It was an ordinary trip to the village market, one we had made a hundred times by that point. Mother sent us to buy some ingredients for a stew: carrots, onions, and a few spices I couldn't pronounce. I had to ask Mother to write them down for me. The irony of my inability to read does not escape me, but the merchants could. Mostly.
By my side was my sister, Seraphine. She wasn't much younger than I at the time, maybe a year or two younger. She wore the clothes I had outgrown: burlap shorts, a cotton shirt, and boots that were just barely too big for her. She was the one with the coin meant for shopping, something she took great pride in. Her hair was short, thin, and brown. Our grandparents always told her that she was almost identical to our mother when she was a child, but since they never took any pictures, it's hard to say for sure.
We were following the usual path that we took, which was by far the safest. The guards patrolled it regularly; local adventurers were constantly combing for creatures. There was no reason even to bat an eye at a rustling bush or a fleeing bird. There was no way we could have known that the guards were occupied with a civil dispute, and the adventurers were off on a grand quest to slay another rat's nest. We never could have known that the local merchants weren't operating that day, and were instead locked in their homes with windows nailed shut.
Finally, we never could have known that bandits were occupying a portion of the path that was more grown in than the rest. It all happened so fast, neither of us could have reacted in time. Neither of us did.
Seraphine was doing her usual shuffle, whistling away at a song she couldn't quite remember. Suddenly, the whistling stopped; I assumed she had given up. I turned around to poke fun at her, and was most of the way through my sentence before I saw the arrow protruding from her rib cage. Before I could so much as scream, two more sprouted from her torso; one from the shoulder, one from the collarbone. Before I knew it, I had three arrows sprouting from me as well. Thump, thump, thump. Just like that.
We both collapsed almost instantly. Seraphine was gone before she even hit the ground. I suspect she was dead as soon as the arrows appeared. I hope so.
"What a shot!" I heard from a nearby bush, followed by applause. Whoever took the shot was proud of himself. I wanted to get a look at his face, see who he was, and remember, but I couldn't move. Blood loss had gotten the better of me. As I was drifting out of consciousness, I watched a large man rip the pouch off Seraphine's hip, like it was just another day.
"Ten silver? That's hardly worth the arrows you put in her, you fools!" He yells at others, begrudgingly stuffing the measly ten pieces in his pocket. "Let's go back; Today was a bust."
-
I woke up in my bed, surrounded by three figures. One of which was the local cleric, who had a sorrowful look in his eye. A look that told me the answer to my question before I even had a chance to ask.
Another was my father, stifling tears. In all the time I had known him, I had never seen him break his composure. Not once. That confirmed my suspicion. Seraphine didn't make it. I did.
The third was my Mother. She sat there, motionless. She wasn't so much as shedding a tear. Grief took hold of her as soon as she got the news, and she went into a permanent state of denial. For years, she would still make a portion for Seraphine. Father never brought it up, and I knew better.
"I'm sorry," I choked out, barely able to breathe. The cleric healed what he could, but his gift could only get me so far. "It was my fault, I'm sorry." I pleaded for forgiveness, but my father just shook his head.
"There's nothing you could have done, Hugo. I should have gone with you."
-
A day later, we performed the final rites. It was a quiet burial, and only a few attended. It's understandable when I look back on it; we only ever spoke to the merchants, but they had fled town out of fear. If bandits would kill two children for ten silver, what would they do to a merchant with a thousand gold in his wagon?
That didn't stop the merchants from leaving something for the family; five hundred gold, collected from the five merchants who frequented our little village. Enough to retire a family in our area for generations. The coins reeked of sorrow, of guilt. We understood. We never spent it.
She was laid to rest in a modest white dress, one she had always eyed when visiting town. We never had the money to buy it; she would stare at it through the glass. I suspect it was the tailor's doing. He always offered the dress for her to try on, but she always declined. I think she wanted to savor the moment she could finally own it.
A paladin came down from the nearest city to perform the rite. He was dressed modestly, wearing all black. He didn't wear his armor, but I don't think he needed to.
"Let her be immortalized by the memory of the vibrant light she shared with others." He recited, before laying a single coin on her headstone. The coin was simple, but it weighed more than I could hope to carry at the time. Must have been enchanted. It was sleek black, almost impossibly smooth. On the top side, it had engraved a simple raven.
-
She reached out subtly at first — a dream here, a raven there. She never showed her face or spoke directly. It took years for me to realize who she was — four years of her showing me that moment over and over again before I understood what she wanted of me.
It was midnight when I returned to the site of the incident. The path was cleared this time, and the villagers learned from their mistake. Lying in the spot where Seraphine fell was a single jet black feather.
When I reached down to grab it, I suddenly awoke in a black abyss — before me a throne, built of avian bones and cushioned with ornate pillows. The same throne that had haunted my dreams for four years. Lying on the throne was a glowing red marble, sitting on top of a piece of parchment.
"What will you give up, young one?" The letter spoke. I hadn't even opened it yet. "What will you give up for strength? To prevent such tragedy from ever occurring again?"
The marble, about the size of a walnut, hummed the same tune Seraphine whistled. It was slower; I wonder if that was the original version of the song? Probably not.
"Everything," I muttered, before grabbing the sphere.
"If you can stomach your past, I will grant you your request." A woman's voice spoke from nothing.
After a moment of thinking, I swallowed it.
Just like that, I was gone.