Crow Roost

"You were HERE? During the slaughter of Eversmile?" Das asks leaning forward with a mixture of excitement and disbelief.

He notices this and corrects himself, his academic mind once again betraying him.

"How is that possible?" He asks now more compose and calm.

"Well..." The girl then tells Das about the day this small village burnt.

She woke up on top of her poor, old hay bed. She lived in a humble stone house not too far away from the plaza.

Yawing and stretching she gets up from bed and starts her day, opening the torn fabrics she used as curtains she lets the tender rays of the dawn light up and opens the window.

Leaning forward she looks at the guards fighting to stay awake, shouldn't be long for the shift in their jobs.

"Oh, Morning Miss!" One of the night guards waves at her as he walks through the street, wearing lighter armor than those at the capital, his helmet is just a simple bucket that lets his blushed face be seen.

She waves back at him, giving him a quick smile before returning back inside.

Wearing but a simple dress she goes to the kitchen, as shabby and worn out as her bedroom. She takes a loaf of bread from a nearby basket and sits down on the small circular table to eat it.

"It wasn't much, but I never needed much" She says to the archmage.

As she told Das about her morning they reached the place that used to be her home. It was mostly rubble now but one could still see the remains of the table, broken and darkened. And her bed is in a similar state.

"I guess now I need everything" She says looking at her home with melancholy.

"I'm sure it is hard, but-"

"You will gift me a brick of solid gold with your magical powers?" She asks seemingly honestly looking back at him.

"That is a myth, mages can't create gold" Das, unsure if she was joking or being serious, didn't know if he should laugh or apologize "I was gonna say that the priests would surely help you in these times of need"

"Are you a religious man, Archmage?" She asks him as she struggles to get through the rubble of her house, tripping at one point even.

"I can't say I am"

"Good, me neither" She says kneeling in front of her bed and lifting a wooden box that bears the scars of fire "The clothes I wear right now, I kept them here. What coin I made I spent in fancy dresses and perfumes, a guilty pleasure of mine" She says throwing the box away "What do you think?" She then turns to Das and moves her cloak to the side so he gets a better view of her attire.

"Looks great, I guess" Das scratched the back of his neck.

"That is a horrible response to give a woman" She replies giving him a look full of contempt.

"Could you keep telling me about that day?"

"Oh, well after eating something I changed and went to the sanctuary" She said looking away from Das and getting out of the crumbled house.

"I thought you weren't religious?"

"I'm not, but it paid the bread and my unhealthy obsession with fancy dresses"

"Paid? You are a priest?" Das asked, his eyes wide with surprise.

"That I am, for a few years now"

"It must have been hard, not only are you a woman, but your hair is black too" As she kept walking, Das followed.

"It wasn't easy but it could've been worse, I'm lucky or...was I guess" She said taking one last glance at her home, before looking forward and moving on.

She went to the sanctuary and by the time she reached it the streets were slowly getting filled with more and more people, most from the village itself but a few, merchants wanting to increase their wealth.

"Good morning, First Priest" She said bowing her head, now dressed in the white robes of the priests, she stood in front of the First Priest.

An elderly man with robes far more elaborate than hers, his head bald and a tattoo of the sun on his forehead. He had a long thin beard and looked at her as you would look at a turd you just step on.

"Morning, now get in and clean everything" He said waving his hand dismissively at her.

"At once, First Priest" She bowed her head once more and went in to fulfill her duties.

She and two other woman priests were scrubbing the floor with brooms and cleaning the pews as their first task of the day but soon came the second, as the First Priest rang the bell in his hands and well-dressed families began to enter the sanctuary, each carried a tiny golden candle in their hands.

After greeting each other, not out of kindness but rather, a mechanical action part of the ceremony, everyone sat on the pews and spectated the ceremony that was about to begin.

Two young boys, sixteen years old each, walked up to the front and near the First Priest who carried with him a dull sword and a torch. They dressed on ragged cloaks and pants, it seemed they had been playing in the mud all day.

All other priests stood idly by the gates as the ceremony began.

"Today it is a joyous occasion, our young boys turn unto men under the guidance of The Lightbringer. He who battled the beast of the Everdark and freed us from its tyrannical rule by taking up the blade and killing the seven dragons of Greed" The First Priest raises his hands and gave the sword and torch to the teens "You now carry the symbols of The Lightbringer, the sword that will vanquish evil and the torch, that will bring light into the lives of your loves ones" He turned to his side and seemed to notice something unpleasant, so when he looked back at the crowd he pointed at the priests "You three there, bring a pair of buckets with fresh water from the well would you? This water is stale and filthy, can't expect me to cleanse the boys into adults with it, won't you?"

The two girls looked at each other confused, but as soon as one was about to speak, the black-haired girl bowed her head.

"At once, First Priest" She then held both girls and took them out with her.

"That is BULLSHIT!" One of them, her hair blonde, shouts as soon as they are far away enough from the sanctuary "I filled the buckets an hour ago!"

"Can't wait for the old, nasty man to die already!" Other shouts as well. Her hair was brown.

"Don't wish death to others, it is said to bring you closer to yours" The black-haired priest scolded her as they rushed on the street to the edges of the town, where the closest well laid.

"I'm sorry, how is it you are not angry?"

"Oh I am, but with a little time, everyone gets what they deserve"

The priests reached the well and began filling the two buckets, there were a few stacked nearby.

"We hated that man, he just wanted to see us fail, and if we didn't do it he just made it up so we would look bad" She tells Das as they are now passing next to the well she just mentioned, they are entering the woods.

"I thought you wanted to visit the village" He voiced his thoughts, Looking around and seeing only a few burnt trees and the intimidating darkness in front of him.

"And I did, but I wanted to go where that person I told you about and I used to spend time together. Don't worry archmage, It's not too far away" She replied, not stopping her pace as she entered the woods.

Das looked behind him for a moment and saw the trail of lights he left. Hitting the end of his staff on the ground the orb of light appeared and hovered above him, he then resumed following the mysterious girl.

Something wasn't quite right, her attitude this whole time seemed too relaced for someone who had lost it all and apparently, a loved one as well. He reasoned it may be just the shock of it all, maybe she had gotten crazy after what happened or it was just a peculiarity of her.

Either way, it felt like if he was a moth, flying to the deadly flame. So he keeps his eyes open and alert at anything that may be stalking from the shadows.

"This person you spoke about, who was it?"Das asked.

"He was someone very close to me...like a dear friend" Her tone seemed to change, to a more serious, even sad one "He was a noisy kid, always messing around and being an overall nuisance...but I guess that was partially my fault, he grew up with me and I'm certain I spoiled him too much"

Grew up with her? Kid?.

"So, you took care of a child?" Das asked, even more, confused than before.

"Yes, but I guess calling him a child is wrong, he was just childish. Loved the spectacle of things and buying tiny toys" She laughed to herself softly.

Something seemed, familiar.

"Wait, he-"

"We are almost there, let me finish telling you about that day"She interrupted him, turning her head to the side to look at him before returning her attention forward.

The three priests had filled two buckets with clean water so they turned around and prepared to make their way back to the sanctuary.

Then, the whizzing of an arrow is heard and the priest with brown hair collapses on the ground throwing her bucket and splashing the water on the ground. She has an arrow in her head, growing through her popped eye, her body spams.

The black-haired priest turns around, her eyes wide and mouth slightly open. There are dozens of armed men rushing forward with axes and blades. Bandits.

She immediately runs back to the village, pulling the other priest who is in shock from the arm as everything becomes pure chaos. The guards rush forward with their spears and bows, trying to stop the assault with little success.

Then as they reach a path between streets several arrows fly at the pair, they strike the blonde priest and luckily spare the last one of the trio. She begins to lose her composure as panic sets in, she stares at the body of the priest on the ground and then the bandits clash with guards who probably were the original target.

She gets thrown in the middle of the brawl as she tries her best to leave while men are cut open and pierced through, soon everything she can listen to is the clash of steel against steel, screaming and loud, mad laugher.

"RUN BACK TO THE SANCTUARY!" The guard who waved at her in the morning yells pulling her from the brawl and pushing her away "RUN!" He then turns around and continues the fight.

She runs with all her might as she sees guards and common people get cut down by the mad bandits.

Soon, she reaches the plaza, where everyone is scrambling to their houses or trying to grab what they can from their stores and flee. But then, she heard the heavy, thundering, horseshoes approaching.

She stops running for a moment and sees that from the main street leading to the plaza a giant horse charges with its rider, another giant on his own, swings his claymore cutting in half entire groups of guard and villagers with brutal efficiency.

Returning her attention to the sanctuary she sprints and reaches the closed gates, she grabs them and tries to force them open because she listens to the ceremony still being held.

The gates, however, do not budge. She turns around thinking of just leaving on her own when she spots a young kid standing abandoned in the middle of the plaza, staring at the incoming monster of a knight.

Without hesitation, she rushes towards the child in an almost desperate way. Everything seems to be in slow motion as she and the knight approach the child at seemingly the same speed.

But at the last second, she jumps and grabs the girl in her arms, barely escaping the charge of the horse and the knight, who luckily didn't swing his claymore.

She holds the petrified child with a pair of red braids in her arms as she lays on the floor, dangerously close to the knight who has come to a full stop. The monster turns the horse around and lifts his claymore ready to strike at both of them.

However, the swift dead never comes. Instead, after remaining in that position for a few seconds, the knight lowers his arm.

The gates of the sanctuary open, as suddenly all the noise seems to have gone quiet around them, while the chaos could still be heard elsewhere in the village.

The hooded man steps out of the church, she sees from where she lays that the people are in the middle of the ceremony, shaking, crying even, but they don't stop chanting.

Das and the girl reached some type of clearing in the middle of the woods, but it looked different from anything Das had seen before. The dirt beneath his feet was cracked and devoid of any grass.

In fact, all the clearing is devoid of life.

He looks at the trees surrounding them and sees they are all dead. Trunks rotten and countless branches without a single leave.

In the middle of the large clearing that was at least fifty meters wide stood a large tree, just as dead as the others. A large roost of crows adorns the branches of the tree as the moon seemed to watch over from above.

The orb from his staff begins to glow as he stands at the edge of the clearing while the girl rushes towards the tree and only comes to a halt once she is close enough to it. Giving her back to Das.

"That man, what happened next?" He asks, standing ready for what may come next.

"He spoke to me" She said loudly, making the crows wake up and caw.

"And what did he said?"

The man lowers his hood, showing the dark steel plates of his gauntlets, and steps forward. A thin, almost welcoming smile on his pale face.

"I'm back, master"

She says turning around, the iris of her eyes now shine with natural blue as the crows caw loud and take flight by the dozen. Covering the dead groove with their shadows.