Chapter 4: ACT I, SCENE 2

ACT I, SCENE 2Day 15 Minutes Since the Ash FellMidsummer Festival — MarketVespar reacts. Three paths.Child—save,Cathedral—goal,Kendra—protect.He grabs an arrow. Nocks. Releases.It soars.Through the ash—and Ansel drops the child, an arrow in his chest. Now! Move! Vespar flies out of his cover and throws himself over Kendra as a shield. Years of training. Take the shot before the shot is gone.The child must have screamed, but the noise never reaches Vespar as he catches a glimpse of the child scurrying behind the stalls and out of sight. Vespar wishes he could have seen the child. Who was it? Someone’s son or daughter—but they have a chance. Vespar doesn’t get to judge a person’s value, only his own actions.A familiar sound grows behind him—a metallic screech.Ansel is grasping at the fletching of the arrow. The same thick shadow sprays from the wound, hissing as it hits the ash on the ground. Around the wound, Vespar notices the flesh knitting, scarring. His own scar aches beneath the cold. His fingers almost reach for it. Vespar knows he has only moments before Kendra’s father turns to them.Vespar catches Kendra’s expression: a tear-streaked face, her eyes wide and frantic. She has grasped a wooden beam in her frostbitten fingers. Vespar can feel her rapid breathing; the warm air of her breath is a shock in the cold. He feels his own breath catch.“Vespar?!” she shrieks, her voice cracking over the rising wind. “What did you do?! What is happening to him?!”Time is up. Vespar hears that jaw start to smile again behind him. He feels the eyes of a loving father looking through him. Child, Cathedral, Kendra. Vespar steals a glance at the massive doors beginning to shutter as guards force refugees back into the market and away from the gateway.Up. Vespar knows the way. Grabbing Kendra by the waist, he hauls her onto rooftops he knows as familiarly as his bow. Vespar could have taken another shot; he could have closed the gap and drawn his sword, but Kendra had seen enough.They run. And her dad weeps.