The boy's cheek still burned where the priest had struck him. He sat in silence with the others, a bowl of thin gruel before him. The dining hall smelled of smoke and mold; the roof beams groaned as though ready to collapse.
He lifted the spoon, but the hunger in his belly made him sick. Not for food—something, else, gnawed at ham. A hollow ache, like teeth grinding inside his bones.
"Eat," the girl beside him whispered. She was older by a year, with hollow eyes and a scar across her jaw, "If you don't, he'll notice."
He forced the gruel down. It slid like ash in his throat.
The priest's voice echoed from the head of the hall, oily and sharp. "Remember, children. The Hollowed watch the faithless. Looks too long at the sky, question too deeply, and you will be taken. Just as your parents were."
The children lowered their heads. None dared speak.
The boy clenched his jaw. My parents were taken, yes— But not by the Hollowed. By men like you.
A sound crept through the hall. At first, he thought it was the wind, but then he heard it more clearly—a faint chime. Like metal striking glass. None of the others seemed to notice.
His eyes drifted upward.
Through a crack in the rafters, light spilled into the gloom. It was wrong—too bright, too sharp. A Dust motes swirled in the air like a dying ember, but they did not fall. They hung there, thumbing, as if caught between breaths.
Something was coming.
The priest paused mid-sermon. His eyes darted toward the ceiling, just for an instant, before snapping back to the children. His voice sharpened. "Finish your meal, Then we pray."
The boy lowered his gaze, but his mind stayed on that light
The hunger inside him sharpened. It whispered—not in words, but in sensation. A pull. A promise.
And thought he did not understand it yet, he knew this: whatever had cracked the sky was not a blessing.
It was a wound.