A Gift and a Promise

Antheos and I had woken up at the crack of dawn on my sixteenth birthday to go hunt in the woods and had already gotten the quarry we'd come for by the time the sun started to peek into the valley. We made our way back towards our village, but just before we stepped out from under the trees, Antheos stopped me. I turned to him and was about to make a joke along the lines of You know I like girls, right?, but the look in his eyes stopped me cold.

I followed his line of sight an froze when I saw what he was looking at. A group of about two dozen riders in dark armour sped across the clearing and into our village without so much as slowing down. Then the screaming began. Anger welled up inside me and I took a step, ready to run down there and defend my people, but my friend held me back. I would have yelled at him, at how he could be so calm when we both had family down there, but I could see him struggle to stay put almost as much as I did, so I stayed and we watched.

Watched, as more and more screams echoed across the valley, watched, as smoke and flames started to rise from our home, watched, as the riders rounded up our people and took the men prisoner. Tears streamed down my face, not sad tears, but tears of anger, as they dragged their prisoners out of the village, forcing them to hurry to keep pace with the horses. As soon as they had disappeared, Antheos and I ran for the village.

It was a gruesome sight. Every single house was burning, and there were dead and injured people all around on the paths between them. Most of them were women, children and old people. Those less injured were already milling around, trying to help where they could. I barely even acknowledged when Antheos walked away to find his sister. I stumbled about, horrified and completely overwhelmed.

"Zairah." a girl's voice croaked. I looked around and found my little sister, leaning against the wheel of a broken but not yet burning chariot, her small hands pressed against a deep wound in her gut, trying and failing to staunch the bleeding.

"Arthea!" I called out and knelt beside her. I stripped of my jacket, bunched it up and pressed it up against the wound. My girl Eliorah, Antheos' sister and a healer, had tought me to do that if someone was bleeding a lot. "You're going to be all right." I told my sister, but she weakly shook her head.

"No, I won't be. I'm going to die." she said definitively, "Promise you'll find those riders and make them pay for this." She gestured at the burning village around us. I nodded. A ghost of a smile passed over Arthea's face. She reached up, took off her necklace and put it around my neck. "For your birthday." she breathed.

"Thank you." I said, but I wasn't sure if she had heard me. Her body had gone limp and her eyes were staring at nothing. I closed her eyes and cradled her small, lifeless body. A howl of pain, grief and anger broke free from me, and then I broke down sobbing, still holding on to Arthea.

Eventually, gentle arms pulled me away from her. I didn't have to look to know that it was Eliorah who was holding me. I reached for the necklace and another sob escaped me when I saw the pendant. It was a small dragon, carved from wood and stained so dark it looked almost black. It had belonged to my mother, and she had given it to Arthea on her death bed, and now my sister had given it to me.

Anger replaced my sadness. I knew what I had to do. I had to find those riders and avenge my sisters death. I would find out who they were and why they had killed her, and then I would make them pay, just like I had promised. I would do whatever I'd have to do, whatever it took. My sister's death wouldn't be in vain.