Page 101 of Realms of Swords and Storms
The child's cries led us to a partially collapsed stall, its colourful awning now serving as a makeshift tent over a small space among the rubble. Livia dropped to her knees, pulling back the fabric to reveal a little girl huddled beneath, her face tear-streaked but miraculously unharmed.
"Mama?" she sobbed as she saw us. "I want my mama!"
"She's safe," Livia assured her, reaching out a hand. "She sent us to find you. Come on, we'll take you to her."
The child hesitated, then took Livia's offered hand, allowing herself to be drawn out from her shelter. I knelt beside them, offering what I hoped was a reassuring smile.
"What's your name?" I asked, trying to distract her from the horror surrounding us.
"Miri," she whispered, her eyes huge in her soot-stained face.
"I'm Jalend," I told her. "And this is Livia. We're going to take you to your mother now, Miri. Would you like me to carry you?"
She nodded, raising her arms to me. I lifted her carefully, cradling her against my chest as I stood. Her small body trembled against mine, a fragile reminder of all the innocence shattered in this square today.
"Let's go," Livia said, already turning back the way we had come. "Octavia was heading for the commander's residence. It's still standing, and the doorway looked stable enough to provide some shelter."
We picked our way back through the debris, Miri's face buried against my shoulder, her tiny hands clutching at my shirt. Livia moved ahead of us, navigating the safest path through the destruction with the instincts of someone who had seen battlefields before.
The commander's residence came into view, its stone façade still intact despite the devastation surrounding it. I could see Octavia in its doorway, supporting Miri's mother, both watching anxiously for our return.
"There they are," I said to the child in my arms. "There's your mother, just as we promised."
Miri lifted her head, a smile breaking through her tears as she caught sight of her mother. She waved, a small gesture of relief that cut through the horror of the day like a knife through darkness.
The blast came from directly beneath the commander's residence, the building erupting in a fountain of flame andsplintered stone. The force of it knocked us backward, Livia falling to the cobblestones beside me as I twisted to shield Miri with my body.
When I could see again, could think again, the doorway where Octavia and Miri's mother had stood was gone, replaced by roaring flames and billowing smoke.
"Tavi!" Livia's scream tore through the air, raw with a grief too profound for words. "OCTAVIA!"
She was on her feet in an instant, lurching toward the burning building, toward where her friend had been standing moments before. I scrambled up, still clutching Miri to my chest, and lunged after her.
"Livia, no!" I caught her arm with my free hand, trying to pull her back from the inferno. "You can't go in there!"
"Let me go!" she cried, fighting against my grip with a strength born of desperation. "Octavia! I have to find her!"
"She's gone," I said, the brutal truth like ashes in my mouth. "Livia, please. There's nothing you can do for her now."
Miri was sobbing against my shoulder, her cries adding to the cacophony of horror surrounding us. I struggled to hold onto both her and Livia, who continued to fight me, to try to reach the flames that had consumed her friend.
"Livia!" A new voice cut through the chaos—deep, authoritative, familiar. Septimus pushed through the smoke toward us, his face streaked with blood, his eyes widening as he took in the scene. "What happened?"
"Octavia," Livia sobbed, still straining toward the burning building. "She was in there. With this child's mother. They were waiting for us, and now..."
Understanding dawned in Septimus's eyes. Without hesitation, he stepped forward and scooped Livia into his arms, ignoring her struggles, her protests. "We need to get out of here,"he said to me, already turning toward one of the alleys leading away from the square. "Now, before the next one."
I followed, still cradling Miri, whose sobs had quieted to a stunned, hiccupping silence against my chest. The alley was narrow, choked with people fleeing the devastation, but Septimus moved through them with grim efficiency, Livia still fighting weakly in his arms.
We made it several streets away before Septimus finally stopped, setting Livia down in the shelter of a small courtyard where a fountain still played, obscenely peaceful amid the sounds of distant screams and crumbling stone.
Livia collapsed against the fountain's edge, her face a mask of grief and shock. "Octavia," she whispered, the name a prayer, a lament. "She was right there. Right there."
I looked down at Miri, who stared back at me with eyes too old for her young face. What could I possibly say to her? How could I explain that her mother was gone, consumed in flame and rubble?
A family hurried past the courtyard entrance—a man and woman with three children in tow, all of them wild-eyed with fear but uninjured. I made a swift decision.
"Wait," I called to them, stepping forward. The man turned, wariness and fear in his expression. "Please, this child..." I gestured to Miri. "Her mother... she didn't make it. Can you take her with you? Just until she can be placed with proper authorities?"
