“It's more than this incident. She's homeless with deep wounds and doesn't want to go to the hospital.” I glance around, only to witness victims and face the bodies of dreamscreechers and Amarians as medics come to take them to the hospital.
My heart stops beating at the sight of these victims. Some are children, some are my age, and I even spot an elderly woman lying on the floor.
There's a chilling stillness that fills the air. There's no sense of life from any of them. No noise. No movement.
I inhale but it shakes to the point I can barely call it a breath. My tiny neck hairs stand. My body stays rigid.
These victims are dead. I don't have to see the gory details to sense it.
And the worst part is, there's nothing I can do about it.
Even as a prince and the descendant of a gift, I have no power to heal or stop death. All I can do is gawk at them. All of these innocent people…
I jolt at the grip on my shoulder and snap my head over to Erasmus. He looks at the scene before us. “It’s terrible. I know.” His grasp on my shoulder gets stronger, his eyes shining with tears. Only then do I realize my vision is blurred with the same droplets.
“These are children…” I murmur, each word threatening a sob. “Loved ones…” The last time their families will see them is this mangled up version of what they once were.
“The best we can do is walk away and let the medics help,” Erasmus whispers, tugging on my shoulder and turninghis attention to me. “You need a doctor anyways, and I'm not letting you go after some girl in this kind of condition.”
My body tightens again but there's a new found blaze in my soul. She's not just some girl. “This is why I should look for her. She's not safe until I help her.”
“She’ll be less safe if you get in the way of medics trying to save her. If she was a dead corpse anyways, you would've spotted her already.”
I pause. He's right. I should stay out of the way. I already know how useless I'd be in this situation. It's impossible to heal her but it's possible to prevent her from being saved.
I reluctantly follow him out the mall. As we walk, paramedics in all white rush up the steps into the mall. Other people jump out of cars and scan the crowds of people.
I see those weeping. All of them. Some of them are lucky enough to spot their loved ones through the crowd, and they race into tight embraces.
Others rush past me, wailing their loved one’s names with no response. They shove past everyone and burst through the mall doors.
Shrieks of shock and heartbreak come from the entrance of the mall.
I swallow weeps of my own, my own lips throbbing. Erasmus comes by my side and pushes my back forward.
That could've been me. That could've been my mother screeching after my death. It could've been me that never came home.
We make it out of the crowd and towards the car down the street. How could dreamscreechers be so cruel to innocent people? How could they just break in and make someone's loved ones go through a tortured death?
What did our people do to deserve this tragedy?
Chapter 12
Amias
I wince and lightly kick my ankle against the examination table as Dr. Kurt pierces my skin with the needle. I divert my attention to all the details of the room instead, not wanting to see the thread go through flesh.
The blue walls around us. I chose that color when I was five and Dr. Kurt wanted to redesign this room to my liking. My family are his only patients here, me being his primary.
I also picked the paintings of the doves on the left wall in honor of Mother's love for birds. The next painting is of bread sides and honey, my childhood snacks, and then on the right wall, a simple cartoon of a blushing deer eating grass with a grin. There was something intriguing to me about deer growing up, with their big antlers and proud stances as they chewed with their crooked jaws.
Those childhood memories are soothing in comparison to watching a thread weaving through my flesh.
The sting of the needle leaves as Dr. Kurt takes a step back, examining me once more. "And he's all set," Dr. Kurt says finally as Mother, Father and Erasmus peek over his shoulder.
Dr. Kurt pushes back his large black framed glasses that seemed rather goofy on him, but somehow matched the long white doctor suit. He smiles, the wrinkles becoming that much more defined around his nose, lips and eyes.
It's odd to think that those same eyes have looked down upon me since I was a newborn.
