Witch Hunter K

Eyes from the Ashes

The flames reached up into the night sky blotting out the moonlight. They lit the valley casting a heavy blanket of smoke into the sky above.

The Merchant's caravan rolled up the mountain road at the mouth of the valley just around midnight. Their wagons, heavy with goods for the Lord of the lands, moved slowly in the dark.

"Woah." Ren, the head merchant pulled hard on the reigns calling his oxen to a halt.

"Why did we stop?" His middle son, Yurie climbed drowsily out of the back of the wagon.
His eyes widened as they adjusted to the dark. "Father?"

Ren's eyes focussed on the pillar of fire feeling a pit growing in his stomach. It was the Lord's mansion.

"We should turn back." Yurie said. "Go find help."

Ren shook his head. "We need to look for survivors... before the fires spread. Fetch the horses. Rid them of their loads. We need to hurry."

Yurie did as his father commanded. With one bound he leaped out of the wagon and onto the road his foot falling awkwardly on a protruding rock. His ankle gave under his weight and Yurie cursed under his breath. There was no time for mistakes.

He grit his teeth and hobbled to the back of the caravan to find their fastest horses. With nimble fingers he picked apart the knots holding cargo to their saddles and tossed the goods in the caravan. He could hear the angry clatter of their wares as he tossed them and his heart seized hoping that he had not broken something.

Once the last of the goods were unloaded Yurie unhitched the horses and pulled them forwards. The horses bucked uneasily in his grasp.

"Come on. I know, I know... We shouldn't be riding towards the fire. Fire is bad. It's very bad; but it's the bosses orders." Yurie managed to settle the horses a little and pull them to the front.

Meanwhile his father had set stones behind the wheels to keep the caravan from rolling away.

"Let's go." He said snatching a set of reigns from his son's grasp.

With a practiced swing of his leg Ren mounted his horse and set out at pace down the steep mountain road.

Yurie swung his leg up and over feeling a twinge in his ankle as he did. He didn't have a moment to waste dwelling on the pain. Instead he spurred his horse on into the night.

                                                                                             ...

Ash drifted down from the sky like pregnant snowflakes, painting what had been green in black and grey.

Her eyes couldn't focus through the tears that burned them. They spilled over her eyelids carving black rivers down the sides of her face.

Above her head she could see the burning trees. Her father's cherry blossoms had been in full bloom only that morning. Now they were burning cinders.

Her lungs burned with ash and smoke, every breath a rattling gasp. All she could do was count the breaths until they would come no more. In her ears was a terrible ringing that neither quieted nor dulled with the passing of minutes.

She couldn't even hear the pounding hoofbeats of the horses approaching.

"Oh my god!" Ren pulled his horse to a stop at the edge of the carnage.

Across the vibrant gardens a thick blanket of ash was piled. From beneath the ash mounds poked out here and there. His memory of the mansion and its gardens told him that some of those mounds were bodies and not bushed.