The sky.
Expansive and blue—like a limitless ocean stretching to the horizon.
In my peripheral vision, two white spots move in the distance, riding the crystal blue waves of air as they soar without constraint.Birds.
Water blooms, teetering at the edge of my eyelids as a memory shared with Sylas rises to the forefront of my mind: sitting atop Pantheon's Peak, discussing what the sky might actually look like, whether it was as blue as the fables once said.
It is,I say to the memory of him.It’s beautiful, Sylas.
Tears fall down my cheeks, cold and heavy, mirroring the weight in my chest at the thought of his absence, and the view he so wished to see.
My eyes close, the warmth of the sun stroking my face.Only it doesn’t comfort—it prickles.Not warming, but uncomfortable, almost burning.
Is this what sunlight is meant to feel like?
The manacles bite into my skin, bringing the reality of my own confinement firmly into the present.
After allowing me the time to adjust—a kindness I never thought he’d grant—the stranger pulls me forward, Auria rises before me like a dream carved in gold and ivory.Streets of pale stone are cut straight and orderly, nothing like the cramped chaos of home.Towers gleam, walls are polished to a shine, banners of white and gold sway in the breeze.
Gradients of dark brown, beige and white line the thoroughfare as the people within the cloaks celebrate to the beat of drums; a deep, rhythmic thundering that rolls across the city like a shockwave.
Each beat is a concussive blow—a relentless, ominous pounding that speaks of my looming demise, making my soul scratch beneath my skin.
“Wh—what’s going on?”I whisper to the stranger, not expecting a reply.
He offers me no attention, as a sneer laces his words: “The Festival of Light.”
Of course, how could I forget.That’s why the Luminary Guards were in the Lantern Market asking for offers to His Grace.
An annual celebration where everyone is obligated to give thanks to the Luminaries for everything they’ve done for us—and continue to do for us.Tearing us from our lives, and confining us into a dictatorship isn’t a cause I would deem worthy of celebrating.But the flawless, sun-kissed faces surrounding me paint a different picture.
Deep within, embers I have buried for years snap to life, fed by the cold fuel of what they’ve done.The flames lick at my pulse, my jaw seizing as the pressure builds—a firestorm trapped behind my ribs.
Ever since they took power, we Hollowers have been condemned to the dark.Forced to scrape a living from the dirt while the rot—that foul legacy of the War of Sun and Shadow—worms its way into our blood.Every day, we suffer.We wither.It eats at our lungs until we can no longer breathe in the stench of our own lives.We aren’t just living underground; we’re being buried alive.
No—we don’t live.We endure.While they rot in gold, in abundance.Seeing them prosper causes bile to rise in my throat, burning my tongue as the opulence sickens me.The chain jerks, pulling me forward as my knees nearly buckle.I’m dragged along the gleaming avenue, but I fight with all that I have left to not show them this weakness.
“Do you enjoy this?”I ask quietly.
He doesn’t look at me.“Enjoy what?”
“Dragging people through the streets like trophies.”
A muscle flickers in his jaw.His head turns slowly, his gaze still tracking forward.“You were noticed long before I chained you.”
I don’t know where the courage comes from to speak these words, but something deep stirs within.“So you’re just the hand,” I murmur.“Not the mind.”
That earns me a glance.
Sharp.Warning.
“Careful,” he says.“Hands can still break things.”
My hands flex and twist against the manacles that weigh heavy from years of our blood.I grip fear by the hilt, using the suffering I’ve endured to sharpen the blade.
I want them to see just what their suffering has forged.Hundreds of eyes press against my skin, weighing more than the iron on my wrists.Judgement fractures in the prism of their jewel-bright eyes, but instead of averting their gaze, the fire within ignites my resolve to stare right back.
They want to see a monster.I’ll show them a monster.
