His wrists splitting open against the metal, blood streaming down his arms, and he didn't notice, didn'tcare, because his mother was burning and he couldn't reach her.
His brother just stared in this broken way, watching his mother's grey hair ignite into a flaming halo.
Her lips peel back from her teeth.
Her nightgown melted into her skin.
Her frail hands clawed at the air, reaching for sons who couldn't save her.
And I watched Arata break.
Not his body.
His mind.
I saw the exact moment it happened—the light leaving his eyes, something fundamental snapping behind them. His screams cut off mid-breath, and what remained was silence.
A shell.
A man-shaped thing staring at the blackening remains of the woman who had given him life.
His lips were still moving.
Mama. Mama. Mama.
But no sound came out anymore.
The rest of the families were burned alive, before I set flame to the traitors. They had to see what they’d done, before they met their deaths.
All the parents.
The college boy.
Dead by fire.
Screaming to the end.
Ashes.
Tons of ashes.
And the smell of burning bodies.
I should have showered longer. Should have scrubbed harder. My Tiger will smell the death on me. She'll see it in my eyes. She'll know what I am. She’ll want to run.
On the other side of my bedroom door, Nyomi was there.
Clean.
Warm.
Untouched by what I’d just done.
Everything I wasn't right now.
She already knows what I am. Doesn’t she?
I turned the knob, pushed the door open, and walked in.
