Cain would be lying if he said it wasn't catching up to him. The sleepless night, the skipped meals, the quiet neglect of a body already too delicate for the life it endured: it was all starting to show. The dark circles beneath his eyes could be blurred away with the right cosmetics, but the sharpness of his collarbones and the way his clothes hung just a little looser were harder to hide. At only 5'7, there had never been much of him to lose, yet people noticed the moment he began to fade.

Still, he kept up appearances. His skin remained pale and smooth beneath a dusting of powder; his black, shoulder-length hair was perfumed and styled with care, slicked back, save for a few stray strands that softened his face. He liked it when someone brushed them aside, fingers tucking them behind his ear as if handling something fragile.

Cain wasn't careless, not really. The grooming, the poise, the faint smile; all of it was armour. But lately, the fire that once kept him burning had begun to dim. Mostly, he was just tired. His body ached in quiet rebellion; his mind floated somewhere between waking and dream. Sleep, when it came, was never merciful. It dragged him back into memories that refused to stay buried.

Still, he held himself together. The Praecia Veil demanded illusion, and Cain had mastered the art of pretending to be whole.

༻𐫱༺

That morning, after the others drifted off, Cain sat awake staring at the sunlight filtering through the window. For a rare moment, he allowed himself the luxury of sadness. He didn't cry; he simply breathed, chest trembling as if trying to remember what peace used to feel like.

He couldn't afford to unravel. If they saw him falter, the illusion of safety would collapse entirely. So he stitched himself back together, thread by thread, as he'd always done.

When the girls awoke, they smoothed their clothing, combed through their tangled hair, and slipped away without a word. Claudia lingered at the door, offering a tired, grateful smile before disappearing down the hall.

Cain fell backward onto the bed, arms spread wide, staring up at the ceiling. He was so tired his bones ached with it. He wrestled with the idea of sleep, knowing it would bring him back to the same shadows, but eventually exhaustion claimed him.

And somewhere between one breath and the next, he surrendered.

༻𐫱༺

"Mama?"

Cain's voice was a thin thread that snapped against the dark.

He stumbled to her, tears cutting clean paths through the dust on his cheeks. Over and over, he pressed his lips to her head, the way she once taught him that kisses could mend cuts and bruises. He kissed her until the salt of his tears mixed with the warm, metallic taste of blood. Until something inside him flipped and the room tilted.

He moved toward his father, and when he finally tried to speak, what came out wasn't a word.
It was a sound no human should make.
His small body convulsed as he vomited onto the floor, the smell clinging to the air like a cruel reminder that nothing could be made right again.

When he could breathe, he crawled to their sides. His trembling hands reached for his father's, cradling it as though weight alone could coax it back to life. He begged, voice breaking in the quiet, the words small and desperate.
"Wake up. Please. Wake up."

He pulled at fingers that did not move.

His voice cracked on the names he loved.

Hours unfurled like a badly wound clock. He curled up beside them, like a small, broken creature folded in on itself, and waited with the patience of a child who didn't yet understand that grief was final.

He counted the stars he still believed were faithful.
He listened for the familiar scrape of his mother setting the kettle, for the soft hum of his father's voice reading by the fire.

Morning crept into the room, gentle and careless.
Sunlight spilled through the window, making halos of the blood.
Birds chirped. Bright, ordinary things.
The world didn't know it had ended.

Hunger settled in Cain's chest. It was something simple to understand, something he could fix. So he whispered to them, "I'll be back soon," and stepped outside.

Outside, Seviel's streets were alive and indifferent. Merchants shouted, wheels clattered, and the air smelled of smoke and salt. Cain wandered through it all like a shadow at the edge of light. He tugged at a woman's skirt and whispered, "I'm hungry." She waved him away, not even looking. Doors closed, voices turned elsewhere. The city had no room for children without names.

By afternoon, when the sun began to dip, he found his way home again. Afternoons always followed mornings, and the rhythm of the world still pretended to make sense. But there, around his house, stood men in uniforms. Faces of stone. Boots that struck the ground like thunder.

Cain crouched behind a thicket of overgrown bushes, the sharp branches pressing against his arms. He held his breath as the men spoke.

"Collect their bodies," one ordered. "Dump them in the wagon."

"And the boy?" another asked, voice bored and detached.

"Couldn't find him last night. Searched everywhere."

"Then tear the place apart. Burn it when you're done."

They moved with the cruel efficiency of those accustomed to destroying. He watched as his parents' bodies were dragged out, handled like refuse, like objects without memory. His lips trembled as he whispered to the wind, to the cart, to the ghosts of his home, "I'm sorry I left. I'm sorry I went for food." He believed, foolishly, that the apology might reach them.

Inside, the men destroyed what little beauty was left.
His father's chair. His mother's vases.
They laughed as they worked, smoking and spitting as if desecration were a kind of sport.

Then came the torches.

The fire started small, then roared into a living thing.

Flames climbed the walls, licking at the beams like a creature set free. Smoke billowed upward, turning the sky the colour of bruises.

Cain's throat burned.

"No," he whispered, the word heavy as a stone.

But the world didn't listen.

He stayed there long after the men had gone, the fire reduced to smouldering embers and smoke that curled into the sky like a dying prayer. The air was thick and stung his throat. The ground beneath him was wet with ash and tears. His clothes stuck to his skin, stiff with soot and blood. The world had gone silent again, the kind of silence that makes you think even the wind has forgotten your name.

He didn't cry anymore.

He had no sound left in him.

He shook. Deep, and uncontrollable, as if his small body was trying to tremble itself out of existence.

He pressed his forehead to the dirt, to the last bit of earth that hadn't turned to black, and whispered something only he could hear.

When he finally stood, his legs gave way twice before they held.
The house was gone.
What was left were pieces; the outline of what used to be home.
He stepped carefully, bare feet slicing on debris, moving through the wreckage as though afraid to disturb ghosts.

He found her first. Not her body, that had been taken. But something smaller: a single silver hairpin, shaped like a lily. It had belonged to his mother, a small token she used to twist in her hair each morning. It was blackened now, but it still shone faintly when the light hit it just right.
He held it in his palm, too tightly, until it cut his skin.
He didn't let go.

For a long while, he wandered in circles around the ruins, afraid to leave and equally scared to stay. Smoke hung in the air, circling him like arms. He thought he saw his father's shadow moving in the haze, tall and unbending as ever, calling him back inside. He ran toward it, tripped, and fell hard, scraping his knees.
When he looked up, the shadow was gone.

He sat there until night fell again, the stars crowding above like witnesses who wouldn't speak.

Hunger clawed at his stomach, but the ache was dull now, something he could live with.

He didn't understand death. He just knew his parents weren't coming back, and that the world outside that burned house didn't care that they were gone.

When the morning came again, he started walking.

Away from the ashes, away from the smell.

His small hand clenched around the hairpin. Behind him, smoke still rose like a signal no one would answer.

He didn't look back.

༻𐫱༺

Cain woke with a start, head pounding, breath tearing through his throat. For a moment, he didn't know where he was. The smell of smoke still seemed to cling to him, the heat still on his skin. His hand was fisted against his chest, nails biting into his palm. Slowly, he unfurled it. And there, caught in the light, was the faint scar that the hairpin had left so many years ago. He traced it absently, as if reassuring himself that it was real. That he was real.

For a long while, he just sat there, staring at nothing. The scenes in his dreams were always the same. The faces never changed. The fire never died.

He rose, moving soundlessly across the room, and opened the window. The air outside was cool and damp, carrying the scent of rain and the faintest trace of the city's decay. Down below, the pavement shone like wet glass. Cain leaned his forehead against the frame, eyes half-lidded. The wind tugged at his hair.

He let the curtains fall closed, climbed back into bed, and let the darkness take him once more.

This time, without dreams.

༻𐫱༺

Lamentations of First Light: The Book of Lamentations from the Bible is a poetic dirge written after the destruction of Jerusalem, where the city itself is personified as a woman weeping in the ruins of her home. "Lamentations of First Light" means the mourning that comes at dawn, the first grief of a soul waking into a world without innocence.