"Lord Jesus Christ…"
Petru the shepherd kneels between the bodies. His cloak is half off his shoulders, forgotten. His hands lift helplessly toward the sky, his face streaked with dirt and tears. For a moment, his mouth working soundlessly, before words finally force their way out.
"Oh, Lord," he sobs. "Oh, Lord above, what have You done?"
He rocks forward, then back, fingers clawing at the air as though he might seize something invisible and drag it down to answer him.
"They were fine," he cries. "I counted them myself last night. I locked the gate—Holy Mother, I did—"
His gaze falls back to the sheep, and his body folds inward as if the sight strikes him anew. Someone grips his shoulders, trying to steady him. Another presses a hand to his back, murmuring something lost to the rush of blood in my ears.
Petru surges to his feet in a single, jerking motion. He turns fully now, finger trembling as it points.
"It was them," he cries.
The words tear out of him. His eyes are wild now, grief shaping into something harder.
"They came yesterday," he shouts, pointing at the travellers. "And today my sheep lie dead. Drained like this—" His voice breaks. He swallows, forcing the words through. "This is no beast’s work. No wolf does this."
Silence settles over us, tense and waiting.
"This is the work of a man," Petru says hoarsely. "Of men who know dark things."
Murmurs break out, words edged with fear.
"Godless ways—"
"Pagan tricks—"
"I said it from the start—"
My chest tightens.
I look again at the sheep. At the clean, terrible stillness of them. Something in me recoils, whispering that this is wrong in a way I do not yet understand.
Voices are rising now. The traveller women speak over our own, hands lifting, palms opening and closing as they refute the accusation. Their tones are heated but not afraid.
"What are they saying?" someone snaps.
"They mock us," another mutters.
"They curse us in their devil tongue!"
"Speak properly," a man shouts. "You stand on Christian ground now."
The noise thickens, layers of speech piling atop one another until meaning is lost entirely. Fear curdles into anger. Anger into certainty. Bodies press closer. I feel the crowd shift around me, a tightening, as if the air itself is being drawn inward.
Petru’s accusation echoes again, louder now, taken up by others. I hear my own language shouted back at them, their voices pushing harder in return, insistent but incomprehensible, only deepening the divide. One of them steps forward half a pace, chin lifted in defiance, and the movement sends a ripple of unease through the crowd.
I stand rooted where I am, heart racing, the image of the sheep burning behind my eyes.
"Stop."
A single voice cuts through the chaos.
The crowd quiets in pieces—voices dropping, heads turning, words dying mid-breath as attention gathers around the man who asked for shelter yesterday. He raises one hand, palm outward.
"This," he says, gesturing toward the bodies on the ground, "…this is not done by man."
