"Find the ones who did this," Yara said. Her voice came out steadier than she felt. "Cultists. Monsters. Whatever's left that deserves it."

  The Scion's head swiveled toward her, green eyes unblinking.

  "Yes, I know." She pressed her palm against her chest where the Gem pulsed. "I know you're hungry. So am I. But we're doing this right."

  Right is a direction. Hunger has no compass.

  "Then I'll give it one," she said, and started toward the temple.

  The plaza still held the kneeling dead. Yara kept her eyes forward, looking past them toward the cultists she'd killed inside. The bodies would still be there. Fresh enough. Wrong enough that taking them wouldn't feel like murder.

  The temple doors hung crooked where she'd torn them open. She stepped through into smoke-stained darkness.

  The cultists lay where they'd fallen—three by the pillars, two near the altar, one sprawled across the dais. She approached the nearest one, the leader she'd blasted into the pillar.

  His mask had cracked. Beneath it, his face looked almost human. Young. Maybe twenty.

  And already dissolving.

  His skin had gone chalky, the same pale gray-white as the monsters in the streets. Where her blast had struck him, the flesh was crumbling inward, collapsing to fine powder that dusted the marble. His fingers were beginning to fragment, joints separating like they'd never been properly fused.

  She crouched beside him, watching the slow deterioration. Whatever the cultists had done to themselves—wearing those masks, channeling that power—had changed them. Made them into something that dissolved like the creatures they'd summoned.

  The Gem stirred in her chest, tasting the air.

  Hollow. Already spent. Nothing remains.

  "Nothing?" She looked at the other bodies. All of them are showing the same signs—skin going pale, flesh starting to powder at the edges. "They're dead. That's something."

  Dead is not food. Dead is empty shells. I need what burns, not ash.

  She stood, jaw tight. Six bodies. All useless.

  "Fine. Then we find something that's still burning."

  The goblin warren was a gutted shop near the eastern wall, the kind of place scavengers nested after the real residents fled or died. Yara had passed it earlier—heard the chittering, smelled the rank stink of too many bodies in too small a space.

  Now it was silent.

  She approached carefully, spear ready, the Scion padding behind her. The broken door hung open. No sounds came from inside.

  She stepped through.

  Goblins lay scattered across the floor. Eight, maybe ten. Small twisted bodies with too-long fingers and needle teeth. They'd torn into each other—claws and teeth marks everywhere, blood splattered across the walls. Some kind of feeding frenzy that had turned inward when there was nothing else left to kill.

  Fresh kills. Still warm. The Gem should have wanted them.

  Beasts. Animals. Barely aware. Feeding on these is like eating grass.

  "They're alive—" She stopped. Looked closer.

  None of them were breathing. The frenzy had been thorough. They'd killed each other completely.

  Her stomach cramped. She leaned against the wall, the hunger twisting tighter.

  "Where else?" she asked. "Where else can I look?"

  The Scion's tail swept across the floor, scattering goblin corpses.

  Anywhere there is fire still burning. Anywhere the light has not yet failed.

  "The Guard posts," she said. "They had barracks. Training yards. Someone has to be holding a position."

  The first Guard post was abandoned. Equipment scattered, doors hanging open, no bodies. They'd run when the temple exploded, or been called back to defend something more important.

  The second was worse.

  Four Guards lay in the courtyard, arranged in a defensive square like they'd made a last stand. Their armor was scorched black. The cobblestones beneath them had melted, then re-solidified in warped puddles of stone. Whatever hit them had been fast and absolute.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Yara checked for breath anyway. Found none.

  The Gem pulsed once, irritated.

  Cold. Hours cold. You waste time.

  "I'm trying—" Her voice cracked. She swallowed, tasted bile. "I'm trying to find the right ones. The ones who deserve this."

  Deserve is a word for people with full bellies. You are not full.

  She turned away from the bodies and kept walking. Her legs felt hollow. The cut on her palm had reopened, blood trickling down her wrist. Each step took more effort than the last.

  The Scion followed, patient as stone. It didn't tire. Didn't need to eat. But she could feel its hunger anyway, threaded through the bond, amplifying her own until she couldn't tell where hers ended and the Gem's began.

  She found the looter in what had been a jeweler's shop.

  He was prying rings off a dead woman's fingers, working them loose with a knife when the flesh wouldn't cooperate. Not a cultist. Not a monster. Just a man with hollow cheeks and desperate eyes doing what people do when civilization collapses.

  He looked up when her shadow crossed the threshold. Froze. The knife was still in his hand.

  "Easy," he said. Hands rising slowly. "Just taking what she doesn't need anymore. No harm."

  Yara stared at him. At the knife. At the rings already stuffed in his pockets. The way he'd stepped over two other bodies to get to this one.

  The Gem surged.

  Yes. This one burns. This one is aware. This one will feed us.

  Her hand lifted without her permission, palm heating as power gathered beneath the scar.

  The man saw it. Saw the green light beginning to glow. His eyes went wide.

  "Wait—please—I got kids, they're hiding in the lower quarter, I just needed something to trade for food—"

  She could do it. One blast. He'd die fast. The Gem would feed. She'd get a few hours of relief from this gnawing emptiness.

  He was stealing from the dead. Maybe he was lying about the kids. Maybe he wasn't.

  "Go," she said. Her hand dropped. "Get out."

  He ran.

  The Gem screamed inside her chest. Not words—just raw fury at being denied.

  Yara doubled over, gasping. Pain lanced through her ribs, her stomach, her throat. Like something with claws was trying to tear its way out from the inside.

  "No," she choked out. "Not him. Not like that."

  Then WHO? You starve us both with your mercy!

  "Someone who deserves it!" She was shouting now, at the empty shop, at the corpse on the floor, at the thing living in her chest. "Someone who chose this! Someone who—"

  The words died.

  Because there was no one left who'd chosen this. The cultists were dissolving ash. The monsters were dead. The Guards had died defending people.

  All that remained were survivors. People like her, scavenging and stealing and doing whatever it took to see tomorrow.

  And the Gem didn't care about deserving. It only cared about burning.

  She pressed her forehead to the wall, breathing in shallow gasps. Her vision was graying at the edges. The double-pulse in her chest had gone irregular—her heartbeat stumbling, the Gem's beating harder to compensate.

  You cannot last much longer, it said, and for the first time, it sounded almost gentle. The body needs fuel. Find it, or I will find it for you.

  "What does that mean?"

  It means I will choose. And I will not be as kind as you.

  A chill ran down her spine that had nothing to do with the wind.

  "No. I'm in control. I decide—"

  The Gem pulled.

  Not physically. Not with hands. But suddenly her body was moving, turning, walking toward the door. Her legs carried her forward without her permission. The Scion fell into step beside her, matching her pace.

  "Stop," she said. Her feet kept moving. "I said stop!"

  I gave you chances. You refused them. Now I choose.

  She could feel it now—a direction, a pull, like a rope tied around her sternum, dragging her forward. East. Toward the higher quarter. Toward somewhere, the Gem sensed concentrated life.

  She tried to stop walking. Her legs ignored her.

  "Please," she whispered. "Let me find someone who deserves it. Give me one more chance."

  The pull strengthened. Her pace quickened.

  You had your chances. You wasted them on mercy you cannot afford.

  "One more," she begged. "Just one more place. I'll find someone. I promise."

  The Gem considered. The pull lessened slightly.

  One more. But when you fail—and you will fail—I choose.

  Her feet stopped. Her control returned, shaky and uncertain.

  She looked around wildly, trying to think. Where would there be someone—anyone—who'd earned what was coming?

  The old military storehouse. If there were looters anywhere, they'd be there. Fighting over weapons, supplies, and killing each other for scraps.

  "There," she said. "The storehouse. People will be fighting. Taking things. I can—"

  Go then. Quickly. You have minutes, not hours.

  She ran.

  The storehouse was empty.

  Not just abandoned—stripped. The doors were torn off. The racks bare. Every weapon, every piece of armor, every scrap of canvas or leather was taken hours ago by whoever got there first.

  Yara stood in the center of the empty room, breathing hard, staring at nothing.

  No looters. No fights. No one.

  The Gem pulsed once. Satisfied.

  You failed. Now I choose.

  The pull returned, twice as strong. Her body turned east and started walking before she could even try to resist.

  "No—wait—please—"

  Quiet. You made your choice. This is mine.

  She was running now, feet pounding against cobblestones, the Scion loping beside her. East through the ruins. Up toward the higher quarter. Her body moved with terrible purpose, following the scent of life like a predator tracking prey.

  She could feel them now. Multiple people. Clustered together. Alive and breathing and warm.

  "Not them," she gasped. "Whoever they are, they're just hiding. They're just surviving. They didn't do anything—"

  They are ALIVE. That is enough.

  Scribe's Row appeared ahead. The barracks. Barricades. And behind them—

  She felt them. A dozen people. Maybe more. Heartbeats. Breathing. Children.

  Horror flooded through her, cold and absolute.

  "No. Not children. Please. Anything but children."

  You had your chance to choose. You refused it.

  "I'll feed you anything else! I'll find someone! Just not—"

  NOW.

  Her body wouldn't stop. She was descending from the roofline, dropping to street level, and approaching the square. The Scion followed, silent and patient.

  Three soldiers behind a barricade. She could see them now. Young. Exhausted. Protecting people.

  And she was walking toward them with a monster at her back and hunger in her chest that would not be denied.

  "Please," she whispered one more time. To the Gem. To herself. To nothing. "Please don't make me do this."

  The Gem didn't answer.

  Her feet kept moving.

  And Scribe's Row grew closer with every step.

  alive when she gets there.

  - Follow for updates

  - Leave a rating

  - Share with friends who like dark fantasy