Red Mercury

Crying Lightning

Adia blinked her eyes open and groaned, trying to remember where she was. Her head split with a headache, she forced herself up and looked around, a beast lay dead on the floor of the barn, and the horses were panicking in their stalls as she limped to the boy laying on the ground before her, she pulled his head into her lap and let her tears pool, then made them disappear.

"Ulric.." She whispered and combed her fingers through his hair, waking him up and helping him sit up.

A light caught her eye, and those dull blue hues drew to the doors of the barn, making her stand... And she trembled as she gasped and pushed them open.

Smoke struck her nose first, then she saw the raging flames of her village. The carnage the wolves left behind... The ashes of her castle.

What she walked in on was a bloodbath... three of the hell beasts had their heads bashed in, skulls showing and ribs broken open wide. One of them had its lung ripped out by the end of an arrow, another had its chest torn to shreds. One of the largest ones had its stomach slashed. From the end of its throat to its groin. Its rib cage looked like it had been pried open, show off any organs that hadn't spilled out onto the grass. One at the end of the clearing with its throat ripped out. And one in a pool of its own blood, struggling to get away, letting out horrible cries of agony.

She snarled to herself, cursing.

"No! No no no!" She grabbed a spare sword and burst out the doors, her feet tearing up on the rocks of the battlefield as she raced to the village.

"Connie!? Julian!?" She looked through the smoke, coughing when she found herself staring in the face of her worst fear... Her sister hanging there in the ashes, her new husband above her, his organs tied around her neck, and her stomach slashed open, her unborn baby laying in the ash by his cord.

She let out a blood curtailing scream that could have awoken the dead as she fell to her knees in that dust.

He heard the scream and stood up in an instant. He bent over and groaned in agony, as every sore muscle and broken bone struck him with pain. He limped out of the almost demolished stables and winced when the sun caught his eyes. 

As everything became clear, he stood and stared at a place that was once so beautiful, a place he had always called home. But now it was ash and blood. As his eyes wandered he saw Adia, kneeling in the dust. Once he got closer he heard the soft sobs coming from the girl. At that moment he no longer cared about the pain as he trampled over to her, he landed in the dust, next to the girl he thought he'd never see cry. 

He wrapped his arms around her and started off in the distance. There was a concern in his eyes, but the most powerful sight was the rage, and his adrenaline took over, settling for revenge.

That day was the first time he'd ever seen her cry...

She pulled against him, melting into his warm touch. "She's gone! First Rachel... now Connie..." She pressed her face into his chest, her body trembling in his arms as her breath came in short gasps, broken ribs seeming to stick in her lungs if she took too deep a breath. She sobbed into his tunic and pulled him closer. 

"W-What happened?! No werewolf pack did this..." She whispered, her blue eyes dull with pain and hurt as she stood, sparkling with tears she thought she'd never shed again. She looked down at him as crystal tears raced down her cheeks, catching the blood light as they fell.

Her walls broken down for a moment, as he stared at those electric blue hues, she trembled. He saw her fears, her hopes... Everything she'd kept locked behind that film of restlessness for so long had broken. It was like she was dying again, the life draining from her eyes the more she thought of her sister, the only family she'd had left...

Gone with the ash in the wind.