“I do not want it, Nahac.” You say this and you are sobbing, sobbing, always the crying little boy. “I do not want their wars or their cowl. I want to go back to the farm.”
“I would gladly take it from you,” she is angry with you, she was always angry with you near her end, “but it is not to be.”
“I never wanted to be special.”
“But you are special, Cahan,” she told you. “So you must be brave.”
More and more angry with you as the years passed. As you grew into what they planned. You still see her, the only image of her left is her sneer as you are taken, sobbing and begging for it not to be, into the dark hole of the blooming room. The stench of the corpses so strong you can taste it, decay, as all things decay. As you will decay. All that will be left after you become the fire is decay. A world rotting down to nothing as its people depart for the Star Path. You are hammering on the door, begging to be let out. Trying not to breathe in. The pain wracking you. Days of pain. You are surrounded by death.
You never wanted her to be angry. Never. You wanted to be together, but Crua cares nothing for what you want. It is a wild land, and it takes and it takes and only the strong are able to stand against it.
It took Nahac. Your sister.
She was not chosen. Her fate was not danced across the walls, not painted on a world soaking in blood and pain and fire.
And you wanted to run.
But you could never run fast enough.
They always caught you.
You are the fire.