"Caw! Caw! Caw!"
"I could hear them...
I could feel them...
Their loud screeching as they circled around me.
The unforgiving scratch of their sharp talons biting through my skin.
Their beaks poking my flesh as knives ready to slaughter.
Their hunger, fresh and undeniable. As they swam around me like vultures, ready to devour my flesh, eat to their bellies fill.
But these were worse...
Crows...
The devil's little messengers....
Their cries, echo around you like laughter..
Mocking you....
Insulting you....
As they tear you apart from limb to limb
'Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!'
I could feel their laughter...
Ringing endlessly inside my ears...
I can still see their faces as they enjoyed watching me, writhing and swarming in my own blood.
The crows...
Singing their mocking song around me.
Waiting until I breath my last
So they can finally enjoy their feast without a shred of guilt.
But...these wounds...and these bruises are not a feast for cowardly birds like them
So I cannot let them..
I will not let them get a piece of me
I will not....
And if I have to become the vulture, the bigger bird to defend what's mine..
Then I will..
I will not die here...
I will not...
Not until I see each and every crow dead under my feet...
I will not give in....
I will live...
And I will show them, Hell!"
Anastasia shot her eyes open. The taste of earth filled her mouth. Lightning cracked. And then—Hugh!!
She heaved for breath. All the crows scattered away from her.
She was half buried in an open ground, surrounded by black soil and dead trees. A wasteland, a cursed battlefield. Where the enemies of the kingdom are discarded to be devoured by the beasts of the forest.
Skeletons painted the ground with a mixture of black and white. But unlike the other lifeless bones. One lived and revenge glowed like an unquenchable flame in a dark abyss.
Lightning flashed across the sky as crows circled around her, cawing loudly as a sign that something big is about to happen.