Chapter 38

There are bodies everywhere. The unwanteds, the guardians, side by side. No care whether one was essential or not. There’s blood, debris, and the lifeless souls of my reject pack, strewn wherever the eye strays. Headless, maimed. Some were torn to pieces, some bleeding out from wounds across their throats and already dead. Dark fluid taints it all. Blood in the shadows stains everything as far as I can see. Chaos everywhere. It’s a massacre we never saw coming, and they hit the weakest in our kingdom, the ones who had no defenses. Most of us were children or teenagers, and we never stood a chance. This is it for us. My story is finally over. I close my eyes and accept fate, choking slowly, no longer panicking but accepting, as blood sours my sense of taste, and I gag and fumble at the grass, hot and sticky with the essence of my life beneath my palms. I’m struggling to breathe, my heart giving in, unable to fight while my body is broken and shattered. Paused and waiting for the final s