Hsiugna
The trees are burning. Their crackling cries of raw agony echo through the forest. In the midst of the smoke, dangling limply from charred branches, blackened corpses are swinging. They do not scream as the blaze touches them.
They are already dead.
The ropes which were looped around their necks and slowly suffocated them haven't yet burned through. The weights that sway at their ends have not yet been cut down by the hungry fire.
A pathway leads away from the death sight. Any hints of small spring flowers have been thoroughly trampled by muddly boots and heavy hooves.
A child stumbles down the road. His peasant's clothing has been torn to frayed rags. It's been ripped completely from his young, thin chest, exposing red gashes and bloodstains on his sun-tanned skin. His face is an unmerciful pool of gore. His eye sockets are empty, jagged holes in his head. They no longer hold eyes, though they weep red rivers of scarlet blood. The hair on his scalp is a misshapen mass of dirty strands. Ruddy highlights glitter hints of color, but it is useless to try to distinguish real hair from blood and dirt. His red-smeared fingers stretch out to either side of him, feeling the heavy atmosphere, the thick agony of slow death and horrible pain.
Though he is the sole survivor of his village, though he has been abandoned on the deserted road of painful, lonely torment, the child makes not a sound.
Perhaps he is too deep in shock. Perhaps his vocal chords have been slashed out by ruthless soldiers. Perhaps it is another reason. But shall we ever know?
Behind him, in the center of the writhing forest, the first of the maimed carcasses crash to the heated ground.
The rope has burned through.
Copyright 1995
Alaisha Makalaster