Draxin Alistair (16)'s Arc

Chapter 1 of 22

The smoke came before the screams. Six-year-old Draxin Alistair pressed his back against the alley wall between two wooden homes and held his breath. His mother had shoved him here a minute ago. She told him not to move until she came back. He could still feel where her hands had gripped his shoulders. The village he had known his whole life was burning. Weathered planks split under boot heels. Doors he had run past every morning hung broken on their hinges. Men in long coats moved through the narrow lanes, calm, unhurried. A broken circle was stitched onto the back of each coat. Draxin did not know what the mark meant. He only knew none of them belonged here. He peeked around the corner. His mother stood in front of their doorway with her arms spread wide. Her red curls caught the firelight. She was still smiling, the way she smiled when she wanted him to feel safe. Two of the coated men were dragging something out of the house behind her, a long shape wrapped in gray cloth. She stepped in front of them. One of the men lifted his hand. Draxin did not see the blow itself. He only saw his mother fall. Her body hit the sand without a sound he could hear over the fire. A moment later his father stumbled out after her, one arm reaching for the wrapped bundle, and fell the same way. Draxin bit down on his own wrist to keep from screaming. His sharp teeth cut skin. The taste of blood was the only thing that kept him still. One of the coated men turned toward the alley. His face was hidden by dirty bandages wound tight across his mouth and nose. Bandaged hands rested on a knife at his hip. He walked closer. Draxin saw the man's eyes narrow above the wrappings, searching. A desert bandit, or something wearing a bandit's clothes. Draxin shrank behind a stack of empty water jars. The wooden slippers on his feet trembled against the ground. He held his breath until his chest burned. The bandaged man paused at the mouth of the alley. He looked straight at the jars. Then a voice called from the street, sharp and short. The man turned and went back to help carry the wrapped bundle away. Draxin waited until the boots faded. He crawled out. His parents lay where they had fallen. He touched his mother's hand. It was still warm. Her smile was still there. He did not cry. Not yet. He looked at the empty doorway where the wrapped thing had been kept, then at the tracks the coats had left in the sand. Whatever they took, they took it from his family. Whatever the broken circle meant, he would learn it. He pulled his mother's scarf loose and tied it around his wrist. Then he started walking after the tracks.