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"Now to celebrate the night!" Tloque passed cups to Itzi and Chicome. "This my friends is a special drink. Chicome, my dear, you've had it before, but Itzi this will be new for you. Now to the night!" Tloque raised his glass and held it i nthe air in the middle of the table, waiting for the others to join him. In a moment both did.

173

"The crowd seems to like it."

"Of course they do. They do it every night as well."

Out of the corner of his eye Itzi saw something green moving and looked over to see the performer walking towards them. He wore a large grin on his face and was obviously enjoying the cheers and back pats form the crows as he passed. As he cleared the crowd he waved his hand towards Itzi and Chicome.

Itzi wrinkled his eyebrows momentarily confused and then waved at the man. The performer cam close and pulled a chair from a nearby table and placed it next to Chicome, diagonally facing the table.

"Hello Chicome, there's room here isn't there. Why didn't you choose larger table? Maybe we can retire to my dressing room? More privacy and all of that if you know what I mean. Itzi nice to meet you." The performer held out his hand and gave Itzi hand, after he offered his in return, and violent shake. "I'm Tloque, you can call me Tez. Ahh the round has arrive. Empty your glasses table and make way for the round." Tloque clapped his hands together theatrically and gathered up the two empty cups on the table, helping to make room for the drinks the waitress was placing on the table.

Itzi took time during the pause in Tloque's speech to get a closer look at his performing clothes. The green that Itzi had seen earlier was actually a flowing shirt and a green cape that was draped over he shoulder and reached halfway down his back. The green cape was covered in a golden fring, and from the look of it Itzi assumed that there was some sort of a symbol or picture stitched into the back of it, just out of his line of vision.

172

"You are here because frankly you were in the right place at the wrong time. Or perhaps you were in the wrong place at the right time? It's not important, you died at the right place and at the right time. You died in the middle of a situation that some of us are interested in. You unique position gives you a certain value to myself and some of my friends, which is why you find yourself here instead of somewhere else. We brought you here but that is about as far as the consensus has gotten." Chicome took a deep drink from her wine, finishing the rest of her cup. "We thought this would be a good place for you to spend a few days, an enjoyable afterlife before we need you to go back."

"Back?" Itzi asked, being polite more then anything else. He knew what she meant from the look in her eyes. There was only one back, and the memories of it had been slowly sinking into his consciousness since she told him that he was dead.

"Yes. We need you alive. Certain tasks are well suited to your kind."

"My kind?"

"Alive."

The performer finished his third song and the crowd erupted with cheers and applause. This applause differed from the other responses from the crowd as it seemed to last longer. The crown began stomping it's feet in time with the clapping and soon the very walls of the inn were shaking.

"He loves this part." Chicome sighed. "Encores should be abolished for being the useless ego stroking that they are. Of course he's coming back," Chicome said with a raised voice to the crowd that paid no attention, "he does this every night!"

171

The performer on the stage brought his song to a frenzied crescendo, raising the response of the crowd to the stomping of feet and clapping of hands. The people that had been sitting beside Itzi and Chicome left their seats, and with clapping hands and smiling faces made their way to the stage.

Chicome leaned forward in her seat, Itzi noticed out of the bottom of his vision that she rested her breasts ever so slightly on the the table as she did this, presumably to make it easier for him to hear her words.

"Why am I here?" Itzi asked before Chicome had a chance to speak. The words that had been about to emerge from her opening lips were swallowed back down.

"Now that is a question that deserves an answer."

170

Chicome stretched, visibly pulling back from the conversation for a moment. "But none of this really matters. Interesting perhaps, but not the best usage of time."

169

She paused for a moment, looking into his eyes, and frowned. "Well, to be more accurate, it's an afterlife. Something for you, Something in somewhat familiar and inviting. Not for you, as in you Itzi, don't missunderstand me, we're not making this exeryday. But it's you as in your people."

"My people? I'm not sure that I have something like that."

"Don't be pedantic. There's not much worse then a pedantic mortal. Think about it this way, whatever you imagine to be your people, they helped shape this. From their pain, fear, joy, and sorrow. Their memories, prayers, myths, it all helped to shape this."

"An inn?"

"It's more then that, and it's different for different people. Like a dream you fade in and out from. And for some it's not a final place, but a stop on the way. When you cross over, it's not as cut and dry as the living think." The music from the stage began again as the performer launched into his second song. "But the specifics of it really are not that important, and I'm not just being difficult, nor am I trying to hide anything from you, but it's hard to be specific about something that really, well, isn't." She took a sip of wine, her green eyes flashed for a moment in the lamp light and Itzi was again struck by her beauty. "Does a reed blow North or South?" She shook her head from the right to the left. "Well both really, but that's not even the full story is it. Does it blow East or West? Well it's more like a combination of all of those, and if there's no wind well then it probably doesn't blow at all? Do you see what I'm saying?"

"That last one doesn't make that much sense. Now I've just been told that I'm dead, and I can't remember my life, so maybe I'm being a bit sensitive. But if the question is what way does a reed blow, and one of the answers is it doesn't if the wind doesn't blow? Frankly that really doesn't cut it."

"Well if the reed doesn't blow you're just dead."

"Some people are just dead?"

"What?" She asked as the music increased in volume.

"Dead! Some people are just dead?"

"Sure. There are a lot of variables that go into this, some people are, and this doesn't make sense, but if you shelve your pedantic ways you can understand what I mean, happier to not exist. For them the nullification or the cessation of their pain or agony is enough, sometimes it may be retribution, sometimes it may be a kindness, sometimes it may be the exhalation of breath into the void of nothingness, the infinity of that moment between existence and extinguish. A void that stretches and warps, and that pulls down into forever, and then just drops away into nothing."

168

The crowd was obviously getting ready to enjoy the entertainment, but the woman with the black hair seated across from him looked anything but happy. She rested her chin on her hand and gave him a tight smile.

"Well, time is ever precious." She rubbed her chin for a moment and then sat up straight in her chair. "Now, obviously something is amiss here. You do realize that you've failed to ask me my name? Have you thought about yourself? Could you tell me your name?"

"I don't know, I don't think so. I Didn't really think about it."

"And I think that we've already been going over this haven't we. Your name is Itzi."

He smiled when he heard the name. Itzi, my name.

"Remembrance, that is good. It's never really a blank slate, that's just something philosophers like to argue about. There's always a little something left scratched on the tablet. So your name is Itzi. My name is Chicome. We don't have much time."

As if on cue the performer on the stage began to play his musical instrument. A sad an melancholy minor tune began to spread over the bar. The performer was obviously talented, as the song was complex but seemed simple as layers of notes were effortlessly piled upon each other.

"He plays well." Itzi said.

"Yes." Chicome said with a huff. "And he has a flair for the dramatic, melodramatic if you ask me, and he's also very full of himself. And I think he's doing this just to annoy me." She looked towards the stage and continued to to talk, and although her words were aloud it seemed to Itzi as though she was speaking to herself. "But he has his own games to play. He's been on the board for a long time, perhaps he forgets himself."

The two sat and listened to the performer play and sing. His song was of lost love, young lovers separated by a heaving earth and a raging river. They grow old apart their love for each other remaining pure. Then on the last day of their lives they both return to the river and die, with their lover in their eyes, on opposite banks of the river.

Chicome sighed and turned her head back to regard Itzi. Her eyes were glassy with tears that had not been allowed to truly form, and there was a sadness in her face that reflected the contents of the song. The applause form the crown only died when the performer in green began playing the next song.

"You're dead Itzi. This is the afterlife."

167

"Or worse." She said dabbing some leftover wine from her lips.

The sound of a stringed instrument being tuned was suddenly heard in the common room. Patrons began to clap and laugh in anticipation. Those patrons that were further away from the stage began to leave their seats and make their way closer. He turned to see if he could find the figure on stage. There was a half-wall at the end of the bench that prevented him from seeing anything more then the flash of a flowing green sleeve.

166

He nodded. He could feel that what she said was correct. This weightlessness that he felt was new, it wasn't the way he always was. Maybe that makes it easier.

165

"My shoulders feel straighter," He continued, "and my breath, there's something about it. It fills my chest and it's so cool, and it just feels, it's hard to describe, as thought it was fresh. Every breath seems pure. I'm not sure, I think I can remember, when it was different, when there was something else, when there was—"

"—a weight."

"Yes! A weight."

Drinks arrived at the table and the black haired lady thanked the waitress with the familiarity of a regular. The waitress nodded in return and went to serve other patrons.

"Thank you." He said taking a sip. The black haired lady absently waved off his thanks with her hand. "Isn't that strange? I don't think I remember anything, I'm not even sure what it's like, to remember something. There's something there, but I can't quite hold on to it. It feels like it should be important, but I just can't be bothered. You have the most beautiful green eyes I've ever seen." He laughed. "Can that even make sense? Or does it make too much sense?"

"With time that will change, all of it. Be glad and enjoy the way you feel for now. In some respects," She paused and brought her wine goblet to her lips. "It's better for you and harder for me. They will deny it, but when I speak now, and strip you of that, there will be sorrow in that for me. They seek to strip everything from me, I think it makes it easier for them." Her lips tightened into a thin line, the first look of sadness or anger he had seen since entering the Crow's Next. "But they have no idea of heavy the burden is. You on the hand may understand very shortly."

164

He watched the woman over the rim of his mug as he drank the Nut ale. Trying, and failing he assumed, to watch her without her noticing. Without anything else to do he realized that he was already half-way done his drink. He put the mug down on the table and then looked up to find the woman who had bought him the drink standing in front of his table.

"Would you mind if I sat down?" She asked. "I don't assume you will, but it always pays to be polite."

"No, please. And thank you for the drink." He answered, trying to his best to follow her lead and be polite.

She sat down and looked at him with a slight smile on her face. A smile that tilted her head to the side, a few stray strands of black curls falling onto her face. Her beauty, obvious form a distance was all the more stunning up close. Straightening she brush her hair out of her face. He smiled back and took another sip of his drink. She looked at his cup as he put it down and then raised her right hand into the air.

"I suppose you're feeling a little bit confused. Out of place perhaps?"

He let his breath out of his nose slowly before speaking. "No. Not confused." He looked away at some of the patrons crowding the bar and thought for a moment. "Not confused...lighter. More at ease."

"I'm glad." She smiled at him again.

163

This seems to be the right place. He thought to himself, a bit unsure as to exactly what that meant. It felt right though, to have come here, to the Crow's Nest, even the watchman had known that. He reached out and let his hands feel the heat form the flame of the small table lamp. He held his right hand close to the light and saw the saw that the light lit the flesh of his finger, around the bone, into a bright red. For a moment his hands felt eerie and lighter then air, as though the heat and glow from the candle had seeped into his hand and was pushing it up into the air. He felt disconnected to his hand, as though it was floating there in space, someone else's hand. Then a thick earthenware mug of ale banged down onto the table.

He looked at the drops of ale that had fallen onto the table, and the white bubbles that were forming in the small puddles. Before the bubbles truly had time to form a deft hand pulled a grey washcloth from an apron waistband and encircled the spilt ale with the cloth. The circular motion of the cloths continues until the ale was gone. With a snap the cloth looped over in the air, was caught by the female hand and tucked knowingly back into the apron's waistband.

"I'm sorry," He said looking up at the woman, who was holing a tray of similar mugs of ale, "I didn't order this."

"No you didn't. But she did." The waitress knelt down bringing her free arm close to his eye level and pointing at a group of people sitting at a table near the bar. "The lady there, with the grey riding dress and the black hair."

He leaned forward and followed her arm to see a woman sitting at a table with three other people. She was looking at him, her black hair combed in such a way that implied immaculate, and he knew, even from this distance, that her eyes were green

"I don't know her."

"She says she knows you." The waitress straightened her legs and began to walk away. "That or she made a mistake and you got a free drink. Not the worst thing ta happen to a man alone in a bar."

Hesitating for a breath, he lifted the mug of ale into the air and awkwardly returned the toast of the black haired woman in the grey riding dress. He took a sip and put the drink back down on the table.

"Is this the nut ale?" He called to the waitress who was making her way back into the thick of the crown.

"Yup." She called without turning around.

It is good for what ails you. He thought, taking another sip.

162

He saw down at the one empty table, choosing the bench so that he could have a full view on the common room. He glanced at the path that he had recently taken and was slightly surprised to note that the space he had occupied had been filled. He hadn't carved a path, instead the sea of people parted around him and then rose to fill the empty space once he was gone. His passage was now invisible, as though he had simply appeared in this seat rather then walked to it.

He placed his hands on the table and looked at them, for a moment feeling self-conscious about where he should put them. Looking up from his hands he relaxed a bit noting that no one, not even the people sitting closest to him seemed to be paying any attention to him or his hands.

161

The man in the white shirt stood still for a moment, waiting to see if Pisco the shepherd was going to address him again. When it became clear that the conversation had returned to the table, the man in the white shirt continued down the row, excusing himself to people he bumped as he passed.

He walked passed a stage that was currently empty, but the flickering lanterns ringing the stage implied that some type of performer would take the stage that evening. The stage was small, with only enough room for two or three performers. People crowded the stage, sitting three deep in a semi-circle along the stage's front.

He saw a seat near the back corner of the common room and made his way towards it. The corner was darker then much of the bar lit by small table lamps on a row of five two person tables. A bench ran along the wall providing seats for one person at each table, and old wicker chairs provided the other. The corner was the furthest corner from the entrance and the the bar explainng the one empty table.

160

He wove his way through the crowd of men and woman. He saw smiling faces as he passed talking and singing at the tables or leaning against the wall. The tables were old and worn with the grooves of countless mugs of ale and dinner plates. He began making his way between to long rows of tables with bench seating. As he made his way a man wearing a brown shepherd's hat and a brown woollen vest leaned back from the table, mouth smiling and eyes glazed, and raised his mug of ale to the man in the white shirt.

The man in the white shirt smiled and nodded awkwardly, unsure how to return the gesture.

"You need something in your hand!" The shepherd clapped the man in the white shirt on the shoulder. "A drink! The nut ale will be what yer looking for. Trust me, it's good for what ales you."

"Come off it already." A large woman groaned from the seat next to the shepherd. She turned to the left to face the shepherd and the man in the white shirt. "He tries that joke on any new face around her. None laugh. Do you hear that?" She turned to address the shepherd. "It's not funny. How many moons with the same joke!" She signed and shook her head. "Nut Ale!" She yelled at no one in particular. "Two nut ale's here. I need to drown this fool's jokes."

"See it is good for what ale's you!" The shepherd laughed.

The man seated directly across from the shepherd nearly spit his drink on the table as he laughed. Choking he thumped his fist against his chest. "Gods Pisco you like to play with fire."

"How do you think I got us here." The shepherd named Pisco said with a smile, turning back to the table. "She loves fiery men."

159

"Grab a seat!" A female voice yelled, rising above the cacophony.

He looked around trying to find the source of the voice.

"You at the front door! Drunk or daft I don't care. Find a place to sit and get your ass out of the way."

He nodded in a few directions, hopefully addressing the voice, and began to make his way through the crowd.

158

White walls that would have gleamed in the sunlight, and light wood used on the doors, windows, and roofs. All of the windows he passed were shuttered, most only showing darkness through the cracks, but a few were ringed light escaping through the gaps along the edges. The moonlight, and it's reflection off of the damp cobblestones was enough to guide him down the road.

After a while the road began to curve to the right and eventually he noted, glancing back over his shoulder, he could no longer see the wall that surrounded the village. He continues to make his way along and the road made a sudden and hard turn to the left. Once the turn was completed he saw The Crow's Nest. Or what, from this distance, he assumed to be The Crow's Nest.

Yellow light and the sound of merriment spilled out of an open door in one of the larger white buildings. As he drew closer he could see the occasional shadow pass on the inside of the door way, and he was able to make out the sign that hung above the open door. An obviously drunken woman, shamefully over endowed, was in the crow's nest of a ship, and leaning forward, towards the viewer. The word's below the image read: Crow's Nest in cracked lettering painted read.

He made his way towards the inn and then stepped through the threshold and inside. He stood there for a moment, blinking away the sudden change in light. After his eyes had adjusted, and after narrowly missing a serving woman carrying a tray full of empty glasses he surveyed the room. A room which appeared to me much larger than the outside of the building had led him to believe. It was quite full of people talking, singing, and for the most part drinking.

157

"You coming in?" The old man asked.

"That's they way I was headed. Yes."

The old man grunted and disappeared from the window in the door. The man stood in the road and listened to the clanking of metal keys in metal locks. After a few moments the clanking ceased and the door swung open on squeaky hinges. The man in the white shirt stepped through the open door and nodded at the watchman, who was staring at him through the window in the door.

"I expect you'll be lookin' for a place to stay," The watchman paused to spit on the road, "given the time of night and all."

"Yes, I think I could use a rest. Although, strangely I'm not that tired. I think I feel more awake then I have in a long time."

"We get all types." The old man said under his breath, although loud enough for the man in the white shirt to hear him. "Try the Eagle's Nest." A cough overtook the old man, and when he recovered after a moment, he spat upon the ground again. "Down the road a ways. Only paved road in town." He began to close the door. The man in the white shirted turned to watch him in his task. "Follow the sounds. You'll get there eventually."

"Thanks."

"It's my job." The old man turned away from the man in the white shirt and began climbing the stairs that led to a feeble flickering light in the watchman's perch. "I've got a drink waiting for me." The stairs creaked under his weight and he leaned on the railing to help him in his journey. "Try not to wake me."

The man in the white shirt watched the man climb the stairs until he was gone from few and then continued down the paved road. He could hear the sound of the common room of the Eagle's Nest growing louder as he walked down the deserted road. The buildings he passed were all somewhat uniform in colour and building material, resembling the construction of the wall the surrounded the village.

157

He look at his hands. He? He turned his hands over and looked at his palms in the moonlight before turning them back around to look at their backs. He. These are male hands. He felt his face and hair. No stubble, short hair. He.

He took a deep breath in through is nose. The air he took in was cool and his nasal cavity felt open and expansive. Their was salt in the air. He took a few steps down the road towards the town so that he could look past the large cliff wall that had been obstructing his view. The cliff walls were bright white and dotted with green bushes bravely taking hold of the moisture and soil that could be found in cracks. But he wanted to see the ocean. After a few clumsy steps he look and saw the water down below. He really was quite high up. Trees obscured anything below him, but the in the distance sparkled and danced in the full moon light.

Something int he blackness seemed familiar to him. Shrugging he began walking towards the entrance to the village. Something about the familiarity that had felt upon seeing the nighttime sky tugged as his memory, but he was unable to focus on it, and so he just kept walking towards the village. It seemed like the thing to do, the road ran towards the village entrance, and after all that was the way he had been heading.

As he got closer to the barred gate of the village he could see lights flickering through the wathman's window, which was inset in the small door. Ten paces from the entrance he could hear the sounds of people's voices and music. At five paces a voice called out to him.

"You there."

He stopped and looked around to see if there was anyone there with that name. Thinking that there had been a mistake he continued to walk closer, hoping to knock on the door and let the watchman know he was there.

"I said: 'You there!'" The voice called out again. "You in the white shirt and brown pants."

He looked down and saw that he was wearing a loose cotton shirt and brown woollen pants.

"Me?"

"Yes" The voice sighed. "The only man standing on the road." An old man's face came into view behind the iron bars. The watchman closed his left eye and squinted at the man standing in the road with the white shirt.

156

The speed that was being traveled seemed to increase again, increasing in an exponential way. Now it was as though the black was slowly being wiped away by the knife slits. Slowly being erased from the field of view that the consciousness held. And then, when the exponential travel hit its apex, white light filled the view of the consciousness with the intensity of before but without the pain.

Then there was impact.

The impact of a body hitting stone. Hitting wet stone. The wetness was perceived by the consciousness, who was still in the process of coming to grips with existence itself, and who was now faced with the exceptionally limiting concept of the physical form in which it had just been manifested, as a cold sensation on its ear and cheek.

The figure sat up on the cobblestones using his arms. It was dark, Night, and the figures eyes were in the process of adjusting to the lack of light. Eventually his eyes began to be grow aware of white circular glow of moonlight on the damp cobblestones. He also became aware of the uncomfortable wetness seeping into his pants and pushed himself unsteadily to his feet. He looked around and saw that he was on a cobblestone road just outside of a small hilltop village.

The village was surrounded by a high brick wall. The brick was smooth and grey in the moonlight. Columns topped in light brown wood marked the entrance to the village. The entrance was currently blocked by a large wooden door with a smaller human sized door inset within it. The consciousness that was now personified was was acutely aware of all of the knowledge that it seemed to easily recall when once it seemed so empty. Memories. Are these my memories, memories of words? Or is there something in this flesh that is feeding me?

155

The light began to get bigger. No motion was felt but the growing size of the speck of light implied travel. The consciousness had a vague idea that it was moving towards the light, but the majority of it's focus was on trying to understand what it was. All other things were hazy and were lost before they could ever be grasped. The past and the future were concept unattainable. The present moment spread out into infinity like a fan.

But there is motion. Motion implied time, a past and a present and a future destination. The speck of light grew in the vision of the consciousness. As it grew so did the light it emitted. Soon the light from the speck seemed to burn itself into the vision of the consciousness. With no ability to look away, or thought process that would enable such a thing, pain began to bloom.

Then, another speck became visible. Seeming dark now against the powerful light of the first speck. Another source of light appeared off in the distance, growing larger with the other two. Then all there was was the light from the first speck. Where once was black now all was light, blinding light. And then it was gone. Now before the consciousness was a shell of black with tiny pin holes of light poking through. An uncountable amount, stretching off into the distance as far as the consciousness could perceive.

Stars! The consciousness laughed. There was strangeness there. A memory. Like stars. Like what I have seen before. A moment. I have a past. The movement, now obvious with the points of light, increased it's pace. Soon the lights were sailing passed the vision of the consciousness at a speed that seemed to pull and bend and stretch the very light being emitted. Now instead of pin pricks the light looked as though it was coming through slits made by a knife.

154

It wasn't like waking up. It was like realizing that you were dreaming but without the dreams. There were no eyelids to open, instead it was like a veil, or a roll of gauze, slowly being lifted off of open eyes. At first there was nothing, blackness. The same blackness that was there before. Only now the consciousness viewed the blackness. The wasn't the blackness of closed eyes or this middle of this nice, this blackness just was.

I am witnesses it. The consciousness thought. I am and it is. We are separate. But where am I?

Now the black began to shift. The separation of the two, of the black and the consciousness seemed to have triggered something. Movement. I'm moving. Do I move? What do I move? The black in front of the seemed to move past the consciousness almost like wind. Wind! Wind on my face. A light! There off in the distance a tiny speck of light erupted in the darkness. Though small and weak, in contract to the never-ending black the speck of light shone like the sun.

153

*10*

He floated. Behind the dark, like eyes closed he floated. There was red at the sides and down the middle if the thought about it, but he didn't. He wasn't even there. He floated. A miss and forgotten. Blown and tumbles and spun around through. He drifted as it pleased, but he wasn't even there to notice. There was a thought behind the darkness something pressing close. Something disturbing the black. There was a whisper where there had been no sounds. Smoke drifted. Consciousness returned.

152

Malina looked up from the rubble and saw that the road ahead was lined with people. More people than had been along the road previously. As they approached Malina could see that all of the people were wearing similar clothing. The colour of their clothing differed yet they appeared to be wearing the robes of a religious order. Most of the people lining the road were wearing Blue or brown robes. Those that were wearing brown robes had black scapula on. There were a few wearing badly stained white robes and one man wearing a black robe with an orange scapula.

They were lined up according to the colour of their robe for the most part, and as Malina passed them she could see the fatigue on their faces and the dust and soot on their robes. The people, men and woman, looked at the Toltec as the marched past with empty eyes; two silent groups watching each other. Then as one the robed marches knelt. The four generals at the head of the column signaled a halt and the procession stopped.

Teiuc dismounted from his horse and walked over to the one man that wearing the black robes. Malina figured him the head of this religious order. As Teuic approached the man remained on his knees with his head bowed. Teiuc reach the man and then lay a hand on the top of his head. The man visibly shuddered and then lifted his gaze to meet Teiuc. Even at this distance Malina could see the tears as they ran down the man's cheeks, she cringed inwardly, because she could not tell why he cried.

151

The procession turned down another narrow street and began making its way to an area of town that appeared to have been badly damaged by the fire. There was a difference in the size of the buildings and their construction, leading Malina to surmise that the age of this area was different then the age of the previous area. What she now saw had the look of faded glory. Ostentation left to ruin.

Malina began to take note of the statues that they passed. There were many, close to the roof tops; on the sides of buildings; or in fountains, and all had been vandalized in some sort. A power struggle at some point, the statues representing the sides of the losers.

Some of the buildings they passed seemed to have been untouched by the fighting and fire. Both others had only a portion of their walls remaining. The procession turned another corner and Malina was forced to suppress the shock she felt from reaching her face. Why do I bother? The entire block that faced her now had been destroyed. It seemed as though the casters has paid special attention to this area. Rubble was piled haphazardly along the side of the road, obviously done by someone in the army to make way for the procession, as the rest of the block still smouldered.

Her Malina could see the ocean through the gaping holes where the buildings should have been. The sun sparkled on the waves as they rippled out in the bay. Seabirds circled in the sky lazily looking for an easy meal before the tide pools filled. She could hear the birds call out as they circled and dived into the water. The juxtaposition between the destroyed building and the circling birds could not have been more obvious for Malina. Nature doesn’t even care. The destruction here was so complete, but for the birds it’s not even worth a glance.

“Except for the carrion.” She sighed aloud now noticing the black birds hopping their way through the rubble.