Drip Drop Teardrop, a Novella (13 page)

I remember the expression
on my father’s face when we appeared out of the fields. Pale and
slack, his eyes bleak as they drank me in. My mother clung to his
arm, as tiny as my favourite doll, her eyes just as glassy. At the
sound of a horse’s nicker I turned to see who stood outside our
home. Four men. All dressed in livery that matched those of their
horses. My eyes were drawn to the emerald and silver heraldic
badges with the silver dove crest in the middle... our symbol of
peace.

They were from the
palace.

I do not know why, but I
was scared. I remember trembling so hard I thought I must be
shaking the very ground beneath my feet. Whatever reasons unknown
my instincts had me pulling my brother behind my back, out from the
view of the men looming ominously over our parents.

Then one of them
descended from his beast and I realised they weren’t all dressed in
livery. He alone came towards me like a serpent slithering on the
ground, his purple cloak hissing in the breeze. His eyes were the
deepest black and probing, so fixated on me I shivered in revulsion
as if he had actually touched me.

“
This is the
one.”

“
You’re
sure?” The soldier who towered above my parents asked
gruffly.

The serpent smiled at me,
ready to strike his killing blow. “She is the one.”

“
No!” My
father bellowed as my mother whimpered at his side. “Run, Rogan!
Run!”

But I was frozen in place
by their panic. An ice sculpture who watched two soldiers hold my
father as he struggled in their arms and a third pull a dagger from
his belt and plunge it into his heart. He twitched and stiffened in
their hold, a horrifying gurgling noise making its way up through
his chest to spurt a thick, bloody fluid out of his mouth and down
his chin. My mother’s screams played the soundtrack to this memory
before the dagger-wielding soldier strolled towards her crumpled
figure, his black gloved fingers stroking comfortingly over her
hair. They slid like leeches down to her throat and back up to her
cheeks. And then he twisted her head between his hands with a jerk
that sent an echoing crack around my world.

That’s when I felt the
tug on my hand and remembered my brother. With a thousand screams
stuck in my throat I whirled with him and began to run, dragging
him with me into the cover of the fields, my father’s last shouts
reverberating in my ears. I drowned out the sounds of my shallow,
panicked breaths, the hiccupping cries of my brother as I
practically hauled him with me, and the hollering and thundering
behind us that made me race harder.

When the thundering
eased, I knew I had lost them in the fields. We were small and knew
the land as well as we knew each tiny scar and line upon our palms.
I headed east, picking up my brother when he tripped, shushing him
when I was no longer sure we were alone. At last we reached the
cave my father had punished us for hiding in only a year before.
Bears, he had warned. But now I feared the soldiers from the palace
more than the bears; the soldiers who wanted me, why I did not
know. It must have been important. They had slaughtered my parents
to have me. Would they murder me too? My brother? At the thought I
remember burrowing him against me in the dank cave, felt his tears
soak my dress.

“
I’m sorry,”
he had whispered.

I wanted to tell him he
need not apologise for crying, for grieving, but I feared if I
spoke all my screams would burst forth with terrifying
consequences.

“
I didn’t
mean to.”

At that, I pressed him
back until a shaft of light filtered over his face. He looked so
lost my young heart broke over and over again. He clutched his
trousers turning away from me and it was then the smell hit my
nostrils. I began to cry. I did not want him to be ashamed of his
fear. He was so little.

“
It’s okay,”
I whispered and made to reach for him, but his shirt slid through
my hands as he was whipped out of sight. I must have yelled - I
don’t know - but I stumbled blindly after him back into a day that
had suddenly turned grey. A day that had once blazed in a beautiful
fire of heat and life. Now it was gone. And as my gaze found my
brother, I realised even the last sparks of the embers had been
snuffed out, leaving only the fire’s funeral shroud of
smoke.

My brother’s small body
lay at the feet of the cave, the dagger edged in blood from his
neck slipping back into its place on the soldier’s belt.

The serpent stepped over
my brother’s body and knelt before me.

“
Say goodbye
to your family, Rogan. A new one awaits you.”

Coming June
2011

ABOUT THE
AUTHOR

Samantha Young
is the author of
the Tale of Lunarmorte
Trilogy
. She graduated from the University
of Edinburgh in 2009, where she studied ancient and medieval
history. Sam enjoys incorporating her love of history into her
writing, and is currently living in her home county of
Stirlingshire, Scotland, doing just that.

Visit
http://samyoungyafantasyauthor.blogspot.com
for more info on Samantha’s upcoming
novels.