maybe even her father was there waiting for her.

Annie awoke with a jump. She hadn't had a dream like that in a long time. Ever since the night her village was raided and her parents died she tried her best to move on.

For a while it worked, but now it seemed she would have to work harder.

Annie decided that it would be best if she didn't go back to sleep; not wanting to risk reliving that horrible nightmare.

Still to that day, she wondered if she could have done something. Maybe she could have warned her mother had she not turned around to see the damage.

She didn't know what exactly happened to her father but could only assume the humans had taken his life as well.