Kalispell

Prologue

Kalispell looked up from her harvesting to see the sun. She wondered what time it was. She had been gone a long time. A cloud obscured her vision. The sun was behind it. She stared at the cloud. It moved and swirled. It was smoke, not cloud. Something was burning. She dropped her basket and turned back towards the village. She ran. If there was trouble, she should help. There were not often fires in the village, but when they started, the spread fast. She reached the end of woods and stopped. A chill ran through her. The whole village was on fire. She could feel the heat, even here, miles away. She fell to her knees. She reached out her thought to her family, hoping she could find them. There was nothing there. She could not feel them. She began to cry.

Through her tears she saw them. There were hundreds of them. Soldiers. They were coming from the village with torches. They were setting fire to all they came across. They burned the small homes outside the village. They burned the fields. She sat and cried. They passed her, not even seeing her. She had cloaked herself. If only her family could have done the same. She knew that they were dead. As soon as the army was completely out of sight, she ran towards the village.

She passed by homes on the way. None were left standing. She deliberately looked away from the bodies that lay in and out of the fallen buildings. She could not help them now. She reached the gates of the village and slowed her pace. She walked down what was left of the streets. No buildings were left untouched. The ones left standing were shells. She wound her way to what had been her family’s home. There was only rubble left of the house. There were no bodies. She searched the entire area around the house. Nothing.